Five Nights at Freddy's 2 Review: A Weak Sequel to a Mediocre Horror

In early December, the film Five Nights at Freddy's 2 was released on the big screen — a direct sequel to the 2023 film adaptation based on the horror game series of the same name. The sequel repeated the first film's financial success, but received very low scores from professional reviewers. However, audiences generously rewarded the second installment with positive reviews. So, when opinions differ, the question inevitably arises: who is closer to the truth — the critics or the general audience?

The truth, as always, is somewhere in the middle. I might have answered that if we were talking about the first film. But in the case of FNAF 2, it's safe to say that the critics were right, especially those who rate it one of ten. The new creation of director Emma Tammi and game author Scott Cawthon, who acted as screenwriter, turned out to be worse than the original in every way.

The opening scene of FNAF 2 is perhaps the film's best moment. The prologue takes place in 1982, when young Charlotte dies before the eyes of dozens of customers at the original Freddy Fazbear's Pizza restaurant (not the one featured in the debut film). The girl became one of the victims of serial killer William Afton, but the crime is being treated as an accident.

How this happened isn't explained in detail. The opening credits only flash with newspaper clippings, revealing that lawyers have framed Charlotte for her own death because she wandered into a restricted area without the restaurant staff's knowledge. It's hard to believe, especially considering Charlotte died of stab wounds in front of dozens of people. Yet, despite the murder being hushed up, the establishment was still closed.

The main story takes place in 2002, a year after the events of the first film. Rumors of the incident at the pizzeria (the restaurant from the original film), spread by Mike and Abby's aunt, who had been attacked by Freddy, spread throughout the town and gave rise to an urban legend that inspired locals to hold a costumed event called FazFest.

Meanwhile, Abby establishes a connection with the souls of the children from the old animatronic team, unaware that she is actually contacting Charlotte's ghost. Her soul controls Puppet and the other animatronics from the original restaurant. Having tricked Abby, the ghost wants to break her restrictions and escape into the city to take revenge on the adults for their indifference.

The lack of clear motivation isn't unique to Charlotte's evil spirit. For example, Abby claims she has no friends, but that's not true. On the contrary, the kids at school listen with interest to her stories about what happened at the pizza place a year ago; one of the students invites Abby to the cafeteria to sit at the table of popular teenagers, and in class she sits with a kid who is going to participate in a science project competition with her.

Despite this, Abby spends her free time alone, considering herself an outcast. She can't come to terms with the fact that her ghost friends disappeared after the events of the first FNAF, and continues to try to contact them, which in turn leads to contact with Charlotte, who has the ability to control several robots at once. She thus deceives Abby by pretending to be her friends and convincing her that their souls have moved from the pizzeria to the new animatronics from the original restaurant.

Mike, Abby's older brother and guardian, has faded into the background. He wants to distance himself from the events that occurred earlier, and he reiterates this in every dialogue of the first half of the film, thereby instilling a profound sense of melancholy in the audience.

Vanessa fares no better: the sequel's plot revolves around her. The protagonist's emotional torment with her father, serial killer William Afton, takes up about half of the two-hour running time. During the process, it turns out that she was Charlotte's best friend as a child, but now she is forced to confront her vengeful spirit and the animatronics under its control.

In the second half of the movie, Vanessa and Mike confront the animatronics who have made their way into the city, where the festival has already begun. From this point on, the characters' serious faces freeze in permanent confusion, a state they remain in until the finale.

The animatronics themselves are well-made, but the action scenes involving them look ridiculous, and the "scary" moments are unlikely to frighten anyone. Undoubtedly, the PG-13 rating imposes many restrictions, but such restrictions didn't hinder, for example, the horror series Insidious.

The filmmakers' main mistake was that they initially took the wrong direction. In a film based on the FNAF universe, such serious characters, unsuccessfully attempting to portray social drama, look out of place. The characters are completely devoid of self-irony and any sense of humor. Watching their everyday lives is so uninteresting that you want to skip it all, or better yet, not waste your time on this chaotic tedium at all.

But the actors certainly can't be blamed for the characters being so flat. They played their roles according to the script, which, as mentioned above, was written by the creator of the FNAF game series. The author failed to create an intriguing plot, and the characters are impossible to empathize with — it seems as if the entire film was conceived for fan service.

Early reviews often claim that Five Nights at Freddy's 2 was created exclusively for fans. But it's hard to agree. Even a dedicated fan of the game series is unlikely to be satisfied with the mere appearance of their favorite animatronics on the big screen, along with a ton of Easter eggs.

Given the specifics of the rating and the simplicity of the game source material, the screenwriter should have stuck to the straightforward outline of the debut film rather than attempting a complex and intricate story. As a result, the film failed to deliver either drama or comedy — and as a horror film, it also failed.

Five Nights at Freddy's 2 is further proof that impressive financial figures don't reflect the quality of a product; they're simply the result of a successful advertising campaign. But something tells me the third movie won't be able to boast similar box office receipts (over $200,000,000), and that's a good thing.