The Karate Kid remake's turbulent, Defamer-aided casting process ended weeks ago, but that doesn't mean Ralph Macchio is ready to move on.

Despite his sincere, how-bad-can-an-11-year-old-fuck-it-up endorsement of new Kid Jaden Smith last week at the Slamdance Film Festival, Macchio's boyish visage cracked, steamed and melted when contemplating Jackie Chan's inheritance of Mr. Miyagi. “I don’t know,” he told MTV News:

"The thing is whether Jackie Chan gives you Jackie Chan, or if Jackie Chan does a, you know, real stretch to the character.” he explained. [...] “I think Jackie Chan and Jaden Smith, with a good script, and all the moons in alignment? It could be another big fat hit.”

Poor Ralph. We'd presume that Sony is in fact counting on Chan's genre-slumming reliability to align these proverbial moons, but! Think of the moral leverage Macchio will have 25 years from now when Jaden Smith traverses his own Slamdance red carpet, second-guessing Mickey Rourke's next comeback as Knox Jolie-Pitt's sensei in another, wrestling-tinged franchise reboot.