The reviews are finally flooding in for the latest video game adaptation, Five Nights at Freddy’s, and they aren’t looking so hot. But before you declare it a surefire flop, we have reason to believe otherwise.
On the eve of FNaF‘s opening weekend, the film so far has a dismal 38% critical score on Rotten Tomatoes (based on 26 reviews) as well as a meager 28 on MetaCritic (based on nine reviews). However, there’s another movie that came out earlier this year that’s also based on a video game that had no problem attaining $1 billion at the worldwide box office, despite also having a “rotten” score on the review aggregate site: The Super Mario Bros Movie.
While the early reactions for the film have largely slammed it for being not scary, not all of the people who saw the movie had a negative experience — especially if they were simply a general audience member rather than a critic. For example, the Twitter user @simplykraus called FNaF “terrific,” and the Letterboxd reviewer Nitro Spider said it was still a well-crafted movie with fine performances despite being “not that scary.” While the positive fan reactions have been fewer and farther between than the negative ones, like Jackseptickeye declaring he really “didn’t like it,” there’s still a glimmer of hope for this movie making its budget back — and then some — at the box office.
In fact, one critic, Digital Spy’s Ian Sandwell, admitted that FNaF was “faithfully” recreated from the game, even though it was an overall negative movie review. You’d be hard-pressed to find any movie reviews for FNaF that are actually universally positive. But even so, that was also largely the case for The Super Mario Bros. Movie, with its 59% critical score on Rotten Tomatoes, and yet, it still found success.
What has been almost universally praised in FNaF are the animatronics, which were impressively brought to life without the aid of CGI. Rather, Jim Henson’s Creature Shop is responsible for bringing Freddy Fazbear and his murderous allies to life. Indeed, the characters look almost exactly as they do in the games.
One thing that likely contributed to the success of The Super Mario Bros. Movie is the fact that it was a very faithful adaptation of the games, with the characters looking like a one-to-one recreation for the most part. If the same could be said of the FNaF film, as all the signs seem to point to, perhaps the PG-13 horror film can make a profit yet.
If you think FNaF becoming a box office success sounds like crazy talk for a critically-panned movie, consider the fact that it is already projecting a $50 million opening weekend, according to Deadline. That figure is made all the more impressive when you consider it only has a budget of $25 million, according to ScreenRant. In fact, that high figure seems like an outright miracle when you consider audiences could stream the movie at home on the same day of its theatrical release with a paid Peacock account, for which the cheapest subscription is only $6 per month.
Five Nights at Freddy’s hits theaters and Peacock on October 27.
