William Afton(2023)

***NOTE: This article is about the incarnation of William Afton from the 2023 movie. The mainstream version can be found here.***
File:Stop hand.png✔

This Article Contains Spoilers -
Warning !! The Joker laughs at this article as it contains SPOILERS. This article may spoil your film and it's ending.. so don't expect us to keep our mouths shut. It's suggested that you exit this page at once unless youv'e seen this movie or series.

## Evil-doer

### Alias

Steve Raglan (fake name)
Mr. Raglan
The Yellow Rabbit
Spring Bonnie (by fans)
Dad (by Vanessa Shelly)

### Occupation

Entrepreneur (formerly)
Career counselor (falsely)
Serial killer
Co-founder of Fazbear Entertainment (implied)

### Powers / Skills

Superhuman strength (animatronic suit)
 Superhuman durability (animatronic suit)
 Murder methodology
Business management
Manipulation
High intelligence
Knifemanship
Intimidation
High pain tolerance
Mechanical engineering

### Hobby

Kidnapping and killing children.
Having people killed by the animatronics.

### Goals

Kill children and get away with it.
Use the souls of his victims to murder night guards at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place (both temporarily succeeded).
Kill Mike and Abby Schmidt.
Kill Vanessa for turning against him (both failed).

### Type of Villain

Sadistic Serial Killer

**William Afton**, also known as **Steve Raglan** or **the Yellow Rabbit**, is the main antagonist of the 2023 supernatural horror film *Template:W*, the film adaptation of the popular Template:W.

He is a Fazbear Entertainment associate as well as a notorious serial killer who murdered several innocent children at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place during the 1980's and hid their bodies inside the restaurant's four animatronic characters, which led them to becoming possessed killer robots.

Around two decades later, he would take up the identity of career counselor Steve Raglan, where he would hire people for the night shift at Freddy's so the animatronics could kill them, somehow having found a way to control them. This includes Mike Schmidt, an unemployed troubled young man who lost his younger brother to Afton several years ago. This makes Afton order his daughter, Vanessa Shelly, to watch over Mike and kill him if he gets too close to discovering the truth. Thus, he is Mike's archenemy.

He was portrayed by Template:W, who also played Stu Macher in *Scream*, Chet Sulloway in *Law & Order: Special Victims Unit* and David Roy Turner in *Criminal Minds*. He is also most commonly known for playing Shaggy Roggers.

## Appearance

### Human

William Afton is a middle-aged man with a light skin complexion, blue eyes, and a gray/taupe combed side-parted hair, mustache and goatee. He wears a pair of golden vintage aviator glasses, which he takes off later in the film, as well as a grayish-yellow long-sleeved shirt with a blue-striped-vertical pattern with a dark blue tie with small light blue polka dots. That said, one scene has him wear what is most likely a Madras-patterned cream shirt with a wine-like purple with dark blue oblique stripes.

### The Yellow Rabbit

While suited, Afton is shown wearing a withered and decomposed golden rabbit suit with heavily damages, gaping holes exposing wires on its right side, a big purple bowtie and two black buttons on its chest. It also lacks a huge part of its right ear. Afton's beard is slightly visible due to the costume's jaw being slightly open. The springlock mechanisms of the costume make Afton seem bulkier and taller. When William wears the head of the Yellow Rabbit suit the eyes glow a ghostly grey. At the end of the film, a large chunk on the stomach is ripped off and it becomes likely blood soaked due to the springlocks failing on William.

## Personality

William is accurately described as a malevolent though intelligent man. He makes it clear that he is a sociopath, not caring about others and displaying clear enjoyment at the torment of people like Mike. He seems to be very egotistical and gladly takes time to admire his own achievements. Despite this, William is also shown to be very intelligent, knowing plenty about the animatronics, being a skilled manipulator, and being able to disguise himself for decades. William seems to enjoy his past actions and crimes as he brainwashes his children victims and hires the sibling of one of the children he murdered to work as a security guard for him just for his own enjoyment, given the implications he wouldn't have hired him otherwise.

As Steve Raglan, William dons a polite and bumbling façade who tries to tell jokes to lighten the mood, while also being rather smug and insulting to Mike when learning about his past jobs. However, when he realizes Mike is Garrett's brother, his behavior changes and he becomes more sophisticated.

