Five Nights at Freddy's | October 27, 2023 | In Theaters and Peacock simultaneously

[Bob Train]

24 minutes ago, SpiderByte said:

There's been a real push by some users here that FNAF and Barbie are some heir apparents to older franchises like Marvel or Transformers etc, even though I think it's kind of a reach to assume the reason FNAF, an already huge video game franchise for almost ten years, is doing well in tracking because of disaffected Marvel or Indiana Jones fans or something

All franchises eventually get fatigued and die. Due to Hollywood's lack of creativity, they have been leaning more on established franchises in the last decade. Movies that are based on a huge brand, but never got a blockbuster movie have the advantage in the post-pandemic marketplace because there is no fatigue there. 

 

Many movies that are based on long-running franchises flopped this year, as they have no draw besides "yet another [insert franchise name] movie". Eventually, audiences get tired of that. We have seen this twice this year with Barbie and Mario absolutely destroying franchises that are more "field-tested" like DCEU, Indiana Jones, Transformers, MCU, F&F, etc. 

 

I remember you saying that a "field-tested" franchise like Halloween only managed to tap out a $49m with a hybrid release, so FNAF, an untested franchise theatrically, would be unlikely to do much more than that. But being untested is actually one of FNAF's biggest assets, as the draw of it is not something like any other major release. By Halloween Kills/Ends, fatigue was kicking in for them and grosses/appeal kept getting lower and lower. There was not much of a draw there beyond "yet another Halloween movie" and the grosses diminished. For some franchises, it takes only 3 or 4 movies for fatigue to set it. For others like F&F, it takes more like 10. For MCU it took 30 movies.

 

I'm not saying that it is taking the audience from disaffected MCU/DC/Indiana Jones/whatever fans, I'm saying it is pulling in a new audience, whereas MCU keeps losing audiences to the point where sequels to movies that opened to $150m are only tracking for $50-$70m. That's because audiences don't see why there is any point in going to a "more of the same" movie when there are movies based on a big brand but first in the franchise theatrically, which gives it an extra novelty that others don't have.

[Porthos]

4 hours ago, Mojoguy said:

Video game movie curse strikes again!

 

Me to all to Younger Gamers going through the roller coaster emotions of a, shall we say, less than great Video Game Adaptation:

 

 

Spoiler

Actual real thoughts in my next post

 

[Porthos]

 

1 hour ago, Zakiyyah6 said:

I'm sure the film will be crap and I won't like it because I'm 39 years old but I remember how freaked out people were about Super Mario Bros reviews and acting like that film was doomed. If FNAF gets bad word of mouth it is doomed but the people who like this IP don't give a darn about reviews. 

 

1 hour ago, Bob Train said:

This. A kids videogame horror movie, you literally cannot get a movie more critic-proof. I guess people are upset a FNAF movie is gonna out open all their favorite franchises this year. Shows audiences are moving on to new franchises.

 

Both of these points are very true.  At the same time "boring" is the Kiss of Death when it comes to Video Game Adaptations.  Or indeed Popcorn Flicks in general.

 

While there has been anecdotal reporting here on this thread and on reddit (and elsewhere) I don't think we have enough info out yet to know how the fanbase itself is gonna feel about the movie.  Knowing some related gaming subcultures in general a tiny bit, I do think there will be something of a protective instinct surrounding FNAF.  But that could get easily shattered if enough/the right influencers start turning on it or just give it "meh" reviews.

 

This isn't to say it's gonna collapse or do shitty or not have a huge OW.  But the initial reactions to this, and oh say, M3GAN are markedly different and that'll probably matter in the end.

 

Still, and I do want to stress this, we simply don't have enough info yet on how the fanbase, never mind the GA, is gonna react to this.  As such sweeping statements one way or the other are pretty premature.

[ZattMurdock]

13 minutes ago, Bob Train said:

All franchises eventually get fatigued and die. Due to Hollywood's lack of creativity, they have been leaning more on established franchises in the last decade. Movies that are based on a huge brand, but never got a blockbuster movie have the advantage in the post-pandemic marketplace because there is no fatigue there. 

