I think I'm the only person on the internet who thinks this season was a bit of a step down haha. All the Terry Silver stuff was magnificent especially
. My problem with this season is that there was just way too much going on. I really liked the focus on the middle school kids and Kenny seems like a great redemption arc in the making, but on the other hand I felt a lot of the other new characters were sort of just thrown in there with very little to actually do and some of the big fan favorites from seasons past seemed kind of sidelined in the plot. Robbie, Sam, and Torri were definitely the most improved over past seasons but it felt like other leads like Miguel (whose growth spurt is SUPER distracting haha) seemed more sidelined then they needed to.
I don't know, I get that this season was building up to the tournament and that's fine but we knew the deal the dojos had wasn't going to stick no matter the outcome so that took away a lot of suspense and at this point I feel like the formula is starting to stretch itself thin. Season two had an excellent build-up of tension that culminated in the school fight which is probably the most iconic moment of the series. Season three had a wonderful villain arc and flashback storyline for Creese that really helped solidify the themes that season was going for. Four had a lot of quality stuff (Shout-out to my girl Amanda LaRusso for continuing to be an absolute goddess every time she's on screen!) but I just don't feel like it had the same connective tissue as seasons past and instead felt like a filler transitional season into the final arc since...again, we know no matter what the outcome of the tournament was going to be the dojos weren't actually going to honor the deal.