Cobra Kai Season 6 Part 2: Kwon’s Death, Explained

This article contains spoilers for “Cobra Kai” season 6 part 2.

Memorably aggressive as he is, the South Korean Cobra Kai dojo’s golden boy Kwon Jae-Sung (Brandon H. Lee) has turned out to be a short-lived antagonist … literally. In the final episode of “Cobra Kai” season 6 part 2, titled “Eunjangdo,” Kwon is one of the most enthusiastic participants in the all-out brawl started by the disqualified Russian Sekai Taikai team, and manages to fight just about every prominent character of the new generation in the span of mere minutes.

However, his mobile, spin-heavy style eventually meets its match in the season’s resident Ivan Drago expy, Axel Kovačević (Patrick Luwis). Bloodied and frustrated, Kwon grabs John Kreese’s (Martin Kove) fallen Eunjangdo blade that gives the episode its name and performs his final, acrobatic flying attack — only for Axel to handily counter it. Kwon falls down, accidentally stabs himself in the chest with the Eunjangdo, and lets out a bloodcurdling death scream that shocks the entire room. Cue stunned confusion and end credits. Did that just happen?

Killing such a prominent character is a truly wild way to end the second part of the final season of “Cobra Kai.” As co-creator Hayden Schlossberg told Variety, the element of surprise was extremely deliberate too:

“We set Kwon up to be the new big, bad antagonist going into this second block. For him to get killed by another opponent is a surprise we were looking forward to.”

Many major “Cobra Kai” characters have been close to death at some point. Pick an episode, and Miguel Diaz (Xolo Maridueña) might fall from a great height after a fight with Robby Keene (Tanner Buchanan). Pick another, and any given combination of adult senseis might attempt to inflict fatal damage with fists, feet, and even bladed weapons. However, by the end of the season, the most obviously evil characters generally taste defeat, the misguided ones come to their senses, and everyone survives to roundhouse kick each other another day. Actual casualties tend to be something like a flashback scene where a younger Kreese (Barrett Carnahan) is forced to fight his even more evil captain (Terry Serpico) to the death.  

Season 6 is different. Here, Mr. Miyagi’s (Pat Morita) big, dark secret is that he once killed a man in Sekai Taikai. “Eunjangdo” even opens with a nightmare scenario in which Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) gets to experience said fight from the victim’s point of view — with an AI version of the dead Morita making an appearance for good measure — and closes with Kwon’s bloody on-screen death. It’s clear that the bets are well and truly off.

The final season of “Cobra Kai” has been split into three parts, so we still have one block of episodes to go. Since it’s unlikely that the show intends to take its foot off the pedal for its grand finale, there may well be more deaths. Right now, the most murderous player on the field is without doubt Kreese, who accidentally drops the fateful Eunjangdo on his way to kill his former friend, Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith). Then again, who knows what will happen and who may die when “Cobra Kai” season 6 part 3 arrives on February 13, 2025?