Inspector Gadget/WMG

'Current' Gadget (robot) contains the uploaded mind of 'Original' Gadget (Human)
Unfortunately either due to some problem with the upload process or the trauma of waking up as a machine caused Current gadget to have a mental breakdown. Only though installing numerous mental blocks and false memories (damaging his intelligence in the process)could he function again. He is now kept due to his strange effectiveness and to take care of Penny, who probably lost her parents to MAD. Original Gadget is either dead or a vegetable. Those who know keep quiet to honour original Gadget's memory.

Gadget was once a really intelligent cop (not a Cowboy Cop); whatever gave him more artificial body parts than RoboCop also affected his IQ.
Given that the propeller that he uses to fly comes out of the top of his head, it seems unnervingly likely that something had to come out in order to make room for it.

Gadget is Maxwell Smart after a horrible accident.
Same voice, same personality, same general level of effectiveness.

Gadget's seeming Obfuscating Stupidity is a Restraining Bolt.
It would make the most sense; if you have a cyborg who can do just about anything, and put him in INTERPOL, you'd want to do something to keep the other cops/agents useful, right? In order to keep Gadget from becoming too effective (a la RoboCop), Prof. Von Slickstein intentionally made him a bit of a ditz.

Gadget himself is just a diversion; the real agents are Penny and Brain.
Penny carries the Computer Book and radio watch, cutting edge technology far beyond Gadget's...er...gadgets. (Remember, this was in the 1980s, before laptops and cellphones existed on a mass scale). Brain is an artificially enhanced animal for urban recon, and he is clearly trained in espionage and a myriad of other skills.

The formula is this: MAD starts its scheme; Inspector Gadget loudly charges in and gets MAD to reveal their hand; meanwhile, Brain and Penny get to work. This is intentional.

Clearly, Police Chief Quimby is in on this. Penny can contact him at any time to bring in the cavalry, and he never asks why the same little girl every single time is on the line.
 * In the second series, Inspector Gadget and the Gadgetinis, it's revealed that, eventually, Brain retired because of trauma induced by taking shots for (and from) Gadget, and now lives in a riverfront house. That's not what people do with pets. That's retirement with honors for a shell-shocked officer. Brain is also fully capable of speaking with humans because of a special collar Penny gave him -- technology far beyond Gadget's.

Gadget is the diversion and is a lot smarter than he looks; he is Obfuscating Stupidity so Penny can accomplish the mission.
Penny and Brain are the real agents, but they aren't aware that they're the real agents. When Penny is in real danger, Gadget actively saves her without fail. This shows both that Penny and Brain are incredibly important and that Gadget can be quite clever.

Penny and Brain are being trained to become agents, but they don't know it.

Gadget is also trying to protect his niece from Dr. Claw and MAD. He could stop being "always on duty" if he wanted to, but he keeps it up so he can remain Penny's backup.

Dr. Claw is Soundwave from Transformers.
Related to the theory that Cobra Commander is Starscream in a Pretender shell. Soundwave decided to start up his own side business as well. Madcat is Ravage.

Chief Quimby is Immortal
Chief Quimby has had one too many No One Could Survive That moments to be a normal police officer. He may even be a cyborg himself, since any minor injuries he suffers at Gadget's hands are always gone by the end of the episode.
 * He probably has Charles Atlas Superpower.

Inspector Gadget is unconsciously trying to kill Chief Quimby
M.A.D. operatives tried to alter/condition/program Gadget to serve their nefarious purposes, to extract revenge by turning an impediment into an instrument. Unfortunately for M.A.D., they were only able to program the kill Quimby directive.
 * Fortunately, Gadget failed in that.
 * Alternately, this is related to the theory at the top of the page. Human!Gadget's consciousness is attempting to get revenge on the guy who allowed him to become a machine.

Chief Quimby is Dr. Claw.
He uses a voice modulator whenever he dons the gauntlet. (You didn't think that was anyone's natural voice, did you?) He uses his network of M.A.D. tunnels to get wherever Gadget is and then gives him an exploding note in an attempt to assassinate him.
 * This troper and his brother once thought the same thing.
 * That has merit, because Quimby is always right there at the end, too - even if Gadget was around the world from Metro City.
 * However, there's an episode where we see Dr. Claw holding Quimby hostage with both of them talking to each other.
 * Robot double. He's talking to himself.

