Demetri Alexopoulos

Demetri Alexopoulos is one of the two tritagonists (alongside Eli "Hawk" Moskowitz) of the 2018 YouTube Red/Netflix series Cobra Kai. 
Initially a sarcastic, cowardly, and awkward bullied victim, Demetri later joins Miyagi Do Karate in order to stand up for himself. Despite this causing his best friend Hawk to turn on him and bully him, Demetri eventually gains enough skills to stand up to him and eventually defeat him in the school brawl.
He is portrayed by Gianni DeCenzo.
== Biography ==
Demetri met and befriended Eli Moskowitz in childhood. Demetri has been unpopular his entire life and was often a subject of bullying.
=== Season 1 ===
Demetri meets and becomes friends with Miguel, despite warning him about his lowly social status. He is regularly bullied by Kyler, but doesn't feel there is anything he can do about it. After Miguel beats up Kyler and his group Demetri decides to join the Cobra Kai Dojo but soon quits after he is embarrassed by the sensei Johnny Lawrence. In the episode "Different but Same", he is shown to have a crush on Yasmine. After Miguel wins the All Valley Karate Tournament, he tells Miguel he might join Cobra Kai again.
=== Season 2 ===
Demetri celebrates Cobra Kai's victory at the All Valley tournament with Miguel, Aisha, Hawk and other Cobra Kai members. He soon decides to join again. When he goes back to the dojo to re enroll he sees Johnny's sensei John Kreese, though he does not know who he is. He is happy to see him instead of Johnny as his last encounter with him ended badly. He first tells Kreese his conditions and expectations, but after looking at his tattoos he tells him how anatomically incorrect they are and even touches them. However, an annoyed and angry Kreese hits him. Demetri complains to Hawk about what Kreese did, but Hawk shows no sympathy for him and tells him to man up.
Having had enough with the bullying, Demetri quits Cobra Kai and joins Miyagi-Do Karate; he writes a negative review of Cobra Kai on Yelp, which angers Hawk. However, Demetri initially struggles with Miyagi-Do karate and does not look interested. When sensei Daniel LaRusso asks him why he is here, he talks about how he has been bullied and now he lost his best friend because of Cobra Kai, and now wants to prove he can fight back. Daniel tries to give him encouragement but Demetri is not confident.
While Demetri, along with Miyagi-Do students Robby and Samantha LaRusso (Daniel's daughter), is eating in the mall, he goes to the comic book store. While there Hawk and other Cobra Kai members surround him and force him to take down his Yelp review of Cobra Kai, but when Demetri refuses Hawk attacks him. Demetri runs away but is soon cornered by them. However, Robby and Sam defend him and beat up the Cobra Kai's.
When Chris, one of the Cobra Kai's who bullied him in the mall, join Miyagi-Do along with four other former Cobra Kai's (Nathaniel, Frank, Abe and Lil Red); Demetri, Robby and Sam are unhappy but Daniel lets them join. After Demetri gets into an argument with Chris, Daniel decides to tell them the time he joined Cobra Kai in order to show how everyone Cobra Kai can corrupt people, and people can change. Demetri then starts to get along with Chris.
Over time Demetri is able to apply his intelligence to his training, which makes him before confident. During a party at Moon's house Demetri attempts to bond with Hawk by talking to him about "Doctor Who'. His attempt seems to work as Hawk is interested. However, after he suggests to Hawk to have inner peace Hawk dumps beer on his head. Fed up with his treatment, Demetri gets revenge by taking a mic and announcing to everyone all the embarrassing stories about Hawk. An angry Hawk tries to attack him, but Robby and Chris stop him, and the cops arrive. Hawk threatens Demetri that he will beat him up at school.
When a school brawl between Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do occurs the next day at school, Demetri gets Mr. Palmer and asks him to stop the fight, but he refuses after watching Cobra Kai student Doug Rickenberger take down a teacher (which even Hawk is shocked by). When Hawk spots Demetri, Demetri runs away and Hawk chases him. Demetri tries to hide in the computer lab, but Hawk finds him. Demetri runs away again. However, Hawk eventually catches him and starts attacking him. After being hit twice, Demetri uses Miyagi-Do Karate to block and counter all of Hawk's attacks. He then kicks Hawk into a trophy case. However, he apologizes to him after, showing he still cares for Hawk despite his bullying.
