What EXACTLY Did Help Wanted Retcon? Feat.

[@RyeToast]

Thank you HyperDroid for joining us today! You can follow him at kzbin.info In today's episode we'll be talking about what the scope of the Help Wanted Indie Games reboot entailed. We'll also be answering if we play as Michael Afton in most of the FNAF Series, Who Golden Freddy actually is, what we would retcon if we could, what's the deal with toy chica's beak, and if FNAF should get a remaster? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To submit questions, theories, and creator collab requests, email at: [e-mail] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Freddy Fazbear Pizza Podcast is YOUR premiere FNAF podcast available everywhere! KZbin: kzbin.info/aero/PLlGAFKgA2Ax_6MKnuaq5ApBgC8osKW4Dx&si=jB2ja5c4k_OnCZQQ Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/1a65iwRRAQylxb9EtRWmsd Apple Music: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/freddy-fazbear-pizza-podcast/id1705899138 Amazon Music: music.amazon.com/podcasts/4c77d1d8-077d-463d-b48e-21280279e281/freddy-fazbear-pizza-podcast -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Timestamps: 00:00 Cold open and Intro 00:31 Topic: What did the Help Wanted retcons mean? 34:25 Question: Who's possessing Golden Freddy, and who is the Vengeful Spirit? 46:00 Question: Do we actually play as Michael in the FNAF series? 51:36 Question: If you could retcon one thing or remove one retcon, what would it be? 01:02:25 Question: Toy Chica's Beak, why? 01:08:40 Question: Do you think it's possible that each Funtime represents one of the Aftons? 01:10:52 Question: Would it be best to remaster the old FNAF games to clean up the lore? 01:14:51 Concluding Thoughts and Wrap Up

[@toyloliSpare]

Guaranteed what I think help wanted meant, is the mini games from every game are fiction. We can count the actual game play of 1-6 as "did happen" but the mini games were fiction and any theory based on the mini games is invalid

[@toyloliSpare]

I also think The big intention of steel wool's games is to do away with ghost kids. Ghost kids never happened although the murders did. All the Steel Wool games, the animatronics are running on Mimic AI and Agony as a force animated the older animatronics.

[@novustalks7525]

The blob being molten freddy is the only satisfactory explanation but him being alive to begin with after fnaf 6 is a plot hole

[@MorningDusk7734]

It would be fascinating if in a world of ghost children and people infinitely resurrecting, the one truly dead child could be Crying Child.

[@RyeToast]

Lmao fr

[@TheWholeEntireCake]

Maybe that’s why he’s crying

[@EmilyNaumer]

In reference to the last question: I feel like the indie dev excuse actually makes remaster more possible. Like the games we started with were interpretations and potentially flawed, whereas a remaster could be “but this is how Michael’s nights actually played out from his perspective”. Like any “mistakes” from the originals are from the indie dev, and they could show that by omitting them in the remaster. Just to clean up the puzzle pieces we’re actually working with.

[@willywhitewool]

Reading Scott's reddit post "A lore question about Help Wanted, and an answer!", Scott talks about how he had a specific challenge of taking characters from across the timeline, some canon, some non-canon, and how to make it all canon. He specifically says he wanted Help Wanted to "mean something" and that he "didn't want just a meaningless collection of mini-games." Considering how much emphasis he places on wanting the games to be canon, even saying a non-canon game would have been "meaningless" really makes me doubt that Help Wanted retconned too much. It seems "out of character" for him to make the original games non-canon to make HW canon. There's still some weirdness for sure, but I think the best in-universe explanation is that Fazbear Entertainment LLC created FNAF 1-3 but without the lore like the hidden newspapers, Golden Freddy, paychecks, minigames, etc., to get people to focus on the spooky animatronics attacking security guards (which was already well-known, Fazbear's Fright from FNAF 3 was inspired by it), but also to distract people from the reputation of murders and the actual truth by making fun of it.

[@shelbybayer200]

I agree with that!!

[@LittleLexi24]

This was always my view on it.

[@seeskittyplay3620]

Tape girl goes into that too! She says it was an elaborate cover up, implying that the events DID happen and that the game developer realized that and started seeding the truth into the games (hence fazbear acting like the developer was crazy)

[@gold571]

@@seeskittyplay3620everyone always forgets that part, lol

[@seeskittyplay3620]

@@gold571 yeah I think the focus got turned to "omg they're retconning the games" vs it being a small inclusion to say "hey every single detail might not be accurate but this stuff happened".

[@tonyspizza4081]

I’ve always found it interesting how as we move forward the more the older games don’t make sense. Like, fnaf 2 was so simple once it first came out, but now it’s just such a gigantic question mark on the timeline.