Dr. Claw is Chief Quimby.
It may be that Quimby got sick of his incompetent subordinate and created M.A.D. for the sole purpose of killing Gadget, inspired by Inspector Clouseau's boss. It may be that Quimby has multiple personalities.
 * Alternately, see MAD is a front operation, below.
 * Not really a WMG. At the end of the closing credits, Quimby/Klaw walks right up to Gadget and tell him, to his face, that he’ll get him "next time."
 * When Penny and Brain walks up he's giving them a shifty look.
 * However, there's an episode where we see Dr. Claw holing Quimby hostage with both of them talking to each other.
 * Robot double. He's talking to himself. (He's not sane.)

Gadget's bizarre behavior, personality quirks and obliviousness are symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder from the accident that took his limbs and the shock of waking up not fully human.
His lack of control over his Gadget parts is because, subconsciously, he does not accept that they are part of him.

He displays a fear of needles in one And Knowing Is Half the Battle segment despite having metal skin. He simply does not believe that he is a cyborg, and throws himself into his work as an attempt to compensate --"Inspector Gadget is always on duty!" His unacknowledged hatred for his inhuman condition leads him to sabotage himself every time.
 * This was the way it worked in the first live action movie with Matthew Broderick.
 * Except when Penny is in danger.
 * Notice in the "Coo-Coo Clock Caper" episode where a device is making all of his gadgets act up, he says "I think there's something wrong with my gadgets." Not "there's something wrong with me" or just "there's something wrong." He refers to the gadgets as a separate entity, despite them being a key component of who he is and what he does. Even though they're integrated into him and his identity as an inspector he still talks about them as though they were completely separate and have no impact on his self-identity.

MAD is a front operation designed to keep Gadget busy.
M.A.D. is a diversion. Quimby is working both ends of a con, playing both the crook and the cop. He sends Gadget (and probably other elite detectives) into deathtraps to try to eliminate them, each deathtrap corresponding to some harebrained "M.A.D. scheme." At the end of the mission, Quimby shows up with his "officers" and "arrests" the M.A.D. agents -- but he's just taking the agents back to HQ to plan the next caper.

This is why it always seems to be the same couple of guys working for M.A.D. -- it IS the same couple of guys. Quimby can re-use them because Gadget is a Cloudcuckoolander.)

MAD is winning on percentages.
We don't see the crimes M.A.D. commits that Inspector Gadget isn't involved with, but Dr. Claw seems to be spectacularly well-funded and supplied with infinite goon resources.

How? Simple. M.A.D. has a 95% success rate on its criminal capers, only losing when they try something too audacious and Gadget is able to shut them down. It is an international organization, after all; it probably conducts multiple operations at the same time. Even if Gadget destroys every M.A.D. plan he comes in contact with (thus explaining Dr. Claw's ire towards him), that's only a small fraction of their overall activities.
 * Gadget can't be the only operative working against M.A.D. Maybe MAD generally breaks even.

Gadget is not a cyborg, but a robot
Ignore The Movie and maybe Gadget Boy and Heather -- it's not that hard.

This would clear up so many strange things: his name, his lack of background, and his constant misunderstandings of how the world works.

Either he was a once-in-a-lifetime achievement of technology, or Penny (who obviously built him) had her funding cut after the sources were unimpressed with Gadget's AI. (You can't blame them.) Nevertheless, they work with what they've got. With Penny's supervision, Brain's assistance, and Gadget's own sheer dumb luck, he works fairly well.

The Gadgetinis are an improvement on the technology, with less equipment but much better AI.

With everything that goes on, Penny may be a literal Gadgeteer Genius who has to scrounge together whatever she can get. The eccentric but effective force of Gadget is the result. She designated him as her 'Uncle' after losing her parents (probably to MAD).