=== Season 3 ===
Demetri is still at odds with Hawk. However he is becoming friendly with Yasmine, because of her lack of popularity. In the cafeteria he shows off his Dinosaur valley project/diorama, which impresses Moon and to an extent Yasmine. Hawk then destroys his project, upsetting Demetri, who mocks his sleep enuresis. Later that day (most likely), he gets revenge on Hawk in a soccer game by calling him a loser that lost the 'hottest' girl (Moon) in the school, and then pushing kicking and leg sweeping him. However, he is then headbutted by Hawk. Unfortunately for Demetri, Sam and two other students, they get detention, but skip it and do karate training which Sam runs while Daniel is at Okinawa, while Hawk and his friends are off the hook.
One day, when Hawk, Mitch, Mikey, and Doug are causing trouble at the arcade, where Chris works, Demetri, Sam, Stiven, and an unnamed Miyagi Do student arrive to help Chris stop the Cobra Kai's. Then, a fight emerges between both dojos. Demetri kicks Mikey to the ground, before facing Hawk, who easily pins him to the ground and grabs his arm. The other Cobra Kai's encourage Hawk to break his arm including Tory Nichols, while Demetri pleads him not to and tries to get Hawk remember their old friendship. After momentarily hesitating, Hawk breaks Demetri's arm after being peer pressured by Tory and the other Cobra Kais, causing Demetri to scream in pain, while Chris is beaten to the ground by Mitch and and Rickenberger, and Samantha freezes and suffers a panic attack over her past fight with Tory in the school karate war.
Demetri shows up to school with a cast, and tells Miguel what Hawk did. However, he is bullied by Kyler, who draws a penis on his cast and shows it to the other students, causing them to laugh with the exception of Miguel, Hawk and the other Miyagi-Do students, and smacks his head. However, Kyler’s bullying earns him the sympathy of Yasmine, who knows how it feels to be mocked since the wedgie incident, as she was mocked on the first day back by Nate and Chris. Yasmine then covers Kyler’s vandalism when she signs and counter-graffiti’s Demetri’s arm cast (thus turning Kyler’s cruelty into a boost of popularity for Demetri), and Demetri thanks her; she then admits she knows what being an outcast is like because of the “front wedgie” incident thanks to Aisha during the beach party at the lake, and admits it doesn’t feel good to be the person being laughed at. Later, Daniel reopens Miyagi-Do and continues training Demetri and the students.
One day Demetri and Yasmine are caught kissing by Miguel and Sam. Yasmine walks away embarrassed, while Demetri tells Miguel and Sam he is in love and reveals that he and Yasmine are dating.
: "He won't have to. He's got friends watching it for him."
: ―Demetri defending Hawk
On one night, when Demetri (who is no longer wearing the cast) and other Miyagi students are at Sam's house, Miguel and his fellow Eagle Fang Karate students show up via Sam's invitation, where Sam tells everyone that they should all work together. However, the group, sans Sam and Miguel, don’t agree with this. When Mitch and Bert attempt to leave, Demetri convinces them to stay by making a speech about how they need to work together and stand up to Cobra Kai, causing them to realize Demetri is right.
Then, several Cobra Kai’s show up and attack them. Demetri is able to hit and fend off a few Cobra Kai’s, but is soon cornered and and attacked by Doug and another Cobra Kai, with the former grabbing his arm (the same arm Hawk was forced to break by Tory and the other Cobras). Doug encourages Hawk to attack Demetri with “Yo, Hawk! Free shot!”
However, Hawk has by then realized Johnny and Miguel were right and Kreese’s methods were wrong; with that, Hawk saves Demetri by knocking down the Cobra Kai student with dreadlocks (while using Demetri’s shoulder as leverage) before grabbing a shocked Doug around the neck and throwing the latter onto a glass table, thus switching sides in the process. Hawk then apologizes to Demetri for everything, resulting in their friendship being reconciled, and the two work together to defeat several of Hawk’s now former classmates.
