Without this scene, How I Met Your Mother, the Cobra Kai series would never have seen the light of day!

Today, Cobra Kai is one of Netflix’s biggest hits. And yet, the series derived from the Karate Kids movies would never have seen the light of day… without the sitcom How I Met Your Mother!

In a scene that remains memorable from the series, Ted Mosby and the rest of the gang prepare a big surprise for their friend Barney Stinson (Neil Patrick Harris) by orchestrating a meeting with the lead actor of his favorite movie, The Karate Kid.

Is Johnny Lawrence a real Karate Kid?

To everyone’s surprise, the Bro Code author sees red when he discovers Ralph Macchio, Daniel LaRusso’s translator: Barney then explains that he says the film’s real “Karate Kid” is antagonist Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka). He also claims that the latter was the victim of an “illegal” punch during their confrontation at the end of the first part of the trilogy.

Did this very personal theory of Barney’s directly inspire the creation of Cobra Kai? In an interview given to our American colleagues CBRThe show’s co-creator Josh Held admitted that the sequence was brought up by the writers when the plot for the series was conceived:

We love all the interpretations surrounding this series, especially the How I Met Your Mother storyline – which is incredible – and we’re regularly asked if Daniel is the real Karate Kid villain. (…) Having these stories in mind when we launched the series gave us confidence because it confirmed to us, although we were already sure, that we are not the only ones who remember The Karate Kid.

That’s why it would be inaccurate to say that How I Met Your Mother really inspired the creation Cobra KaiLet’s at least admit that he gave credit to his then-unfashionable interpretation of the famous film and offered revenge on Johnny Lawrence, finally shedding his image as the eternal bad boy loser!

The iconic scene of How I Met Your Mother:

All six seasons of Cobra Kai are now available exclusively on Netflix.

Discover the list of series currently available on the platform!