Killer animatronics are out for revenge—and this time, it’s personal—in Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, opening in Prague (in both Czech-dubbed and original English-language versions) and cinemas worldwide this weekend. Like the original film, this Blumhouse sequel delivers some effective scares but also drones on endlessly with exposition disguised as fan service. Still, unlike the recent genre-swap M3GAN 2.0, fans of the first film and the video game series that inspired it should be more than satisfied by what’s on display here.
Part of that is down to series creator Scott Cawthon, who shared a writing credit with no less than four others for the first Five Nights at Freddy’s—including director Emma Tammi, who also returns for this sequel—but receives sole screenplay credit here. His dedication to the franchise is on full display, and anyone who has played the games will immediately recognize the new characters introduced here, pulled straight from 2014’s Five Nights at Freddy’s 2.
You know what you’re in for right from the opening, a nostalgic flashback set in a rare still-operating Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza Place, circa 1982. Here, a young Charlotte Emily (Audrey Lynn-Marie) attempts to stop a sinister Freddy Fazbear actor during a kidnapping, and meets a more violent fate than we might expect from a kids-oriented horror film. She ultimately ends up in the arms of this sequel’s new antagonist attraction: the creepy Marionette, a kind of Kabuki Slenderman with long black appendages and a mask borrowed from Spirited Away‘s No Face.
The Marionette “conducted” the four primary animatronics at Freddy’s using wireless technology years ahead of its time, security guard Michael (Freddy Carter) tells ghost hunter Lisa (Mckenna Grace) as she explores the abandoned pizzeria, now closed in the wake of multiple child murders 20 years later. Why a fifth animatronic needs to control the other ones wirelessly, instead of having them all following a central programmed routine, doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense. But don’t worry: all this backstory will soon come into play.
Police officer Vanessa Shelly (Elizabeth Lail), who happens to be the daughter of child killer William Afton (Matthew Lillard), also happens to be the childhood friend of Charlotte, and is haunted by her murder despite never mentioning it to potential love interest Mike Schmidt (Josh Hutcherson). Mike, meanwhile, is only worried about the well-being of his sister Abby (Piper Rubio), mourning the loss of the spirits of the murdered children who inhabited the animatronics in the first film.
And just as their town gets ready for FazFest—celebrating renewed interest in the location of a series of child murders, following the events of Five Nights at Freddy’s—the spirit of Charlotte, now inhabiting the Marionette, breaks herself and the animatronics she controls out of the pizzeria, setting the stage for carnage on the streets.
The fun of playing the Five Nights at Freddy’s games—heck, the fun of watching someone play the games—is down to monitoring a series of security cameras, swapping between them one-by-one until we’re jump scared by a goofy giant puppet that has suddenly appeared. The first Five Nights at Freddy’s didn’t do a great job of re-creating this, and neither does this sequel, save for a nifty climactic scene of Mike tracking the various animatronics from a central control room, and donning a disguise to prevent imminent attacks.
What this film does have is jump scares to spare. These bulky robots sure do seem to be able to sneak up right next to our protagonists completely unnoticed, while the Marionette is even more stealthy. Balloon Boy, also imported from the original video game sequel, is a little less intimidating. There’s nothing here that will spook anyone coming in from Weapons or Black Phone 2, but young viewers fresh into horror films are in for some genuine shocks.
And while there’s minimal bloodletting, multiple sequences here feel more intense than anything in the previous movie; a scene of robotics teacher Mr. Berg (Wayne Knight) meeting his deserved fate comes close to Scorsese’s Casino. The Marionette takes center stage—and possesses multiple victims, robbing the movie of its central charm—but the roster of animatronics is doubled, with shiny new variations of Freddy Fazbear, Bonnie the Rabbit, Chica the Chicken, and others joining their classic companions.
Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 doesn’t know when to stop delivering exposition, and is still laying on the lore as the film comes to its stunted conclusion. Devoted fans of the series might get a lot out of the thick (back)storytelling, but anyone else will find this stuff pretty tepid. Worst of all: the movie never pays off on its central promise of a massacre at FazFest.
While Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 does a lot of world-building, it doesn’t seem to know what to do with the world it creates; our protagonists are largely tangential to the larger narrative, and climactic scenes have us rooting for the killer robots. Still, it offers enough creepy ambience and animatronic havoc to keep devotees entertained. Casual viewers may find the overstuffed mythology overwhelming, but for franchise fans, the ghosts in the machine still have plenty of charm.
While the film proper ends on a cliffhanger setup for Five Nights at Freddy’s 3, stick around through the full end credits for multiple additional sequences that further elaborate on what’s in store.