Then, Demetri, Hawk and Miguel run to the Miyagi Training Building in the back of the house after defeating the Cobra’s, where Sam has just disarmed Tory. Hawk tells Tory that the fight is over. Tory stops, disagrees with Hawk by saying the fight isn’t over, threatens Sam that their rivalry will never end and warningly tells Hawk to watch his back, to which Demetri says Sam and Hawk have friends watching out for them.
The following morning at Miyagi Do, Demetri and Hawk high five and hug, same with Chris and Mitch, and Bert and Nathaniel, who all become friends again and unite in one dojo being run by both Daniel and Johnny.
=== Season 4 ===
Demetri and the rest of Miyagi-Do are training with Eagle Fang for the upcoming tournament. He and Sam are circling each other much to Johnny's confusion. He tells him that they need to be provoked in order to go on offense. Johnny then throws a bottle in order to get mad. While Eli is having a water break, he notices a painting in Miyagi-Do and Demetri explains it's a sparring deck in Okinawa. After Eli is scolded by Nathaniel and Chris, he looks at Demetri but leaves. Demetri, Sam, Miguel, Eli and the others then build an Okinawan sparring deck, helping the dojos work together.
During training, Johnny brings them to a rooftop and has them jump from one roof to another. Knowing how dangerous it is, Miyagi-Do refuses. However, after Daniel texts Sam, she then jumps to the next roof, impressing her and the others.
In another training session, Miyagi-Do is doing combos with Johnny but when he gets distracted watching Miguel train with Daniel, Demetri accidentally kicks him. In retaliation, he ties up Demetri and his classmates use him as a punching bag. He is then hanging out with Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang at a drive-in where they end up in a confrontation with Cobra Kai. He, Miguel, Hawk and Sam leave after drenching the Cobra Kai's with sprinklers.
Demetri is also in attendance watching the rematch between Johnny and Daniel. When Eli arrives, he pulls back his hood, and Demetri sees Eli's mohawk has been nearly removed, which shocks everyone. After realizing the merge didn't work, Eagle Fang leaves with Demetri staying with Miyagi-Do while Hawk ends up leaving with Johnny.
He visits Eli to explain about the updates of the All-Valley tournament and shows nervousness about fighting former Miyagi-Do student Robby Keene. Eli then reveals he cut out the remains of his mohawk, reverting back to his original personality, and says his former personality made him ruthless to Miguel, Moon and even Demetri before adding "I got what I deserved." However, Demetri tells him he already forgave him; Eli replies that it doesn't matter, as he quit karate. He then tells Eli that he was the one that got him into karate, which has helped him gain confidence, strength and also win Yasmine's heart. Demetri shows his excitement for the tournament but he tells Eli it won't be as exciting if he doesn't participate. Left with no choice, Demetri then shows Eli their old binary brother video and tells him that regardless of his name, they will still be binary brothers, while also telling him that his mohawk never defined who he was. Inspired, Eli then returns to karate and joins Miyagi-Do. During a tournament simulation, Miyagi-Do is cheering for Demetri when he is sparring with Daniel but ends up getting hit. The rest of Miyagi-Do are happy when Eli joins the dojo.
Due to the updates of the All-Valley Tournament, Demetri needs to participate in the weapons display section of the skills competition, so he's given a pair of sais and starts to train under the tutelage of Sam.
Demetri and Eli are at the prom where Eli tells him that going to prom without a date is embarrassing. Yasmine reunites with Demetri, and he dances with her and Moon. They both go to Stingray's afterparty, where he and Yasmine are making out, much to Eli's sadness.
On the day of the All-Valley, Demetri shows off his weapons skills in the skills competition. Before Eli's match against Miguel, he tells Eli is that it's not helpful how no one has beaten Miguel. He advances to the semifinals where he faces his former classmate Robby Keene. In the first two rounds, Robby easily scored two points. After this, the ref gives both fighters a timeout to go talk to their sensei's. After being advised by Daniel to go back to his fundamentals, Demetri fights better and takes Robby down in the third round, but Robby recovers and defeats Demetri. He watches the sudden death match where he's holding Eli's gi and then celebrates with Miyagi-Do after Eli wins the boys division.
