Sony announces its first new Karate Kid movie in 12 years

Sony announced tonight that it’s making a new Karate Kid movie, the first since 2010's Jaden Smith/Jackie Chan vehicle The Karate Kid—and also the first since Sony Pictures Television’s Cobra Kai raised the franchise’s profile considerably, transforming it from a mere nostalgic touchpoint back into a thing people actually, y’know, care about.

At this point, we have no idea whether this film—about which, there are pretty much zero details known, outside its base existence—is likely to work alongside the show’s story of original Karate Kid villain Johnny Lawrence and his kick-heavy quest for redemption; the alternative would presumably be to do a whole new reboot, since “What is Daniel up to these days?” has been pretty definitively covered at this point. (And it’s not like we’re likely to be checking back in on Smith’s adolescent karate prodigy, Dre Parker, a decade-plus down the line.) Beyond that, we know bupkis: No stars attached, no creative team, nothing except Sony’s acknowledgement that it owns a brand called The Karate Kid, people seem to like it, and it’s damn well going to get another movie at this point.

The Karate Kid news was the flashiest material Sony announced today, but it also came with a number of movements to the studio’s schedule. That includes the reveal that Madame Web—Dakota Johnson’s entry in Sony’s “Spider-Man but Spider-Man’s not there, these are his friends, it’s cool” film franchise—is moving back about four months, to February 2024; the similar Kraven The Hunter is, meanwhile, getting moved way up, and will apparently now be hitting theaters just four months from now, in January 2023.

The Karate Kid movie is now scheduled for a June 2024 release.

[via Variety]