 * Alternately, the doctor that made Gadget a 'Cyborg' made him. The reason Penny thinks he's her uncle is he knew from government records from tests her parents were told to take her to an early age that she is increadibly gifted. When her parents died he took the opportunity to put his new creation into an intelligent family by telling a grieving, emotionally weak child this was her fake, long lost uncle. This, in addition to Gadget's stupidity, is make him think he still has his humanity and want to protect people. It also explains his bouts of hyper competency. He is programmed to be that good, but early experiments of the good doctor's all rebeled and saw themselves superior. Maybe even Claw is one.

Gadget is an undercover agent for a massive global secret agency, and he's training Penny.
Think about this one: Gadget is a cyborg, possessing highly advanced cybernetics, from the 1980s. He must have cost billions.

Think some minor metropolitan police department can afford that kind of cash? In the 1980s? No detective is worth that much, not even the competent geniuses.

Gadget must have held some Big Secret that made it worth keeping him alive at any cost when he had his accident.

He keeps up his Too Dumb to Live persona as a cover: he can travel to all sorts of exotic locations under the guise of "stopping MAD" to perform his real missions. Ever wonder why he can travel to different countries and execute investigations freely when he's a city detective? Sadly for us viewers, the real missions remain classified.

Quimby is his handler.

Penny is a genius, which is exactly what this unspecified global agency needs. Penny and Brain are allowed to "stow away" everywhere and "save" her bumbling uncle, giving her ample training without letting her know that she's being trained. Where do you think her computer book, a computer so advanced that it can hack mechanical things such as (1980s) helicopters and doors, came from?

And Brain? As mentioned above, he is either genetically engineered or trained to be the perfect assistant to a member of this agency.

Penny and Brain are in no actual danger. "MAD" is either a whole cloth fiction of this agency, or a bumbling crime syndicate led by an insane Bond Villain obsessed "mastermind" who's useful as a training tool but poses no real danger. If Penny ever gets in real trouble, then notice how Gadget suddenly becomes hypercompetent, quickly extracting her with barely a word before going back to bumbling wackiness.
 * This agency is known by many names across the world, but it's best known by the name of its United States branch:... CONTROL.

Penny is currently working for the Los Angeles division of the agency under an assumed name.
The same world-wide organization designed for human protection would, having seen the success they achieved training Penny to become a super-spy, immediately repeat the experiment with two other young women who they've been tracking. All they need do is give Penny an assumed name, insert her into Beverly Hills and send her group up against colorful lunatic villains.

Gadget is not a cyborg. He is a modern day elemental, channeling the spirit of modern technology.
The story, as it has been retold by Inspector Gadget, is that he was gifted with his cybernetic implants by one Professor Slickstein in order to battle Dr. Claw and the forces of MAD. This is not true. As a human police officer, the man who would become Inspector Gadget went to investigate threats against the professor's life. He discovered, quite accidentally, that the Professor was in fact an agent of MAD, and the danger he was in was fabricated to give him an excuse to go into hiding. When he was found out, Slickstein knocked out the policeman and set his house ablaze. In his death, his spirit fused with the technology in Slickstein's lab, creating for him a body made from random electronic parts, and making him the avatar for the spirit of technology. This is how a cyborg as advanced as he could possibly exist in the 1980s, and why he seems to have a limitless supply of gadgets that couldn't possibly fit in his body. He subconsciously reshapes his parts to create almost any tool needed for a given situation. His technopathy also extends to the Gadgetmobile. He crafted the false memory of Slickstein giving him his gadgets to cope with the trauma.
 * Hmm, I quite like that. It dovetails in with another theory I have:
 * How do you explain Professor Von Slickstein showing up in the series as a good guy, then?

Besides being a cyborg, Gadget also wears nanotech-infused clothing.
It's been stated that many of Gadget's gadgets are inside his hat--the Copter Propellor, for one. Therefore, it and other objects must NOT come from inside his head. If it's just a normal hat, and if the gadgets don't exist inside him, where do they come from? ANSWER: the hat has a lining of nanotechnology that "shapes" itself into whatever gadget he calls upon. See the animated movie "Lupin the Third: Dead or Alive." The main story concerns some very Gadget-like technology.
 * That would explain the Magic Skirt-like properties his trench coat seems to have. Seriously, that thing stays up nearly every time he lands on his head.

