Five Nights At Freddy’s 2

Welcome to Movie Spotlight. This series is to highlight recent movies in theaters that you might want to enjoy seeing in person, or if there are interesting topics that you would like to look at. I will praise what is good and what could have been improved, but it is still an opinion, so feel free to make one yourself. I personally like action, horror, romcom, and adventure, but I will review as many genres as I can. The first will be Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, a horror film based on the Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 game. Spoilers ahead if you do not want details.

First Act

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 is a movie based on the video game Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, which is also the first location of the Freddy Franchise according to the lore, entering into a wonderland with pizza, ball pits, tunnel boat rides, carousels, and animatronics. We first start the movie with a prologue, getting an ambiance of the first pizza location filled with children and ignorant parents, as we are introduced to Charlotte, who, at the end of the scene, becomes the Marionette after dying from injuries from William Afton, who was in an animatronic suit to lure kids for his own experiments. The intro with the credits reveals how Charlotte had been blamed for her own death, while another location opened to throw the situation under the rug. We flash forward to where we see Vanessa and a bit of her struggle dealing with how she had been traumatized by her father, William Afton, and how Mike offers her some advice on how he got over his. Abby, Mike’s sister, also seems firmly attached to the location and her friends, the animatronics from the second location. The story is mostly progressed by Abby’s intervention with the animatronics in the movie, and it was fueled by the fact that she was kept away from her ‘friends’ and how no one seemed to honestly believe or take her seriously.

On a side note, having the prologue connection between two different locations while having a similar theme of possessed animatronics seeking some type of freedom is good for consistency, and it is appreciated as an easy way for someone to look at two movies back-to-back. I do have to mention how there is a lot of fan service in the movie, pointing out easter eggs or specific little references to the original games and books, but they lack some logic. The lore-heavy movie makes it hard to compile together, especially for a short movie review.

Second Act

The instigating event in the movie is when Abby took a speaking toy with her home, but also when Michael Afton is introduced as a security guard who wanted people to investigate the original location. This leads to one of the members being possessed by Charlotte, and the rest being killed while Michael escapes. We follow Vanessa’s effort to confront the fear of her father that has overwhelmed her, ending with a reinforcement of her fear, but she is also able to fully discover that having a weapon brings confidence in her. That same night, Abby is led to the original location looking for her friends, but it is actually Charlotte who has manipulated Abby to help Charlotte. Eventually, Vanessa finds out how Abby had seen the animatronics and investigated, but was kidnapped. While Abby attends her science fair, Mike goes to an old business partner of William named Henry, who started the first Freddy’s place, but who is also Charlotte’s father, to discuss what has been going on. Abby’s misfortune at school led her back with the animatronics, later to be held hostage unknowingly as Charlotte manipulated both Abby and Vanessa to unlock the animatronics’ perimeter, letting them be able to walk freely outside the original pizzeria.

Third Act

The plot continues as Mike finally goes to find Abby once he realizes Abby is in danger at the original location. He investigates, finds Vanessa, and stays at the security office to disconnect the animatronics as they are now set free. For a while, Vanessa and Mike struggle with the animatronics until Mike finally manages to shut off the signal that controls the animatronics from the Marionette, but then the Marionette possesses Abby in her home. Vanessa arrives first but is confronted by Charlotte in Abby’s body, but then Mike arrives with a music box given to him by Henry, who had built it for when Charlotte was a baby to fend her off. This leads to a fight breaking out as orders are given to the animatronics to destroy Vanessa, Mike, and Abby, but the old animatronics who had come with Mike intervene and defeat the Marionette’s animatronics. All animatronics shut down, but their spirits are set free as the animatronics containing the souls of Abby’s friends power down. With victory, but seeing how untrustworthy Vanessa seems, Mike feels betrayed and untrusting of Vanessa, so he rejects her getting close to his family, leaving Vanessa alone and vulnerable. The scene ends with the Marionette coming back to Vanessa and possessing her.

Post Credits

There is an after-credits scene where the second location is set to burn the morning after, but some kids find William Afton inside the old bunny suit. There is also a voicemail after where Henry warns Mike of something coming, as it is assumed the Marionette finds and attacks Henry to cut off loose ends.

While there are a lot of nice details of lore within the movie, it is not very consistent with the stakes it presents to the audience, nor does it make a lot of sense because some events are very convenient for the characters, and some are not very realistic. Regarding the ending, which can make or break a movie, I do believe it was not strong, nor does it make sense to end it like that. Between characters’ mistrust and some betrayal has been present, but it should not be so much so that it separates them at the end of the movie, because most of the problems had already been dealt with.

Regardless of what the ending is like, I recommend this movie for anyone who has heard of Five Nights at Freddy’s, and while it wasn’t the best horror movie. I do believe it was scarier than the first Five Nights at Freddy’s with more jump scares, but I would rate this movie a good 8 out of 10, perhaps only because I am a big fan of the series. Regardless, I would say it is a particularly good movie for those who know of it and those who want to keep exploring the whole franchise. Let us hope the third movie is much scarier and better written for the sake of a better movie.

Source for Image: https://x.com/FNAFMovie/status/1976814091596619866