India, Dec. 5 -- When the first Five Nights at Freddy's landed in 2023, it became an unlikely phenomenon-part nostalgia trip, part carefully packaged PG-13 horror that allowed younger fans to feel like they were touching something dangerous without actually being scared. Built on the cult success of Scott Cawthon's video-game universe, the film stitched together haunted animatronics, missing children, and internet-fueled mythology into something that audiences devoured regardless of its shortcomings. A sequel was inevitable.

The second instalment opens with a flashback to 1982, where a young girl named Charlotte witnesses a kidnapping during a party at the original Freddy's location and is murdered while adults inexplicably stand by. Her...