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“Well, the situation is pretty dire here. We’re advising all of our clients to commit their entire holdings into tinned provisions and hunting rifles.” This nugget of wise counsel comes from the Brain Gremlin – a lab-engineered, speaking, glasses-wearing member of the oozy monster mob that overruns Manhattan’s ultra-modern Clamp Tower skyscraper in filmmaker Joe Dante’s zany follow-up Gremlins 2: The New Batch. At first glance, it’s merely an financial suggestion from one monster to another. But, oddly enough, it’s also surprisingly sturdy life advice. Honestly, consider my perspective.

When things go bad, the most counterproductive action you can do is view events with undue solemnity. The Brain Gremlin grasps this. Actually, most of the fang-bearing creatures that inhabit Dante’s unrestrained 1990 movie (possibly his finest) possess the same wry, meta sense of humour regarding the hazy boundary separating the mundane and absolute bedlam. It’s one element of Gremlins 2: The New Batch that keeps me coming back – and as I age, it’s the underlying idea that resonates the most.

A Childhood Fixation

Of course, my fondness for this movie wasn’t born on such an philosophical plane. As a child, we were limited to a few scratched-up video tapes at home. Included within that collection were Gremlins and its second chapter, the latter housed in a thick former-rental sleeve probably bought from an independent video outlet and boasting growling monsters on its tattered front. I was immediately enamoured and these films wasted no time inserting themselves inside my tiny, impressionable mind. From then on, they became an almost-daily part of my childhood viewing routine.

Dante’s initial installment typically gets all the accolades, thanks mostly because of its legacy as a partly frightening holiday classic – and to be fair, I’ve watched Gremlins an incalculable number of times. Nevertheless, its sequel seldom receives 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 long summer holidays, I’d lock myself inside and play it. When I got my own TV-VHS combo unit, it continued playing looped in my bedroom. Gradually, it ingrained itself in my mindset. If my parents observed this fixation, they gave no indication of concern.

Subtler Rewards and Cultural Nuggets

As I got older, new understandings rewarded multiple watches, amplifying the pleasure of watching diminutive verdant beasts joyously wreck a New York high-rise. I learned the future-focused property magnate and Clamp Tower owner, Daniel Clamp (John Glover), was inspired directly by future president Donald Trump, with his ginger staff member Marla (Haviland Morris) alluding to his former spouse Marla Maples. Fortunately, Clamp possesses greater compassion than his real-life counterpart.

The “doomsday” video Clamp plays during the height of creature carnage? I discovered it was modeled after a actual “Doomsday” video commissioned by the CNN boss Ted Turner in case the world really ended. I noticed how Dante went out of his way to film varying versions of a meta sequence where Gremlins seize control of the actual feature in progress. One for cinemas, one for VHS and TV, each providing a grinning portion of self-referential entertainment sorcery ahead of its time.

A Persistent Legacy

While it was makeup maestro Rick Baker’s gloriously nasty-looking creatures that caught my eye as a child, this deeper gold held my interest as an adult. Ultimately, I even spoke to Dante about it myself and he had no reservations telling me he made the movie with the express purpose of ridiculing those who loved its goofy-but-heartfelt predecessor and desired a sequel. “We were going to make fun of the fact you came to see it,” he gleefully confessed. This Looney Tunes-esque defiance and commitment to not take his sequel as gravely as his Warner Bros bosses clearly wanted him to, only deepened my appreciation further.

When I went through a abrupt familial death recently, I was taken aback to discover that, during my deepest grief, all I desired to do was sit and watch Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Odd, no? Perhaps not. The nostalgic calm it provided was necessary to dilute my mind’s grief morass – but the stuff it had bestowed upon me as an adult were just as useful.

Like Gremlins tearing apart a genetics laboratory, there’s certain elements in life you just are powerless over. Dante is aware of it. The Brain Gremlin agrees completely. Sometimes, you have to emulate them: welcome the pandemonium, invest all your resources into canned food and shotguns and try not to approach life with excessive gravity.

It’s robust worldly wisdom from a most improbable origin – and it’s why Gremlins 2: The New Batch will always be my comfort movie.