Directed By Emma Tammi

Starring – Josh Hutcherson, Elizabeth Lail, Piper Rubio

The Plot – One year has passed since the supernatural nightmare at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza. The stories about what transpired there have been twisted into a campy local legend, inspiring the town’s first ever Fazfest. Former security guard Mike (Hutcherson) and police officer Vanessa (Lail) have kept the truth from Mike’s 11-year-old sister, Abby (Rubio), concerning the fate of her animatronic friends. But when Abby sneaks out to reconnect with Freddy, Bonnie, Chica, and Foxy, it will set into motion a terrifying series of events, revealing dark secrets about the true origin of Freddy’s, and unleashing a long-forgotten horror hidden away for decades.

Rated PG-13 for violent content, terror and some adult language.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 | Official Trailer

POSITIVES

Regardless of what you thought about the first movie, there were charming uses of its budget that enacted practical authenticity, in the form of some elaborately detailed animatronics, and while this sequel doubles down on many of the same problems that plagued its predecessor, creatively, the heart of this franchise still beats prominently in the designs of these haunted stage animals. In a day and age where computer generation would be used to cheaply and quickly render these familiar creatures, especially interactively, it’s nice to see a production that puts its budget where it rightfully belongs, helping to inscribe an influential tangibility that goes a long way in selling its atmosphere, all the while articulating heft and motion detectability, on account of the movie’s equally impressive sound designs. While my fear and uneasiness with this franchise isn’t anywhere near where passionate die-hards of the games say it should be, there’s a nagging reminder of established essence constantly beating at my subconscious that involves the presence of these characters firmly detected in the ways they’re polished with off-screen craft, helping to drive the tension of their adorning sequences, even without any kind of effective pay-off in the direction, and it’s nice to see that these films were approached with the care and concern of its legacy, bringing fandom frenzy in the form of these games brought to life, without anything even closely resembling artificiality. Speaking of fandom, the film will also prove to be endearing more to those passionate enthusiasts than attaining a newfound audience, particularly as a result of some infectious Easter eggs that are unmistakable, even to the untrained eye and ear. While this did very little for my personal interpretation of the experience, it does prove that this movie has its built-in audience in mind when it comes to its extensive journey, helping to ease any preconceived prejudice that this is just another shameless cash grab to capitalize on a prominent franchise.

