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“Well, it’s rather brutal here. We’re advising all of our clients to commit their entire holdings into preserved goods and firearms.” This piece of wise counsel comes from the Brain Gremlin – a lab-engineered, articulate, spectacled member of the slick creature crowd that overruns Manhattan’s super-smart Clamp Tower skyscraper in director Joe Dante’s unhinged continuation Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Superficially, it’s simply an investment tip from one monster to another. But, curiously, it’s also pretty solid life advice. Seriously, consider my perspective.

When situations deteriorate, the worst thing you can do is view events with undue solemnity. The Brain Gremlin grasps this. Actually, the majority of the fang-bearing creatures that populate Dante’s unrestrained 1990 movie (possibly his finest) possess the same sly, self-aware comic sensibility regarding the indistinct border separating everyday life and absolute bedlam. It’s a particular aspect of Gremlins 2: The New Batch that keeps me coming back – and the older I get, it’s the theme that strikes the deepest chord.

An Early Life Obsession

Of course, my attachment to this movie didn’t start on such an introspective level. As a child, we only had a few battered VHS tapes at home. Included within that collection were Gremlins and its sequel, the latter housed in a bulky previously-rented case likely purchased from an off-brand video shop and featuring grimacing beasts on its worn-out artwork. I was right away smitten and these films quickly proceeded inserting themselves inside my young, susceptible psyche. After that point, they became an practically routine part of my early years entertainment regimen.

Dante’s original usually receives all the praise, thanks largely to its legacy as a moderately spooky festive favorite – and to be fair, I’ve watched Gremlins an incalculable number of times. That said, its sequel seldom receives 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 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 became deeply rooted in my mental framework. If my parents observed this fixation, they appeared unbothered.

Hidden Rewards and Societal Nuggets

As I got older, new insights enriched repeat viewings, amplifying the pleasure of watching little green monsters happily vandalize a New York high-rise. I learned the forward-thinking real estate tycoon and Clamp Tower owner, Daniel Clamp (John Glover), was inspired directly by the eventual commander-in-chief Donald Trump, with his red-headed employee Marla (Haviland Morris) alluding to his former spouse Marla Maples. Thankfully, Clamp has more heart than his real-life counterpart.

The “doomsday” video Clamp plays during maximum monster mayhem? I discovered it was based on a real-life “Doomsday” video commissioned by the CNN boss Ted Turner as a contingency for the world really ended. I noticed how Dante took extra pains to film varying versions of a meta sequence where Gremlins take over the exact movie you are viewing. One for cinemas, another for home video and television, each offering a winking bit 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 captured my attention as a child, this deeper gold held my interest as an adult. In time, I even interviewed Dante about it myself and he had no qualms telling me he made the movie with the direct intention of poking fun at those who loved its absurd-yet-genuine predecessor and craved further installments. “We were going to make fun of the fact you came to see it,” he cheerfully disclosed. This anarchic insubordination and determination to not take his sequel as seriously as his Warner Bros bosses evidently expected, only increased my affection for it.

When I endured a unexpected loss in the family recently, I was surprised to find that, during my heightest mourning, all I wanted to do was sit and watch Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Strange, isn’t it? Possibly not. The comforting familiarity it offered was essential to dilute my mind’s mourning mire – but the stuff it had bestowed upon me as an adult were just as useful.

Like Gremlins running amok in a genetics laboratory, there’s some things in life you just can’t control. Dante knows it. The Brain Gremlin knows it too. Sometimes, you have to be like them: embrace the chaos, commit your entire being into preserved goods and firearms and try not to view the world with undue solemnity.

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