=== Season 5 ===
Demetri and the rest of Miyagi-Do meet where his sensei Daniel LaRusso says that he is adhering to the bet and is closing down the dojo. Daniel says that regardless of what happens, Miyagi-Do will remain inside of them. After, Demetri says that he will work a summer job.
The next day after Miguel returns home from Mexico with Johnny and Robby, he goes with Miguel and Eli to a tattoo shop where Eli gets a new tattoo. Eli sympathizes with how awkward it was for Miguel to share a ride with Robby. When his girlfriend Samantha LaRusso texts back, the binary brothers get nervous when El Serpiente tells the two about Sam's messages. Later, the two go to a jewelry store where Miguel buys an octopus tattoo.
While his friends are spending their day at a waterpark, Demetri goes to Johnny Lawrence's apartment to offer him new phones. He buys one with a cracked screen and sets him up to start his ride-share services.
During their first class session, Chozen is training with Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang. He gives the students eggs but are picked off by the Japanese assassin. Anthony gives them an idea to protect the eggs, comparing the situation to Dungeon Lord. Demetri and Eli agree and after the plan works, Chozen surrenders.
Wanting to know more about Terry Silver, Demetri then goes with Bert, Miguel, Eli and Sam to talk to Stingray. Stingray talks about his incident with Terry Silver by demonstrating it through Dungeons & Dragons.
Now ready to put things to an end, Demetri alongside Robby, Miguel, Eli, Sam and Tory go to the Cobra Kai dojo to expose Silver. When the others arrive, they fill in the rest of their classmates about the situation. They try to upload the video clip of Silver admitting to Tory he cheated in the All Valley Tournament. While the binary brothers are in the office, the Miyagi-Fangs are in a confrontation with Cobra Kai. Unfortunately, Mitch betrays the merged dojos and rejoined Cobra Kai when he reveals he tipped off Kenny Payne and Kyler. While the Miyagi-Fangs are fighting the Cobra Kai students, Kyler confronts Eli and Demetri. Eli mocks Kyler about all his bullied victims beating him up, prompting Demetri stating he hasn't, to which Eli says he'll get his turn. Eli then fights Kyler and his friends, while Demetri initially is trying to get the video clip uploaded. However, when Kyler lands a hit on Hawk, Demetri joins the fight and kicks Kyler. Demetri then knocks down Kyler's friends and Kyler; satisfied he beat his bully, he shows excitement.
The binary brothers head back to the others with the uploaded video on the laptop, while fending off a few Cobra Kai's along the way. While Kyler knocks the laptop out of Eli's hands, Anthony gets it, and Demetri and the Miyagi Do's protect Anthony while he checks the upload progress; the video successfully uploads and Anthony plays it on the TVs. In the end, Daniel defeats Terry Silver.
=== Season 6 ===
On the first day back at school, Demetri and Hawk are greeted by their friends. During training, he and Hawk reveal the dojo name to their sensei's and classmates where they will be named Miyagi-Fang Karate, featuring a logo of Mr. Miyagi with fangs.
At school, Demetri, Miguel, and Hawk are attending the college fair. Demetri and Hawk have been wanting to go to MIT, "Massachusetts Institute of Technology," together. During a college tour, the binary brothers and Miguel runs into Kyler and Brucks. They are surprised that Kyler goes to College of the Valley. Kyler also explains that Brucks goes to MIT, to Demetri's surprise. Later, Demetri, Hawk, and Miguel goes to a party hosted by a fraternity named, Theta Omega, where Kyler is being hazed by the fraternity members and their leader, Zenker. During the party, Demetri and Miguel overhear Zenker's plan to disqualify Kyler. Later, Kyler picks a fight with the frat students after learning from Zenker that he was never going to be a member. Demetri, Hawk, Miguel, and Brucks assists him of fighting Zenker and the frat members before the 5 leave the house. While hanging out in the arcade, Brucks reveals to Hawk and Demetri that he scored a 750 on his SAT and that the MIT he's referring to is Midwest Industrial Training.
