Just like pineapple on pizza, people have had mixed reviews about the new Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 movie, which was released on December 5, 2025. The sequel is something FNAF fans have been waiting for since the release of the first movie in 2023. The critiques people often had about the first movie were that it was not gory enough or had not have enough action. Even though both movies are rated PG-13, the creator of the original games, Scott Cawthon, was determined to make this movie scarier while keeping the gore to a minimum, which was stated in an interview on SA Live with Matthew Lillard and Skeet Ulrich. In the same interview, actor Matthew Lillard, who plays the main antagonist in the first movie, William Afton, states, “What people seemed to really want is more action, more jumpscare. So that is the second film in a nutshell.”
With a new movie, of course, comes with new cast members as well. The newer cast members in the movie include Skeet Ulrich, who plays Henry Emily, McKenna Grace as Lisa, Wayne Knight as Mr.Berg, and Freddy Carter, who plays Michael Afton. This movie definitely brings Scream and FNAF fans together, as Ulrich and Lillard both star in another movie together after almost 30 years since Scream 1 (1996). Even with this reunion, the movie had a lot of critiques to it.
Critics, on Rotten Tomatoes, state that the movie was a “bleak, shameless cash-grab,” and “worse than the first film”. So far, the movie has 15% on Rotten Tomatoes, 5.8 on IMDb, and 2.8/5 on Letterboxd. Even with such low ratings, the movie still hit high in earnings on opening night. According to Deadline, FNAF 2 reached $ 64 million on its opening day and weekend, still not surpassing the $ 80 million the first movie made. Even with such low ratings, the movie managed to rake in millions just on the opening days.
The opinion of critics does not always reflect the opinion of FNAF fans, as when interviewing student, Emily Peschke (12th grade), she states, “I did like it, but because there was a bunch of references, especially like small ones, which I thought were really cool.” She then states, “The story I didn’t really like because they did not go based on the games, which I knew they weren’t, but I didn’t like what they did to the puppet. I did enjoy the movie despite that. The song at the end was a banger too.”
Even with this, it seems that fans seemed to enjoy it more than critics, who probably do not know the lore or the characters in the story as well as actual fans do. It does seem that there will be an FNAF 3 movie in the future, as there were many hints at it, especially at the end of the film. It’s speculated that it will come out in 2027 to 2028, but dates have not been confirmed yet, as of late.
