Steven Spielberg and Chris Columbus are bringing the mischievous mogwai back to the big screen with "Gremlins 3."

Warner Bros. officially greenlit a third film in the series, which will arrive in theaters on November 19, 2027, more than 40 years after the franchise's initial theatrical release. The announcement came from Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav during the company's third-quarter earnings call on Thursday.​

Columbus, who wrote the original 1984 "Gremlins" film, will return to direct and produce the upcoming sequel. Spielberg, who served as executive producer on both earlier films through his company Amblin Entertainment, will reprise that role for the new project. Columbus will co-write the screenplay alongside Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein, the directing duo behind this year's horror hit Final Destination: Bloodlines.​

Expressing his enthusiasm for the project, Columbus stated, "I'm filled with a tremendous surge of inspiration and passion as I embark on this cinematic journey. It's an honor to reunite with Steven Spielberg and Warner Bros., as we bring this latest chapter of Gremlins to a brand new generation of moviegoers who will experience all of the thrills of this grand adventure on the big screen."​

The original "Gremlins," directed by Joe Dante, became a cultural phenomenon upon its 1984 premiere. The film followed a young man who receives a mysterious pet, a Mogwai, with three strict rules: keep it away from bright light, never let it get wet, and don't feed it after midnight. When these rules are broken, the cute creature multiplies and transforms into dangerous gremlins that terrorize a small town during Christmas. On a $15 million budget, the film grossed over $150 million in the United States alone and became one of the highest-grossing films of the era.​

The 1990 sequel, "Gremlins 2: The New Batch," also directed by Dante but without Columbus as writer, performed significantly weaker financially, earning just $41 million on a $50 million budget. This underperformance led the franchise into a prolonged dormancy that lasted for decades.​

For years, attempts to revive the franchise stalled. Columbus has been working on a "Gremlins 3" script since at least 2017 with various collaborators, but the project never moved forward. Recent developments suggest that momentum finally materialized, particularly following the success of an HBO Max animated series called "Gremlins: The Wild Batch," which launched in 2023.​

Details regarding the plot and cast for the upcoming film remain under wraps. However, Columbus previously expressed strong preferences about the production approach, emphasizing that traditional puppetry and animatronics should be used rather than complete CGI to maintain the franchise's original charm.

Tags
Steven Spielberg, Sequel