[@DatPurplePerson]

A question I've always had is why, out of all the kids William has killed, is (presumably) Cassidy the "ONE YOU SHOULD NOT HAVE KILLED"

[@mandalynn1384]

Because Cassidy/Charlie lore has been too conflated. Like many other characters

[@deltatin2758]

I think the theory is her murder was super brutal

[@floatingcrispbag7842]

On the Chica's beak thing, i also find it interesting that when Gregory messes her up and takes her voicebox she also ends up beakless. I dont know if it actually means anything or if its important but i think its pretty neat lol

[@0ndem]

I think the point of the indie Dev idea is to just make the narrator of the games unreliable. So dates should be treated as rough. Same with timelines

[@RyeToast]

That's where I'm at

[@-Jimini-]

Episode by episode, Rye is recreating the Timeline Talkback Stream Can’t wait for the coming episodes with Tom, ID, Dawko, and Mat

[@tropezando]

I don't know, I have grown fond of Crying Child as a name for the character. It's simple and to-the-point. Even if his true name were to be discovered at some point, I think people would still refer to him as "XXXXX, the crying child" for clarification.

[@DraconianBS]

I personally don't even really like FNAFs story anymore, but it's entertaining to watch smart people trying to fit it together cohesively and narratively. Plus I love theories, and the theorists personalities

[@Jhakri_]

Yup, I wouldn't play the games or read the books & spend time trying to put this stuff together myself but I love hearing what people theorize is going on and comment sections.

[@caldercockatoo2234]

Honestly I can't even bring myself to CALL it a "story". It's really just a slideshow of different events of varying vagueness, outside of the books, probably the movies, and MAYBE FNaF 6 and Ruin. There's no real character arcs, no core story beats, and CERTAINLY no clear theme. Fans are pretty much forced to gather whatever info we DO have, especially from other sources like the aforementioned books, and build off from there, causing a confusing mess of thousands of different interpretations that's very difficult for anyone who hasn't been following the franchise since 2015 to get into. This may have sounded really random and aggressive, but if I see an opportunity to criticize a franchise that I love I will undoubtedly take it.

[@bpsara]

⁠​⁠I think that’s why I see the lore more as a continuous mystery for the fanbase to solve instead of expecting a cohesive narrative story. It’s practically an added difficulty mode or expanded route within and beyond the main games.

[@Lisa_Flowers]

@@caldercockatoo2234 i've been following the lore since 2015 and even I don't know what's going on or how anything connects to anything else lmao. It's so intensely convoluted and there are so many random details that even if I know the general beats of what's going on, and a lot of smaller specific details, explaining in any depth what most of them mean or how they connect is impossible. I literally cannot fathom how people create theories with how confusing everything is lmao

[@YesitGoldy]

Meh. Unlike everyone in the replies, I do genuinely enjoy this narrative and story they're putting out. I do go into the games and books to find lore but the best way to know the lore is through videos like this. People debating and video essays. The community really powers the franchise.

[@MorningDusk7734]

Maybe Michael isn’t being fired due to his actions, maybe William sends him in to do something, then extracts him via termination for an immediately fire-able offense, like animatronic tampering.

[@matti.8465]

From a storytelling perspective, I hate that the Crying Child isn't Golden Freddy. It would bring everything full circle thematically but no, it's just some victim we never heard of. And there being two spirits kinda feels like overcomplicating things for no reason, but it's probably the canon answer.

[@Gonk373]

To be fair to the inclusion of the tales books to the scholastic book fairs, I got most of the animorph books from those fairs, and one of those gave me a recurring nightmare about people around me getting shot in the head and seeing their brain matter.

[@Sire1212]

In my notifications it didn't show the full title and ended at the @ so when I saw Scott cawthon on the thumbnails my eyes practically bulged out of my head 😂

[@nessie7306]

me too💀

[@RyeToast]

LMAO

[@Pulsarnix]

Same here

[@Josh651Pro]

😂😂😂

[@zah_old_acc]

YAY HYPER DROID GETS TO THEORY TALK WITH A FELLOW THEORIST AGAIN!!!

[@RyeToast]

You know it!

[@Jobroski47]

Yuhhhhh happy day for us droid enjoyers

[@MorningDusk7734]

I think if they want to answer any questions about the old games, they should release a free roam game where you’re the security guard of a small museum dedicated to Freddy’s memorabilia, set before FNAF 3 so the phantoms can show up as antagonists. No lore furthering, you and the museum mean nothing, you just deal with surviving the nights and at the end there’s a newspaper saying the collection was bought out for new horror attraction: Fazbear Frights. You get placards scattered around mentioning just enough to know what’s canon and what was Indy game stuff.

[@kewlkid4364]

36:42 I feel like since perhaps the animatronics mistake us for William in Fnaf 1, that could be a plausible explanation for Cassidy saying “It’s Me” like, referring to her killer

[@syweb2]

If The Silver Eyes is to be believed, they behave like this not necessarily because they mistake you for your killer, but because they consider all adults to be threats.

[@knightyknightmare9074]

I think it’s sorta insane that Springtrap does pokemon evolution design changes. Losing and gaining limbs and flesh. Changing teeth and shit. Where did it come from and where did it go lol

[@Katosepe]

It may already be the case but I'd retcon the SB ending that shows Vanessa looking down from the rooftop onto Vanny. It just makes no sense and confused things needlessly.

[@RyeToast]

OH YEAH HONESTLY FR

[@brodiebaxter99]

I find myself counting down the days until the new episode of this podcast comes out each week. Just listening to people talk about fnaf without trying to sell a theory is really entertaining. Would love an episode about some of the inconsistencies in the series that we tend to ignore when crafting a coherent story for a theory

[@Sock-Monster-Simian]

I listened to an 11hr video at one time while doing a long bout of work, so I can 100% guarantee that I will listen to the whole Supreme Timeline all at once. I love being reminded of all the FNAF stuff I've forgotten over the years (which is why I loved Rye's lore-by-the-games series), so I'm always looking for deep dives into FNAF lore.