The dog (Brain, is it?) is not a real dog.
He is alt. universe Agent Salad. From the Monty Python sketch "Mr. Nutrino"

The entire show is Inspector Gadget's Dying Dream.
Gravely wounded in the line of duty, he volunteered for an experimental cyborg conversion project-- which failed. He died on the operating table.

Inspector Gadget used to be Maxwell Smart.
Maxwell Smart somehow got to the point where he almost died, but then they turned him into a cyborg. He basically forgot about his previous job with CONTROL and was sent to live with his neice...

"Doctor Claw" is the secret identity of a famous and widely recognizable real-life person.
Doctor Claw's face is never shown, and his voice is obviously disguised. Why? Because we would recognize him. There is a easily recognizable celebrity, perhaps in the world of entertainment or politics, that is leading this crime and terror organization from the shadows.
 * My personal bet in roughly 1986 would have been then-US Vice President George H.W. Bush, but...
 * ...too easy.
 * Wrong. It's obviously Nick Briggs.

Doctor Claw is the original Gadget
He was horribly mangled and deformed by the incident, which is why he never shows his face. The MCPD gave him up as a lost cause and built a robot to replace him. Maimed, unpersoned and forced into a life of crime, you'd want to destroy your duplicate too, wouldn't you? It makes the story a lot more depressing, but don't worry. Claw will get the impostor... next time!
 * Funny, IG character designer Brian Lemay thinks exactly the same thing.

Doctor Claw is Black Doom
The mechanical claw, the deep, rumbling voice, the seeming omnipresence, the apparently limitless agents...it all makes sense. MAD is the front organization for Black Arms, a terrorist organization led by an Eldritch Abomination. The goofy MAD thugs aren't human. Claw (nee Black Doom) imparts them with a morphic illusion belying their true, alien nature.

Doctor Claw is Nibbler
He's keeping himself busy while waiting for Fry to become the chosen one

Doctor Claw is Penny
Penny's parents are dead and her only living relative is Inspector Gadget. Unfortunately, if Gadget cannot maintain a steady job and income, Penny will be taken away and placed in an orphanage. To prevent this, Penny created the persona of Dr. Claw to "menace" the city and get Chief Quimby to maintain Gadget's job. Thus, Penny hires competent, but not * too* competent, henchman to menace Gadget and make him seem more effective than he really is. Thus, Gadget has job security and Penny can stay with her uncle.

Doctor Claw is Penny's father
Once upon a time Dr. Claw was an ordinary yet brilliant man with a wife and young child. He is also greedy and decides to use his genius to become rich, so he begins to set up the foundations of a criminal empire. Now as far as Penny knows both her parents died in an accident of some kind. Probably a car accident. Except it wasn't a car accident; it was a car intentional. The accident was actually a failed attempt on her father's life that only succeeded in killing her mother. Her father, now scarred by the incident, uses this as an opportunity to fake the dead and continue to build his empire using the new persona Dr. Claw. He has no contact with Penny because he knows if it became public knowledge the two were related she would end up like her mom. Also, he doesn't know anything about raising kids. This also means Gadget's sister was Claw's wife. Gadget, being Gadget, drove the poor man insane while the couple were dating and was a pain in the neck at the wedding. Probably the honeymoon too. Gadget of course is oblivious to this, yet still manages to annoy the crap out of his brother-in-law without even knowing it. Penny got her smarts from her dad and Claw is aware of her interference in his plans, yet whenever she is captured he orders his henchmen only to restrain her. He claims it is because even evil has standards and M.A.D. gains no profit from harming children, but in reality he doesn't want to see his daughter hurt. He DOES want Gadget dead though. His bumbling idiocy is an nuisance and his continued existence drives Claw up the wall. Look at his reaction in any episode, Gadget annoys him on a personal level.

In an alternate world, Penny was Dr. K from Power Rangers RPM
This is mainly due to their shared electronics skills. The difference between them is that Penny had her Uncle to step in and stop Alphabet Soup.

Inspector Gadget is a TimeLord.
And he's his own TARDIS.

