How TV ’toon Gremlins: Secrets Of The Mogwai rewrites the franchise rulebook…
THE MOGWAI
You think you might know the Gremlins rules (no water, bright lights, midnight feasting). But there’s one you don’t: never compare Gizmo to Baby Yoda, a stricture recently broken by Joe Dante, director of the 1984 original, to his cost. “I got a lot of criticism,” he laughs about making the connection. “But if you put the two designs together, it’s pretty obvious where one came from and where the other came from.”
Thirty-three years after his last outing, Gizmo is back in animated origin story Gremlins: Secrets Of The Mogwai, with Dante serving as consulting producer. Unlike the puppet version, ’toon Gizmo is highly mobile, the plot propelling him across 1920s China to return to his homeplace, aided by Sam Wing (Izaac Wang), who grows up to be the shopkeeper in the original film. “Because Gizmo is on the move, he has to be in bright light, which is against the rules of Gremlins,” explains showrunner Tze Chun. “You constantly have to come up with innovative ways to shield him.”
Dante and exec producer Steven Spielberg encouraged Chun to take “big swings” in crafting Mogwai history, to the extent the show has added a fourth rule to Gremlins lore. “It really serves as an engine for the series,” teases Chun. “It’s a reason why everybody is after Gizmo.”
GREMLINS
Chief Gizmo-chaser is Riley Greene (Matthew Rhys), a p
