Five Nights at Freddy’s 2

Grade: C+

I’ve always had a fascination with shut down, abandoned places – the idea that this used to BE something, and hasn’t been anything else since, but also never got the wrecking ball or a rebuild. You can still visit or look inside, and feel those ghosts. That’s one of the reasons I was so drawn to 2023’s Five Nights at Freddy’s.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 has Abby (the wonderful Piper Rubio) beginning to once again receive messages from her animatronic “friends” at the long-closed-down Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza – a Chuck E. Cheese type restaurant, at which her older brother Mike (Josh Hutcherson) worked as an overnight security guard. It seems like many of the problems that arise could have been avoided by tearing Freddy’s down, or oh, I don’t know…staying away from there. But the whole town seems to have unlimited access to this unlocked, unguarded building, and – equipped with malfunctioning flashlights – they go there, and decide to split up.

A franchise like this tends to have a revolving door of directors, yet Emma Tammi – who was behind the camera for the first movie – is still hanging in there. Her locations and colorful cinematography have almost the same appeal as the previous installment. She knows how to conjure up nostalgia for those untouched places forgotten by time and man. We’ve been there and done that, though. It’s not enough to sustain another chapter. The original games are famous for their jump scares, of which there are plenty in the film. Many are predictable. Characters repeatedly close their eyes to avoid looking at something, then open them to see that the thing is very close. There’s even the overused one where we see someone from the side, opening a refrigerator door. When they’re done looking inside, they close it, to reveal someone standing right there.

The actor I was most looking forward to seeing here was Mckenna Grace, who – deservedly – is on a hot streak. She is wasted in a small role as a host/producer of a ghost hunter show called Spectral Scoopers. The screenplay puts an abrupt end to her involvement, and her part likely took just a couple of days to film. The two people who played the tag-team killers in Wes Craven’s original Scream both make an appearance. This could have been mined for some comedy in-joke gold – but disappointingly, nothing comes of it, and they don’t even share any scenes. Wayne Knight has some amusing bits as Abby’s ever-discouraging science teacher. He gets his just desserts in a manner similar to his fate in a certain dinosaur movie from 32 years ago.

The movie ends with an obvious cliffhanger – and indeed, Five Nights at Freddy’s 3 is already in the works, with Tammi directing, and all the principal cast coming back. This second installment is harmless and not awful. I thought about recommending it a few times, but it ultimately left me empty and disinterested. What allured me to the first film so much doesn’t carry the same weight here. Let’s face it, how much of a threat can these decades-old animatronics be? Seems like you can easily outrun them. I’m imagining a parody that involves them creaking, squeaking, and constantly stopping to WD-40 each other. Scary Movie 6 is in production, with the Wayans brothers returning as writers and actors. I hope they incorporate some ideas like that.

Grade: C+