Dr. Claw used to be Gadget Claw, one of Inspector Gadget's gadgets.
He was given artificial intelligence and went rogue. Quimby is pissed at Gadget and wants him to clean up his own mess.
 * No wonder we only ever see Dr. Claw's hand. That's all there is of him.

Gadget is a robot, and so are Penny and Brain!
Gadget's a flawed prototype for a line of Spy Bots, foisted on to a different department for "field testing". Quimby puts up with him because the G-Men tell him to. When they designed Gadget they went whole hog on built in tools and equipment, but this led to hardware and software efficiency issues which resulted in the majority of Gadget's CPU cycles being spent on executing system functions leaving him with little brainpower to actually THINK with. Realizing that cool gear means jack when you have only ten decahertz to think with meant they radically altered their design goals, now aiming to streamline the design to produce a cooperative network of units, each competent at a specific function. The result was Penny, the Radio Watch, the Computer Book, and Brain. Penny is in fact the next generation of their AI research. When creating her they focused exclusively on providing her with brainpower, necessitating a "no frills" body plan. Next in intelligence is Brain, an autonomous drone for in-field work designed to look like a dog. The third most intelligent unit in the system is the Comp Book, which in actuality is an advanced security hacker with no self awareness coding. The radio watch is just a radio watch. The department budget was exhausted by this point, so actual testing was foisted on a lesser Law Enforcement Department. They're all programmed to think they are real for fear of a robot uprising. Any system maintenance or upgrades are wiped from their memory banks. By the time of Gadget and the Gadgetinis the Brain unit is retired due to age. Penny has been upgraded and fitted with revised software, giving her the ability to create drones fitting the needs of the mission more closely than before.

Penny is being trained to be a Red Ranger.
Penny IS being secretly trained, but it's not to be a secret agent, it's to be a power ranger. Specifically a red ranger, since she always wears red and by then she'd have a lot of experience in both fighting evil and leadership(she does tell Brain what to do). Her watch is a multi-purpose morpher with the actual morphing capabilities locked(or requiring a second device to do so). The martial arts training will come when she gets a bit older. Atsuko will likely be the pink ranger. GO GO GADGET RANGERS

Dr. Claw is nothing more than a bomb.
Speaks for itself, really. Just see the opening credits.

Gadget is subconsciously repressing his own intelligence.
This is similar to the whole "traumatized by becoming a cyborg" theory above. Basically, Gadget used to be a real smart guy before he became a cyborg (this is where he originally got the reputation of being a great detective), and when he did, he couldn't accept it, maybe even didn't consider himself human anymore. In order to preserve what sanity/happiness/peace of mind/what-have you he had left, he subconsciously "buried" some of his own intelligence, kind of like how someone might "bury" a traumatic memory; without his intelligence, he couldn't understand the ramifications of being a cyborg, and thus minimized further trauma. His intelligence is only unlocked in two situations: Those "papa wolf" moments when he realizes Penny is in danger, and when something would actually challenge him (like when he invents new gadgets for himself. How much electrics/electronics/computer science/cybernetics/robotics would he have to know to even make something that moves properly, let alone a gadget that almost works!?) -- in both these situations, he is not able to reflect on his physical status and what it means as he is busy doing something else.

The gadgets are named after Gadget.
How many other cyborgs do you see running around in the Inspector Gadget canon? Yeah, I thought so. So basically, after Gadget got into his accident and was being a vegetable/immobilized/something like that in a hospital bed somewhere, Von Slickstein (either prior friends with Gadget, or impressed by something he'd done) came forward with the idea to give him enhanced cybernetic (or bionic, as they say in the show) prosthetics tailored toward his job. Perhaps there had been cyborgs before, but their prosthetics were only replacements, not enhancements. Perhaps he'd tried enhanced stuff before, but it hadn't worked for whatever reason. Either way, Gadget was the first successful (successful meaning he could live a relatively normal life) cyborg of his kind, and whatever system Slickstein used came to be known under Gadget's name, formally or informally.
 * Because "Go go Slickstein Copter" just doesn't have the same ring to it.

The reason Brain is so intelligent is because, well, he's Gadget's Brain.
When Gadget's mind is being uploaded into the computer they found that only a portion of his mind could be stored so they stuck the rest in the collar. Gadget has all the personality of the happy-go-lucky uncle and Brain has the skills of a hard shelled cop who plays by his own rules.