Following the Sekai Taikai announcement and their reveal of selecting 6 fighters to compete, Demetri and his classmates continues to train in order to earn a spot. At school, Demetri and Hawk talk about getting a spot in the tournament and that they think Kenny should have the last spot. Before the tournament, Mike Barnes has the students undergo rigorous training processes. After the first session, Demtri is one of the twelve students who moves on to the next round. However, he has to participate in a tiebreaker with Hawk, Devon and Kenny for the final two spots. While training at the dojo at night, Demetri tries to have a date with Yasmine, but she encourages him to keep training and the two make out. While getting ready to race in the forest, Hawk admits to Demetri that he never applied to MIT and explains that since the frat party, it helped him get back on track and he wanted to keep his options open. Demetri gets upset at this but Hawk says that he'll still apply for MIT later. The race between the four students begin. When Hawk and Demetri are fighting for the flag, Demetri takes advantage of Hawk and cheap shots him and earns a spot along with Devon.
Before Miyagi-Do's training session, Demetri reveals to Miguel, Sam, and Hawk that he got accepted to MIT while reminding Hawk about not applying. Later, Demetri watches the fight between Miguel and Robby for male captain, which Robby wins and earns the position; and watches the fight between Sam and Tory for female captain, which Sam earns the position by default after Tory leaves the team and presumably quits karate following her mother's death. With Tory not going to compete with Miyagi-Do, Hawk takes her place. This unexpectedly gives the binary brothers the chance to go to Barcelona together as they planned.
Demetri goes with Hawk, Miguel, Robby, Sam, Devon, Johnny, and Daniel to Barcelona to compete in the Sekai Taikai. While getting ready, they see the new Cobra Kai, led by John Kreese and Kim Da-Eun and their fellow students, led by Kwon Jae-Sung. Shortly, Tory appears with them, revealing that she has rejoined Cobra Kai, much to Demetri and Miyagi-Do's shock.
== Personality ==
: "Skeleton. Classic."
: ―Demetri to Miguel Diaz[src]
Demetri is a sarcastic and awkward person with low self-esteem. He considers himself a jaded realist but he actually has no confidence in himself. When Johnny embarrasses him on his second day at the Cobra Kai Dojo Demetri immediately quits.
Demetri is a minor character in season 1. His screen-time is limited and he doesn't have any sort of story-line. Outside his self esteem issues and friendship with Miguel and Eli, nothing is known of him. In season 2, Demetri's character is more developed. His sarcasm is still present, but has reduced significantly. At first, he attempts to re-enroll in Cobra Kai, but after Kreese hits him, he writes a negative review about the dojo. This results in his best friend, Hawk, ending their friendship and bullying him. He eventually joins Miyagi-Do Karate. Despite struggling and still showing lack of confidence, as time goes by he is able to learn the Miyagi-Do Karate techniques, which allows him to become more confident and a better fighter. After Hawk pours beer on his head at Moon's party, Demetri decides to tell embarrassing stories about him in front of the other attendees (namely, Hawk's bawling when Dobby dies while the two watched Harry Potter, and especially Hawk having sleep enuresis).
During the school karate war, Hawk chases Demetri who tries to get away from him, but Hawk eventually catches up to him and starts attacking him. Demetri however uses his Miyagi-Do Karate technique to defend himself. He then kicks Hawk into a trophy case, injuring him as a result, though he does apologize, showing that he still cares about him despite the latter's constant bullying.
