Published Jun 26, 2026, 8:00 PM EDT
Ryan O’Rourke is a Senior News Writer at Collider with a specific interest in all things adult animation, video game adaptations, and the work of Mike Flanagan. He is also an experienced baseball writer with over six years of articles between multiple outlets, most notably FanSided’s CubbiesCrib. Whether it’s taking in a baseball game, a new season of Futurama or Castlevania: Nocturne, or playing the latest From Software title, he is always finding ways to show his fandom. When it comes to gaming and anything that takes inspiration from it, he is deeply opinionated on what’s going on. Outside of entertainment, he’s a graduate of Eureka College with a Bachelor’s in Communication where he honed his craft as a writer. Between The IV Leader at Illinois Valley Community College and The Pegasus at Eureka, he spent the majority of his college career publishing articles on everything from politics to campus happenings and, of course, entertainment for the student body. Those principles he learned covering the 2020 election, Palestine, and so much more are brought here to Collider, where he has gleefully written on everything from the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes to Nathan Lane baby-birding sewer boys.
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This article covers a developing story. Continue to check back with us as we will be adding more information as it becomes available.Video games are an excellent medium for horror, spawning countless classic franchises like Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Dead Space, and more. Yet, translating them to the screen has had mixed results. While there have been some genuine gems, like HBO’s The Last of Us series, and ambitious undertakings, like Mark Fischbach’s Iron Lung, there are more than a few attempts that have failed to meet expectations and capture what was so beloved about their source material, like the recent Return to Silent Hill. Among the more divisive to come to screens in recent years has been the Five Nights at Freddy’s films, which have succeeded in bringing Freddy and his animatronic pals to life thanks to Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, but have nonetheless been met with an icy reception from critics.
Yet, the series, based on the lore-filled viral horror games by Scott Cawthon, has been a money printer for Blumhouse Atomic Monster. Fans were ready for Freddy when the first film arrived in theaters, giving it a staggering box office haul of over $297.2 million despite releasing simultaneously on Peacock. Its second film was more of the same last year, with an also respectable $239.6 million. Emma Tammi’s efforts all but assured that, like Matthew Lillard’s William Afton, the franchise would always come back. Now, another installment in the animatronic-filled franchise has finally been confirmed, with some extra creative firepower coming aboard.
Blumhouse has brought in horror veteran Gary Dauberman to pen Five Nights at Freddy’s 3. He replaces Cawthon, who wrote the entire screenplay for the sequel himself after working with Tammi and Seth Cuddeback on the first film. The hope is that Dauberman can use his experience in the genre to write a story revolving around the family-friendly pizzeria that can still frighten and evoke the energy of Cawthon’s games while impressing critics and audiences. He’s perhaps best known for penning the original Annabelle, but his presence has also been felt as a co-writer on the 2017 adaptation of Stephen King’s It and the scribe for another recent video game adaptation, Until Dawn.
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Scott Cawthon, Seth Cuddeback
Scott Cawthon, Jason Blum, Russell Binder
Five Nights at Freddy’s, Five Nights at Freddy’s 2
Five Nights at Freddy’s
William Afton / Springtrap