Five Nights at Freddy's 2 (2025)

1/2 Star (out of 4)

Diddly Bot

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

After initially showing some promise, Emma Tammi's cash-in sequel Five Nights at Freddy's 2 devolves into the most achingly shopworn batch of mismatched clichés imaginable; it's so bad it feels mechanical, like a rundown robot.

Mike (Josh Hutcherson) and his younger sister Abby (Piper Rubio) are trying to get back to a normal life after the harrowing events of the first movie. Mike and Vanessa (Elizabeth Lail) might even share a romantic spark. But Abby misses her "friends" and Mike doesn't know how to tell her that they're gone.

Meanwhile, a group of paranormal investigators discovers the original Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, where Vanessa's childhood friend Charlotte was killed. They inadvertently unleash Charlotte's vengeful ghost, now inhabiting an animatronic character called the Marionette. Charlotte hopes to trick Abby into helping her unleash Freddy, Chica, Bonnie, and Foxy, sending them out of the restaurant and into the real world to cause untold havoc.

It's hard to overstate the awfulness of Five Nights at Freddy's 2, the sequel to the popular 2023 original. The dialogue feels forced and mismatched, as if characters aren't really speaking to or listening to each other. Characters split up when they shouldn't. Day suddenly turns to night. Robots that normally squeak and clunk and rumble the ground when they walk, sometimes simply silently appear.

The "original" Freddy's restaurant seems to magically emerge in town as if no one ever knew it was there, though close enough that Abby can ride her bike to it. Abby's robotics teacher (Seinfeld's Wayne Knight) emotionally bullies her in a merciless way, going so far as to deliberately destroy her creation before the science fair, all so that when he meets his end, it's something we can root for.

There are dozens of small irritants, from convenient coincidences to a complete lack of understanding of time passing. It all ends with a vague and seemingly random collection of twists that suggest a third movie, but Five Nights at Freddy's 2 is more than plenty.