“Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” - A real groaner.

What’s the over/under on how much more money Blumhouse Productions can squeeze out of the FNaF film turd? $200 million? $300 million? For those of you who aren’t part of the cult following of FNaF games, FNaF stands for Five Nights at Freddy’s. For those of you who are part of the cult, know that I hate you all a little bit right now. Because you all spent $297 million to see the first quite bad FNaF film (which was made for a paltry $20 million), a sequel was made. And since you all will probably spend a similar amount to see the somehow-much-worse Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, there’s going to be at least one more rock-bottom-fifty-feet-of-crap-then-us sequel that I’m going to begrudgingly sit through.

Yes, Five Nights at Freddy’s was a turd of a film. I said even the fanboys should ask for seventeen dollars back and the only reason I didn’t include it as one of the worst movies of the year in 2023 was because the animatronics were at least visually interesting. Freddy’s 2 gets no such consolation, managing even to make the animatronics worse.

Freddy’s 2 begins with a scene set back in 1982, featuring a young girl named Charlotte at a birthday party at the original Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza. She witnesses a boy being snatched by someone in a Freddy suit and is disdainfully dismissed by practically every parent in the building as she frantically tries to tell them what she saw. Finding no help, she attempts to rescue the boy herself and ends up stabbed and dying in front of those same parents who still barely care that a girl bleeds to death in the arms of a marionette animatronic. Everything about this scene is executed terribly, is completely unbelievable from a storytelling perspective, and is but a small taste of the shit sandwich the audience is forced to swallow for the next ninety minutes.

Flash forward to a about a year after the events of the first film (twenty years after Charlotte’s death) where we meet back up with the three survivors of the first film, Mike (Josh Hutcherson), his younger sister Abby (Piper Rubio), and Vanessa (Elizabeth Lail). After an awkward date between Mike and Vanessa, followed by an even more awkward conversation between them at Mike’s house, interspersed with Abby constantly whining that she wants to see her dead kid friends again, I realized how much I disliked all three of them. The film seemed to go out of its way to make the audience wonder if maybe Vanessa’s serial killer father (Matthew Lillard) was right.

Meanwhile, the security guard (Freddy Carter) at the original Freddy’s invites and escorts a trio of ghost hunters in to explore the dilapidated restaurant. Led by Lisa (Mckenna Grace), the three quickly split up to check out various areas. Lisa’s partners are quickly dispatched and Lisa is possessed by Charlotte. Not even trying to hide his glee or obvious ill intentions, the security guard leaves after watching the possession happen.

This scene is nearly as bad as the opening flashback, but for different reasons. The two murders are as bloodless and sanitized as Charlotte’s murder, reinforcing how very, very PG-13 this movie is. It blows the identity of the non-supernatural villain well prior to the film’s sad and half-hearted reveal in the climax. And it completely wastes Mckenna Grace, who is de-possessed a short while later, her dead body left in a storage room.

At this point, it seemed as if the movie had abandoned the entire premise of the murder bots. That’s not to say they aren’t still in the movie, but they really don’t do much. After Charlotte escapes the restaurant, she sends the bots to kill the parents from that 1982 birthday party. In an attempt to stop them, non-evil Mike stays at Freddy’s, working on the computer to try to disconnect the bots’ network connections. Bet you weren’t expecting a major plot point being disconnecting a router.

There are far more terrible components to this movie - Wayne Knight playing an asshat science teacher, to name one. But perhaps the worst component was also the only one that elicited an actual audible reaction from the audience. At one point, Abby is possessed by Charlotte and Mike exorcises Charlotte by playing a music box at her that Charlotte’s dad (Skeet Ulrich) gave her. As Charlotte (now in marionette form for some reason) slithers away, Mike puts the music box away. The entire audience, myself included, let out a collective “why are you putting it away?!” groan. But does Charlotte coming flying back into Abby? Or into any of the humans? And shouldn’t Abby be dead like Lisa? Don’t be absurd.

That groan nicely sums up this laughably atrocious film. Like the last film, this film has no idea what it wants to be. Screenwriter Scott Cawthon and director Emma Tammi have now made two films with no entertainment value, confusing and nonsensical storytelling, bland and shallow characters, and barely any scares (and a paltry five wildly uncreative kills). And to top it off, the movie ends with an actual cliffhanger, figuratively slapping the audience in the face as if to say “you’ll eat your shit sandwich and like it.”

Rating: Ask for everyone’s money back and remember to give the stink eye to the cult followers that don’t ask for their money back.

“Regretting You” - Took the words right out of my mouth.

