Diego A. Ramirez

[Image Description: It's a vertical comic strip of 14 panels arranged one under the other. The style is realistic, done with sketchy lines in a dark burgundy. It is not colored or shaded and there is no background. The comic features the interactions of a couple, Magritte (also called Margie) and Rafael (also called Raf). Magritte is a young woman, she is wearing a baggy armhole tank top with a tight fitting black top underneath, shorts and boots. She has a messy bun and a small messenger bag slung over her left shoulder. Rafael is her partner, wearing baggy pants, sneakers, fingerless gloves, V-neck t-shirt and an open button-up jacket with a hoodie and the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair has short side with long top bangs and a short goatee.

 (First panel): There's only Magritte visible from the waist up. Off screen, Raf says to someone else: “Magritte has our tickets.” Magritte is excited, looking straight forward. Her left hand in on her bag's strap, her right hand rummaging inside her bag. Magritte says: "Yeah! Even made sure to put them in my wallet so that I wouldn't- uh..."

 (Second panel): She is beginning to look concerned, now with her face turned to her back, both left hand holding the lip to open the bag wider and her right hand still rummaging inside. Magritte says: "wouldn't forget.... Hang on, it's not on it's usual pocket. Haha." The last is a nervous laughter.

 (Third panel): Magritte is kneeling on the ground. Rafael is standing to the side and behind her, only his feet visible. Magritte looks frantic, searching inside her bag. Her right arm is forearm deep digging in her bag. Magritte says: "It's definitely here-! It's the one thing I never forget 'cus I never take it out of my bag!" Rafael says, firmly: "Margie, when you took it out to put the tickets in, did you put the wallet back in the bag?" The letters are bolded, with the word "back" underlined for emphasis. Magritte says: "Give me some credit, there's no way I'm that stupid." The last three words are underlined for emphasis.

 (Fourth panel):  The scene has changed and now Magritte and Rafael are in a car. We see them from the passenger's side. Rafael is driving, looking straight ahead at the road. Magritte is hunched forward, hugging herself with the left hand. Her right hand is holding her head. She is looking out the passenger window, avoiding Raf.

 (Fifth panel):  Rafael turns slightly to look at Magritte.

 (Sixth panel):  The point of view is now a side profile view from the drivers side. Rafael has his left arm leaning on the open window, his right hand on the wheel. Magritte is hunched over facing the passenger window. Rafael says: "I'm not mad at you, if that's what you're worried about." Magritte says: "I can literally feel your disappointment."

 (Seventh panel): Back to the passengers side, Rafael is looking at the road. Magritte is frustrated, no longer leaning her head against her right hand and instead her hand is palm upwards. Rafael says: "Well, yes. It is a disappointing situation, but-" Magritte interrupts: "You'd think I'd be able to do the one thing I was asked to do-! That I'd at least learn from the last billion times I forgot shit. Rafael says, quieter: “that's not where I was going with this...”

(Eighth panel):  Magritte has her right hand holding her face with the palm on her cheek, left hand placing the tips of her fingers on her left temple and eye brows. She is frustrated and angry. Magritte says: "It's not like I've got anything more important rattling around in my brain.  But, for some reason, if it's not my music, or like.... food or something, then it's just not a priority. I can't make myself care enough to make it a priority!"

(Ninth panel): She now has both hands in front of her, elbows bent, finger extended in a vague hand gesture as if there was something in front of her. Magritte says: "I'm an adult in my 20s and I still manage my responsibilities like a child. I'd be more dependable if I could just stop and think for a second, but I'd probably forget to even breathe if it weren't for the..."

 (Tenth panel): Her frustrated expression turned to confusion. Her hands are still in the air in the same position as before. Magritte says:"... why are we parked?" Her noticing this stopped her rant.

(Eleventh panel): Magritte straightens up and faces the window entirely, left hand crossed over her body to lean on the car door. Rafael, off screen: "Margie." Magritte says: "Oh." Magritte's inner thoughts are written around her. "He stopped the car to scold me. No, not ‘scold’. Don't be a child about this. He's disappointed and just needs to make sure you understand so you can do better next ti-"

 (Twelfth panel): Magritte is still looking out the window, but now with a shocked expression. Rafael reached with his right hand, and its now resting gently on her upper back. Rafael interrupts her inner monologue with "I need you to stop repeating the shit your parents and teachers and such yelled at you growing up. They were wrong, and nothing you just said makes sense."

