Five Nights at Freddy’s Fazbear Frights #5
By: Scott Cawthon, Elley Cooper & Andrea Waggener
*This post contains spoilers for Bunny Call and other stories in Fazbear Frights #5
Fazbear Frights is a series of short stories set in the Five Nights at Freddy’s universe. Each short story is broken into individual discussions to really focus on the individual theme.
If you want to get caught up on other terrifying tales you can check out my post on 1:35 A.M., Room for One More, The New Kid, Fazbear Frights #1 & Fazbear Frights #2.
Overview:
Unhappily, Bob is on a vacation with his wife and kids on a remote camp group geared towards families. Everyone seems to be having such a good time except him. To have a little fun, he signs up for Bunny Call. A service where an animatronic rabbit names Ralpho with cymbals comes to your cabin before sunrise and noisily wakes the whole cabin.
Sounds like just the thing to scare his overly joyous family.
However, Bob quickly regrets his decision. He is unable to sleep with a stomach that is tossing and turning. Tired and nauseous he decides to stop the wake up call. When he peeks outside all he sees is another father name Phillip who also can’t sleep due to the impending call. The two men chat about their childhoods and their parents before Bob decides to find an employee to help him.
Unfortunately, the lodge is closed and dark so he fumbles his way back up the path. Suddenly, he hears a noise of pops and cracks and sets after the source. Fearing Ralpho is heading to his families cabin he sprints and closes the cabin door with minutes before the Bunny arrives.
But he does arrive… and does not listen to Bob when he says he does not need the wake up call.
Ralpho first tries the door… then the window… then the other window… the trap door under the house… the window over his sons bed. Each time, Bob uses all his strength to prevent them from entering. At one point he hits Ralpho in the paw and the “animatronic” begins to bleed.
Finally, with Ralpho halfway through the last window he makes eye contact with Bob before retreating for no apparent reason.
Bob is elated and embraces his family telling them all how much he loves them.
At breakfast, Bob is happy enjoying his family and amazing pancakes. Nothing could ruin this new found feeling.
Then the camp owner informs everyone the Bunny Calls could not be completed this morning. And they do apologize for the inconvenience.
The End
Appreciate the People Around You
This is a popular theme in this book series (see The New Kid). Bob loves his family but does not appreciate them. Their positivity and excitement annoys him. He can’t help but think of the times before he had children.
Only after fighting off Ralpho is he able to really appreciate them. He describes things in a new positive light that just a day ago he described in disgust.
The fear of losing everyone he loved scared him out of his rut.
The Struggles of Fatherhood
The theme of what it means to be a father and the struggles that come with it is the main theme of Bunny Call. Bob knows he should be happy but can’t deal with his loss of who is was versus who he is now with a wife and kids. Wanting to be the best father but still holding on to yourself.
Another example comes in his discussion with Phillip in the woods. Bob blurts out aspects of his childhood without prompt. This is his first time being alone with another father and he lowers his guard sharing a little bit of the struggles. Both express that they are try to live up to or do better than their fathers. Of course, this interaction is brief after all this is a horror story about a killer bunny but I think it was the most important part or the story. It lays out to the reader what we are actually reading and supposed to be taking away.
The Family Protector
He does not wake his family when Ralpho tries to break in. Instead, he intends on hiding the entire Bunny Call from them and protecting them himself. His wife seems fully capable of aiding him and taking some of this burden off of him. There is no scenario where she would want him to wake her up so she can help save her family. If he is unsuccessful, she and the kids are in danger. It is not fair for her to not know the danger they face.
Telling your wife that there is an killer robot Bunny running around the woods is strange. However, if my husband was truly terrified of something I would get my family out of the situation regardless how unlikely it seemed. If there is a real threat, we gotta get out of there. If he is hearing and seeing things that aren’t there, we still gotta get out of there.
In the end we find out that the Bunny Calls could not be done that morning due to a staff member being out. There was an actual threat and he felt that he couldn’t wake his family. He had to protect them even if it killed them.
A Literal Wake Up Call
Bob has always loved his family but didn’t appreciate them. This demonic wake up call was also a wake up call for Bob in his life. He was so focused on everything that he no longer could do that he wasn’t able to enjoy what’s to come and the new experiences that life brings by growing.
After Bob defeats Ralpho his attitude turns completely. Food tastes better, he appreciates little things about the camp and he is smiling with the rest of his family. He was living in his misery when they first arrived and chose to see everything as a negative or an attack on him.
He could have lost everything easily. The priorities of his life changed once he had that experience.
Overall,
This story ended pretty well for all the characters. Sure, the best case scenario is that a crazy person dressed as a bunny and tried to kill Bob’s whole family. Worse case scenario is that a demonic bunny suit came to life and will try again but… no one died. Almost every entry in this series has the main character meeting a grisly and gruesome end so Bob got off easily.
Bunny Call is one of many stories I have read in this series. With that, I didn’t think it was as captivating as others. I think that the best stories are the ones that the reader relates to and I can’t relate too much to Bob. I’m not a father, I’m never going to be a father so I more sympathize with the wife. My critic of Bob’s unwillingness to include his wife is evident of who I relate to.
An ok story that has a creepy ending but I wouldn’t miss it if it wasn’t in the anthology.
Rating: 3/5 stars
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