Imagine it’s 2014 again and a random game developer named Scott Cawthon is all over the internet. YouTubers and content creators are going crazy over his brand-new horror video game. Markiplier titles the first video of him playing it, “WARNING: SCARIEST GAME IN YEARS.” CoryxKenshin uploads a walkthrough on YouTube and puts “DON’T WATCH AT NIGHT!!” in the title; MatPat starts making videos about game theories, and new artists like The Living Tombstone, JT Music, and CG5 are rising to fame writing songs about this game: Five Nights at Freddy’s.
Five Nights at Freddy’s Games had been coming out from 2014 to 2021, and now, the last FNaF project is here; an almost two-hour-long movie that gathered all FNaF fans to theaters in October.
Two staff writers from the Scroll, freshmen Sophia Henson and Sophie Pennington, discuss the good and bad parts of the movie and compare it to the story the games follow, mentioning the performances the actors gave, the constant plot twists the movie contained, and the experience of seeing it in theaters.
Spoiler alert: If you haven’t seen the movie “Five Nights at Freddy’s,” please stop reading now.
PENNINGTON: We’ve been waiting for this movie to come out for forever!
HENSON: I know! I’m excited it’s finally here!
PENNINGTON: A lot of movie critics aren’t very fond of it, though.
HENSON: Really? I found it really good.
PENNINGTON: I think the critics might not like the fact that it’s not really scary.
HENSON: I think you’re right; there were jumpscares but the movie as a whole didn’t really come off as creepy, not like the games do.
PENNINGTON: If we’re comparing the movie to the games, I feel like it wasn’t really that accurate, at least the lore wasn’t.
HENSON: Yes! Vanessa isn’t even part of the first game, she’s in the most recent game: Security Breach. It was weird how they put her into the movie when the movie is set in a totally different time period than the one Vanessa’s in.
PENNINGTON: It wasn’t a terrible decision though; she was needed in order for the movie to include those crazy twists and turns.
HENSON: It did help the movie flow a little bit better since none of [William] Afton’s children were really involved like in the game.
PENNINGTON: About the kids, it felt unnecessary to change Elizabeth’s name from the game to Abby; it’s not that important to me but I just found it slightly odd on the writers’ behalf.
HENSON: I agree.
PENNINGTON: I also just wanted to mention I think it was kinda cool how they included real life problems, like how Mike, played by Josh Hutcherson, was going to get evicted from his home and had to pick up the job in order to keep the house.
HENSON: Yeah.
PENNINGTON: And the fact he had to go to William, who was played by Matthew Lillard, to get the job and the movie came full circle and William ended up being Vanessa’s dad, the killer, and the man who kidnapped Mike’s brother was a crazy reveal. What about the acting though? I think some people were better actors than others, but what are your thoughts on that?
HENSON: I think Matthew Lillard had the best acting out of everyone.
PENNINGTON: Definitely.
HENSON: Matthew Lillard as William, Piper Rubio as Abby, and Kat Conner Sterling as Max, the babysitter, were great performances.
PENNINGTON: Don’t forget the blonde kid; he was played by Grant Feely and his performance was amazing, especially for a kid.
HENSON: Josh Hutcherson though?
PENNINGTON: Josh Hutcherson… I hate to say it, but his acting wasn’t the best in my opinion.
HENSON: No, no, I agree.
PENNINGTON: He had good moments in the movie, but overall, his acting could have been better.
HENSON: Outside of the movie though, the experience was super fun.
PENNINGTON: Oh definitely! Lots of people went with their friends or family, which is how Scott wanted people to come.
HENSON: Our show time was especially fun because we went with our friends and we went on the official day it came out.
PENNINGTON: Specifically our theater was super funny.
HENSON: It was so full of huge FNaF fans!
PENNINGTON: I loved it when people clapped at the scenes CoryxKenshin and MatPat showed up in; they’re huge icons when it comes to FNaF.
HENSON: And the directors put the original Five Nights at Freddy’s song by The Living Tombstone when the credits came on! That had to be one of my favorite moments.
PENNINGTON: Oh, mine too.
HENSON: Do you think our friends liked it too? Even though we’ve been fans of the games way longer, I hope they still enjoyed it.
PENNINGTON: Well, we went with [Saugus High School freshman] Adam [Guzman] and he said he “liked the movie a lot and actually it was pretty good and there wasn’t really anything bad about [it]… in general.”
HENSON: I feel like if you weren’t a FNaF kid, you wouldn’t appreciate the movie as much.
PENNINGTON: I see where you’re coming from; maybe that could also be another reason why the critics don’t like the movie. The movie is targeted towards people who already know the FNaF lore, so they might have forgotten to fill in the holes for people who don’t already know the full story.
HENSON: Oh, that makes a lot of sense.
PENNINGTON: I saw an interview on YouTube with Ben O’Shea interviewing Jason Blum.
HENSON: Oh I saw that one too.
PENNINGTON: Yeah, at one point Ben asked why Jason believed in the movie so much.
HENSON: Didn’t he say something about it being perfect for what Blumhouse does?
PENNINGTON: Yeah, specifically, he said, “It touches on everything we… love to do at Blumhouse… there’s nothing we like more than things that are creepy.”
HENSON: I don’t think another production company could have done it better.
PENNINGTON: I agree, I think so too. Overall, I’m gonna say the movie by itself was a solid 6.5/10.
HENSON: I’m gonna say 8/10. Our theater made it really enjoyable, even if the movie wasn’t the best.
PENNINGTON: Oh, including the experience? I would even say 9/10.
HENSON: I agree! I hope we’ll be writing an article on a second movie sometime in the future.
PENNINGTON: We can only hope.
Though the movie doesn’t look the best in the eyes of critics, the experience was memorable and will always hold a special place in every FNaF fan’s heart. Scott Cawthon’s supposed last project, the Five Nights at Freddy’s movie, is a great closing to every FNaF kid’s childhood.
