After watching “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” for the second time, I can say, without a doubt, that this movie is better than the first one. One of the main reasons I’ve come to this conclusion is how well Blumhouse and Scott Cawthon adapted to feedback from the first movie. Adding more horror elements like jump scares, more set pieces and more action has definitely elevated the adaptation as a whole. Especially with the addition of many more animatronics, “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” successfully builds on a foundation of making the overall story bigger, and capturing more of what fans had wanted. 

Of course, the horror elements are limited with the movie’s nature as a PG-13 film. But “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” does what it can within this realm of possibilities. This can be seen in how the movie approaches Marionette’s design, as it is by far the eeriest part of the cast. Even if most of Marionette’s screen-time was focused on when she possessed someone else, the placement of her character always heightened the scariness at the moment. Through this, “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” provides an excellent franchise gateway for kids to experience horror. 

But “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” doesn’t stop there. There are two sequences that highlight Matthew Lillard’s William Afton, and both do an extremely good job of building suspension. Charlotte’s attempt to save the kidnapped child and Vanessa’s confrontation with William Afton were the main parts of the movie that perfectly showed how any movie has the potential to properly build tension, regardless of its target audience. 

However, this film definitely has its shortcomings. 

Plainly put, the script is awful. “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” unapologetically makes the assumption that everyone seeing it is familiar with all of the franchise and lore. This isn’t a negative, but much of the random bits of dialogue added is only understandable to people who’ve played the games. However, the rest of the script is pretty bad, comparably worse than the first film. There is an apparent inability to get from one point to another in a logical manner. For example, close to the end of the film, the animatronics have broken free, and Charlotte is outside trying to fulfill her goal of killing her parents. Vanessa’s car breaks down at the most important moment when she needs to get to Mike’s house. As she’s stuck in the middle of nowhere, it just so happens that Mike’s friend drives by and is able to give Vanessa a ride. The incredible convenience of characters feels like they have the ability to teleport. There is no sense of scale as to how long it takes to get from, for example, Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria to Mike’s house. Abby is able to ride her bike to Fazbear’s in a matter of minutes, build an entire robot with the help of Chica, go back to the house to sleep, and then go to school for a science fair, all in one evening. 

The film’s use of characters is a whole other bundle of messiness. Michael Afton, a character who was in exactly one scene prior to the ending section with absolutely no foreshadowing or development, is revealed to be Vanessa’s secret insane brother, and is immediately defeated without accomplishing a single aspect of his goals. The entire relationship between Mike and Vanessa is confusing. Vanessa was an active accomplice to multiple murders, all of which she deliberately covered up. “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” allows this to be apparently perfectly fine to Mike; there is just so little time spent on developing the relationship between the two that when it breaks down at the end of the movie, it never felt important to care about.

In its attempt to heighten the world building from the first movie, “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” also leaves significant plot holes. Throughout the movie, there’s a festival about the animatronics and franchise that is built up. Fazbear Fest, or Fazfest for short, is mentioned frequently, and shown numerous times in various scenes. There’s flyers on franchise buildings, and excitement built throughout the town, especially as the movie gradually builds to a big final showdown. In the last section of the movie, the characters lead you to believe that the festival will become a total blood bath. But it’s not, and the final battle takes place in a single room of one house. “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” created a vibrant setting that was received with an abundance of interest from the community, but ended up having it play no role in the plot at all. A detail that encapsulates all of the problems is when they deliberately establish at the beginning that Mike and his friend are painting the living room, only for it to look exactly the same for the rest of the movie.

“Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” is not a movie that can stand well on its own two legs. It depends on the viewers to have knowledge beforehand to make crucial parts of the dialogue understandable. It also begins and ends with similar conflicts, even adding a cliffhanger as an ending to the movie. The issues that are presented aren’t solved by the characters, leaving this sequel as an obvious setup for the third movie. 

But that’s not what “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” is supposed to be about. Even if it fails at being a “good” movie, it provides material that fans have wanted to see on the big screen. Being able to see each easter egg and hear every audio cue in a theater is the best part, in my opinion, of movie adaptations. “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” is very successful at showing what fans want, things that are recognizable from the games or novels. The film is constructed to ensure content from the franchise is apparent.

Does that mean fans deserve a movie as lackluster as “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2?” Of course not. Fan service should not be choked between long stretches of inconsistent plot points and pitiful writing. It’s entirely possible to make a good movie that’s abundant with fan service, and fans deserve to have competent stories and characters. In all honesty, this film is a joke for its target audience, even with all the references and cameos for the fans. 

Cawthon was very successful with implementing fan suggestions from the first “Five Nights at Freddy’s.” When approaching the third movie in this trilogy, it’s time to listen to the critics if he wants to give “Five Nights at Freddy’s” fans the best movie adaptation experience.

On this blog, members of the Carmel High School chapter of the Quill and Scroll International Honorary Society for High School Journalists (and the occasional guest writer) produce curations of all facets of popular culture, from TV shows to music to novels to technology. We hope our readers always leave with something new to muse over. Click here to read more from MUSE.