Reboot Battle: Karate Kid

I've just finished seeing the new "Karate Kid" (or "Kung Fu kid" if you want to be more accurate) and I've been wanting to stack it up against the old "Karate Kid" as soon as I exited the theater. Not sure if that's a good or bad thing.

                           VS

Anyway, this is how the battle will go: I will award a star for each version in every aspect it is superior, and will compare stars in the end.

Warning: Spoilers ahead.

Round I: Plot Presentation

The plot did not significantly change in the reboot other than the martial art and the location. The reboot is plot point note-by-note similar to the original, right down to the villain instructor telling his second-best student to break the hero, despite his insistence that he can beat him fair and square.

What matters here is how the plot is dramatized. The plot points provide the escalation, but the presentation will determine the effectivity. The original Karate Kid had it down pat, with Daniel-san progressively getting his ass kicked in increasingly painful and humiliating ways. In this respect, the reboot was somewhat lacking. Sure, using slow-motion made the blows to Dre seem more painful, but he is hardly humiliated. He endured rather standard and cliched bullying tactics (Emptying the bag? Please...), while suffering nothing compared to Daniel getting thrown off his bike while going downhill or having his car die in the middle of a date. It is also to the original's credit that the disadvantages Daniel vis-a-vis the girl and his enemies is much more stark than that endured by Dre. I guess Will Smith's son cannot stand having to play a complete loser.

Since this is a fairly big point of lumped together factors (can't be bothered to go into more separate details...nobody watched Karate Kid expecting Citizen Kane), it gets multiple stars. Advantage to the original.

Original: ***
Reboot: **

Round II: Leading Man (Boy)

It's Ralph Macchio vs. Son of (Will) Smith.

Sure, Son of Smith comes off as "cooler", with his hip hop moves and skateboard. (A decade behind, but better than a bike.) However, having such attributes does not help in this case, as upping the cool only ends up reducing the sympathy for the character. Macchio's Daniel looked like he genuinely needed Mr. Miyagi, while Son of Smith's Dre looked like he could have coasted by on slick had he just played his cards right. It also doesn't help the reboot that the hip-hop jiving of Son of Smith made him come off as more of a douchebag and less of a lovable everyman. Further compounding the reboot is that while Macchio won't be getting an Oscar, he at least acted his part. Son of Smith at some parts looked like Mokujin from Tekken (yep, the walking piece of wood), and at other parts looked like all he cared about was striking cool poses for future Hollywood reference. Macchio may hit a few sour notes, but Son of Smith felt too cool to condescend to playing any.

Advantage to Macchio's Daniel-san.

Original: *
Reboot:

Round III: The Mentor

This is an intriguing comparison. I can't really go one way or the other here. On one hand, Pat Morita plays the "hidden dragon" martial artist master / father figure to a lovable-yet-detached perfection. On the other hand, one cannot deny the on-screen charisma of Jackie Chan. Jackie Chan's Han gets minus points though, because his "let's make him more human" moments are so schmaltzy that they're practically begging for tears, thus compromising his unspoken authority as the master in the partnership with Dre. Contrast Han's incessant whining about his car crash with the stoic, dignified (though drunk) revelation of Miyagi's Japanese internment camp experience and subsequent war service. However, Jackie Chan has undoubtedly far more charm at this stage of his career than Pat Morita did during the making of the original.

By the barest of margins, advantage to Chan's Han.

