🔗 Share this article

“Well, it’s rather brutal here. Our recommendation is all of our clients to put everything they’ve got into canned food and shotguns.” This piece of sage advice comes from the Brain Gremlin – a genetically modified, speaking, bespectacled member of the slick creature crowd that swarms Manhattan’s high-tech Clamp Tower skyscraper in filmmaker Joe Dante’s unhinged continuation Gremlins 2: The New Batch. At first glance, it’s simply an portfolio pointer from one monster to another. However, oddly enough, it’s also pretty solid existential counsel. Seriously, consider my perspective.

When things go bad, the biggest mistake you can do is view events with undue solemnity. The Brain Gremlin grasps this. Indeed, most of the toothy monsters that occupy Dante’s wild 1990 film (arguably his best) possess the same wry, meta funny bone regarding the hazy boundary separating everyday life and unadulterated chaos. It’s a single component of Gremlins 2: The New Batch that maintains my loyalty – and the older I get, it’s the underlying idea that strikes the deepest chord.

A Youthful Fixation

Of course, my connection with this movie wasn’t born on such an philosophical plane. In my youth, we were limited to a few battered VHS tapes at home. Part of that group were Gremlins and its second chapter, the latter housed in a chunky ex-rental box likely purchased from an off-brand video shop and sporting growling monsters on its knackered cover. I was immediately enamoured and these films wasted no time lodging themselves inside my young, susceptible psyche. Henceforth, they became an almost-daily part of my childhood viewing routine.

Dante’s original usually receives all the accolades, thanks mostly because of its reputation as a partly frightening holiday classic – and let me be clear, I’ve watched Gremlins an incalculable number of times. However, its successor rarely gets the same level of high regard, which feels criminal. As a kid, I’d never miss an opportunity to watch Gremlins 2. During bright summer vacations, I’d seclude myself indoors and stick it on. When I got my own TV-VHS combo unit, it stayed in constant rotation in my bedroom. Gradually, it became deeply rooted in my mindset. If my parents noticed this obsession, they didn’t seem to mind.

Subtler Discoveries and Cultural References

As I matured, new insights enriched frequent screenings, heightening the enjoyment of watching diminutive verdant beasts joyously wreck a New York high-rise. I learned the future-focused development mogul and Clamp Tower owner, Daniel Clamp (John Glover), was modeled closely on the later-to-be-president Donald Trump, with his ginger staff member Marla (Haviland Morris) echoing his one-time partner Marla Maples. Thankfully, Clamp demonstrates more humanity than his genuine article inspiration.

The “doomsday” video Clamp plays during peak-Gremlin chaos? I discovered it was based on a real-life “Doomsday” video created by the CNN boss Ted Turner should the world truly faced apocalypse. I noticed how Dante went out of his way to film alternate cuts of a self-aware scene where Gremlins hijack the actual feature in progress. A version for theaters, another for home video and television, each providing a grinning portion of fourth-wall-breaking cultural alchemy ahead of its time.

A Lasting Influence

While it was effects expert Rick Baker’s fantastically vile creatures that drew my gaze as a child, this deeper gold kept me hooked as an adult. In time, I even interviewed Dante about it myself and he had no reservations informing me he made the movie with the specific aim of poking fun at those who loved its absurd-yet-genuine predecessor and wanted more. “We were going to make fun of the fact you came to see it,” he gleefully confessed. This anarchic defiance and commitment to not take his sequel as solemnly as his Warner Bros bosses clearly wanted him to, only made me love it even more.

When I endured a sudden family bereavement earlier this year, I was surprised to find that, during my heightest mourning, all I desired to do was sit and watch Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Odd, no? Maybe not. The comforting familiarity it offered was necessary to weaken my mind’s sadness sludge – but the insights it had given me as an adult were just as useful.

Like Gremlins tearing apart a genetics laboratory, there’s particular aspects in life you just are powerless over. Dante is aware of it. The Brain Gremlin agrees completely. Sometimes, you have to be like them: accept the turmoil, invest all your resources into preserved goods and firearms and try not to take things too seriously.

It’s robust worldly wisdom from a very unlikely source – and it’s the reason Gremlins 2: The New Batch will eternally stand as my go-to cinematic solace.