Ali Mills is a fictional character portrayed by Elisabeth Shue in the film The Karate Kid (1984), and in the third season of its sequel series Cobra Kai (2021).

Shortly after the breakup, she began to date Daniel LaRusso who had just moved to Reseda, until they broke up after the Senior Prom in 1985.

She became a pediatric surgeon, and settled in Denver, Colorado with her husband, Dr. Gregory Schwarber (an oncologist whom she met in medical school).

In December 2018, Ali returned home and had a short reunion with Johnny, and later Daniel, revealing that she is currently in the process of divorcing Gregory.

Johnny (in Cobra Kai) describes both his relationship with Ali and their 1984 breakup (events alluded to but not shown in The Karate Kid).

They noticed a group of girls in front of them and one of his friends, Dutch, began to throw Milk Duds at them as an "alpha move".

In Season 2, Episode 6 of Cobra Kai, Johnny and his friends (Bobby Brown, Jimmy and Tommy, who they helped to sneak out of the hospital for a 24-hour road trip) talk about his breakup with Ali: on the night that Dutch got so drunk that he smashed a dart board, Johnny also got so drunk that he missed Ali's birthday - ultimately leading up to the "big fight" that ended their relationship.

Later that evening, Tommy confesses that he also had a crush on Ali (whom he met in homeroom during freshman year) but never had the courage to ask her out.

Daniel and Ali meet the next day at their high school on the soccer field as she prepares to attend cheerleading practice.

This interaction is a stark contrast with Ali's parents who interrogate Daniel when they meet him and are not impressed that he lives in Reseda rather than Encino.

This difference in social class is further emphasized at the end of the date, when Daniel is teased by other teenagers because he is picked up by his mother in their old car (an incident that bothers him more than Ali).

Social class is further reinforced when Ali asks Daniel to meet her after dinner with her parents at an elite country club.

Prosperous and successful Daniel appears happy to see him, while Johnny (who was just fired from his construction job and is living in a small apartment in Reseda, California) is very uncomfortable.

Daniel reveals to Johnny that Ali is currently a pediatric surgeon who has since moved to Denver with her husband Gregory Schwarber, an oncologist whom she met in medical school.

Daniel mentions that he did not send Ali a friend request, as he believes Amanda would frown on him reconnecting with ex-girlfriends, and does not see a purpose in doing so in the first place.

After losing the Cobra Kai dojo to Kreese (who had a talk with the landlord, and finds out that the landlord does not like Johnny), and seeing his unconscious neighbor and star student Miguel Diaz on life support due to Miguel's spinal injuries accidentally caused by his estranged son Robby Keene at the end of the school fight, Johnny drives to the beach and throws his smart phone away into the sand in a fit of rage.

Later, while working on his laptop, Johnny opens up Facebook to look at the concert photos and finally sees Ali's "friend request", which he accepts.

She notes that lots of time has passed since high school, and says that she is happy with her family and career, and could "still kick your ass at air hockey".

However, Ali receives a phone call from her mother reminding her about the Christmas party, and she invites Johnny to join her.

They joke that it is funny to run into each other at the same country club that Daniel (the "kid from Reseda") was forced out of when he came to find Ali, and hug.

At that moment, Johnny enters and almost has an accident with a waiter carrying bowls of spaghetti (all references to similar events in reverse in The Karate Kid).

While Amanda is paying for dinner, Ali lectures Daniel and Johnny on their behavior by pointing out that they both share much more in common than they like to think.

She transferred to Harvard University in 1984, from which Shue withdrew to pursue her acting career (she was inspired by a friend to work in television commercials as a way to pay for college) one semester short of earning her degree (she eventually graduated in 2000).

[4] Among the younger cast members, Shue remembers Ralph Macchio [Daniel] as someone who was considered "a big star compared to the rest of us.

So it’s funny how the idea of Ali coming back [started]...at first, I thought, ‘Well, her character really left the world of The Karate Kid in a way that wasn’t so great...would people care about her coming back?’”[6] She ultimately joined Cobra Kai due to the encouragement from director, Dan Trachtenberg.

[5] She also decided to return because the writers planned to contest Daniel's version of the breakup in The Karate Kid II.

Hurwitz also added that "hearing what happened at the start of that movie was such a bummer for us ... so we knew when we brought her on the show we would find a way to explain and get her side of the story".

[7] In addition, in chapter three of his 2022 memoir onWaxing On: The Karate Kid and Me, Ralph Macchio explores both Daniel's version of the breakup and his own personal lack of awareness at the time of the impact it had on Shue.

[9] Zabka concurred noting that, "I think I lived everybody's fantasy of being Daniel LaRusso at Golf N' Stuff with Ali Mills on his arm … to kind of recreate those moments was so much fun and we just laughed the whole time.

I didn't know it when we shot it because I'm leaving and it was me turning away, and you just stay on her for that moment and there was a whole story in her eyes there that I thought really captured the heart of that sweet little adolescent romance from 36 years ago".