Chozen Toguchi is unquestionably a badass. But when Yuji Okumoto learned that the writers wanted his character to get naked in season 5 of Cobra Kai, the actor wasn't sure his actual cheeks were camera-ready.

"When I saw that [in the script], I said, 'Oh my God, seriously? I've gotta show my butt on camera?'" recalls Okumoto. Not only that, the rear view happens in the first five minutes of the season 5 premiere, when Amanda (Courtney Henggeler) stumbles upon a naked Chozen taking a morning dip in the LaRusso family pool.

"I said, 'I don't know if they want to see an old dude's butt. Maybe you should get somebody else to do this,'" says Okumoto, 63, who confirms that the role of Chozen's right butt cheek was played by "somebody else."

Still, the actor says he thought the moment was "a hilarious entrance to the whole season," and admits that he pitched an idea to make the poolside encounter even more awkward. "I actually wanted [Chozen to be holding] a small towel and they gave me a bigger towel instead," he adds. "It would have been funny if he was holding this small little face towel."

With that important business out of the way, it's time to talk about Chozen's other big reveal this season: He's completely in love with Kumiko (Tamlyn Tomita), and he has been for years! After admitting his true feelings about her to Daniel (Ralph Macchio) during a night out on the town, Chozen finally works up the (liquid) courage to leave her a sweet and borderline-confessional message on her voicemail.

"When we were filming the phone call, I wanted to have that sense of [Chozen being] uncomfortable. 'Oh, what am I doing?' It was so much fun to play those moments, those beats of Chozen's uncomfortableness talking to possibly the love of his life," Okumoto tells EW in the video above. "He's probably kept this flame inside of him burning for all these years, but never said anything maybe out of respect for Daniel-san. I think when Daniel says it's okay, just go for it, Chozen is like, 'Oh, wow!' And I made that call. It'll be interesting to see where that goes after that."

Though Netflix hasn't yet renewed Cobra Kai, plenty of fans are now shipping Chozen and Kumiko (Choziko? Kumizen?) and hope they get together in season 6. "All the fans, that's all they talk about: 'How is Kumiko? Oh man, I had such a crush on Kumiko in Karate Kid II,'" says Okumoto. "It would be interesting to see the two of them together now on a different level. Before [in season 3], we were just friends. But now when the stakes are a little higher, it would be interesting [to see] how Chozen handles that."

Watch the full interview with Okumoto above.