Despite his cruelty, there is a moment after stabbing Vanessa where Afton stopped what he was doing and looked at her with a face of shock, implying that, despite his attempt at her life, he does hold a small but genuine amount of care for his daughter. However, this is likely William just being disappointed that he could no longer control Vanessa.

## Biography

### Past

In the 1980s, William Afton was most likely an employee or co-founder of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place with a daughter named Vanessa Shelly. Sometime in the 1980s, while wearing a yellow rabbit springlock suit, William would murder five children at Freddy's before hiding their corpses inside the animatronic suits. At an unknown point in time, he would also kidnap the young Garrett Schmidt in front of his brother Michael, and then kill him.

After the murders, the restaurant would be abandoned and become a hot spot for trespassers and vandals. Though according to Afton, the owner doesn't bother destroying the building due to his attachment to it. To avoid being caught, Afton would change his name to Steve Raglan and become a career counselor, while his daughter Vanessa would change her last name to Shelly and become a police officer. As implied by Vanessa, William began to lure people to work at Freddy's in order for the animatronics to kill them.

### *Five Nights at Freddy's*

William first appeared in the beginning of the movie during the opening credits, where a minigame depicts him luring away five kids in the yellow rabbit suit. He appears properly as a career counselor for Mike, after Mike was fired from his Mall Security job for assaulting a father in front of his son; having mistakenly assumed he was kidnapping the kid due to his past trauma with Garrett. "Steve" initially acts condescending towards Mike for his past failure of keeping a job; however, upon reading Mike's full name, he recognized him as the brother of Garrett, the boy he kidnapped years ago. He quickly changed his nature, offering Mike coffee as a friendly gesture. He explained to Mike how he won't be able to keep a job properly with the way he acts, but then revealed that he has a job for him: a security gig at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza. Mike is initially reluctant to take the job upon learning it requires him to work a night shift, but William offers him his card in case he wants to change his mind.

Mike eventually calls William to take up the job, in order to keep his sister, Abby, from going into the custody of their Aunt Jane. William reveals the history of Freddy's during his phone call with Mike. Explaining how the place was shut down years ago, but the owner couldn't let it go, which is why a security guard is hired to watch it over from vandals and robbers.

As Mike works at the restaurant, he starts having vivid dreams of his brother's kidnapping, albeit this time with the appearance of the ghost children of the animatronics. During the third night's dream, Mike asks the spirit of Golden Freddy to tell him what happened to his brother, offering to give him anything. Golden Freddy responds to this by disappearing and leaving a drawing of a humanoid rabbit behind.

After seeing how Abby has befriended the animatronics, he asks her if they know anything about Garrett's kidnapping. She explains how they don't know anything, but all they mention is the existence of a Yellow Rabbit.

Near the end of the film, after Mike is saved from Foxy by Vanessa, he is taken to a police compound to heal his injuries, Vanessa finally tells him the full truth: William is her father, and he kidnapped and killed the five missing kids before stuffing their bodies in the animatronic suits. She was unaware of his kidnapping of Garrett until Mike told her, where she reveals a picture of her and William (wearing the Yellow Rabbit suit) back when the restaurant was open, in which she is holding the toy plane that belonged to Garrett (given to her by William). She reveals that William controls the animatronics and influences their nature, which is why they want to kill Abby to make her a fellow animatronic despite their friendly attitude towards her nights before. She also warns that he would soon be coming to the restaurant to finish the job himself.

As Mike struggled to rescue Abby from the animatronics, he was confronted by William in his rabbit suit. The two engage in a brief fight, in which William easily overpowers Mike through a surprising amount of strength by knocking him down to the floor. He taunts Mike about the coincidence of him killing Garrett all those years ago and how he's now about to kill Mike and Abby, calling it "symmetry". Knocking Mike out, he prepares to deliver the final blow, only to be stopped by Vanessa, who had decided to stand up to her father after years of abuse. This leads to William taking off his mask, revealing himself to be the "Steve Raglan" counselor who helped out Mike. Despite managing to shoot him, William overpowered Vanessa easily and stabbed her, knocking her out. However, this gave time for Abby to draw a picture of William as the Yellow Rabbit killing the kids and putting it on the wall of drawings, due to Mike realizing that William was controlling the animatronics through the drawings on the way depicting the Yellow Rabbit as friends with the five kids (a callback to when Abby's teacher told Mike the influence drawings have on children). Shining a light on the picture and revealing William as the murderer, all the animatronics turn on him. He breaks down in anger and insults the animatronics for betraying him, telling them that *he* made them. Chica's Cupcake launches himself at William and bites out his suit. This action activates the springlocks, all of which pierce William through the skin and mortally wound him. In response, he takes up his mask and puts it on with a demented smile on his face, declaring he always comes back. Writhing and twitching in agony, he was dragged away by the animatronics as the restaurant collapsed.

