Five Nights at Freddy's—Exciting Game Adaptation or Boring Snoozefest?

The game Five Nights at Freddy’s (FNAF) has built up quite the reputation over the past decade. With its iconic jumpscares and mysterious lore, it earned itself a spot as one of the most popular indie horror games of all time. Long-time fans of the game knows that FNAF has branched out widely since then—a long-winded series of games with lore so convoluted it’s driven Matthew Patrick from Game Theory to insanity, books that are supposed to both simultaneously prove and disprove theories in the overarching storyline, and collaborations—the most recent of which was with Dead by Daylight, another wildly popular franchise. After years of teasers, the movie adaptations of the video game franchise are finally here—and with the new trailer for the sequel now out, it’s time to revisit the first film.

The audience is introduced to Mike Schmidt (Josh Hutcherson), a tired mall security guard struggling to stay afloat. While keeping watch, he sees a man grabbing the arm of a child and sprints over, tackling the man into the fountain. He is then promptly fired, as the man is revealed to the kid’s father. Mike then meets with his career counselor, Steve Raglan (Matthew Lillard) details his many failed jobs, mentioning to him how difficult it really is to find opportunities for him given his track record, and offers him one last job as a night security guard. At night, after a bit of an awkward exchange with his younger sister Abby (Piper Rubio), he goes to sleep and dreams about the kidnapping of his little brother, Garrett—explaining why he’d reacted as violently as he did in the mall. While Mike initially refuses to work nights, he eventually accepts the offer as his estranged and entitled aunt Jane (Mary Stuart Masterson) threatens to seize custody of Abby for the monthly custody payments.

After setting up an arrangement with Jane’s babysitter Max (Kat Conner Sterling), Mike arrives at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza on his first night on the job. The pizzeria used to be very popular back in the 1980s and the owner, despite the restaurant having been abandoned for years, kept the building intact due to sentiment. Mike walks around the building for a little, finding three of the four animatronics behind the curtain on the main stage, before walking back into the security office and falling asleep at his desk. He then dreams of the kidnapping once again and this time sees five children who’d also witnessed the crime. However, when Mike approaches them to ask about who’d abducted his brother, the children scatter and he is unable to catch up to any of them.

The next day, Jane is found meeting with Max and her brother Jeff (David Lind) over a deal to find dirt on Mike to strengthen her custody case. Due to Mike’s desperation to keep his job, Jeff suggests that they vandalize the pizzeria in order to sabotage his current employment. Unaware of this, Mike shows up the following evening to the pizzeria where he meets Vanessa Shelly (Elizabeth Lail), a police officer who explains that the building had shut down after five children went missing. She shows him around the place, including the four animatronics—Bonnie, Chica, Freddy and Foxy, before his shift ends. After he leaves Jeff, Max, and two others show up to trash the building—and as they’re doing so, the animatronics come to life and kill all of them. This begs the question: what will happen to Abby now as the custody battle continues?

When this film had been first released, it was clear that there was polarity amongst the reviews. Critics rated the film poorly for a variety of reasons—the main one being the fact that it is a decidedly weak entry in both the horror and comedy genres. The animatronics themselves aren’t particularly scary, despite being the main threat of the entire film—lumbering slowly towards the characters. What should be menacing and nervewracking feels more like a slog than anything when they’re moving on-screen. However, fans of the franchise and general viewers gave overwhelmingly positive reviews—finding it to be an entertaining watch. The movie tied in various references and mediums throughout the entire franchise—a jumpscare from Balloon Boy (a character in Five Nights at Freddy’s 2), Matthew Pattrick’s cameo (who covered the lore and created theories for years about the series) in the diner scene where Jane is having her meeting with Max and Jeff, and much much more. Finding hidden secrets has been a staple of the FNAF fandom for years, so it’s no surprise that fans were excited to pore over and analyze every frame.

As someone who is writing both from a fan and critic standpoint, both sides have their points. The FNAF franchise is well-known for its absurdity—and the source material, while a classic, very much does not include coherent storylines. The criticisms about the horror aspect being undercooked are reasonable—but fans seemed to have gone in with the expectation of consuming FNAF content rather than a horror film, and found enjoyment from it. The movie is much more of a celebration of the FNAF franchise over the years rather than an actual horror film—and this the film succeeded spectacularly in it. It is unapologetically Five Nights at Freddy’s in nature from easter eggs to the confusing story. This isn’t to excuse the lackluster writing—which fans have all but given up on at this point—but it does explain the obvious rift in opinions.

Overall, Five Nights at Freddy’s is a fun movie that stays true first and foremost to its source material. However, in order to enjoy it in its totality, it is recommended that the viewer first become familiar with the games this movie is based off of.

If you would like to support the author, click here to receive an analysis of the sequel’s trailer. As the website is still being worked upon, you may have to wait 3-5 business days to receive your bonus content. Thank you!