 

Many movies that are based on long-running franchises flopped this year, as they have no draw besides "yet another [insert franchise name] movie". Eventually, audiences get tired of that. We have seen this twice this year with Barbie and Mario absolutely destroying franchises that are more "field-tested" like DCEU, Indiana Jones, Transformers, MCU, F&F, etc. 

 

I remember you saying that a "field-tested" franchise like Halloween only managed to tap out a $49m with a hybrid release, so FNAF, an untested franchise theatrically, would be unlikely to do much more than that. But being untested is actually one of FNAF's biggest assets, as the draw of it is not something like any other major release. By Halloween Kills/Ends, fatigue was kicking in for them and grosses/appeal kept getting lower and lower. There was not much of a draw there beyond "yet another Halloween movie" and the grosses diminished. For some franchises, it takes only 3 or 4 movies for fatigue to set it. For others like F&F, it takes more like 10. For MCU it took 30 movies.

 

I'm not saying that it is taking the audience from disaffected MCU/DC/Indiana Jones/whatever fans, I'm saying it is pulling in a new audience, whereas MCU keeps losing audiences to the point where sequels to movies that opened to $150m are only tracking for $50-$70m. That's because audiences don't see why there is any point in going to a "more of the same" movie when there are movies based on a big brand but first in the franchise theatrically, which gives it an extra novelty that others don't have.

That’s not even remotely how this works. 
 

Five Night at Freddy’s has a built in audience, just like Warcraft had (and anyone that know anything about gaming franchises work, know that I’m still being incredibly generous comparing FNAF to Warcraft). Comparing this with Super Mario Bros. is wrong not because in the case of Super Mario Bros reviews didn’t matter, it’s because people are assuming this one has a built in fan base as big as Super Mario’s. People love to theorize about fatigue in franchises when we have glaring signs that the movie theater experience never fully recovered from the pandemic days.

 

Franchises aren’t going absolutely anywhere. They will keep thriving, either in movie theaters, streaming, gaming and VR, and I’m pretty sure that we are going to have MCU and Star Wars films throughout all our lifetimes, along with DC films and etc. What is sadly changing is the moviegoing experience. You keep poising franchises against each other when their true competition isn’t the films themselves, but all forms of entertainment out there that aren’t the movie going experience. Movie theaters are sadly becoming a prestige experience. And what I mean by that isn’t less MCU or blockbuster films. I mean more of them, at a considerable expensive cost. 

Edited October 25, 2023 by ZattMurdock

[Porthos]

18 minutes ago, ZattMurdock said:

What is sadly changing is the moviegoing experience. You keep poising franchises against each other when their true competition isn’t the films themselves, but all forms of entertainment out there that aren’t the movie going experience.

 

SIDE POINT [But one I've been meaning to make for a while]:

 

You want to know that the real thing that is changing?

 

It's not network streaming.  It's not even gaming.  Though those are both big.

 

The real New Thing is all the younger folks growing up watching YouTube and Twitch. 
 

When it comes to YouTube(TV), it's a point that TVGrimReaper over on Twitter has been making off and on for a while:  People are just sleeping on how much of the viewing audience YouTube is carving up out there when it comes to streaming discussions:

 

Here's a look at July 2023:

 

See YT right at the top?  See "other streaming" on there?  It's a hugely under discussed factor, IMO.  Go hop on Twitch one night and see the streams that literally have tens of thousands, sometimes near hundreds of thousands of viewers.  Then consider the sheer number of people that are streaming in the hundreds.

 

I'm not sure it's fully sunk in how much the younger generation is growing up not just on network streaming, but streaming in general.

 

I've been making the point off and on for a while now that gaming itself is a huge new addition when it comes to Attention For the Entertainment Dollar, and I 100% stand by that.  But the rise of self-published streaming on YT/Twitch isn't given nearly amount the level of attention that it deserves, IMO.  Especially when compared to all the angst spilt over the Netflix/Disney/HBO Max/Amazon/Peacock/Others wars.

 

As I said, a side point.  But one I've been meaning to make for a while now. And this thread is as good as any since it is sorta kinda On Topic (ish), given the demos involved and it D+D'ing on Peacock.

Edited October 25, 2023 by Porthos

[Bob Train]

2 minutes ago, ZattMurdock said:

That’s not even remotely how this works. 
 