[@Kmartinlucas]

If Funtime Freddy is meant to represent TCC (1:08:52), could that be why he's the face of the blob? The first and most important death representing all of the agony William has caused because of it.

[@tehawsumninja]

Imagine Rye getting everyone in a full podcast line up like gtlive's theory talkback but every week to bounce theories off one another

[@LandonAndCassy]

If Scott asked the community to band together to ask ANY 2 yes or no questions about the franchise, what would you hope they were? I personally would ask: 1. Is Mustard Man from Midnight Motorists William? 2. Is the Crying Child's name actually in the Security Logbook?

[@phoneguy4637]

I believe that Golden Freddy is a hallucination of Fredbear by Michael. he stuffed lil' cry-a-lot into Fredbear's mouth and killed him - that sure gave him ptsd.

[@KohakuAmber22]

I feel like I remember Matpat doing a theory on each character representing a family member back when Sister Location came out, but I'm not 100% on that.

[@syweb2]

It was specifically about Ballora, and I'm pretty sure that video is where the BalloraMom theory originated (or at least got popularized).

[@Prime_The_Great]

My theory on Michael being Fritz Smith is that he is working for William, but not as a bad guy. My theory: His abusive father tells him to work for one night at this place and he does. William discovered the possessed animatronics moving around after causing the DCI and wants to observe the animatronic reactions, but can’t do so himself because he was the dayshift security guard and might get caught if he went there again. I can even see William guilting Michael about his brother in order to force him to take the job, to contrast with William’s actions getting Elizabeth killed. Then if SL takes place before Fnaf 1, then it could explain why he was “nerfed” in handling the animatronics going from 10 in Fnaf 2 to 4 in Fnaf 1, then later 1 in Fnaf 3, then needing the help of noise modules for Pizzeria Simulator.

[@CottonCandySharks]

Very good theory!

[@emeraldqueen1994]

I think Andrew is NOTHING MORE THAN a Cassidy stand in for the books 📕

[@RyeToast]

TRUE

[@GeneralIkaika]

I'm fairly certain that 'Molten Freddy' is pretty much just the Funtimes after Baby is ejected, and that the Funtimes were made either with pieces from the original animatronics, or with remnant/agony collected from them, possibly combined with the agony from any children they 'collected'. Their souls could have still been freed even before they were turned into the Funtimes, just remnant/agony remains, with maybe some intelligence imparted onto their circuits like how Afton did with Springtrap/Glitchtrap. Although it is possible they may have added more victims to them after they became ennard, either killing people themself or picking up the scraps from Burntrap/Scraptrap while they're on the loose before gathered by Henry for the burning.

[@L-o-l-b-i-t]

I always thought of the Toys being aggressive to be Charlie messing with their facial recognition, to watch out for William most likely (in the case that Michael is the fnaf2 guard, with his similar looks) or it glitching out and only focusing on anyone wearing a fazbear uniform after hours (in the case that it's a different person) and such BUT this is coming from a guy who isn't entirely sure on all the pieces so big grain of salt

[@syweb2]

Phone Guy specifically mentions the Toys staring at all adults, not just employees.

[@L-o-l-b-i-t]

@@syweb2 OH YOURE RIGHT, then the glitched out option still stands, just being for any adult

[@phoneguy4637]

about Michael: maybe it's just this infamous "like father like son"-thingy? you know what peoples say about psychological things such as sadism and insanity. they can be inherited

[@weirdoss7]

For a second I was: "No way he brought Scott Cawthon!" 😂

[@jozkuz5674]

Thank you for making these. Always glad to listen on release when your video notification pops up😊

[@RyeToast]

Glad you like them!

[@_dinerbear]

Yay im so glad another episode came out!!! This is literally my fav podcast lmao :p

[@NotUlpoadingAnything]

37:14 The Foxy grid seems like it was probably supposed to give us the name but Evan was a little forced. 38:58 She's also crying outside in the Take Cake mini-game before Afton kills her. 1:02:57 I know Toy Chica has this voice line in UCN , "Where’s my beak? Lodged in your forehead of course." It's probably supposed to clear up whether she or Mangle caused the Bite of '87. 1:12:05 Unfortunately the official Fnaf Plus game got indefinitely postponed. Phisnom's not part of the Fanverse Initiative any more and the Steam page is gone.

[@sutarikun]

Thank you as always for doing this show! I'm starting to wonder if maybe the original FNAF timeline was told through the eyes of Michael and if we're getting a new idea of how things played out. It would explain some of the weirder stuff.

[@RyeToast]

Thank y'all for listening! And honestly that's totally valid

[@Jhakri_]

I think the games in universe are the games we play but without the mini games, the lore, etc. The in universe games are just the bare-bone surviving the 5 night experience.