 (Thirteenth panel):  The perspective switches back to the driver's side profile. Rafael says: "A poor memory isn't synonymous with poor priorities. Nor does it speak to a lack of maturity. The priority was there, we just have to build a better habit of checking things before we leave the apartment. Both of us. It's gonna take time. You afford everyone else a ton of patience, all the time. Can you please afford some for yourself? The situation sucks, we were both looking forward to this. But it's not the end of the world. We didn't forget things on purpose. So let's take it easy and try to end the day on a good note. Alright?" Magritte says: "Okay... c-can we um...."

 (Fourteenth panel): Magritte has turned to face Rafael and her eyes are filled with tears and they're running down her cheeks.  Rafael looks startled, lifting his arm off Magritte's back. Magritte says: "Can we get some ice cream on the way back?" Rafael says: "O-of course!" End of description.]

[Image Description: It's a vertical comic strip of 14 panels arranged one under the other. The style is realistic, done with sketchy lines in a dark burgundy. It is not colored or shaded and there is no background. The comic features the interactions of a couple, Magritte (also called Margie) and Rafael (also called Raf). Magritte is a young woman, she is wearing a baggy armhole tank top with a tight fitting black top underneath, shorts and boots. She has a messy bun and a small messenger bag slung over her left shoulder. Rafael is her partner, wearing baggy pants, sneakers, fingerless gloves, V-neck t-shirt and an open button-up jacket with a hoodie and the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair has short side with long top bangs and a short goatee.

 (First panel): There's only Magritte visible from the waist up. Off screen, Raf says to someone else: “Magritte has our tickets.” Magritte is excited, looking straight forward. Her left hand in on her bag's strap, her right hand rummaging inside her bag. Magritte says: "Yeah! Even made sure to put them in my wallet so that I wouldn't- uh..."

 (Second panel): She is beginning to look concerned, now with her face turned to her back, both left hand holding the lip to open the bag wider and her right hand still rummaging inside. Magritte says: "wouldn't forget.... Hang on, it's not on it's usual pocket. Haha." The last is a nervous laughter.

 (Third panel): Magritte is kneeling on the ground. Rafael is standing to the side and behind her, only his feet visible. Magritte looks frantic, searching inside her bag. Her right arm is forearm deep digging in her bag. Magritte says: "It's definitely here-! It's the one thing I never forget 'cus I never take it out of my bag!" Rafael says, firmly: "Margie, when you took it out to put the tickets in, did you put the wallet back in the bag?" The letters are bolded, with the word "back" underlined for emphasis. Magritte says: "Give me some credit, there's no way I'm that stupid." The last three words are underlined for emphasis.

 (Fourth panel):  The scene has changed and now Magritte and Rafael are in a car. We see them from the passenger's side. Rafael is driving, looking straight ahead at the road. Magritte is hunched forward, hugging herself with the left hand. Her right hand is holding her head. She is looking out the passenger window, avoiding Raf.

 (Fifth panel):  Rafael turns slightly to look at Magritte.

 (Sixth panel):  The point of view is now a side profile view from the drivers side. Rafael has his left arm leaning on the open window, his right hand on the wheel. Magritte is hunched over facing the passenger window. Rafael says: "I'm not mad at you, if that's what you're worried about." Magritte says: "I can literally feel your disappointment."

 (Seventh panel): Back to the passengers side, Rafael is looking at the road. Magritte is frustrated, no longer leaning her head against her right hand and instead her hand is palm upwards. Rafael says: "Well, yes. It is a disappointing situation, but-" Magritte interrupts: "You'd think I'd be able to do the one thing I was asked to do-! That I'd at least learn from the last billion times I forgot shit. Rafael says, quieter: “that's not where I was going with this...”

(Eighth panel):  Magritte has her right hand holding her face with the palm on her cheek, left hand placing the tips of her fingers on her left temple and eye brows. She is frustrated and angry. Magritte says: "It's not like I've got anything more important rattling around in my brain.  But, for some reason, if it's not my music, or like.... food or something, then it's just not a priority. I can't make myself care enough to make it a priority!"

(Ninth panel): She now has both hands in front of her, elbows bent, finger extended in a vague hand gesture as if there was something in front of her. Magritte says: "I'm an adult in my 20s and I still manage my responsibilities like a child. I'd be more dependable if I could just stop and think for a second, but I'd probably forget to even breathe if it weren't for the..."

 (Tenth panel): Her frustrated expression turned to confusion. Her hands are still in the air in the same position as before. Magritte says:"... why are we parked?" Her noticing this stopped her rant.

