New ‘Karate Kid’ Film Reportedly Moving Forward At Sony

With Cobra Kai releasing its latest season on September 9th, another new entry into the Karate Kid franchise is finally moving forward. According to Murphy’s Multiverse, Sony Pictures is looking to cast an Asian male lead around 17 years old for a new feature.

Per the initial report, the character will need to speak Chinese and Mandarin. His name in Karate Kid will be Li. Usually, in Karate Kid, the teen is the student, but in this new installment, the teen will be the teacher. Per the initial report, Li is small for his age but smart and scrappy. He will be a teen from Beijing whose life is uprooted when a tragedy sends him and his mother to Brooklyn, New York.

This tragedy has Li and his mother coping in their own ways. The tragedy separates the two in their relationship in a severely bad way. Things change for the better after Li meets a girl from his high school named Mia and her father Victor, who owns a neighborhood Pizza Parlor. While Li’s mother is against violence, he trains Victor in the art of Kung-Fu. Li finds a way back into the ring himself.

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While there is currently no director for the film, Peter Rabbit writer scribe Rob Lieber will pen the script. In December 2021, Cobra Kai creators Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz, and Hayden Schlossberg renewed their contract with Sony for four more years. According to the report on that contract, the new deal will help them expand the Cobra Kai and Karate Kid franchises, respectively.

Whether or not the new film will be in the same universe as Cobra Kai has yet to be determined. However, it is likely they will be separate entities. Moreover, there is no word if this will be streaming on Netflix or in theaters. Sony and Netflix did ink a deal to allow the streaming service to have streaming rights to Sony’s library of films. So, how this will pan out will be interesting.

Are you excited about a new Karate Kid film? Leave comments below!

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