Five Night at Freddy’s has a built in audience, just like Warcraft had. Comparing this with Super Mario Bros. is wrong not because in the case of Super Mario Bros reviews didn’t matter, it’s because people are assuming this one has a built in fan base as big as Super Mario’s.

No one is assuming that. I haven't seen anyone predicting anything above Mario's $144m 3-day OW, the highest I have seen is some saying around $100m. Everyone knows Mario is a significantly bigger IP. And Mario had no reason to be frontloaded as it's an animated kids movie, whereas this is a PG-13 horror movie releasing at the tail-end of the spooky season, which will help OW but hurt legs.

2 minutes ago, ZattMurdock said:

People love to theorize about fatigue in franchises when we have glaring signs that the movie theater experience never fully recovered from the pandemic days.

For big IP movies, fewer admissions in general are canceled out mostly by inflation. If you look at every sequel that opened $10m+ (or is a sequel to a movie that opened $10m+) this year, 10 have beat their predecessor DOM, and 10 haven't, so roughly a 50/50 split. 

For many original movies/comedies/dramas, even inflation doesn't counteract the loss in admissions, but that's not what is being talked about here.

2 minutes ago, ZattMurdock said:

Franchises aren’t going absolutely anywhere. They will keep thriving, either in movie theaters, streaming, gaming and VR, and I’m pretty sure that we are going to have MCU and Star Wars films throughout all our lifetimes, along with DC films and etc. What is sadly changing is the moviegoing experience. You keep poising franchises against each other when their true competition isn’t the films themselves, but all forms of entertainment out there that aren’t the movie going experience. Movie theaters are sadly becoming a prestige experience. And what I mean by that isn’t less MCU or blockbuster films. I mean more of them, at a considerable expensive cost. 

I agree, franchises will keep thriving, but all franchises get fatigued eventually, and when that happens, audiences will start to shift towards new franchises, which will become the new kings of the box office. We have seen that this year, with Barbie, Mario, and FNAF being the biggest breakout hits (despite all 3 having their detractors saying it was "only internet hype" and "detective Pikachu 2.0"), whereas franchises like MCU, DCEU, F&F, Indiana Jones, Transformers etc. have stumbled. People may not like it but it's true.

[ZattMurdock]

1 minute ago, Porthos said:

 

SIDE POINT [But one I've been meaning to make for a while]:

 

You want to know that the real thing that is changing?

 

It's not network streaming.  It's not even gaming.  Though those are both big.

 

The real New Thing is all the younger folks growing up watching YouTube and Twitch. 
 

When it comes to YouTube(TV), it's a point that TVGrimReaper over on Twitter has been making off and on for a while:  People are just sleeping on how much of the viewing audience YouTube is carving up out there when it comes to streaming discussions:

 

Here's a look at July 2023:

 

See YT right at the top?  See "other streaming" on there?  It's a hugely under discussed factor, IMO.  Go hop on Twitch one night and see the streams that literally have tens of thousands, sometimes near hundreds of thousands of viewers.  Then consider the sheer number of people that are streaming in the hundreds.

 

I'm not sure it's fully sunk in how much the younger generation is growing up not just on network streaming, but streaming in general.

 

I've been making the point off and on for a while now that gaming itself is a huge new addition when it comes to Attention For the Entertainment Dollar, and I 100% stand by that.  But the rise of self-published streaming on YT/Twitch isn't given nearly amount the level of attention that it deserves, IMO.  Especially when compared to all the angst spilt over the Netflix/Disney/HBO Max/Amazon/Peacock/Others wars.

 

As I said, a side point.  But one I've been meaning to make for a while now. And this thread is as good as any since it is sorta kinda On Topic (ish), given the demos involved and it D+D'ing on Peacock.

And just to add to this, also, TikTok.

People keep poising traditional media against each other when the actual threat is that no, people don’t care about the movie theater experience. They care about the social media of it all, their ‘communal’ experience isn’t physical, it’s online and we’re probably getting a shitload of teens streaming this film together on Discord or something in the next upcoming days. The actual threat to the movie theater experience isn’t even most of times scripted, and it’s not a fair fight. 
 

