How Five Nights At Freddy’s 2’s Credits Scene Sets Up a Third Movie

Warning: This article contains spoilers for “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2”.

Director Emma Tammi’s “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” is so heavy with lore and mythology that it will make your head spin. Only those who are intimately familiar with the “Five Nights at Freddy’s” video games created by Scott Cawthon will be able to understand the meaning, as the “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” script (written by Cawthon) includes characters, scenes and ideas from the games that are never properly explained. For example, by my estimation, there are three different versions of Freddy Fazbear, the killer pizzeria robot, each operating under a different set of supernatural rules.

The villain of the first “Freddy’s” movie was William Afton (Matthew Lillard), a serial killer whose modus operandi was to lure children to his Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza restaurants and murder them in the back room. William liked to wear a yellow rabbit costume when he committed his crimes, designing himself to look like one of the animatronics he had built. The Yellow Rabbit is an integral part of the story of the game “Freddy’s”.

The Yellow Rabbit is also an integral part of “Freddy’s 2”. William’s daughter, Vanessa (Elizabeth Lail), has a lucid dream during the film in which she has visions of her monstrous father stalking her in the bunny suit. This happens as she helps her future boyfriend Mike (Josh Hutcherson) and his sister Abby (Piper Rubio) escape various other Fazbear animatronics who have gone haywire and escaped into the streets.

The film ends with a sequel tease involving the Yellow Rabbit… even if it’s pretty lame. It is implied that there is an animatronic version of the Yellow Rabbit – not a version with William Afton inside – and that it will come to life just in time for “Five Nights at Freddy’s 3”.

I repeat, the mythology of “Five Nights at Freddy’s” is extremely complex. In the first film, it is explained that the animatronics of Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria are able to live and walk around because they are possessed by the ghosts of William Afton’s victims. In the second film, there are new, shinier robotic versions of the animatronics, but they appear to be artificially intelligent terminator robots. Each of the animatronic animals – Freddy, Foxy, Chicka and Bonnie – appear to have their own personality, but they also end up being possessed, this time by the same singular ghost. It’s never clearly explained, but the ghosts seem to serve as batteries for the Fazbear gang.

And if that’s the case, then the twist at the end of “Freddy’s 2” makes sense. In the mid-credits of “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2”, we see a trio of idle criminals – never before seen in the film – breaking into Freddy Fazbear’s abandoned pizzeria. They mention that the building is scheduled to be demolished the next day, so they must hurry to collect any artifacts from the 1980s that might be left behind. In the film’s present time, 2002, Freddy Fazbear’s has become an object of camp admiration, so any authentic toys or products these interlopers can scrounge up would fetch a pretty penny.

Looters find merchandise, as well as an additional spooky artifact. They discover a slightly worn and partially skinless yellow rabbit animatronic. They cover it in plastic (to protect it from a leaky roof) and excitedly run out of the room, going to get their van to wrap it up. When they leave the room, the Yellow Rabbit’s electric eye begins to glow, implying that he may be alive.

Because it is the Yellow Rabbit, the implication is that the living animatronic is possessed by the spirit of William Afton. The events of “Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” are activated by an animatronic called the Puppet, itself possessed by the ghost of one of Afton’s victims. The puppet’s ghostly powers are said to have somehow infiltrated multiple animatronics at once, allowing him to “puppet” them all from a distance. It also appears that Afton’s mind – active due to the previous dream sequence – is drifting somewhere in the ether. Either the spirit of Afton or the spirit of his victim now animate the Yellow Rabbit animatronics.

This very clearly means that the Yellow Rabbit will become the central villain of the inevitable (?) “Five Nights at Freddy’s 3”.

It’s worth noting that “Freddy’s 2” also features a few never-before-seen animatronic cameos. There’s a chubby ladybug-like creature that only appears in one scene, and later, Mike is stalked by a young, big-eyed robot. These two creatures don’t play a big role in “Freddy’s 2,” but there’s every reason to believe they’ll join the Yellow Rabbit on a killing spree in “Freddy’s 3.” Because the story of “Freddy’s” video games is so complex and confusing, a number of new characters could appear to help Afton’s rabbit-shaped ghost. When the film finally comes out, we here at /Film will be here to talk about it. Fingers crossed that we like the next one more than the current one.

“Five Nights at Freddy’s 2” is now playing in theaters.