[@mrghost545]

Rye toast, I want to inform you about something to do with Michael, well with the whole remnant thing, in fazbears frights it’s mentioned that remnant has the ability to not only bring people back from the dead, but to regenerate things, which means post SL, michaels body would have eventually regenerated itself from the remnant. So, yea, theirs some food for thought.

[@TheWholeEntireCake]

If we sat down the people who deciphered The Zodiac Killer’s cypher and handed them all the media from the FNAF franchise maybe they could figure it out. Well, or self immolate.

[@TomásSampaulesi]

In my Opinion, the ABSCENSE of golden freddy in HELP WANTED makes me think the real games we play are the CANON EVENTS while the in-game world has their almost 1 to 1 version of those games but are still incomplete, i don't think you can retcone anything this way since WE have more information that the ingame world will have playing their version of those games.

[@lorde_spooky]

If I remember correctly never see the DCI kids get stuffed so it's entirely possible their souls never possessed anything. They got a proper burial and moved on and therefore never had to be released with fire or anything.

[@olivabishop6139]

I mean, Charlie never got stuffed. Puppet just crawled over to her and she possessed them. (Is puppet a guy technically? Idk) Anyway, I guess it's not necessary to physically be inside the animatronic but just nearby/have some kind of emotional connection?

[@lorde_spooky]

@@olivabishop6139 yeah but the puppet was like right on top of Charlie's body, the DCI kids were just strewn all over the floor. Didn't even touch the toy animatronics. I don't know the rules have never been very clear.

[@BigJSandd]

CONNECTION I FOUND: OMC only appears in two games, world and ucn. We know world was originally gonna be a heaven type place for CC because of the clock ending. What is UCN? It’s hell. OMC has only appeared in heaven and hell, or the afterlife. LIKE SO HE CAN SEE THIS

[@meganpatterson1840]

Idk but part of me feel’s like afton is just still in the charging pod during the dlc and that they put the burntrap ending in the original game to show that he’s still around and that he might be an actual threat again in another game or something

[@nessie7306]

that's interesting, personally I see it as, steelwool saw the backlash Burntrap caused and was like "nope, nope, it never happened, it's not even canon" and that's why he's not present. Honestly as much as I hate retcons, I would prefer that over Burntrap appearing in a new installment

[@meganpatterson1840]

@@nessie7306it would be annoying if he were to re-appear but if they were trying to hide it then why would they put the tangle in the dlc, it kind of feels like they were trying to prove that they exist. That’s just what I think might be happening tho

[@averystreeter9470]

I’m a teacher and they had an entire fnaf section at our middle school book fair 🤡 I was dead I couldn’t believe my students would have access to them

[@kksmith2282]

Always interested in this topic, though it's impossible to talk about it on reddit without a bunch of idiots downvoting me to oblivion and jumping on me for "falling for Fazbear propaganda" or some garbage (guys, please, just because events happened doesn't me they necessarily happened exactly as we saw them!). I feel like you take is pretty much how I see it - stuff essentially happened as we see it unless Scott decides it didn't :P My point has always been, we don't know, he absolutely could make that determination. I hate how little of an open mind people have towards that.

[@phoneguy4637]

I find it also very strange that lil' cry-a-lot STILL has no nane. ok, I think we can safely assume his family name is "Afton". but he STILL has no surename... really strange.

[@lorde_spooky]

My cynical opinion? It retconned nothing. At one point it was intended to be a retcon but they didn't follow through with the retcon and instead tried to keep fitting everything into the original continuity for fear of backlash.

[@littlegoat713]

first time watching this Podcast, you did a GREAT DreadUnit impression!

[@RyeToast]

Thanks! I'm glad you think so!

[@Cd62004]

I do wanna point out scott has made mention of chicas beak after fnaf 4 in Ultimate custom night one of toy chicas voice lines mentions that her beak is lodged in the players forehead so I think Scott needed to make his hint cannon still since he hates recons so he just decided later on ehhh I'll make her do the bite of 87

[@btg-bp4vl]

I really tired to keep track of the convo, but the second you said "tombstone," my brain-rot just started playing random living tombstone songs, and then you said "follow me," and my brain responded with "fooooollllooooooww meeeee, follow follow follow, but the truth is hard to swallow"

[@musichild]

They’re talking about the mimic having different endo skeleton piece it made me think of something Scott said “there’s a piece of me in every body.” knowing that’s definitely not what’s going on it just came back to me in that moment 😂

[@rad1165]

Ennard say that

[@bubbleshock14]

Still catching up on the podcasts, but I really love them. As good as theory videos are, its nice to just hear people rambling about this series

[@MichaelHaneline]

This never really seemed like that complicated of an issue to me. Scott was for the most part making the plot up as he went along. After a certain point, that just become untenable, at least in terms of avoiding plot holes. This gives an out. It doesn't mean all that plot is completely thrown out. It just means that the first 6 games are basically, in universe, like any other product that is "based on a true story". It might be really close to what really happened in canon, or the games might be equivalent of the Cocaine Bear movie, and until old things are re-confirmed in newer canon, your guess is as good as mine as to what "really" happened.

