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“Well, the situation is pretty dire here. Our recommendation is all of our clients to invest all their resources into canned food and shotguns.” This piece of wise counsel comes from the Brain Gremlin – a scientifically altered, talking, bespectacled member of the slick creature crowd that swarms Manhattan’s super-smart Clamp Tower skyscraper in filmmaker Joe Dante’s unhinged continuation Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Superficially, it’s simply an portfolio pointer from one monster to another. However, oddly enough, it’s also remarkably sound existential counsel. Truly, hear me out.

When things go bad, the biggest mistake you can do is view events with undue solemnity. The Brain Gremlin grasps this. In fact, most of the toothy monsters that inhabit Dante’s chaotic 1990 feature (debateably his greatest) possess the same wry, meta comic sensibility regarding the indistinct border separating daily routine and unadulterated chaos. It’s a particular aspect of Gremlins 2: The New Batch that ensures my return – and as I age, it’s the underlying idea that echoes the loudest.

A Youthful Fixation

Naturally, my connection with this movie wasn’t born on such an philosophical plane. As a child, we only had a few scratched-up video tapes at home. Included within that collection were Gremlins and its second chapter, the latter housed in a chunky ex-rental box almost certainly acquired from an independent video outlet and sporting growling monsters on its worn-out artwork. I was instantly captivated and these films quickly proceeded inserting themselves inside my tiny, impressionable mind. From then on, they became an practically routine part of my youthful watching schedule.

Dante’s first film usually receives all the praise, thanks primarily due to its status as a semi-scary seasonal fave – and to be fair, I’ve watched Gremlins an incalculable number of times. That said, its sequel infrequently obtains the same level of elevated esteem, which feels criminal. As a kid, I’d always seize the chance to watch Gremlins 2. During bright summer vacations, I’d seclude myself indoors and stick it on. When I acquired my personal TV-VHS combo unit, it continued playing looped in my bedroom. With repetition, it etched itself permanently in my mindset. If my parents noticed this obsession, they didn’t seem to mind.

Deeper Rewards and Societal Easter Eggs

As I grew, new understandings enriched multiple watches, heightening the enjoyment of watching little green monsters joyously wreck a New York high-rise. I learned the ahead-of-its-time real estate tycoon and Clamp Tower owner, Daniel Clamp (John Glover), was based squarely upon the later-to-be-president Donald Trump, with his red-headed employee Marla (Haviland Morris) echoing his second wife Marla Maples. Thankfully, Clamp demonstrates more humanity than his genuine article inspiration.

The “doomsday” video Clamp plays during the height of creature carnage? I discovered it was inspired by a actual “Doomsday” video commissioned by the CNN boss Ted Turner in case the world truly faced apocalypse. I noticed how Dante went out of his way to film alternate cuts of a self-referential segment where Gremlins seize control of the very film you’re watching. One for cinemas, a separate one for tape and broadcast, each providing a grinning portion of meta pop-culture magic before the term was even a thing.

An Enduring Influence

While it was makeup maestro Rick Baker’s gloriously nasty-looking creatures that drew my gaze as a child, this hidden treasure kept me hooked as an adult. Eventually, I even interviewed Dante about it myself and he had no reservations revealing to me he made the movie with the express purpose of poking fun at those who loved its goofy-but-heartfelt predecessor and wanted more. “We were going to make fun of the fact you came to see it,” he happily revealed. This Looney Tunes-esque rebelliousness and determination to not take his sequel as seriously as his Warner Bros bosses evidently expected, only made me love it even more.

When I went through a unexpected loss in the family not long ago, I was taken aback to discover that, during my heightest mourning, all I wanted to do was sit and watch Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Odd, no? Possibly not. The nostalgic calm it furnished was essential to thin out my mind’s mourning mire – but the perspectives it had imparted to me as an adult were similarly beneficial.

Like Gremlins tearing apart a genetics laboratory, there’s some things in life you just are powerless over. Dante knows it. The Brain Gremlin shares this wisdom. Sometimes, you have to follow their example: accept the turmoil, invest all your resources into canned food and shotguns and try not to view the world with undue solemnity.

It’s robust worldly wisdom from a most improbable origin – and it’s why Gremlins 2: The New Batch will eternally stand as my feelgood film.