William was last seen at the end of the movie after Freddy's has broken down to ruins. Having been taken to a storeroom, he is still twitching and whining in pain even in death. He reaches out to the ghost of Golden Freddy to help him, only for Golden Freddy to close the door on him, leaving William to live forever in pain inside of the animatronic suit just like his victims. However, given his role in the games, as well as his actor signing a three picture deal, William will likely escape the storeroom and return to make good on his promise of "I always come back".

## Relationships

† means that the character is deceased. †? means that the character's fate is currently unclear or unknown.

### Family

* Unnamed Wife †? - Wife *(presumably)*
* Vanessa Shelly †? - Daughter

### Allies

* Vanessa Shelly †? *(formerly)* - Daughter/Right-hand woman
* Freddy Fazbear † *(formerly)* - Victim/Brainwashed pawn
* Bonnie the Bunny † *(formerly)* - Victim/Brainwashed pawn
* Chica the Chicken † *(formerly)* - Victim/Brainwashed pawn
* Foxy the Pirate † *(formerly)* - Victim/Brainwashed pawn

### Enemies

* Mike Schmidt - Archenemy/Attempted victim
* Vanessa Shelly †? - Daughter/Former right-hand woman/Attempted victim
* Abby Schmidt - Attempted victim
* Garrett Schmidt † - Kidnapee/Possible first victim
* The Missing Children † - Victims/Former pawns
	+ Freddy Fazbear † - Victim
	+ Bonnie the Bunny † - Victim
	+ Chica the Chicken † - Victim
	+ Foxy the Pirate † - Victim
	+ Golden Freddy † - Arch-Nemesis/Victim

## Gallery

WillytheKid(napper).pngWilliam kidnapping Garrett.FatherandDaughter.pngWilliam wearing the Yellow Rabbit suit in a picture with his daughter Vanessa back in the 1980s with the toy plane of Garrett Schmidt.AftonBlumhouse.pngWilliam in the present, posing as career consellour "Steve Raglan".Realization.pngWilliam realizing that Mike Schmidt is the brother of Garrett, one of his victims.WilliamAftonBlumhouse.pngWilliam getting a call from Mike Schmidt.WilliamAftonMovie.jpgWilliam as his plan is coming to fruition.SpringBonnieBlumhouse.pngWilliam in the Yellow Rabbit costume, having arrived at Freddy's to kill Mike and Abby.OGGhostfacelikerevealbutfnaf.pngWilliam unmasking himself to intimidate his daughter, Vanessa.Fatheroftheyear.pngWilliam attacking Vanessa.Guilt.pngWilliam after stabbing Vanessa, possibly taken aback about his actions.SpringWilly.pngWilliam being fatally springlocked.Ialwayscomeback!!.png"I always come back!"Minigamestrugglebutreal.pngWilliam slowly dying from the springlock failure.LeftfordeadWIll.pngWilliam's well-deserved death as he is left for dead in a backroom, bleeding out from the springlock malfunction.
## Trivia