[@TheWholeEntireCake]

I said the same thing like a year ago and got obliterated for implying the Great Scott Cawthon didn’t have a set lore map planned out for an 8+ game franchise. It’s not even a dig at Scott to say that he wasn’t planning for a series from game one even though he said it himself that the first game was a last ditch effort in his game development career and that it was meant to be a standalone game. It’s not insulting to imply he wasn’t prepared for a lore complex series before it took off after debut of FNAF 1. Nobody can see the future (I’m looking at you, Theresa the Long Island Medium) so there’s no way he could have predicted it would have taken off when he created game one, it’s very plausible and probable that he had to scramble to link up plot lines to continue the lore exponentially.

[@MichaelHaneline]

@@TheWholeEntireCake this fandom is honestly pretty toxic like that. I’ve been roasted for being politely critical before too. Also I’ve been roasted for stating theories that people didn’t agree with (only for those theories to later become mostly accepted after MatPat put forward the same theory)

[@Lisa_Flowers]

@@TheWholeEntireCake The wild thing is he has literally confirmed this himself lmao. In the interview Dawko did with Scott a few years ago, he said he didn't have some grand long term plan for the games story, and from the sound of his voice he sounded vaguely annoyed that people constantly assumed/acted like he did. He 100% made a lot of it up as he went along, and I think he even said his general approach to the games was to make another one to correct 'mistakes' he made in the last game (this seems to mostly apply to gameplay, but potentially also lore). But a lot of this fandom is incredibly toxic and basically always has been. They often put Scott on a pedestal that doesn't allow anything that even resembles criticism in their eyes (even when it isn't actually criticism and it's stating something that he himself has agreed with!!!). In their eyes Scott is a god who is playing 4d chess when all of us are playing checkers, and his lore is perfect and we're just dumbasses for not figuring it out. When like, yeah the lore is compelling, there's a reason people are still engaging with it 8 years on. But it is a convoluted, tangled mess of vagueness that i'm not convinced Scott himself can entirely decipher. A lot of that is down to Scott having to metaphorically build the plane while it was flying, so lots of things just had to make enough sense for things to move along in the moment, but the later implications are confusing or redundant or contradictory or just straight up erronous. Decisions are also made and seemingly retconned without it being explicitely and clearly acknowledged that that has occured, and there's a consistent theme in this franchise of not commiting to almost ANYTHING being objectively true, even really basic things like whether specific characters are dead or alive or specific events happened or not, let alone _what_ exactly went down. That's how you get things like 10 dead kids, save him when Charlie is a girl, any dead characters ostensibley still being alive, Vanessa looking at a dead doppleganger in the Vanny suit when the game straight up tells us Vanny = Vanessa, and like 3 different things that in universe cause people to hallucinate when really one would have been enough (Nightmare gas, illusion discs,etc.)

[@AdamGaffney96]

If you think about it, Scott has finally made the perfect religious game - A series of stories that seem connected to varying degrees, everyone disagrees on the fundamentals of what happened or what any of it even means, and it's vague to the point that it's too hard to follow unless you're super dedicated.

[@puyopuyogooey]

now I really really want to see Ryetoast get a "I hate Andrew" poster xD

[@soonahero]

Scheduling this Sunday, before the workweek, makes my life so much better. Thank you

[@RyeToast]

I'm glad to help!

[@lucassoares4412]

I think lefty didnt got shown burning is because scott didnt want to confirm right away that lefty was puppet

[@syweb2]

9:13 That would be my preferred option, but opposite to how you presented it. Since the toys were "scrapped" and never seen again, save for shell bits, I find it fairly easy to make _them_ the ones infused into the Funtimes and/or Molten Freddy, at least timeline-wise. It may not necessarily make sense with the Withereds talking independently/with seeming self-awareness in UCN, but I find it makes more sense with the physical aspect - where the animatronics are _physically_ at any given time. 13:38 Something to note is that the Tangle's head matches with AR Funtime Freddy's head much more than even Help Wanted FF, suggesting that the Tangle might have been made from AR animatronics (Funtime Freddy was the last AR animatronic released, after all). Every shell present in the Tangle has been in Help Wanted, save for the Puppet (which the Tangle could have just picked up from the Pizza Sim ruins it ended up in). 15:10 Circus Baby's face _is_ on the Tangle, don't forget that. 29:57 It seems more like it's setting up the _first_ Happiest Day. 33:00 They don't even disappear _up,_ they just fade in place. 33:35 Puppet has her mask on the whole time. 47:20 One thing I would like to note is that the logbook suggests that Mike took his first Freddy's job for free pizza vouchers, which wouldn't make sense if he tampered with the animatronics on his first day. Generally, I like to think that Custom Night characters always get stinky because _that shit's stressful as fuck and they're gonna get sweaty, with no opportunity to leave and use the restroom._ It's also because of the Security Logbook that I put Mike's first Freddy's _job_ as FNaF 1, followed by Sister Location, then 3 and 6, with him having nightmares as 4 somewhere after FNaF 1. 1:03:00 He did specify the _tiny_ Toy Chica from FNaF 4. 1:12:08 Also, it got cancelled due to shenanigans (unless that was undone?).

