Five Nights At Freddy’s 2 Survives Drubbing From Critics And Easily Wins The Weekend Box Office… But It’s Not All Good News

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Movies aimed at kids and teens often succeed regardless of what critics say. If young audiences are excited about a film, negative reviews usually don’t stop them – or their parents – from buying tickets. This is clearly the case with Emma Tammi’s Five Nights At Freddy’s 2, which topped the box office this weekend. However, a closer look at the numbers reveals the film’s success isn’t as massive as Blumhouse Productions and Universal Pictures likely hoped.

This weekend’s top 10 movies have an interesting narrative, but a closer look suggests some potential challenges for the film industry as the year draws to a close. See the complete list below, and then come back for a more detailed breakdown.

TITLE WEEKEND GROSS DOMESTIC GROSS LW THTRS
1. Five Nights At Freddy’s 2* $63,000,000 $63,000,000 N/A 3,412
2. Zootopia 2 $43,000,000 $220,474,037 1 4,000
3. Wicked: For Good $16,750,000 $296,951,660 2 3,985
4. Jujutsu Kaisen: Execution* $10,155,000 $10,155,000 N/A 1,833
5. Now You See Me: Now You Don’t $3,500,000 $55,324,383 3 2,629
6. Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair $3,250,000 $3,250,000 N/A 1,198
7. Eternity $2,726,043 $9,582,661 4 2,386
8. Hamnet $2,300,000 $4,177,850 6 744
9. Predator: Badlands $1,857,000 $88,258,490 4 2,080
10. The Running Man $1,115,000 $36,525,717 5 1,549

Five Nights At Freddy’s 2 Easily Won The Weekend Box Office, But There May Be Trouble Ahead For The Video Game Adaptation

Everyone expected Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 to be the number one movie this weekend, and it was. The franchise is very popular because of its video games, and fans definitely turned out for the sequel. While Zootopia 2 came in second after a good Thanksgiving opening, the overall box office numbers aren’t as high as industry experts had hoped for a big December release.

Early numbers from The Numbers show Five Nights At Freddy’s 2 earned $63 million in its first weekend in the US and Canada – a very strong start. Like many Blumhouse productions, the film was made on a relatively modest budget of $36 million (according to Variety). It opened better than several other successful films from this year, including F1 ($57 million), Sinners ($48 million), and Weapons ($43.5 million). However, a closer look reveals some potential problems that could affect its performance over time.

The film franchise is facing other issues as well. Although Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 didn’t receive good reviews (I gave it a one-and-a-half-star rating in my review), even its core fans seem disappointed. The original movie received a strong “A-” rating from CinemaScore audiences, but the sequel only got a “B,” indicating a noticeable drop in satisfaction.

The real test for the new Five Nights at Freddy’s movie will be next weekend. The first film’s box office dropped significantly after its initial release—by 76%—because people could watch it at home instead of going to the theater. This time, the sequel won’t be available for streaming right away, so it will be interesting to see how much declining interest and negative reviews affect its performance.

While Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 likely won’t reach the massive success of the first film – which earned almost $300 million worldwide in theaters – it’s still proving to be profitable. It’s already made $63 million in the US and $46.1 million internationally, bringing its total earnings to $109.1 million. With these numbers, we can anticipate more movies in the future, though it will be worth watching to see if the slightly lower performance leads to any changes in how the films are made.

Significant Competition Sees Zootopia 2 Take A Modest Dip In Its Second Week

It was expected that Five Nights At Freddy’s 2 would challenge Zootopia 2 at the box office. Although the movies are very different, they both appeal to a similar young audience. With their release dates so close together, some audience shift was inevitable. So, it’s not surprising that Zootopia 2 has moved into second place after a strong opening over Thanksgiving – but it’s still performing very well overall.

While a 57% drop in weekend earnings isn’t great news, Zootopia 2 still landed in second place this weekend with $43 million. Domestically, the film has now earned an impressive $220.5 million, making it the ninth highest-grossing movie of 2025. It’s already outperformed Captain America: Brave New World, which earned $200.5 million earlier in the year. At this rate, Zootopia 2 is almost certain to finish in the top five movies of the year, but whether it can reach the $423 million earned by A Minecraft Movie and Lilo and Stitch remains to be seen.

While those numbers are impressive, the film is performing even better internationally. Zootopia 2 has already earned $695 million in foreign markets, putting it on track to become only the third movie of 2025 to surpass $1 billion worldwide, alongside Ne Zha 2 and Lilo & Stitch. This is excellent news for the film industry, especially with the highly anticipated release of James Cameron’s Avatar: Fire And Ash just a couple of weeks away.

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2025-12-07 23:12