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“Well, conditions are quite harsh here. We’re advising all of our clients to put everything they’ve got into canned food and shotguns.” This nugget of sage advice comes from the Brain Gremlin – a lab-engineered, articulate, bespectacled member of the oozy monster mob that infests Manhattan’s super-smart Clamp Tower skyscraper in director Joe Dante’s zany follow-up Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Superficially, it’s merely an portfolio pointer from one monster to another. However, curiously, it’s also remarkably sound existential counsel. Seriously, consider my perspective.

When life takes a turn for the worse, the biggest mistake you can do is view events with undue solemnity. The Brain Gremlin understands this. Actually, a large portion of the dentally-gifted beasts that inhabit Dante’s wild 1990 film (debateably his greatest) possess the same sly, self-aware sense of humour regarding the hazy boundary separating daily routine and absolute bedlam. It’s a single component of Gremlins 2: The New Batch that maintains my loyalty – and with the passage of time, it’s the theme that resonates the most.

An Early Life Fixation

Of course, my fondness for this movie did not begin on such an philosophical plane. In my youth, we only had a few battered VHS tapes at home. Among them were Gremlins and its sequel, the latter housed in a thick former-rental sleeve likely purchased from an independent video outlet and boasting snarling creatures on its knackered cover. I was immediately enamoured and these films wasted no time embedding themselves inside my young, susceptible psyche. From then on, they became an practically routine part of my childhood viewing routine.

Dante’s original typically gets all the accolades, thanks mostly because of its status as a semi-scary seasonal fave – and to be fair, I’ve watched Gremlins more times than I can count. That said, its follow-up infrequently obtains the same level of lofty appreciation, which feels criminal. As a kid, I’d invariably jump at the prospect to watch Gremlins 2. During bright summer vacations, I’d lock myself inside and play it. When I acquired my personal TV-VHS combo unit, it stayed in constant rotation in my bedroom. Gradually, it ingrained itself in my psyche. If my parents noticed this obsession, they gave no indication of concern.

Hidden Delights and Societal Nuggets

As I grew, new understandings enriched repeat viewings, heightening the enjoyment of watching small emerald creatures gleefully trash a New York high-rise. I learned the ahead-of-its-time development mogul and Clamp Tower owner, Daniel Clamp (John Glover), was inspired directly by the later-to-be-president Donald Trump, with his ginger staff member Marla (Haviland Morris) echoing his one-time partner Marla Maples. Thankfully, Clamp possesses greater compassion than his actual-world equivalent.

The “end of civilisation” video Clamp plays during peak-Gremlin chaos? I discovered it was modeled after a real-life “Doomsday” video commissioned by the CNN boss Ted Turner in case the world really ended. I noticed how Dante made a special effort to film varying versions of a meta sequence where Gremlins take over the very film you’re watching. One for cinemas, another for home video and television, each providing a grinning portion of meta pop-culture magic before the term was even a thing.

An Enduring Appeal

While it was creature designer Rick Baker’s wonderfully grotesque creatures that captured my attention as a child, this subsurface richness maintained my fascination as an adult. Ultimately, I even spoke to Dante about it myself and he had no qualms revealing to me he made the movie with the express purpose of poking fun at 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 gleefully confessed. This cartoonish defiance and resolve to not take his sequel as gravely as his Warner Bros bosses evidently expected, only made me love it even more.

When I experienced a abrupt familial death recently, I was astonished to realize that, during my deepest grief, all I wanted to do was sit and watch Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Weird, right? Perhaps not. The soothing reminiscence it furnished was essential to dilute my mind’s grief morass – but the stuff it had imparted to me as an adult were just as useful.

Like Gremlins rampaging through a genetics laboratory, there’s some things in life you just are powerless over. Dante is aware of it. The Brain Gremlin shares this wisdom. Sometimes, you have to follow their example: welcome the pandemonium, commit your entire being 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 eternally stand as my feelgood film.