[@bonkboy12]

This is just my opinion, but I think all the previous games did happen the way we see it and help wanted just made light of the previous games, but everything after help wanted is in the same universe but telling a new story

[@demysol]

There's a chance that 'Cassidy', which is the name we get in the Logbook associated with a word scramble, was actually meant to be the name of the Crying Child. Cassidy is a gender neutral name and the crying child speaks to us by scrambling words in complete phrases. But THEN there's the little girl named Cassidy in the Silver Eyes trilogy as the child replacing Jeremy's spirit. So we'd have name doubles of Michael Afton in Michael Brooks (the child possessing Golden Freddy in the books) and 'Cassidy' Crying Child Afton even though Dave Miller doesn't seem to having his own kids in that universe?

[@TheWholeEntireCake]

I don’t know, Cassidy doesn’t seem like a gender neutral or androgynous name to me. I’ve never met or heard of a male named Cassidy before. Casey, sure. That’s not to say it isn’t true but I just haven’t heard it before. Then again, there are men named Brittany and Tracey so…

[@Zantorm]

I love this podcast

[@RyeToast]

I'm glad!

[@EonOfTheNeon]

1:12:04 So who’s gonna tell ‘em? :’)

[@centrecore1677]

Love the new podcast! I only really post fnaf shorts on my channel but i have always had this one theory about micheal being tested on after "the crying child" and the way william asked micheal to find Elizabeth was through a tape recording he found after getting out of the test chamber. I feel also that because of recent book spoiler leaks this theory might have a more eveidence then i origanlly thought! Keep up the great work and please get fuhnaff on again that guy rocks 😂

[@connorcaddy5661]

16:51 that's why I think they showed the tangle for a sec in ruin, to show that it's real but burntrap isn't

[@roxanaescobar6303]

Something I would like to say abt the Andrew thing is that if Andrew were to be canon to the games that would either mean that Jake is also canon or what happened between Andrew and Jake never happened. In my opinion both ideas r horrible bc everything that happened between Andrew and Jake is a motive for Andrew to turn out the way he is (try being more nicer and forgiving) there's also the fact that Jake lets Andrew rest, Andrew is out of the picture as the books keep going, so him being in the games already doesn't make sense. Also if Andrew is canon that means Jake also has to be which shows there's ANOTHER child death that had happened in the timeline that wasn't ever said in the games. Ig a way u could get out of that is Jake dying from his cancer, but even still in order to have Andrew u need to have Jake.

[@Wallnut256]

Wouldn’t it have been funny if they spent an hour talking about how they agreed that the Funtimes all represent a different Afton family member? 😂

[@raysandrarexxia941]

I once watched a 10 hour video on Bionicle in one sitting, I *will* watch the 8 hour FNAF video.

[@chlorisc6078]

55:48 - Concidering some of the other animatronics can teleport a bit. Like the camera buzzing and them moving cameras in fnaf 1 so golden freddy is probably a real suit but cassidy's agony is so wild that she can teleport the actual suit. But then again it does apear as a giant head. It is a bit weird.

[@apexdragonoid5395]

It was awesome to hear my question get read. Even if it never was discussed cause the evidence I used just seemed right.

[@Eyes3210-pk6rd]

Wooo new upload

[@RyeToast]

Let's goooooo

[@Tomatech]

A lot of FNaF 4 lore was intended to reinforce dream theory, and dream theory only became a large talking point after scott highlighted the missing beak. Most of FNaF 4 has either been made irrelevant with The Retcon (the one that did away with Dream Theory), or has been recontextualised in future games (like the golden freddy plush bacoming a spying device based on the good ending of Sister Location)

[@CottonCandySharks]

I love these podcasts so much!

[@RyeToast]

I'm glad!

[@JalebJay]

What if Princess Quest leads into Vanessa heading downstairs with Gregory for Burntrap ending instead of Freddy?

[@nathanstruble2177]

Ah, you found the perfect solution to the Mimic, another Mimic so they can fight each other forever. Or teach them Rock Paper Scissors. Forever.

[@seeskittyplay3620]

What if happiest day is just the puppet and vengeful spirit helping the MCI kids remember who they are or what happened to them? We've been given several stories where dead kids don't realize they're dead..

[@RyeToast]

Very possible. But the balloons flying up does seem to imply "moving on"

[@seeskittyplay3620]

@@RyeToast that's fair but Chica in ultimate custom night saying she was the first as well as (I think) mangle and Jack o Chica saying they've seen vengeful spirit (they say him, if I recall correctly?) Implying that those souls are still around (probably held back by vengeful spirit or something)

[@synettech5800]

36:00 so crying child is to happiest day as Henry is to Pizzaria Simulator

[@hircenedaelen]

I think the best thing to do is look at definitely real games, and use them to confirm things from the past games

[@Rand0m-gUy.]

LES GO THE BEST PODCAST AGAIN

[@RyeToast]

YOU KNOW IT

[@SasakiKojiroRoR]

Yes! My favorite FNAF youtubers 🥹🥹🥹❤❤

[@RyeToast]

I'm glad!

[@jimmyjackson2393]

With the log book fazbear entertainment could have physical evidence of what nightmare fredbear would look like

[@Coreybyte]

ok instead of anti andrew club do this "Anti-Andrew Association" because alliteration.

[@thlimpq8840]

THE Retcon is obviously dream theory being canon.