Regretting You is now the second Colleen Hoover novel adaptation I’ve seen, after last year’s It Ends With Us. I hope there isn’t a third adaptation because neither of these movies were what one might describe as “good” or “entertaining” or “worth it.” And like with It Ends With Us, I did not take anyone with me to Regretting You because it’s far funnier to be one of four men in a theater packed with women, watching a movie best described as what if the Lifetime Channel got drunk and fell down the stairs?

By the way, I knew what I was getting into when I RSVP’d for the screening of Regretting You. Not the story itself - I don’t hate myself enough to read a Hoover novel on purpose. But I read the synopsis blurb and saw the movie poster and figured I apparently do hate myself enough to spend two hours in a theater watching another Hoover adaptation.

Hey, all you Hoover fans - are all of her books as depressing as It Ends With Us and Regretting You? Do all of her books include a lost teenage romance, domestic abuse, infidelity, melodramatic happy endings that are only possible after worst-case scenarios, or all of the above? Is this why you drink so much wine in your book clubs?

If it sounds like my cynicism meter is in the red, you are correct. It’s been in the red since roughly five minutes into watching Regretting You. The film starts with high-school aged Morgan (Allison Williams), Jonah (Dave Franco), Chris (Scott Eastwood), and Jenny (Willa Fitzgerald) at a party. Morgan and Chris are a couple, Jonah and Jenny are a couple, Morgan and Jenny are sisters, and all of them are friends. This party scene only lasts a couple of minutes, but it’s painfully obvious that Morgan and Jonah love each other (but do nothing about it) and Chris and Jenny are definitely cheating on Morgan and Jonah with each other. And the scene ends with Morgan telling Jonah she’s pregnant.

Seventeen years later, Morgan and Chris are married with their now seventeen-year-old daughter Clara (Mckenna Grace). Jonah and Jenny have recently reunited and have a new baby themselves. While celebrating Morgan’s birthday, Morgan casually remarks how the baby looks exactly like Clara when Clara was a baby. Got it...the baby is the result of Chris still cheating on Morgan with Jenny (Jonah and Morgan don’t figure this out until much later in the film). That sound you hear is the Lifetime Channel doing a keg stand.

The next day, Morgan and Jonah are independently summoned to the hospital, surprised to find each other there, then told that Chris and Jenny were killed in a car accident. Jonah quickly realizes Chris and Jenny were having an affair and Morgan demands Jonah keep it a secret from Clara. To add to the drama, Clara blames herself for the accident because she thinks Jenny was texting and driving while texting with Clara. Oh, and their conversation revolved around Clara liking a boy named Miller (Mason Thames) and Jenny warning Clara not to be the other woman. That sound you hear is the Lifetime Channel hitting the banister at the bottom of the stairs.

Now that Jenny and Chris are out of the picture, it’s only a matter of time before Morgan and Jonah confess their lost love for each other. And it’s only a matter of time before Clara finds out about Chris and Jenny’s affair. And it’s only a matter of time before Clara and Miller bone because they’re seventeen. Nothing in this movie is the least bit surprising and now the Lifetime Channel is now lying unconscious in a pool of its own vomit.

The story isn’t the only thing that made this movie a terrible watch. The acting ranges from a solid Grace, to a very uneven and uncommitted Williams, to mostly literal jaw-clenching from Thames, to a wildly miscast deer-in-headlights Franco. And shoutouts to Eastwood, Fitzgerald, the criminally underutilized Clancy Brown (as Miller’s grandpa), and the criminally overused Sam Morelos (as Clara’s friend) for collecting a paycheck by appearing in this dreck.

On top of that, the tone of the film is all over the place. There’s practically zero consideration of the affair beyond it being a convenient excuse for Morgan and Jenny to barely care that their significant others are dead. Just kick a car a few times, throw a few eggs at an ugly painting, abandon a baby for a couple days, and kick a hole in an annoying door and everything will be right as rain. Even Clara barely grieves for her dead relatives before moving on to a bunch of AMC branded movie dates with Miller. It’s like the movie knows emotions are a thing that exists but has never actually felt any of them.

The moral of the story - mine, not the movie’s - is don’t take a date to see this movie. Or any Hoover film adaptation. And probably don’t read another Hoover book. But do please help the Lifetime Channel get home. They don’t look good.

Rating: Ask for all of your money back and another glass of wine.

“Troop Zero” - A tale of two movies.