* William Afton is Matthew Lillard's second serial killer role in a film, the first being Stu Macher, one of the original Ghostfaces from *Scream*.
	+ Afton's knife wipe while in the Yellow Rabbit suit is a reference to Ghostface's signature and iconic move in *Scream*.
* Back in December 2022, when it was announced that William Afton would be played by Matthew Lillard, fans started making memes of Shaggy Rogers from *Scooby-Doo* committing Afton's heinous murders while wearing purple clothing. This is due to Lillard portraying Shaggy in the live-action *Scooby-Doo* films, as well as being the animated character's current voice actor in several *Scooby-Doo* media.
* The name Steve Raglan is almost an anagram to the word "everlasting". Assuming this isn't a coincidence, it could be a callback to Afton being infamous for cheating death several times.
* William as Steve Raglan has a role very similar to that of the Phone Guy from the original games, instructing Mike on how to do his job through the phone likely as a reference to the debunked theory where the Phone Guy was actually the killer.
* William's movie counterpart taking the identity of Steve Raglan is most likely a reference to the same way William's counterpart in the novel trilogy took the identity of Dave Miller to make sure no one finds the bodies of his victims in the animatronics.
* Director Emma Tammi described casting Matthew Lillard as William Afton as "The number-one role that we really had the fan-base in mind for".
* His behavior before his death seems to imply that he will return as Springtrap in the future, now trapped in the rabbit suit, similar to his video game counterpart.
* While it's clearly meant to be the suit, Afton's costume is never called "**Spring Bonnie**" in the movie, known only as "the Yellow Rabbit".
	+ This might be a slight reference to how Golden Freddy was ultimately just a fan nickname made canon, and how he was called simply "Yellow Bear" in the files of the first game. Or possibly that none of the characters knew the name of the animatronic.
* There are several differences between William Afton in the film and William Afton in the video games such as:
	+ In the games, Mike Schmidt is an alias used by William's son Michael Afton. In the movie, they're unrelated in any way, and instead it's Vanessa who's Afton's child under a false identity.
		- On that note, William has three children in the games: Michael, Elizabeth and The Crying Child. In the film, Vanessa is his only child as far as we know.
			* Seeing as he is Vanessa's abusive, manipulative father, this version of William seems to be a fusion between himself and Bill A..
	+ In the games, William appears to speak in a Southeastern English accent. In the film, he speaks with an American accent. Also Afton’s manner of speaking in the games and novels is more calm, methodical and poetic akin to Hannibal Lecter but in the film he speaks in a psychotic, deranged and unhinged voice.
	+ William's car in the video games is purple, though in the film appears to be black.
	+ Him going by the Steve Raglan alias, whereas the game Afton never used any aliases. However, the novel Afton *did* use the Dave Miller name.
	+ This Afton is not the owner or founder of Freddy's as far as we know.
* In the movie, William's appearance bears a striking resemblance to his novel counterpart with the only difference that William sports a goatee and gold aviator glasses.
* The scene in which the Animatronics drag Afton's dying body, Is a recreation of the same scene from the first instalment of the novel series "The Silver Eyes".
* Despite it being stated otherwise, fans theorize that William *is* Mike's father as he is in the games, and that the filmmakers are hiding the connection in the case future films are made. It should be noted based on Mike's dream that William's kidnapping of Garrett was rather uncommon compared to the other killings, due to the picnic taking place in the middle of nowhere in the woods. This implies that William's kidnapping of Garrett was targeted for specific reasons. Not to mention that William recognized Mike based on his last name, despite the fact that it was never mentioned how William knew Mike's last name connected him to Garrett. Due to Scott Cawthon's unusual form of storytelling, fans believe that detail was intentional and will be brought up in future movies.
	+ Due to this, many fans theorize the idea that William and Mike's mother had divorced prior to the film's events and she remarried another man, making Garrett Mike's half-brother. This would lead to William kidnapping Garrett and killing him as revenge for Mike's mom leaving him, and trying to murder Mike and Abby to finish off the bloodline.
	+ However, fans also theorize that Mike's father, as shown in his dream, could actually be the film's version of Henry, due to the resemblance between the father and the technician working on the animatronics in the video tape, meaning that Mike's character is the film version of Sammy Emily, Henry's son. This led to the idea that Garrett is the film's stand-in for Charlotte, and William kidnapped him to take revenge on Henry for leaving his company or other unknown reasons. The fact that Mike's father is implied to have committed suicide, similar to Henry doing so in the novels, furthers this.
		- This would explain why William drew out his attempted murder of Mike rather than killing him on the spot, possibly wanting to spite him for being Henry's kid.

## Navigation

Template:Five Nights at Freddy's Villains
pl:William Afton (Pięć koszmarnych nocy)