Five Nights at Freddy’s (2023)

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Posted By: brian@brianschell.com October 30, 2023

Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone

The long-awaited adaptation of a video game was a disappointment to the Horror Guys. The premise is interesting, and the practical effects were very cool. But there weren’t many surprises and too much talk and drama. It’s decent but doesn’t live up to the hype.

Synopsis

We watch a security guard frantically trying to open a ventilation tunnel. He crawls in as something bangs on the door behind him. Something’s coming up behind him, and it’s… singing. He soon finds himself strapped into a chair with a whirling, saw-bladed, mask-looking thing coming down over his face. Credits roll.

Mike and his little sister Abby get up and get ready for their day. Mike’s a security guard at a mall, but he’s really awful at it and gets fired. According to Steve, his career counselor, he’s not very good at anything. Steve does have a “high turnover” security job for Mike at night, but Mike turns it down.

Mike dreams of his childhood, when his little brother, Garrett, was abducted. Mike’s Aunt Jane wants custody of Abby, and she contests his custody in the courts. She’s… not nice. Mike calls Steve back and accepts the job. The job is a security guard at a former kid’s place, “Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria,” that’s been closed for a long time. All Mike has to do is keep people out.

There’s a videotape that explains the history of the place. It’s a family-friendly, fun place with cutting-edge animatronic creatures. He sleeps at a desk through most of the night and then goes home.

Max, who watches Abby at night, actually works for Aunt Jane, who hired her to dig up dirt on Mike. They come up with a plan to break into Freddy’s, mess it up, and Mike will be fired.

That night, Abby wants to go with Mike, who doesn’t allow it. Mike dreams about Garrett again, but this time, other children appear in the dream. When he wakes up, the electronics are going crazy in the place. Vanessa is a cop and stops by to see if everything is OK.

Vanessa says that this place gets to people, and they never last in the job. She turns on the animatronic creatures for him, and they’re really… something. She also mentions that back in the 80s, a bunch of kids went missing, which is why the place shut down. In the morning, they both leave.

As the sun comes up, and Mike leaves, Max’s boyfriend, Jeff, and his buddies, Hank and Carl, break in and wreck the place. Carl finds an animatronic creature where it shouldn’t be, and it kills him. Another one gets Hank. Jeff watches the glowing-eyed murder machines on the security cameras, but they know where he is too. Max eventually shows up, and a strange child leads her deep inside the building. One of the machines bites her head off.

Vanessa comes to see Mike at home, explaining that somebody broke into Freddy’s. She finds his sleeping pills and thinks he may have been too messed up to lock the door. He tells her all about Garrett and his dreams.

That night, Mike tries repeatedly to get in touch with Max about babysitting Abby, and he ends up taking her with him to Freddy’s for the night. As always, Mike passes out from the sleeping pills, so Abby goes exploring. Mike wakes up and finds Abby being tickled by Freddy and his robotic friends. She thinks they’re nice and introduces them to Mike. “They just wanna play.” She hugs them before leaving. Mike thinks this is all weird, and then they go home.

Mike notices that Abby’s drawings for the past several weeks have been of the animatronic creatures– which have been appearing to her as her imaginary friends. Except that she had never seen the animatronics until last night. She explains that the robots are possessed by ghosts.

The next night, Mike and Abby go back to Freddy’s, and Vanessa is there too. She knows all about the ghost-possessed robots. Everyone, including the robots, built a “fort” out of tables; it all looks like fun. Vanessa seems to know more about this place than she should. Mike thinks the robots are possessed by the ghosts of the dead children killed by the same man who took Garrett. Vanessa’s obviously hiding something, and she tells him to never bring Abby back to that place.

The next morning, Aunt Jane is there, and that goes badly for Abby. Mike goes back to Freddy’s in the daytime, and takes his sleeping pills. The little ghost boy in his dream explains that Mike can go back and save Garrett– if they can have Abby. When he agrees, all the little ghost children attack him with knives. When Mike wakes up, he’s strapped to the chair we saw in the opening credits, with the machine coming at his face; he barely escapes. He then finds the bodies of Max, Jeff, and the others.

Back at home, Jane is babysitting Abby, and we see that Freddy is there, as well as his “ghost boy.” He tells Abby that Jane “fell asleep.” They take an Uber to the pizzeria.

Vanessa has patched up the wounded Mike. Vanessa admits that she knew about Max and the others. She says that they never found any of the missing children back in the 80s. Their corpses are inside those machines as well as their ghosts. The bad man knows that Mike is looking for him, and “He’ll be coming. His name is William Afton, and he’s my father.” Vanessa gives him an electric cattle prod, which will mess with the ghosts’ animatronics.

Back at Freddy’s, Mike arrives to find Abby already there. One of the robots takes Abby to an “open” animatronic body and tries to put her inside, but Mike Tases it.

Mike runs into a big, nasty rabbit that we haven’t seen before; it’s clearly the leader. The rabbit admits he killed Garrett all those years ago, and now he wants Abby, too. Vanessa comes in with her gun, and he takes his head off– it’s Steve, the employment agency guy, who is also Afton, Vanessa’s father and founder of the pizzeria. She shoots him, but the suit protects him. He stabs Vanessa.

Abby draws a new picture and posts it to the wall with other drawings. “What have you done?” asks the bad man. The other animatronics see the drawing and turn against the yellow rabbit. “They can see you now; they know what you did,” she tells him.

The robots are not happy, and they attack Afton. Mike and Abby drag Vanessa outside.

Mike and Abby are doing much better, but Vanessa’s in a coma in the hospital.

Back at Freddy’s, we see the ghost boy lock Afton inside a storeroom.

Commentary

This was based on a popular video game that I have no experience with at all, but I did see “Willy’s Wonderland” (2021), which has nearly the same premise. Also very similar was “The Banana Splits Movie” (2019).

Mike really is a terrible security guard. He spends all night sleeping with sleeping pills and headphones on. He’s pretty useless as an adult, as well. Jane is nasty, but he’s a terrible “parent” for Abby. Other than wanting to save Abby, he has no real redeeming qualities. He sort of comes around in the end, but he’s still scummy.

It’s awfully long, and nothing much really happens until 45 minutes in. There’s far too much drama with Mike and his backstory and not nearly enough of the good stuff. The creatures are not CGI; they’re actual puppets and physical props.

This may be the most-hyped, heavily advertised horror film this year. To be completely blunt, “Willy’s Wonderland” did it better.