NEGATIVES

Having such an unflattering opinion of “Five Nights at Freddy”, I was hoping that the sequel would improve and resolve some of those glaring hinderances of its predecessor, but unfortunately the two years spent since that movie hasn’t garnered any kind of attainable knowledge for Tammi’s direction, or Scott Cawthon’s writing, as to what adapts seamlessly to the screen, leaving this movie a sloppy and at times boring mess that doesn’t abide by the basic rules of three act storytelling. For starters, the script from Cawthon is full of illogical contrivances, laughable conveniences, and dumbfounding character actions, on account of a screenplay that consistently feels abruptly rushed and clumsily underdeveloped, featuring far too many characters to constantly keep tabs on, a majority of which are simply standing around with little to no direction towards making them a valuable presence. Sometimes, this defeating execution pertains to the overbearing need to suppress the idea that this crime scene restaurant remains a prominently unlocked access area for so much of the community, or characters in peril remaining in a situation driving that peril, but the most glaringly persistent are those very same aspects that condemned the previous movie, such as these animatronic machines bearing such an unmistakable heft and influence to any setting they invade, yet being able to sneak up and disarm human counterparts. I like to think that I’m someone who is able to suppress a lot of disbelief in movies with such exaggeratedly fantastical concepts, however I’m not able to buy that every character in the movie is deaf, on account of those annoying antagonists receiving justice, feeling so painfully contrived, even for a movie based on a video game. As for the characterization itself, it is fiercely flawed, without anything in the way of subtle nuance to obscure the obviousness of their intention to scenes they accompany, but there’s a complete lack of logic or reality concerning these initialized set-ups that makes it difficult to buy in and subscribe to the conflicts that this movie is constantly selling to its audience, providing a far more distracting emphasis that directly takes away from the meaningful momentum of flat as a pancake frights, without anything even close to a memorable jolt or tantalizing atmosphere to bake suspense into the movie’s foundation. As someone who typically lashes out at cheap and timely jump scares, I would’ve welcomed them in a movie so void of situational anxiety, especially in Tammi’s direction falling so flat with dressing up these individualized sequences with any semblance of urgency or tension, but this film is so uncontrollably PG-13 that it feels like a gateway horror movie made for tweens seeking to make the next big step from Goosebumps, often alienating a majority of its grown audience, whose only wish is to see some bite to a franchise lacking any kind of teeth. In parallel to the movie’s underwhelming script, the dialogue is some of the worst that I’ve experienced, this year, particularly those unintentionally laughable interactions paid to a new addition to the franchise, played by the legendary Skeet Ulrich. During Skeet’s one and only scene in the movie, the lines attempt something metaphorically meaningful in their sentimentality, but instead come across as artificially enacted by something other than human hands crafting these supposedly internalized responses, and aside from detracting me from every meaningful conversation that the movie uses to tackle such heavy handed expositional dialogue, it conjures a complete lack of effort paid to developing its story in ways that meets its audience at eye level with humanity, instead opting for the soulless kind of wooden artificiality that has made Chat GPT a sought after tool for writer’s block, recently in the movie industry, inscribing a heft weight of unflattering influence to the consistency of the performances, which are equally dreadful. To be fair, the cast is working as hard as they possibly can to make chicken salad out of chicken shit, particularly Elizabeth Lail, whose arc involving traumatic legacy is among the most substantially risky of the entire film, but there isn’t enough opportunity or charisma in this ensemble to override such stagnantly stale writing with emotionality, wasting away lead and supporting turns like they’re nothing significant to the movie’s integrity. Some instances certainly pertain to minimalized usage, such as the aforementioned Skeet Ulrich, Matthew Lillard, or even the far too good for this film, McKenna Grace, but even the complete lack of energy that befalls leading turns like Josh Hutcherson’s and Piper Rubio’s respective approaches feels like a phoned-in far cry from the humbling humanity that they supplanted to their original portrayals, perhaps on the glaring evidence of a surrounding stinker, that they were able to accurately pick up on. As for newfound additions to the franchise, there was some appreciation in my initial engagement towards the expanding lore, to make this feel bigger and bolder than its predecessor, but the two most distinguishing factors to this cause; a new antagonist and a third act revelation, each come with their own problems of ineffectiveness, crafting such glaring obtuseness to gaming ideas that weren’t properly presented in the depths of this adaptation. On the former, this Marionette, who conveniently wasn’t mentioned during the first film, is presented far too overly frightening than the mistakably cutesy of Freddy Fazzbear’s original stage performers, making it a little too over the top difficult to believe that she would be a staple of pop culture entertainment, and the latter, with the addition of a new-but-familiar character to the history of this franchise, is acted a bit too on the nose and obvious to fall anywhere other than where the film eventually puts him, leaving this twist registering with the kind of predictable impact that had another patron in my theater yelling audibly “DUH!!”.

OVERALL
“Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” bores audiences to death, on account of its clunkily executed narrative and lifelessly limber dialogue, that somehow surmises even more disastrous results to an already uninspiring predecessor. With contrivances, conveniences and clammy characterization aplenty, the film surmises one of the most artificially soulless scripts of the cinematic year, without anything even closely resembling logic or human influence, and while the film is another opportunity to indulge in the practicality of animatronic designs, their monotonous deliveries involving ten times more energy and emotionality than their human counterparts leave this once prominent establishment condemned by the holes in its foundation of now two disappointing installments.

My Grade: 2.9 or F