[@obnoxas]

AINT NO WAY MY GUY MENTIONED QUINTON REVIEWS. I JUST FINISHED THE ICARLY/VICTORIOUS SAGA LMAO

[@raysandrarexxia941]

"We hate Andrew here" Welcome new FNAF fans!

[@Dreamy_Muse]

I feel so dumb but I can not for the life of me figure out what these acronyms are and I feel like I’m just old 😂

[@RyeToast]

Off the top of my head, the ones we listed were: MCI = Missing Child Incident (the five kids who were killed and stuffed into suits at the original Freddy's location) DCI = Dead Child Incident (the five kids who were killed at the FNAF 2 location) BV/CC = Bite Victim/Crying Child (the kid we see in the FNAF 4 cutscenes) Did I miss any?

[@Dreamy_Muse]

@@RyeToast omg thank you so much! I don’t think you missed any!

[@3nc335]

My theory is that after the princess quest ending, Vanessa told Gregory that her alter ego Vanny was making a physical body for Glitchtrap/Mimic program, so that she and the Mimic program could make the closest physical version of William using Mimic AI for his mind, and his actual dead body for his body, which is what Burntrap is. However since the Princess Quest ending is canon Gregory stopped it by freeing Vanessa which meant that Burntrap was never finish and that the Mimic we see in Ruin is just a unfinish version of Burntrap. The reason why I think that is because of the Mimic Youtooz, the Mimic Youtooz has the same pose as Burntrap hinting that there the same. How did Vanny get her hands on the Mimic though? I have no idea. Anyway my point is that this is how Gregory imagine Burntrap because of what Vanessa told him, which also means that design that Burntrap has in the Burntrap ending is probably not the actual look of Burntrap and is just what Gregory imagine Burntrap looked liked. Which is why the Mimic and Burntrap looks so different one is just a imagination .My other part of this theory is that since the Tangle is still canon since we see it in Ruin, does that mean Gregory saw it since it's in his comic panel, and that both the Princess Quest ending and Burntrap ending are canon? No the Princess Quest ending is still canon and the Burntrap ending is still a fake- noncanon- what if ending. The reason why Gregory knows that the Tangle exists and knows what it looks like, is because Vanessa and Gregory went underground to trap the Mimic/Unfished Burntrap using Mixes, securing it. (My personal opinion that Mixes was a premade thing and that Gregory and Vanessa just reused and didn't actually make it.) How ever something went wrong, and Gregory or Vanessa or even both saw the Tangle, and since the Tangle is (allegedly) made of agony, The Tangle got angry and tried to attack. Which cause the whole Pizza Plex to collapsed and fall down, Which is why people thought it was a earthquake. Since the place was going down Gregory and Vanessa ran away somehow, and escaped. Since they where in a such a rush, Gregory left his walky-talky and his backpack and then the events of Ruin happened.

[@shelbybayer200]

To be fair, the Story of FNAF is a HORROR series So, the books being Graphic actually is accurate to what is SUPPOSED to be Depicted

[@jk844100]

This is going to be a weird comparison but I think it’s appropriate because I think it’s similar in what they’re trying to accomplish. My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. In the FiM franchise there’s the show itself but there’s also a comic book series by IDW (which is really good btw) but for a very long time fans didn’t know if the comics were supposed to be canon or not because there quite a few contradictions and inconsistencies between the show and the comics. But (I believe it was around when the season 10 comics came out) it was revealed that the comics actually exist in-universe and they’re written by Spike and the reason for the contradictions and inconsistencies is that Spike is an unreliable narrator; he often can’t remember exactly what happened and in a lot of cases he wasn’t even there when the events occurred so he’s just writing from second and third hand accounts, or just making stuff up to fill in the gaps. The comics are about events that actually happened but the way they’re being told isn’t 100% accurate. So any difference between the comics and the show are immediately solved with “well Spike’s recollection isn’t completely accurate” or “Spike wasn’t there for that so he had to make some stuff up to fill in the gaps” etc. FNAF 1-6 being in-universe games is way to reconcile differences between the Scott era and the Steel Wool era, it also makes it so that SW don’t have to follow exactly what was presented before, it gives them more freedom to do what they want without being constrained by previous lore. Plus any existing inconsistencies can be explained with “well the indie dev didn’t know what” or “the indie dev just made some stuff up to fill in the gaps”

[@ImminentFates]

I would retcon the retconing of dream theory

[@ImminentFates]

Which let's be real is the reason that Scott did the indie game thing it was the only way to do dream theory after the retcon continue the story and have his soft reboot type thing

[@EpicRandomness555]

Hm, I’ve never heard it suggested that Happiest Day just didn’t happen before FNaF 3 and Pizzeria Simulator. I thought they were separate souls from all the ones burned in Pizzeria Simulator.

[@tupe444]

when did the blob get named the Tangle?

[@RyeToast]

It's named in the code of Ruin

[@sitrovideomalish8963]

I just wanna see the solving of all 1-4 games sometime, cus there still are some unexplained things there

[@blueberryelf1150]

We love the Andrew slander here!! Raaaaaaaaa!

[@mohmdbak3062]

Id like to see you do an interview with sire squaks, maybe about the canonecity of the books? But i dont know

[@finebook281]

crazy idea, but is it possible that the Crying Child is named Cassidy Afton?

