Biters FNAF is coming to GBM…well, sort of…You see, I was thinking of doing a three-way battle royal between the Five Nights film, Willy’s Wonderland, and the Banana Splits Movie, as they all seem to stem from the same base: the Five Nights game franchise.

However, while I enjoyed all three films, one was far better than the others at being a FNAF movie, and shockingly, it wasn’t Freddy Fazbear.

Taking the bronze is The Banana Splits. The popularity of the Indie horror game Five Nights At Freddy’s made a movie seem like a logical next step, but as I recall, it seemed like studios were having trouble getting it off the ground.

Cut to trailers of the Splits movie, and I was ready to write this film as a lazy reskin and cheap Five Nights knockoff. Luckily, it was different enough to be its own thing, so its blessing is also its curse. It’s not Five Nights or the Splits, which puts it at the bottom of the barrel as an adaption of either.

The silver medal goes to the Five Nights film. This one has the characters, the location, all the Easter eggs and the fan service you could want, so how could the FNAF movie only take second in an FNAF contest?

Well, Biters, the fact that this is a franchise enjoyed by kids and adults means the violence is relatively tame, which, from that standpoint, is understandable. However, who could have guessed a property centred around murderous animatronics?

What level of gore would be expected in a proper horror film? Not to mention, as a YouTube movie reviewer pointed out, our protagonist, played by Josh Hutcherson, spends most of the film sleeping. So, while this was made with love for the fans, it’s still only a runner-up.

Now, what does Willy’s Wonderland do to come out on top? Well, like the Splits, it has the gore, and like Freddy’s, it has the iconography. Using Nicolas Cage as your star doesn’t hurt either.

What’s so great about this is not only does Cage not have a single line of dialogue in the entire movie, but the killer animatronics seem to be little more than a minor annoyance as he goes about cleaning a run-down Chucky Cheese knockoff.

Not only does Willy’s have the correct type of location and bad guys to work as a parody or homage to FNAF, but it also subverts expectations to stand alone as its own goofy horror flick.

Biters, as I said, are all worth a watch, particularly if you’re into light or campy horror. With that, Biters, we here at GBM would love to hear if you think I got it right.

Until next time,
James