🔗 Share this article

“Well, conditions are quite harsh here. The guidance we offer all of our clients to commit their entire holdings into tinned provisions and hunting rifles.” This nugget of sage advice comes from the Brain Gremlin – a scientifically altered, articulate, glasses-wearing member of the slimy Gremlin horde that overruns Manhattan’s high-tech Clamp Tower skyscraper in filmmaker Joe Dante’s unhinged continuation Gremlins 2: The New Batch. On the surface, it’s simply an investment tip from one monster to another. Yet, in a strange manner, it’s also surprisingly sturdy life advice. Truly, listen to my reasoning.

When things go bad, the worst thing you can do is view events with undue solemnity. The Brain Gremlin grasps this. In fact, most of the toothy monsters that populate Dante’s unrestrained 1990 movie (debateably his greatest) possess the same knowing, self-referential funny bone regarding the indistinct border separating everyday life and absolute bedlam. It’s one element 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.

An Early Life Fixation

Naturally, my connection with this movie did not begin on such an deeply thoughtful note. Growing up, we only had a few battered VHS tapes at home. Part of that group were Gremlins and its sequel, the latter housed in a chunky ex-rental box likely purchased from an non-chain rental store and sporting grimacing beasts on its knackered cover. I was immediately enamoured and these films did not delay inserting themselves inside my tiny, impressionable mind. After that point, they became an practically routine part of my childhood viewing routine.

Dante’s initial installment typically gets all the praise, thanks primarily due to its reputation as a semi-scary seasonal fave – and to be fair, I’ve watched Gremlins an incalculable number of times. That said, its successor infrequently obtains the same level of elevated esteem, 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 remained on repeat in my bedroom. With repetition, it ingrained itself in my mindset. If my parents observed this fixation, they appeared unbothered.

Deeper Rewards and Pop-Culture References

As I got older, new revelations enriched repeat viewings, heightening the enjoyment of watching diminutive verdant beasts gleefully trash a New York high-rise. I learned the ahead-of-its-time property magnate and Clamp Tower owner, Daniel Clamp (John Glover), was inspired directly by the eventual commander-in-chief Donald Trump, with his ginger staff member Marla (Haviland Morris) echoing his one-time partner Marla Maples. Fortunately, Clamp possesses greater compassion than his genuine article inspiration.

The “end of civilisation” video Clamp plays during peak-Gremlin chaos? I discovered it was modeled after a actual “Doomsday” video produced by the CNN boss Ted Turner in case the world really ended. I noticed how Dante went out of his way to film alternate cuts of a meta sequence where Gremlins seize control of the very film you’re watching. One for cinemas, a separate one for tape and broadcast, each offering a winking bit of fourth-wall-breaking cultural alchemy before the term was even a thing.

A Persistent Legacy

While it was makeup maestro Rick Baker’s gloriously nasty-looking creatures that caught my eye as a child, this hidden treasure held my interest as an adult. Eventually, I even conversed with Dante about it myself and he had no qualms revealing to me he made the movie with the specific aim of ridiculing those who loved its silly-yet-sincere predecessor and craved further installments. “We were going to make fun of the fact you came to see it,” he happily revealed. This cartoonish defiance and resolve to not take his sequel as solemnly as his Warner Bros bosses evidently expected, only made me love it even more.

When I endured a abrupt familial death not long ago, I was astonished to realize that, during my most profound sorrow, all I wanted to do was sit and watch Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Strange, isn’t it? Perhaps not. The nostalgic calm it furnished was essential to weaken my mind’s sadness sludge – but the perspectives it had imparted to me as an adult were similarly beneficial.

Like Gremlins rampaging through a genetics laboratory, there’s certain elements in life you just are powerless over. Dante is aware of it. The Brain Gremlin knows it too. Sometimes, you have to be like them: accept the turmoil, invest all your resources into preserved goods and firearms and try not to approach life with excessive gravity.

It’s robust worldly wisdom from a very unlikely source – and it’s the reason Gremlins 2: The New Batch will always be my feelgood film.