[@TheWholeEntireCake]

Are you saying that CC is a female child?

[@AngelHehehe-hl2yr]

Since my brain doesn't work when do these podcast come out like what day?

[@Ms_mushroom_fairy]

I honestly don’t think that burntrap is the mimic to me it doesn’t make sense, why would you find him in another place than the mimic and also they don’t even do the same thing “burntrap” doesn’t mimic it’s a reincarnation of w afton helped by vanny but, the mimic mimics the stuff around it and didn’t need anyone’s help except cassie, wait what if cassie is like going down Vanessa’s route

[@meganpatterson1840]

Well it also seems to mimic to a means to an end so why would it mimic afton in security breach, it doesn’t help it in anyway and either way burntrap has very different mannerisms like he’s twitching and can barely walk while the mimic is very robotic and seamless in its movements

[@krymsonuchiha14]

I have a small theory on why we don't see lefty burning. What if Henry stayed in the room with Lefty so he could burn with his daughter?

[@krymsonuchiha14]

Also omg the one about recreating the family in SL... I am so using that in my personal timeline and fanfics now....

[@ShrapnelStars]

When it comes to canonicity and retcons, Scott's MO seems to be to keep things vague enough that you can't definitively say he made a mistake or changed his mind. He even said as much in an old reddit post. "There are no holes in the story, only holes in your understanding", which is clearly BS. Changing how important the Chica beak was and trying to silently backpedal on dream theory when he realized fans didn't like it prove that. He also has his own definitions of "canon", "continuity", and "retcon" separate from the rest of the writing world that only serve to keep him from being questioned. If you engage with everything on his terms, the story and discussions will continue to spin their wheels and go nowhere, so I fully stopped engaging with the games and books on his terms and viewed them through the lens of every other form of writing and storytelling. Things get infinitely easier when you accept that he has thrown in a ton of stuff just because he thought it was cool and didn't think of the ripple effect of story implications he'd have to account for. What was Mike doing for 20 years? Doesn't matter, because "30 years later, the final showdown with the player against my most badass design yet, and it ends with the place burning down" sounds cool, and I promise you the thoughts began and ended right there. I don't even have an issue with that. I just wish he was upfront about just happily making cool stuff that he enjoys instead of coping that there's some deep, planned story going on. The indie dev thing, however, I feel like that was meant to keep Steel Wool free to tell stories in their own way without having to take everything Scott did into consideration, and to keep fans from pestering them about the old lore of 1-UCN.

[@johnman8398]

Scott's vagueness isn't to dismiss mistakes or conceal when he's changed his mind, it's more so to give himself the freedom when writing the narrative to change or add things when he sees it as necessary. I haven't seen the holes in understanding line but if that's what he said it was either a joke or if it was serious before his interview with dawko in which case that quote no longer matters as from the interview its clear that isn't a stance he holds anymore (if it was one he even had to begin with). Sure things are easier if you chalk up anything you can't easily rationalise in the story to Scott didn't think about that at all but that's boring and unsatisfying. Again in his interview he's been pretty clear that he isn't some mastermind who thought of every problem in the narrative, he isn't being vague to hide his shortcomings or anything like that its also to allow fans to speculate as sometimes its best to leave things ambiguous. If fans wanna take it as him knowing everything and that there are no mistakes that's on them.

[@Lisa_Flowers]

@@johnman8398 the problem is he leaves EVERYTHING ambigious. There are very very few things in this franchise that you can say for a fact are objectively true or objectively happened, if anything at all lol, and that's (imo) a bad thing. Confirming specific details as true or not true, or as mistakes/retcons or still canon, doesn't take the fun out of solving the mystery, it makes it actually _possible_ to solve it. If almost every single thing you say about FNAF can be questioned with no objectively true answer given, it isn't solving a mystery, it's speculating endlessly into eternity. A lot of people love that but for a lot of fans it is frustrating. Not just how ambigous everything is, but that you can't even tell what is HUGELY important or coherent with the rest of the story, or just a random detail that Scott has forgotten about and isn't relevant anymore. Which sucks when there a TON of details strewn about that don't clearly connect to anything (e.g. Chica's beak, the whole 'the baby isn't mine!' thing from sister location, an literally hundreds of other things. What do literally any of those mean? are they important? do they still matter?). When you can give 100 explanations for one thing, and there are 100 things to explain, and it's hard to tell what is worth prioritising or not, things get hard to keep up with. I honestly think Scott not confirming or deconfirming anything has less to do with not wanting to admit he's wrong or even wanting to let fans speculate. I think it's because he's afraid that the explanation that he has/is technically 'true' will disappoint or even anger people, or won't be as well recieved as what people individually come up with or what is widely accepted in the community. It's entirely possible that there are huge widely accepted theories that are built on a foundation of wrong intepretations that have been so taken for granted people think they are obviously right, so I can't imagine things would go down well if Scott confirmed that they aren't. I think the OC has a point about Scott back pedling on dream theory because of how deeply unpopular it was when that seemed to be what he was hinting towards. And after 8 years, what might have been true at one point might not be anymore, so some answers especially about the old games lore might not be true anymore, or might have been silently retconned.