Gadget, Penny and Brain are working as a Team
This is going with Gadget Obfuscating Stupidity and Penny and Brain being the real agents. They and Chief Quimby exchange information by talking in a very, very complicated code. For example, in the Sleeping Gas episode when Penny and Brain hide in Gadget's luggage, when Gadget complains of the sack being too heavy, he's actually telling Penny/Brain that they've got and arm or leg sticking into his back. In the circus episode, when Penny suggests that the Ringmaster and the clown are the MAD agents and Gadget disagrees with her, he's actually agreeing with her and instructing her to keep an eye on them. Also in the circus episode, when Brain saves Gadget from the trapeeze act, Gadget is critizing Brain for making himself too obvious... So, yeah.

Brain is smarter than your average dog because he's a rescued science experiment
MAD was performing illeagal genetic experiments on animals, Brain being amoung them. Gadget (or Penny secretly helping Gadget) rescued him, and adopted Brain into the family. Grateful at having been spared from life in a cage, and possibly being dissected alive, Brain has loyally helped Penny and Gadget in whatever way he can. Even if it means being the team Butt Monkey.

Dr. Claw is actually Big Louie from UHF.
He's mean, we only ever see his arm, he has a creepy voice, he has a Cool Car... I think this is a no-brainer.

Mad Magazine is MAD's squeaky-clean front company/financier.
Just because it's awesome. Maybe Dr. Claw is really Alfred E. Neuman!

Inspector Gadget is DEAD.
The sequence you see in the opening credits is from the final mission. All the stories you hear eventually lead up to a Downer Ending. All this time, we never knew how it all ended, yet it was right in front of us. Quimby getting electrocuted in the safe kills him, too. It figures that Gadget would die when he starts doing competent work.

Penny has horrible grades and a bad reputation at school.
All that time she loses following her uncle all over the world has to impact her studies and attendance.
 * Penny is actually yelled at by her teacher in one episode for not paying attention in class

Inspector Gadgets brain (because his head is full of all those gadgets), is in BRAIN THE DOG.
There's a remote connection, and the farther he is from Brain the worse his thinking is.

If the Continuity Reboot ever surfaces...

 * It will give Gadget a more definitive origin story.
 * Gadget may get more moments to shine.
 * Dr. Claw will end up as the Knight of Cerebus... When he's outside of his office.
 * We'll finally get to know what happened to Penny's parents.
 * Maybe we'll even see some Character Development!

MAD Cat is the Chesire Cat from Alice in Wonderland.
Dr. Claw went to Wonderland so he could find a literally mad pet(and everyone was mad in Wonderland). After finding MAD Cat, he had Dr. Spectrum and Dr. Dummkopf remove his disappearing powers and reduce his intelligence to that of a normal cat.

The Mayor of Metro City is named Mayor Wiggum.
It already has a police chief named Chief Quimby, and we all know at least one town that has a mayor named Quimby and a police chief named Wiggum.

the two movies describes two alternate universes
let's see, the first movie was more realistic and darker and edgier as we can see in the following:

the murder of brenda's father by the hands of DR.MAD himself. the not-so-nice fate of john brown which would be the logical reason for his robotic upgrade. the(expected)psychological and physiological difficulties for john to accept and control his new body. a more superhero-like attitude for this inspecteur gadget especially in his fight against his duplicate. the supervillain-like rampage of said duplicate. the lex luthor tendancy of DR.MAD. the fact that this inspecteur gadget is more of an inexperienced rookie than a real idiot. the gadgets,while goofy, are quite practical and realistic in their depiction. gadget overcame the NSA microchip issue by the end by sheer human willpower. Gadget fell in love with Brenda (a human).

=> all of that means that the first movie was more of a realistic superhero-like origin story for both of inspecteur gadget AND DR.MAD.

on the other hand,the second movie is set in a lighter and softer universe,where:

Gadget is a real goof. his gadgets are cartoonish. DR.MAD is a classical mad scientist supervillain using soft science for thievery. gadget is more of cyborg as he relies more on the NSA microchip. the scientist responsible of the Gadget project isn't brenda and her father. this Gadget ifell in love with G2 (a full robot). commissaire quimby is a classical jerk of a boss.

