🔗 Share this article

“Well, conditions are quite harsh here. We’re advising all of our clients to commit their entire holdings into canned food and shotguns.” That bit of shrewd guidance comes from the Brain Gremlin – a lab-engineered, articulate, spectacled member of the slimy Gremlin horde that overruns Manhattan’s super-smart Clamp Tower skyscraper in helmer Joe Dante’s unhinged continuation Gremlins 2: The New Batch. At first glance, it’s nothing more than an financial suggestion from one monster to another. Yet, curiously, it’s also remarkably sound existential counsel. Honestly, listen to my reasoning.

When things go bad, the most counterproductive action you can do is view events with undue solemnity. The Brain Gremlin comprehends this. Indeed, the majority of the fang-bearing creatures that inhabit Dante’s chaotic 1990 feature (debateably his greatest) possess the same sly, self-aware comic sensibility regarding the hazy boundary separating the mundane and absolute bedlam. It’s a particular aspect of Gremlins 2: The New Batch that keeps me coming back – and as I age, it’s the message that resonates the most.

A Youthful Fixation

Understandably, my attachment to this movie didn’t start on such an introspective level. In my youth, we only had a few battered VHS tapes at home. Part of that group were Gremlins and its follow-up, the latter housed in a bulky previously-rented case almost certainly acquired from an off-brand video shop and sporting grimacing beasts on its worn-out artwork. I was immediately enamoured and these films wasted no time embedding themselves inside my small, malleable brain. From then on, they became an practically routine part of my youthful watching schedule.

Dante’s original usually receives all the accolades, thanks largely to its status as a moderately spooky festive favorite – and to be fair, I’ve watched Gremlins more times than I can count. However, its follow-up infrequently obtains the same level of high regard, which feels a travesty. As a kid, I’d invariably jump at the prospect to watch Gremlins 2. During sunny school summer breaks, I’d lock myself inside and stick it on. When I acquired my personal TV-VHS combo unit, it continued playing looped in my bedroom. Over time, it ingrained itself in my psyche. If my parents observed this fixation, they didn’t seem to mind.

Hidden Rewards and Cultural Nuggets

As I matured, new revelations enhanced frequent screenings, elevating the fun of watching diminutive verdant beasts happily vandalize a New York high-rise. I learned the forward-thinking real estate tycoon and Clamp Tower owner, Daniel Clamp (John Glover), was modeled closely on future president Donald Trump, with his auburn-haired worker Marla (Haviland Morris) echoing his second wife Marla Maples. Thankfully, Clamp has more heart than his genuine article inspiration.

The “end of civilisation” video Clamp plays during peak-Gremlin chaos? I discovered it was modeled after a genuine “Doomsday” video produced by the CNN boss Ted Turner as a contingency for the world really ended. I noticed how Dante went out of his way to film varying versions of a meta sequence where Gremlins take over the exact movie you are viewing. An edit for movie houses, one for VHS and TV, each offering a winking bit of meta pop-culture magic ahead of its time.

An Enduring Legacy

While it was creature designer Rick Baker’s fantastically vile creatures that caught my eye as a child, this deeper gold held my interest as an adult. Eventually, I even interviewed Dante about it myself and he had no hesitation informing me he made the movie with the express purpose of mocking those who loved its absurd-yet-genuine predecessor and desired a sequel. “We were going to make fun of the fact you came to see it,” he cheerfully disclosed. This Looney Tunes-esque rebelliousness and determination to not take his sequel as solemnly as his Warner Bros bosses evidently expected, only increased my affection for it.

When I endured a unexpected loss in the family recently, I was surprised to find that, during my deepest grief, all I felt compelled to do was sit and watch Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Weird, right? Possibly not. The nostalgic calm it furnished was necessary to thin out my mind’s mourning mire – but the insights it had imparted to me as an adult were just as useful.

Like Gremlins running amok in a genetics laboratory, there’s some things in life you just are powerless over. Dante is aware of it. The Brain Gremlin knows it too. Sometimes, you have to emulate them: accept the turmoil, put everything you’ve got into preserved goods and firearms and try not to take things too seriously.

It’s robust worldly wisdom from a most improbable origin – and it’s why Gremlins 2: The New Batch will eternally stand as my go-to cinematic solace.