Chris Columbus, writer of the original Gremlins, confirmed that the next installment of the Gremlins franchise will be a reboot.
In an interview with Metro US, while discussing the possibilities of a Goonies sequel, Columbus stated, “Gremlins we are actively talking about that. So that’s what I’m working on with my production company 1492 Pictures. It will almost definitely be a reboot.”
However, this would not be the first time that a reboot has been talked about for the franchise. In 2013, Vulture.com reported that Warner Bros. met with Amblin Entertainment, the rights holders for Gremlins, about potentially rebooting the franchise. After this meeting, Warner Bros. hired Seth Grahame-Smith, writer of The Lego Batman Movie, to produce the movie with David Katzenberg, producer of It (2017).
In 2015, Grahame-Smith gave an interview with Entertainment Weekly about the project at the time, and stated, “I think we ran out of steam, everybody got busy doing other things.”
This quote essentially killed the idea of a reboot of the 1984 classic getting made. Later that year, star of the original film Zach Galligan announced that a Gremlins movie was going to be made, but it would be a sequel, not a reboot. Galligan again spoke about the potential Gremlins 3 with BleedingCool.com stating that Warner Bros., Steven Spielberg and Columbus wanted to make it and erase the memory of Gremlins 2: The New Batch. Galligan even claimed that the film was being written by Carl Ellsworth, writer of Disturbia and The Last House on the Left. Columbus himself spoke about the third Gremlins film by saying it would be “twisted and dark.”
There is no official release date yet, and there is no official writer and director attached to the project. Columbus does not seem to be the prime candidate to direct since he will be directing the movie adaptation of Five Nights at Freddy’s for Blumhouse Pictures.
