After years of talk about a potential third Gremlins movie, there was more surprising news back in 2019 about an animated prequel to the original that would chart how Sam Wing (seen as the old shopkeeper in the first movie) first encountered Gizmo. The main cast has now been announced for the series, and Ming-Na Wen, BD Wong and Matthew Rhys will lead it.
Along with a teenage street thief named Elle, Sam (Izaac Wang) and Gizmo take a perilous journey through the Chinese countryside, encountering, and sometimes battling, colorful monsters and spirits from Chinese folklore. On their quest to return Gizmo to his family and uncover a legendary treasure, they are pursued by a power-hungry industrialist and his growing army of evil Gremlins.
Sam’s mother, Fong Wing, will be voiced by Wen, and his father, Hon Wing, will be voiced by Wong. Sam’s mom is described as a doctor of Chinese medicine who is “resourceful, slyly funny and fiercely protective of her family,” while his dad is characterized as a “calm rock” that has “never believed his father-in-law’s tales of magic and adventure.” The elder of the Wing family, known only as Grandpa, is voiced by James Hong. He claims to have traveled the world on grand adventures and he alone knows the true power (and secrets) of the Mogwai and the importance of protecting them. Gizmo will be voiced by AJ LoCascio. Rhys voices nemesis Riley Greene, a power-hungry English industrialist and treasure hunter who wields black magic that is determined to stop at nothing in his pursuit of Gizmo and the mythical treasure of the Mogwai.
Tze Chun is overseeing the show, which should hit screens this year. Should it be a success, you can bet that Warners will seriously look again at pulling the lever to make the new Gremlins film. Gizmo, meanwhile, has already been back on our screens, appearing alongside Billy Peltzer himself (Zach Galligan) in a new ad for Mountain Dew that you can find below.