Warner Bros. is reviving the Gremlins franchise after more than three decades and with a couple of powerhouse names back on board.
Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav announced the greenlight of a new Gremlins film during the company’s third-quarter earnings call on Thursday.
Zaslav said Steven Spielberg is back on board as executive producer through his company Amblin Entertainment.
The 1984 original film’s writer, Chris Columbus, is also returning to produce and direct the film.
Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein, the directing duo behind this summer’s horror hit Final Destination: Bloodlines, are teaming up with Columbus to write the new feature installment, The Hollywood Reporter also reported on Thursday.
The new Gremlins movie will be released Nov. 19, 2027. Upon release, it will be the first Gremlins movie in 37 years.
The first Gremlins movie was a dark horror comedy directed by Joe Dante and introduced an adorable creature called a Mogwai that’s adopted as a pet by a suburban family. But when the creature’s caretaking rules are broken, the Mogwai multiplies into an array of destructive green killer monsters. The film was a box office hit, produced for only $11 million and grossing $151 million domestically.
The film spawned a divisive sequel — which was also directed by Dante, but not written by Columbus. Released in 1990, Gremlins 2: The New Batch was a broad comedy set in New York City that brutally satirized the original film. The film only made $41 million at the box office and effectively halted the franchise.
Warners and Amblin effectively tested modern-day interest in Gremlins with an animated series titled : Secrets of the Mogwai that was launched in 2023 and has aired two seasons on Max.
Gremlins 2 has also gained a certain level of cult appreciation since its release and has been championed by director Quentin Tarantino.
“With Gremlins 2, [Dante] was able to do a MAD Magazine take-off on the first Gremlins for the entire movie,” Tarantino said (below). “They actually start goofing on every aspect of Christopher Columbus’ original premise … and it was hysterical … it actually gets better every time you see it. It’s the first of those gag-like movies to 100 percent work from beginning to end since Airplane!”
The notion of gremlins was first conceived during the 1920s when mechanical failures in Royal Air Force aircraft were jokingly blamed on the small monsters. The term “gremlins” also entered popular culture as children’s author and RAF pilot Roald Dahl published a book called The Gremlins in 1943. Walt Disney considered adapting the project into a feature film, but it never got off the ground.