I have no illusions that Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 entertained me due in no small part to personal bias. There was genuine enjoyment to be had for how silly and fun it was and enjoy it I did. I, of all people, am not immune to nostalgia. But there’s no mincing words: the second outing at the cinemas for creator Scott Cawthon’s behemoth horror franchise is, in no uncertain terms, a movie of mixed to low quality. It’s kind of bad. And that’s okay.

Its effects are simultaneously better and worse, its dialogue ranges from alright to atrocious, and its performances are all over the place. The premise it runs with, remixing the second game with its shiny new Toy versions of the Fazbear Entertainment gang, is a fun time fueled by fan service and busting at the seams to try and accommodate it all to an under two-hour runtime. But it’s messier than the backrooms of the pizzerias it takes place in.

A Remix of Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 (And Others), Heavy on Fanservice

This time, the primary antagonist puppeteering a cast of aggressive animatronics is literally a puppet; the Marionette, a scorned victim of the previous film’s antagonist William Afton. Slain and bound to the very first restaurant Afton started, a group of ghost hunters unleash its evil when a recording of their show goes horribly wrong. It’s up to Mike (Josh Hutcherson) and Vanessa (Elizabeth Lail) to try and seal it away again, or risk their lives being torn apart by the supernatural once more.

For the game fans this film was crafted for, it will satiate any lore craving they might have. Well, at least until the third film, when Mike will combat oxygen deprivation that causes him to hallucinate phantom animatronics (no, that sentence is not a joke, that actually happens). There are tidbits of foreshadowing for sequels, confirmations of theories, retcons, and somewhat amusing cameos. For everyone else, you’ll get a good laugh and the occasional scare, but you will have a plethora of questions.

The Screenplay Has Been Springlocked

The script for this sequel is riddled with oddities, nothing characters, and genre cliches that are in a quantum state of “good because it’s hilarious” and “bad because it’s genuinely bad” depending on who is delivering them. The story isn’t always predictable just because of the adaptation factor it relishes in, but its dialogue is undeniably silly and hamstrings what could otherwise be good performances with a need to rush along lore and forced character development.

Hutcherson’s go around as Mike this time is phoned in, and it doesn’t help that he wasn’t given anything to work with other than being a stereotypical single father figure to his kid sister. It’s not all bleak; Lail does actually deliver the film’s best bits in a genuinely frightening dream sequence delving into Vanessa’s backstory. She also gets a few fun final girl moments, but hasn’t reached the level of iconic that would garner calling her a scream queen; we’ll see if that changes in 3 given the radical shift in character she goes through here.

Great Villains Hamstrung by an Imperfect Script (And Effects)

Piper Rubio is once again fit to her role as Abby, though the character she’s playing is oddly one note for a child who is psychic friends with the ghosts of dead kids. The brief voice lines for the animatronics by guest stars garner little in the way of memorability, but long-time Freddy voice actor Kellen Goff does manage to make a solid impact with the one or two lines he receives.

While we’re on the topic of those new fiendish animatronics, they are much better than anticipated. Their practical puppetry bases and how they’re composited with the CGI isn’t bad at all, with game designs translating well and moving nicely. The Marionette’s myriad forms, however, do feel exceptionally goofy despite the terrifying concept of a slithering octopoid puppet ghost with no concrete skeleton. They’re the lowlight of the film’s effects, but it’s kind of endearing how silly they look.

The biggest victim of the film, however, is Freddy Carter. He plays the creep factor of his character up to a thousand in a way that absolutely would work with better writing and a darker tone. But he’s shackled by the lore implications of being a character people have been waiting for, in a way that feels more offensive to the story than the constant easter eggs. Every word that leaves his mouth feels comically bad, laden with exposition or just outright limp and cold linework.

We Underused Matthew Lillard Again (And Skeet Ulrich This Time Too)

Which is a shame, because our minor villain does get to have fun. Matthew Lillard’s brief screen chewing time in the sun as William Afton once more is delightful, playing a deranged killer in a yellow bunny costume with all the glee that visual would indicate.

Skeet Ulrich as fan favorite character Henry Emily, however, doesn’t get nearly enough time to shine. Despite being a perfect casting for the role and delivering a convincing turn as a grieving father, he’s relegated to just delivering a plot device that gets 30 seconds of screentime. Here’s to hoping the next film reunites the Scream alums, allowing the long-time rivals of the game to finally cross paths.

Can Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 Be More Than Fan Service?

I suppose the constant reiteration of that last point is important to address: the current train of thought is that hopefully, eventually, the kinks will be worked out as far as the Five Nights at Freddy’s films go. Though I’m not holding my breath.

There are no reservations that this is, first and foremost gateway horror for younger audiences, with a nostalgia barbed fishhook to sink into in older fans as well. My humble prediction is that almost all of these films will remain roughly the same level of quality (middling to poor), the same level of frightening (more than you’d think and much less than you’d hope), and the same level of entertaining for the segments of the population it hits for (a fairly fun time).

And maybe that’s enough. To simply be entertaining gateway horror is fine, I don’t think there’s a screaming necessity for these to be masterpieces. This movie is kind of bad, and that’s okay if all you need is some fleeting entertainment or to see your favorite game adapted to film. But films with this much franchise potential should be treated as all others. They can be strong horror films with great iconography rather than features beholden entirely to that iconography.

Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 fails to wow in any particular department other than being “for the fans” and much of its unintentional humor. Still, there’s a glimmer of hope here in its silvery eyes that this can all be something more down the line.