The FNaF, or Five Nights at Freddy’s, movie was one of the best movies to have released in 2023, and everyone agreed that it was amazing.
DAY OF THE RELEASE
I was shocked to hear that the movie would be streaming on the same day as its release in theaters, October 26th. I’m sad I missed the theater experience, but all over the internet were videos of the theater and people being excited to attend!
Many new and old fans were humming the infamous Freddy music box song, cosplaying as characters from the games, and causing unforgettable memories.. aka incidents as some people created a challenge of stealing the posters that promote the movie.
Though, even at home I had an amazing time watching this movie. With all the lights off, even the slightest jump-scare was enough to spook me. The only thing I really missed was classic theater popcorn.
CONTROVERSY
When the teaser trailer was released in May of this year, many fans were quick to spot a major difference between the movie and the games. The original black and white eyes were now replaced with red and orange. This sparked rage within the FNaF fandom.
Many fans were devastated at the change, thinking that this would make the movie unwatchable. Then some fans explained and defended the eyes due to the black and white eyes being difficult to reproduce with the practical animatronic puppets.
The fandom was at war with.. itself. People were photoshopping what the animatronics “should’ve” looked like, while others actually liked the way the new eyes looked and were angry with those who didn’t.
After the movie came out, everyone came to enjoy the way the Jim Henson Creature Shop went with the animatronics eyes. They could shift color to correspond with their spirit’s emotions, a detail adored by the viewers.
PLOT
As far as the plot goes, it is different from the games and books, we follow the protagonist named Mike Schmidt who works the nightshift at an abandoned animatronic pizza place called “Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza Place”.
Mike takes care of his little sister Abby, though throughout the movie he has constant nightmares about when his brother went missing in 1987. The children who haunt the suits in Freddy’s are connected to the man who took his brother, and so Mike’s main goal is to get the children to tell him who that man is so he can get his revenge.
The way this is done is very fluid, and the animatronics actions are very accurate to the games and books. It is confusing that we now have a third different universe to the FNaF lore, though I don’t mind it and neither do the majority of fans.
MATPAT
Though we did not get to see famous YouTuber, Mark Fisbach, known online as Markiplier, we got two amazing YouTuber appearances.
The first of the two was secret, and gave everyone a huge shock when he showed up on the screen. The FNaF game theorist Matthew Patrick, or MatPat as a diner waiter in a made up restaurant named ‘Sparky’s’. The restaurant name was picked because of a pretty huge theory about a “secret animatronic” in the first FNaF game, and MatPat’s name tag was ‘Ness’ after a funny theory video he made years ago.
The second appearance, very appreciated by long time FNaF fans, was Cory Williams, better known as CoryxKenshin on YouTube. He was one of the first to create FNaF let’s plays that actually blew up, very similar to Mark and many others.
FINAL THOUGHTS
At the end of the movie, I was excited to check out all the fan content because I already knew the movie was going to blow up in popularity. Fanart, memes, clips and anything that could be made was and still is being made.
As a long time fan, I got to see new fans enjoy the content like I did many years ago, and the movie brought everyone together to appreciate the franchise. So overall, the Five Nights at Freddy’s Movie was a hit, and I cannot wait for more.