We’re lucky of still getting movie theater experiences with insane box office runs like Spider-Man: No Way Home, Avatar 2, Maverick, Barbie and Oppenheimer. These experiences won’t go away, but they will become more rare while the actual movie theater experience becomes more and more expensive and more prestige.

[Lucas]

They didn't do any press screenings for it here, but there's no way it's that bad (that's Meg 2 levels), it's mostly just gotta be that no one thinks reviews will matter.

[Boxofficerules]

This conversation has become like the movie, boring and tedious.

[JimmyB]

13 minutes ago, Bob Train said:

No one is assuming that. I haven't seen anyone predicting anything above Mario's $144m 3-day OW, the highest I have seen is some saying around $100m. Everyone knows Mario is a significantly bigger IP. And Mario had no reason to be frontloaded as it's an animated kids movie, whereas this is a PG-13 horror movie releasing at the tail-end of the spooky season, which will help OW but hurt legs.

For big IP movies, fewer admissions in general are canceled out mostly by inflation. If you look at every sequel that opened $10m+ (or is a sequel to a movie that opened $10m+) this year, 10 have beat their predecessor DOM, and 10 haven't, so roughly a 50/50 split. 

For many original movies/comedies/dramas, even inflation doesn't counteract the loss in admissions, but that's not what is being talked about here.

I agree, franchises will keep thriving, but all franchises get fatigued eventually, and when that happens, audiences will start to shift towards new franchises, which will become the new kings of the box office. We have seen that this year, with Barbie, Mario, and FNAF being the biggest breakout hits (despite all 3 having their detractors saying it was "only internet hype" and "detective Pikachu 2.0"), whereas franchises like MCU, DCEU, F&F, Indiana Jones, Transformers etc. have stumbled. People may not like it but it's true.

The milking of the Mario IP for movies seemed long overdue and that's an IP with 40 years of fans. It becoming a new franchise is a lock.

 

Barbie still feels like lightning in a bottle type event.  Im not sure it becomes a franchise. We will get a sequel but a 3, 4 movie IDK.

 

FNAF lets wait and see how frontloaded this is and fan driven. Detective Pikachu still made 144m domestic and 428m worldwide. 

[ZattMurdock]

Just now, JimmyB said:

The milking of the Mario IP for movies seemed long overdue and that's an IP with 40 years of fans. It becoming a new franchise is a lock.

 

Barbie still feels like lightning in a bottle type event.  Im not sure it becomes a franchise. We will get a sequel but a 3, 4 movie IDK.

 

FNAF lets wait and see how frontloaded this is and fan driven. Detective Pikachu still made 144m domestic and 428m worldwide. 

And I wouldn’t even dare to compare FNAF with Pokemon, let alone Super Mario Bros.. I never saw that film, but that had Ryan Reynolds and I feel like it’s absolutely nuts how that didn’t work out.

 

We are dealing with a different beast here and hence why the point I’ve made and Porthos following post is actually pertinent: this is the first film built in from the streaming / twitch / YouTube culture. This particular subset of online fandom don’t really care about film critics, yes, but it’s actually more than that: they don’t care about the moviegoing experience either. What they want is the frenesi of communing together on Twitch / Discord / Twitter talking about the film. It’s incomparable with all the other gaming franchises because what they actually want is to consume this to their own terms, which is in complete opposition to how we perceive film consumption. 
 

When you look through that lens, it becomes rather obvious why this is getting a day and date streaming release. The movie theater experience there was never really the point, and if it can’t appeal to outside their bubble, they will be content loving or trashing the film within their own community bubble. The ‘event’ for them isn’t the moviegoing experience, it’s that the film exists and that they will be able to consume just like they consume their own gaming experience, which is radically different than the subset of gaming adaptations like Mario, Pokémon, Warcraft and etc..

[Krissykins]

1 hour ago, SpiderByte said:

Definitely not true. Blumhouse signed into the project in 2017, three years before Peacock launched.

Um. It was still in development until August 2022. I said before the film was made, not when the rights were purchased. 

[SchumacherFTW]

2 hours ago, Mojoguy said:

Who could have guessed the Eras movie would have a more mature and better behaved audience?