Original:
Reboot: *

Round IV: Villains

The original had a bunch of southern California douchebags, while the reboot had Chinese douchebags. While the Chinese seem more credible on paper, some of the characterization of the villains is somewhat thin in the reboot. The evil kung fu mentor initially looked more menacing, what with his brutal drilling of his students and their military-precision at acting on his commands. However, his lines are delivered in a clipped monotone that does nothing to make him scarier, especially in scenes where he is not ordering students around. The Cobra Kai sensei's delivery of "I want him broken" is much more chilling and menacing than that of the kung fu master, precisely because the latter delivered it like he was reading it. The little combatants are an interesting dynamic. While in the original, the lackeys seem far more menacing than the boss fight guy, the reboot has the boss fight guy rightly more menacing than his lackeys. However, the reboot misdelivered on a subtle but important plot point. During the tournament, there is one guy who belongs to neither camp who makes it to the semi-final. In the original, its a dark-skinned Asian guy (Filipino?) who has some pretty convincing aerial moves that look more Tae Kwon Do than karate, while the reboot has some kid douche with a mohawk. The purpose of this character is to build up the boss fight guy as a world beater. The original pulled this off well-enough, with the Asian guy scoring on some nifty kicks before the boss fight guy hulks up and runs him through. This made it seem like he can beat even experience and flashy high-fliers, making him look more daunting. In the reboot, mohawk guy is so pedestrian that he looked overmatched by boss fight guy. It did not make boss fight guy look more daunting. Indeed, he looked more bully than world beater.

By a small margin, advantage to the Cobra Kai.

Original: *
Reboot:

Round V: The Ladies

Who is the hero fighting for? Its the original's young cheerleader Elisabeth Shue versus the reboot's Generic Asian Girl picked up from generic asian girl catalogue. Who plays a weak violin. *yawn*

No contest. Big advantage to Elisabeth Shue. Big, big advantage. (Just watch Leaving Las Vegas.)

Original: *
Reboot:

Round VI: The Montage

The reboot's training montage featured gorgeous Chinese countryside vistas and the Great Wall of China, while the original's montage had the mean streets of Santa Monica beach. Yeah....

However, as Team America teaches us, a montage is made awesome not by the scenery but by the music. Does the music get you to believe in the awesomeness-in-becoming of our hero? Or does it want you to beg for it to stop?

The reboot's training and fight montages had some fairly forgettable hip hop instrumentals and generic Chinese instrumentals, and didn't even feature the somewhat catchy song featured in its trailer. The original had this in the fight montage:

You're the best around!!!!

Advantage Esposito. Not even the reboot's trailer song comes close.

Original: *
Reboot:

Round VII: Training Gimmicks

The original had "wax on, wax off", while the reboot had "jacket on, jacket off". The original's training gimmicks were more comedic, and in-line with the premise of an everyman being eased into the strict discipline of a martial art by a wise master. While the reboot's training gimmicks seem to magically diminish the learning curve (Son of Smith seemed way too good at kung fu after the gimmicks), they look much cooler and have all the mystic juju of a Shaolin temple. Plus, the dragon well water and the snake woman were an upgrade in awesome from the crane stance on a pier.

Advantage, jacket.

Original:
Reboot: *

Round VIII: The Combat

This is what most people came in expecting to see. The movie is called "Karate (Kung Fu) Kid" after all. The original was criticized because Daniel seemed to punch soft, but it was in-line with the premise of an everyman loser who had just learned karate to save his hide. It also further enhanced the sense of drama in the final match. The reboot featured some nifty kung fu, but all the fights looked the same. (Just check out the blandness of mohawk guy.) It takes a hell of a bad job to make karate seem more varied and diverse in style than kung fu. And while the kung fu looked nicer as a whole, the use of the wire was also as readily apparent as steroids in baseball. At least the tournament in the original featured fighting that might realistically occur. Plus, while the snake charming stance looked way cooler than the crane, the move Son of Smith executed afterward was just jaw-droppingly fake. Say what you will about Daniel-san's soft punching, but at least he wasn't blatantly abusing wire-fu like an insecure douchebag.

Advantage to non-wired Karate.

Original: *
Reboot:

Final Tally

Original:  ******** (8)
Reboot: **** (4)

Winner: Original

Final Note:

I absolutely loathe the soundtrack of the reboot. I especially despise that asinine chest-thumping congratulatory rap by Son of Smith and his brother while the credits were rolling.