=> which led us to the conclusion that in this universe gadget is like his animated incarnation.

the differences between the two movies indicate that each one happened in a different reality, creating two different Gadgets.

john brown and DR.MAD were the nail that engendred the two alternate universes
if there are two alternate realities,then the separation pointor the nail has to be very close so as the settings won't be very differents,isn't it?

then the nail must be the DR MAD attack on the Gadget project.in the reality of the second movie,john brown was left for dead by this universe DR.MAD in the same accident, but in a much worse state than in the first one and brenda died with her father in the attack, which let another scientist take the lead of the project.meanwhile because of his critical injuries,most of john's body was dysfunctional, so dysfunctional that even with the help of the gadget project, he lost a significant part of his intellect,must relies completly on his NSA microchip to even function, suffered a greater trauma making of him a complete ditz,and had his face heavily reconstructed.

the sequel will treat the encounter between the two realities
the third movie will be about the encounter between the two DR.MAD, more likely the second meeting the first by a teleporter mishap, the first will team up with the second to eliminate the first Gadget and take over the world through super science and manipulation.meanwhile, the second Gadget and G2 will find the teleporter and use it to chase their DR.MAD, they'll eventually meet the first Gadget and team up with him to take down the two DR.MAD in an ultimate shodown of ultimate destiny. finally the second Gadget,G2 and DR.MAD will go back to the second universe in a sad goodbye, while the first Gadget will arrest the first DR.MAD and give him to the FBI, or INTERPOL due to his now greater criminal statut, and we can hope that the first Gadget will marry Brenda at the end to make it a round happy ending.

The toy Dr. Claw's Face isn't the actual Dr. Claw.
I wouldn't put it above Dr. Claw to have body doubles.

(Film) Gadgets main control programs are off line
When he fell out of bed it knock the control program off line, giving him limited control of the gadgets, their running on manual control only. See here

Penny is currently hiding out in The Big Bang Theory.
Metro PD finally found out she was the real hero and sent her to Pasadena to investigate scientists with the potential of being MAD agents. Her job as a dumb blonde waitress is really a cover.

Inspector Gadget has Attention Deficit Disorder.
In the direct-to-video film Inspector Gadget's Last Case, he shows signs of this. When telling Chief Quimby that you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs, he goes on to talk about using powdered eggs. Later, he says that the Gadgetmobile can't cut the mustard anymore, and then blathers on how he doesn't understand that statement and wonders why anyone would want to cut mustard.

Claw is The Once-Ler
The Once-Ler never had a Heel Realization at the end of the book. Instead of wanting to give hope to the future, he turned to a life of super villainy with his fortune. The Japanese counterpart of Claw is another Once-Ler that was head of the Japanese Thneed production.

Inspector Gadget is a grown-up Gadget Boy
Penny is the daughter of Agent Heather and Myron Drabble, and Brain is a remodeled G-9


 * I had the same feeling, except Penny being Heather and Dabble's daughter interferes with the notion that she is Gadget's niece, and Brain showed no signs of being robotic.

Gadget Boy is a future clone/smaller robot duplicate of Inspector Gadget.
The little guy doesn't seem to actually be Inspector Gadget himself, just a similar creation. Gadget Boy is part human, like Gadget, but his human parts were created artificially in a laboratory, just like his mechanical parts. He was created in an attempt to recreate the success (or at least that's what it looked like on paper, as he was always foiling Claw's plans) of the original Inspector. That explains how Gadget Boy can be susceptible to human diseases (as opposed to G9 who was 100% mechanical) and be seemingly partially human while still being a 100% artificial being.


 * The people who made Gadget Boy never met the actual Inspector Gadget, but they had access to Dr. Slickstein's records and files on him, including copies of his personality, and they used that to make Gadget Boy as much like Inspector Gadget as they could.

MAD stands for Mutually Assured Destruction
Dr Claw's ultimate goal is to instigate a full-scale open conflict between NATO forces and the Soviet states.