 

Swift fans > FNAF fans

Nah, that's just London

[Bob Train]

31 minutes ago, ZattMurdock said:

And I wouldn’t even dare to compare FNAF with Pokemon, let alone Super Mario Bros.. I never saw that film, but that had Ryan Reynolds and I feel like it’s absolutely nuts how that didn’t work out.

 

We are dealing with a different beast here and hence why the point I’ve made and Porthos following post is actually pertinent: this is the first film built in from the streaming / twitch / YouTube culture. This particular subset of online fandom don’t really care about film critics, yes, but it’s actually more than that: they don’t care about the moviegoing experience either. What they want is the frenesi of communing together on Twitch / Discord / Twitter talking about the film. It’s incomparable with all the other gaming franchises because what they actually want is to consume this to their own terms, which is in complete opposition to how we perceive film consumption. 
 

When you look through that lens, it becomes rather obvious why this is getting a day and date streaming release. The movie theater experience there was never really the point, and if it can’t appeal to outside their bubble, they will be content loving or trashing the film within their own community bubble. The ‘event’ for them isn’t the moviegoing experience, it’s that the film exists and that they will be able to consume just like they consume their own gaming experience, which is radically different than the subset of gaming adaptations like Mario, Pokémon, Warcraft and etc..

Lol no. Under 25 demo has fueled the vast majority of hits post-COVID. It's Gen X and Boomers who are lagging behind in terms of going to the theater, not Zoomers.

[WittyUsername]

I see no reason to assume bad reviews would hurt a movie like this. I still can’t comprehend why they decided to do a hybrid release, though. They didn’t do that for Exorcist. 

[ZattMurdock]

4 minutes ago, Bob Train said:

Lol no. Under 25 demo has fueled the vast majority of hits post-COVID. It's Gen X and Boomers who are lagging behind in terms of going to the theater, not Zoomers.

The under 25 demo isn’t a monolith. And if you don’t understand that it isn’t even about "gen x", ‘boomers" and "zoomers", that you are analyzing this with a 2010s lens instead of how fast changing the market is, I don’t know what to say to you. 
 

You keep trying to look at this with the eyes of the 2010s, fueling franchises against each other when these kids want to ‘mod’ this film and watch it with markiplier narrating it and his mug on the left or right bottom of the screen. This isn’t film culture, this is streaming culture, your petty franchise wars don’t have place here, they are too busy simping for their favorite streamers and ongoing fandom rivalries to care about that.

[Eric the Ape]

Moderation

 

I have no idea what Zatt/Bob Train are talking about here, but it seems things are testy yet again. End it here.

[Bob Train]

Just now, ZattMurdock said:

The under 25 demo isn’t a monolith. And if you don’t understand that it isn’t even about "gen x", ‘boomers" and "zoomers", that you are analyzing this with a 2010s lens instead of how fast changing the market is, I don’t know what to say to you. 
 

You keep trying to look at this with the eyes of the 2010s, fueling franchises against each other when these kids want to ‘mod’ this film and watch it with markiplier narrating it and his mug on the left or right bottom of the screen. This isn’t film culture, this is streaming culture, your petty franchise wars don’t have place here, they are too busy simping for their favorite streamers and ongoing fandom rivalries to care about that.

Nah, kids born post-2010 have shown up for Minions 2 (highest-grossing Minions-verse movie DOM) Mario, Elemental etc.

 

In fact, Elemental's insane legs show that they are willing to watch movies that aren't IP too

 

This "they don't care about movies because they are too busy watching YouTubers" is an oversimplified take, they are willing to do both.  

[Arlborn]

1 minute ago, Eric Fazbear said:

Moderation

 

I have no idea what Zatt/Bob Train are talking about here, but it seems things are testy yet again. End it here.

I think once they moved away from talking about franchises and started talking about the state of cinema in general it because quite an interesting discussion, I think both had some good points there, and then as usual @Porthos came in and really contextualized their discussion in a very helpful manner.

 

But oh well, I get what you mean about it possibly end up becoming too aggressive.

[SpiderByte]

1 hour ago, Krissykins said:

Um. It was still in development until August 2022. I said before the film was made, not when the rights were purchased. 

Yes, which probably means it was not "always made for Peacock" years before they even announced intentions to launch Peacock