Ever since the first game was released in August of 2014, the survival horror game “Five Nights at Freddy’s”, created by Scott Cawthon, has been a global sensation after gaining popularity on YouTube and other popular streaming services with thousands of gameplay videos and other various forms of content surrounding the series. FNAF became a media franchise after the release of 8 more following video games and 12 official books by Scott Cawthon, and the series is well-loved for its intriguing/mysterious lore, overall gameplay effects, and audience appeal. It’s no wonder that fans were ecstatic to hear that finally a movie was being made about the series after so many years of hoping and waiting that one would be produced, and many fans have questions surrounding what the film itself will entail; When will it be released? What will the plot consist of— and who will be performing and producing this heavily anticipated film? 

The concept of “Five Nights at Freddy’s” is simple, the player or “security guard” tries to survive the night by not getting attacked (Jumpscared) by haunted murderous animatronics, the original four being Bonnie, Freddy, Chica, and Foxy. The following games offer different mechanics and new characters to make the gameplay and surrounding “lore” more interesting. The movie will follow much of a similar plotline, with the description overview we know so far of the movie saying “A troubled security guard begins working at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza. While spending his first night on the job, he realizes the night shift at Freddy’s won’t be so easy to make it through.” 

Jason Blum, a producer of the FNAF movie, announced via twitter that the movie is set to be released just before Halloween on October 27, 2023. The production companies working on this film are Blumhouse Productions and Striker Entertainment; the film is being distributed by Universal Pictures. Fans were especially excited to hear that the iconic animatronic characters and other visual effects will be created by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, the company behind famous renowned projects such as Sesame Street. We don’t yet have a good look at what the animatronic characters will look like in regard to movement and design, but we do know that with these committed producers and companies with such high acclaim, the outcome will certainly be rewarding.  

Some of the casting decisions have also been released to the public, and many fans are delighted and even surprised with the decisions made by casting as to who will play the characters in the film. Some character names present in the official cast names for the film aren’t recognizable, so it looks like we will be seeing many new characters not yet seen in the game franchise, but for the ones we do know, the actors are sure to be a good fit. William Afton, the main antagonist in the FNAF games known as “The Purple Guy”, will be played by Matthew Lillard, who is known for his work in films like Scooby-Doo as Shaggy and in Scream as Stu. The main protagonist, Mike Schmidt, will be played by Josh Hutcherson, who is best known for his role as Peeta in The Hunger Games. It will be interesting to see these actors’ interpretations of these popular character names and what course of action the movie will take in portraying these characters on screen.  

There is lots of speculation from fans regarding possible surprise cameos in the film, many theorize that big name YouTubers such as Markiplier and CoryxKenshin will appear in the film due to their support of the games on their platforms and the supposed “hints” they’ve been dropping in recent videos pertaining to future projects they are working on, though none of these theories have been confirmed by either the producers of these content creators. Some even speculate that Jack Black will be appearing in the film due to his love for the game series and the multiple funny videos he has posted in the past reacting to the games and singing songs about them. I personally would be freaking out if I watched the movie and all of a sudden Mark, Cory, or Jack made an appearance; it would definitely jump to one of my top 10 favorite films of all time, but I’m not getting my hopes up in assuming.   

So far not much else is known about the movie or what surprises it will have in store for fans when it is finally released. Whatever the case, a movie that we’ve been waiting 9 whole years for is bound to be an iconic film with many great themes to be explored.