Well, let's be honest, this one does clean up the problematic white patriarchy exhibited in the three other films, but it still stereotypes Asian people as....

....I fooled you didn't I? Yeah, I'm not at all one of those people.

Whatever, no one is going to read this anyway.

I do, however, feel the need to give this two stars on principle. I mean, I did remember that they made this film when Part III was (possibly) blocked from my memory to save myself the horror of it all... but that I don't think it deserves that.

When I was a kid, actually a Freshman in High School, I kind of had the attitude that no Ralph Macchio meant it wasn't a real Karate Kid film. I'd rather not see it made and I went out of my way not to watch it until I caught it on cable.

I'd like to think I've matured since, but they are rebooting Blade and...no Snipes. The same attitude applies. I guess I haven't grown.

At any rate, it's not just the lack of Macchio, it's the addition of Ironside doing his absolutely best impersonation of Michael Ironside and over-acting to the point where I'm actually shocked the rest of the cast made it through without groaning. He's kind of like Nicholas Cage without the charisma isn't he?

Moving on, Swank does an OK job of selling it physically. I mean, I'm a pretty big guy, I was certainly a big guy in High School, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that she could kick my behind from here to kingdom come. Unfortunately, as much as she does sell the physicality of the role, it doesn't take a trained eye to see she doesn't know the fundamentals of even a basic street brawl.

She made up for it later in here career, but it still leaves you with the impression that she never threw a real punch in her life.

And that, combined with Ironside is enough to really make this movie a flop, even if it had Macchio in it... which it doesn't, and I'm still going to be juvenile and insist it can't be a Karate Kid film without him.