(Eleventh panel): Magritte straightens up and faces the window entirely, left hand crossed over her body to lean on the car door. Rafael, off screen: "Margie." Magritte says: "Oh." Magritte's inner thoughts are written around her. "He stopped the car to scold me. No, not ‘scold’. Don't be a child about this. He's disappointed and just needs to make sure you understand so you can do better next ti-"

 (Twelfth panel): Magritte is still looking out the window, but now with a shocked expression. Rafael reached with his right hand, and its now resting gently on her upper back. Rafael interrupts her inner monologue with "I need you to stop repeating the shit your parents and teachers and such yelled at you growing up. They were wrong, and nothing you just said makes sense."

 (Thirteenth panel):  The perspective switches back to the driver's side profile. Rafael says: "A poor memory isn't synonymous with poor priorities. Nor does it speak to a lack of maturity. The priority was there, we just have to build a better habit of checking things before we leave the apartment. Both of us. It's gonna take time. You afford everyone else a ton of patience, all the time. Can you please afford some for yourself? The situation sucks, we were both looking forward to this. But it's not the end of the world. We didn't forget things on purpose. So let's take it easy and try to end the day on a good note. Alright?" Magritte says: "Okay... c-can we um...."

 (Fourteenth panel): Magritte has turned to face Rafael and her eyes are filled with tears and they're running down her cheeks.  Rafael looks startled, lifting his arm off Magritte's back. Magritte says: "Can we get some ice cream on the way back?" Rafael says: "O-of course!" End of description.]

A big one is this video from Bonk Bon, who analyses Michael's dialogue from the end of SL and combs through a few comments made by PJ Heywood about his own performance of the character. It's a great video made by someone who also loves Michael Afton, I big recommend it -- and it doesn't go into theory territory really. It references the Logbook I believe every few bits, but it's mostly just an analysis of Michael's speech from Sister Location. It's quite insightful!

Bon goes deeper into this --- but to summarize; there is enough here to suggest that even after the events of Sister Location, on some smaller level, Michael does still seek his fathers approval... Even though he's clearly ready and willing to put his ass six feet into the ground. Now obviously, in that speech he doesn't speak to William in a loving, caring way -- I also believe that laugh/sigh he does at the end is extremely indicative to how he actually feels about his father (potential disgust or depression for being mistaken for him in any capacity) --- But he's also not exactly as cold or distant as many of us might think he'd might be towards his child-killing father... It's a bit more nuanced to that.

I had to search for it in the video, but even PJ Heywood himself once stated that he felt that Michael sounded like he was "trying to win his fathers approval," (at about the four minute mark). And of course, PJ Heywood isn't the lore keeper of FNaF, but being that he was directed by Scott Cawthon and was given at least a brief summary to work with, I think there is reason as to why he specifically feels that Mike felt inclined toward this.

There's other legitimate aspects to this whole theory, but to tackle your other reservation about Michael being so rebellious when he was a child but being so obedient as an adult; I do have some ideas about this as well, and other bits of lore we can point to explain this... Well, first off, there is the fact that Michael accidentally killed his brother, I'm sure that would take a lot of wind's out of a lot of other peoples sails at that point; probably would shatter a lot of that defiant confidence he had. However, we can go deeper than that...

Because, I'm pretty sure it's implied by recent books that, like, it was William who subjected Michael to the FNaF 4 nightmares, as punishment for locking his door and running away during Midnight Motorist. (Tales of the Pizzaplex #8, Dittophobia; which shows a young boy being forced to endure basically FNaF 4 while being observed by someone unknown the whole time). Plus there's that the room in Sister Location, Michael's illustration in the logbook...

(I'm sure you're aware of almost all of these, I'm just trying to show my receipts here, sorry if any of this is repetitive).

If all this is really true, the whole Nightmare sequence thing could've just been Williams version of obedience training for Michael. Anytime Michael may have spoken out of turn or done anything further defy or maybe even just anger William -- This might have been his punishment. Again, we don't know what happened to Michael's mother -- but I think it's safe to say that William probably had custody of Michael for at least the rest of his teenage years which, well, I think would've given him plenty of time in order to properly "discipline" him to his own linking... which is just --- so messed up to think about now. But not surprising, unfortunately.

But even if that's not why William put Michael through the FNaF 4 wringer, there are plenty of other clues from Scott that seem to indicate that William had been manipulating Michael to do his bidding.

Many have pointed out this weird poster in Pizzeria Simulator that seems to parallel the Afton family. You got a giant yellow bear (Dave, the Crying Child) a clown (Elizabeth), a dude in a purplish suit (William) -- with a puppet on his hand who looks EXACTLY like him (Michael)! Of course, this can still work if you only believe that Michael only went to Sister Location to do his father's bidding, William still was still tricking Michael and I'm sure withholding important information all the same... But I don't know, I feel like there's a bit more going on here than just that.