Sitting next to each other, in the same theater on the same night, my wife and I saw two entirely different movies. I saw a heartwarming movie with adorable, courageous kids, a solid story, and a tight running time that kept the film from meandering. My wife saw a jumbled, sometimes-incoherent story, writing that failed to make her care about any of the characters, and a running time that made the movie feel rushed. Am I right? Is she right? Am I cutting this movie slack because I just watched three turds in a row (Underwater, Dolittle, Bad Boys for Life)? Is she dead inside?

(Side note: she is your editor, so delete that last bit before she reads this.)

(Editor’s note: Dick.)

Christmas Flint (Mckenna Grace) is a tween girl trying to cope with the death of her mother. Living alone with her father, Ramsey (Jim Gaffigan), in their trailer/law office (in rural Georgia circa 1977), Christmas spends countless hours staring at the night sky, convinced that her mother has passed on into the stars. One day, she overhears Miss Massey (Allison Janney), the school principal and local Birdie Scout leader, talking with a NASA scientist (Ash Thapliyal) about the upcoming Birdie Scout Jamboree. Whichever troop wins first place at the talent show gets to record a message on a golden record that will be attached to the Voyager Probe, soon to be launched into space. Loving space as much as she does, and desperate to send a message her mother might hear, Christmas sets forth to win the prize. Unfortunately, she is not a Birdie Scout. When she approaches the older girls in the troop, asking to join them to help them win, they respond by stuffing her into a locker.

Determined not to be denied, Christmas decides to start her own troop, enlisting four other outcasts – Joseph (Charlie Shotwell), Hell-No (Milan Ray), Smash (Johanna Colon), and Anne-Claire (Bella Higginbotham). Christmas also convinces her dad’s secretary, Miss Rayleen (Viola Davis), to be their troop leader. The group is every bunch of misfits you have ever seen throughout dozens of films, just with different names. The Mighty Ducks, the Goonies, the Bad News Bears, the oil workers in Armageddon, and, now, Troop Zero.

Join us?

(SPOILER ALERT - I need to talk about some scenes that my wife and I agree on and some that we don’t.)

Between the inception of the troop and the Jamboree is when almost all of the character building happens. In order to qualify for the Jamboree, each of the kids has to earn a patch to be considered an official Birdie Scout. This second act is the part that really lost my wife and I can understand why. Miss Massey hands Miss Rayleen a nearly-empty jar with a handful of misfit patches representing very random skills. I get that this was supposed to be a metaphor for the troop, but it doesn’t make sense in any context. Along with those patches, Miss Massey issues a warning that the kids have to earn the patches honestly; they can’t just grab a patch and pretend they earned it. This makes sense until you see that nobody is actually monitoring or testing the kids besides Miss Rayleen. And the tasks they perform to earn the patches are questionable at best. They don’t really serve to build the characters so much as to serve as punchlines for some sight gags. Which, in this case, was good enough for me.

The other part that kills my wife - and this goes for me too - are movies in which bullies never get punished for assaulting other children or even questioned by authority figures. It is an incredible turn off that always takes us out of the film because it is so unbelievable. This film has two major examples of this. One is a food fight in which Miss Rayleen conveniently cannot hear despite being in the next room and which all of the blame falls squarely on the misfit troop. The second is how troop zero is treated during their performance at the Jamboree, to the point of abject humiliation while a tent-full of grownups literally do nothing to stop it. I get that some people are assholes, which is why their kids are assholes, but you not only have to suspend your disbelief during this scene to accept it; you have to beat your disbelief into submission.

You think your shit don't stink?

Despite those flaws, the film worked for me. There was enough earnestness in the kids’ performances that I looked past the haphazard writing. Gaffigan, Janney, Davis, and Grace gave great performances, with a very solid assist from young Shotwell. I wanted them to defeat the older girls’ troop because those girls were shitheads and Miss Massey let them get away with being shitheads. Christmas’ happy-go-lucky attitude in the early part of the film, even after being bullied by several other kids, rubbed me the right way. And, I really liked the way the kids became friends and banded together by the end of the film.

Sure, rooting for the underdog here was exceptionally easy and there are clearly some backstories and character relationships that were dropped on the cutting room floor in order to keep the running time at ninety minutes. But, the underdog is Mckenna Grace. She is impossible not to root for. She emotes better than almost any actor out there and she is now three-for-three in making me sob during a film. Looking back, I probably am cutting this movie some slack. But I felt for these kids and any film that can make me cry is worth it in my book. I think it is pretty clear who is right in the instance.

Rating: Ask for two dollars back. If you are dead inside, ask for ten dollars back. (Editor’s note: Dick.)