Sweep the leg! 🥋
With apologies to Prince, we're gonna party like it's 1984.
A new "Karate Kid" movie is in theaters with Ralph Macchio, and the Miyagi-verse expands by bringing Jackie Chan into the fold with some serious martial-arts action and a nod to the old-school fight montage. (Kids, we used to have these all the time back in the day!) Speaking of throwbacks, the "Sex and the City" saga continues with a new season of "And Just Like That ..." And if you're already missing "The Last of Us," we feel you, fam, and are here to help.
Oh, yeah, I mentioned a party: This week, Watch Party's celebrating its first birthday! I've had a blast bringing you great recommendations for the big and small screens, and there's lots more to come. Thank you to everyone who's subscribed and shown love the past year, and if you have a friend or loved one who's not on board yet, let them know the bandwagon's got plenty of room.
Now on to the good stuff:
Watch a new 'Karate Kid' show off his moves in the all-star 'Legends'
While it may not be the Marvel Cinematic Universe or the "Star Wars" galaxy, the Miyagi-verse has interestingly become one of the most enduring pop-culture franchises thanks to the "Karate Kid" spinoff show "Cobra Kai." And for the first time in a while, martial arts drama and youngsters in gis are back in cinemas with "Karate Kid: Legends." Ben Wang is the new karate kid, a teen who moves from China to New York City, runs afoul of a bully and gets trained by sensei Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) and kung fu shifu Mr. Han (Jackie Chan) for a big karate competition. "Legacy" can't quite figure out what kind of "Karate Kid" it wants to be but, man, Wang is a star. (Peep my ★★½ review.)
I sat down with Macchio and Wang at CinemaCon, the convention of movie theater owners, to chat about how "Legends" expands the Miyagi-verse (named for Mr. Miyagi, obviously), and how the legacy of the original "Karate Kid" still fuels the franchise. Wang's new character is "dealing with an internal struggle a little bit different than what my struggle was back in the day, but at the end of it, you're rooting for people you care about," Macchio says. "That's the storytelling.'
Stream 'Sex and the City' spinoff 'And Just Like That ...' on Max
Confession time: I'm not exactly the target audience for all things "Sex and the City." (My wife, though? TOTALLY into it.) I do enjoy some silliness, however, and that's apparently what Season 3 of the Max revival show "And Just Like That ..." has in spades, according to TV critic Kelly Lawler. In her ★½ review, she writes that the series is "still as lightweight and shallow as a knockoff pair of Manolo Blahniks, unimaginative and dull, this year with a side of ATVs and 'Little House on the Prairie' jokes." (Hard to go wrong with ATVs, honestly.)
My man Patrick Ryan got the scoop from Cynthia Nixon about guest star Rosie O'Donnell having a cameo as a sex-starved nun and also got the lowdown on Carrie Bradshaw's very chic "cloud hat" from Sarah Jessica Parker.
Get your dystopian fix after finishing 'The Last of Us'
So, how about that cliffhanger in the latest season finale of "The Last of Us"?! It's going to be hard to wait till the third season for that. In the meantime, we've got plenty of coverage of the recent closing chapter (streaming now on Max). Kelly recaps who survived and who died, plus she teamed with our colleague Brendan Morrow to look at where Season 3 could go if the show, like it has so far, sticks to its video-game roots.
And if you've finished the season and are already missing all the nightmarish drama, we've got five more dystopian shows to watch. Always good to remind folks to watch "Andor" if they haven't had the pleasure.
Even more goodness to check out!
Got thoughts, questions, ideas, concerns, compliments or maybe even some recs for me? Email btruitt@usatoday.com and follow me on the socials: I'm @briantruitt on Bluesky, Instagram and Threads.
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