And yes, there is movie Michael, whom is just completely taken into his fathers goof juice... Now clearly, there's nothing in the games to indicate that not only was Michael directly involved in Williams murders, but actively murdering other people himself in the process --- However, Michael being his fathers pawn does feel like it has some consistency under Scott Cawthon's pen. Clearly, they are both defined by their relationship to their respective fathers and they both feel some level of subservience to him.

Also, side tangent! No one has pointed this out --- But I think it's rather significant that Michael Afton in the film is a security guard... Because he has only had two CONFIRMED appearances in the games; Sister Location and Pizzeria Simulator, and in both of those he was either a technician or a manager! Michael Afton as a security guard is only something that has been hinted at in the Security Logbook --- So, I think Michael being a confirmed security guard in the second film might just be Scott lightly adding fuel to that theory ... After all, it's also interesting that, in the movie, Michael is a security guard at the FNaF 2 location as well...

Alright, alright, tangent over... So, I've been spending a lot of time talking about why I feel Michael Afton was, at least at some point, extremely obedient to his father, but I haven't talked about how this impacts his status as the protagonist or how he would've helped William throughout the course of the franchise... Other than I strongly don't believe that Michael was ever helping William with his murders.... But the main theory I've really become interested in is that William had been sending Michael to Freddy's locations in order to try and collect their endoskeletons.

Basically, the idea is that William wanted the endoskeletons of the original five MCI animatronics, Freddy, Bonnie, Chica, Foxy and Golden Freddy --- In order to study remnant, and to eventually melt them down --- leading to the creation of the Funtime animatronics. That's why Michael (and supposedly his alter ego, Fritz) was initially fired for "tampering with the animatronics". That's why in Help Wanted there's a hidden graphic of Freddy and other endoskeletons in Circus Baby's, and that's why this exact thing happened in the third main FNaF Novel, The Fourth Closet... And that's what Henry was talking about in his secret audio log.

"He lured them all back. Back to a familiar place. Back with familiar tricks. He brought them all together. (...) He set some kind of trap – I don’t know what it was, but he led them there, again. He overpowered them, again. And he robbed them of the only thing that they had, again."

This is basically the Molten MCI theory; the theory that when William was destroying the animatronics in the FNAF 3 minigames, he was taking their endoskeletons back to Circus Baby's, melting them down and injecting their remnant into the Funtime animatronics. It's not a perfect theory but there's a lot of evidence behind it -- And it makes sense that was the reason why William was sending Michael to these locations in order to try and retrieve them --- Only for William to have to do it himself anyways.

HERE'S another video explanting it all --- As well as Sister Locations place in the timeline extremely well.

THIS ALL BEING SAID --- I'd like to believe that GameMichael wasn't completely aware of his fathers murders-- and if he was, I think there is a strong case that he was being manipulated by William to believe that it was for a good cause --- Maybe William had told him that this was all in the sake of bringing his brother and sister back -- And I'd buy that. I mean, as far as we still know, Michael has no mother figure in his life, all he has left of his father after loosing pretty much everyone else close to him... I could see it being possible that he would've initially clung to him like a damaged puppy in hopes of getting validation and maybe even his family back.

"I still hear her sometimes. Why did that happen?"

Whatever the case, I'd also like to believe the moment he realized William was completely full of shit was when Circus Baby revealed to him that it was his animatronic that killed her.

Finally, to wrap this up is I think the reason why I like this theory so much is that it adds an extra layer of nuance to his character. In my absolute mind, Michael Afton is the HERO of the original Five Nights at Freddy's games; however, he is born of under the control of his father -- Which is something he digs himself out of. By the end of the games, he's completely renounced his father and any hope of trying to win his favor and is only focused on destroying him --- and sending him to hell where he belongs. And in my mind, Michael redeems himself.

It's fun to think of Michael as this sarcasitic, quippy, smart ass who just has nothing but hatred for his father --- but I like the added sense of vulnerability he has by the implication that he was forcefully under his father's rule for many years... I think many fans got it right, Vanessa Shelly is the main adaption of Michael in the movies.

I think it's also notable, as stated by PJ Heywood himself as well, regardless of Michael's part, he is written to be a purposefully sympathetic character --- Against his father, whom has pretty much no redeeming traits --- and I think that's true even in his film adaptation; who I think is much more of a bastard, but you can clearly see that he's someone who feels he can only define himself by his relationship with William... But I'm hoping, I'm praying, I'm FEIGNING that in the third movie, Michael is the one who ends up setting his father ablaze because -- that would just be such a great way to parallel the arc I feel he has in the original games.