In season 3, Demetri is shown to no longer be afraid of Hawk. Growing more confidence and assertiveness due to his arising popularity, he does stand up to Hawk by pushing and leg sweeping him to the ground. After Hawk breaks his arm and Kyler mocks his cast, he earns the sympathy of Yasmine, who is now nicer to him due to her knowing what it's like to be mocked after the wedgie incident. The two are caught kissing by Miguel and Sam, but Yasmine denies wanting to date him. When Sam tries to get Miyagi Do and Eagle Fang Karate to work together, Demetri makes a speech that they need to work together to defeat Cobra Kai. He is also later seen as a mediator between the two, ironing out the details of their alliance. Agreeing that all should train at Miyagi-Do Dojo, but deadlocked on team name, gi design, post training snacks and sensei dispute protocol. During a fight at Sam's house, Demetri is saved by Hawk, who has realized the error of his ways, and the two reconcile their friendship and work together to defeat several Cobra Kai's. Demetri stands up for his best friend when Tory threatens Hawk for defecting, telling Tory that Hawk's friends will be watching his back. The day after the fight, Hawk has joined Eagle Fang and the two are shown high fiving and hugging. Demetri has grown from an awkward and sarcastic nerd, to a capable and more assertive fighter and person. Demetri's sense of humor is featured more than it was in season 2, but not as much as it was in season 1.
== Fighting Style ==
Demetri is not a natural fighter. He is never seen fighting until he joins Miyagi-Do, and even there he struggles with technique. However, he does benefit from his sharp intellect, instantly deducing that Daniel's painting and sanding chores are muscle memory exercises. Daniel eventually makes use of Demetri's intelligence, presenting a blocking drill as a puzzle to be solved. This helps Demetri become a fairly solid defender, making him the opposite of the aggressive Hawk. During his fight with Hawk, he successfully uses the Miyagi-Do technique to counter all of his former friend's strikes, finally defeating him by kicking him into a trophy case.
Demetri's lack of strength is compensated by his speed; he is a very fast runner. Demetri is able to consistently outrun people, including five physically fit Cobra Kai students (Chris, Mitch, Hawk, Doug, and Mikey).
Demetri's skills are shown to have improved in season 3, which is most notably evidenced in the LaRusso house fight, where he fights off a few Cobra Kai's himself, while defending the smaller Bert and Nate at the same time, swings Bert around for higher kicks, and manages to take down several Cobra Kai after teaming up with a redeemed Hawk. He however, is easily beat by Hawk in the laser tag fight, due to the latter being more focused. Demetri's best fighting comes when both he and Hawk team up to take down several Cobra Kai's in the LaRusso house fight (Mentioned above), which makes them a complimentary and effective duo. Overall, Demetri's offense, defense and overall technique have all significantly improved, all of which make him a better fighterDespite the merging of Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang Karate, Demetri doesn't really take anything from this brief alliance as he primarily uses his Miyagi-Do style. After the two dojos split due to disagreements between their senseis, Demetri is seen as one of the best shots at defeating Robby Keene at the boys division of the All Valley Tournament, showing that he is one of the best male fighters at Miyagi-Do until Eli joins. During their training for the new skills competitions of the tournament, Demetri becomes adept with the Kamas for the weapons display category. He successfully displays his skills with the kamas during the skills competition of the All Valley Tournament. During the individual fights at the All Valley Tournament, Demetri manages to make it to the semifinals and fights former classmate Robby. While he throws some solid kicks, blocks some of his attacks and even maneuvers Robby's body down, Demetri was is still unable to land any hits on him, and is ultimately defeated due to the latter's superior strength, skills and experience.
Although he doesn't train much after the tournament due to Miyagi-Do being shut down, he is later trained by his new sensei Chozen, following Daniel re-opening the dojo and his offense does improve later. During the Cobra Kai Dojo Brawl he easily takes down a few cobras and knocks out and defeats his former bully Kyler. When the Miyagi-Fangs tried to protect Anthony by forming a circle around him, Demetri was one of the five remaining fighters standing in the circle as the rest were being pulled away from the group by the cobras.
After the Cobra Kai shut down Demetri was shown to improve his offense and combine both styles during the summer. Demetri striking power and agility has improved as he was able to hold his own against Hawk (What is in the top 3 of the best fighters of the Miyagi-Fang Dojo alongside Miguel & Robby) and was able to briefly pin him to the ground during their captured the flag challenge in Coyote Creek.
== Gallery ==
File:IMG 1596.jpeg
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