'Gremlins 3' Will Stick With Puppets Instead Of Using CGI (If It Ever Gets Made)

Fans of Gremlins have been asking for Gremlins 3 for a long time. In fact, it's been 25 years since Gremlins 2: The New Batch arrived, and it's about time those little monsters made a comeback. Though there's an animated series coming to HBO Max, that's a prequel story, and fans want something new with the same style as the original. The good news is, if Gremlins 3 ever gets made, director Chris Columbus fully intends to do it with practical puppets and not computer generated visual effects.

Chris Columbus has been making the publicity rounds thanks to the release of The Christmas Chronicles 2 on Netflix (and in Cinemark Theatres) this week, and that means he's been getting loads of questions about his past projects, including his thoughts on the reboot of Home Alone on Disney+, and now the potential future of the long-gestating Gremlins 3. The good news is that it sounds like Columbus is still trying to get it off the ground. The director told Collider:

"I would love to do it. I wrote a script, so there is an existing script. We're working out some rights issues right now, so we're just trying to figure out when the best time to make that film would be."

Technology has come a long way since the days of the original Gremlins movies, and many have worried that Gremlins 3 would abandon the practical puppets that make those movies work so well, adding a level of B-movie camp to the proceedings while also making the creatures truly tangible. Thankfully, Columbus wants to stick with the puppets:

"I would still do it the same way – I would do it as tangible puppets, not CGI. Maybe having — you know we had one stop-motion scene in the first Gremlins, but I don't think I'd use much CGI in Gremlins 3."

Columbus knows that they'd probably have to use CGI to pull off certain shots or to enhance the practical effects, much like the stop-motion shot that he references (which is when a bunch of Gremlins come marching down a city street), but it's good to hear that they want the creatures to primarily be done with puppetry.

Back in August of 2017, Columbus teased the screenplay, saying it was "as twisted and dark as anything." At the time, he said budgetary concerns were at the heart of the conversations about when the movie could happen. Surely that's even more important now since the coronavirus pandemic has made insurance for film productions much pricier. But whenever Gremlins 3 gets off the ground, fans will be ready, and hopefully it will be worth the wait.