How Gremlins Went From Fairy Stories to Warplanes to Hollywood Legend

Today the impish creatures known as gremlins are best known from Joe Dante’s 1984 horror hit Gremlins and its 1990 sequel. Though their origin begins in the deep reaches of Western mythology, they really distinguished themselves during the first half of the 20th century, when they came to represent everything that could and would go wrong with modern technology.