‘Cobra Kai’ Season 3: Who Is John Kreese’s Vietnam Friend?

Cobra Kai fans learned a lot about John Kreese’s past in Season 3. Throughout the season, Cobra Kai featured flashbacks to a younger Kreese (Martin Kove) who fought in Vietnam. But in the Season 3 finale, Kreese is seen holding a photo of himself alongside some buddies from his service in Vietnam, ultimately calling up one in particular for a favor.

We’re not sure who the friend is, but it’s likely Kreese will ask him to help him and his Cobra Kai class to take down Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang in Season 4. This has led to some fans wondering if Kreese is actually calling Terry Silver — the main villain in The Karate Kid Part III. In the 1989 film, Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith) is introduced as a Vietnam veteran who met Kreese during their time together. He helps Kreese get back at Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) and Mr. Miyagi (Pat Morita), sending Kreese to Tahiti while he slyly recruits Mike Barnes (Sean Kanan) to beat Daniel at the All Valley Karate Tournament.

Silver tells Daniel and Mr. Miyagi that Kreese died and eventually manipulates Daniel into competing in the tournament after refusing. Daniel comes to Silver for his help after Miyagi declines to train him. But after breaking a man’s nose due to his more aggressive fighting style, Daniel opts out of the tournament. Silver then reveals to Daniel his real agenda and Barnes assaults him. Miyagi saves Daniel and the two train for the tournament. When it was all said and done, Daniel takes down Barnes and wins the tournament for the second time.

In an interview with Collider in September, Kove talked about the possibility of Griffith coming back to reprise his role as the sadistic Silver. “To be perfectly honest, I don’t even know the answer to that question totally. So we’ll keep it the undercurrent of the interview, you know? I really don’t even know the answer!”

It would make sense for Silver to be the mysterious friend from Vietnam since there hasn’t been anyone from The Karate Kid Part III to make an appearance on Cobra Kai other than Daniel and Kreese just yet. In the third season — spoiler alert — fans saw the return of Kumiko (Tamlyn Tomita) and Chozen (Yuji Okumoto) who were main characters in The Karate Kid Part II. Fans also saw the return of Ali Mills (Elisabeth Shue) who made an appearance in the ninth and 10th episodes of the Netflix series.