Timeline
This is a timeline of events that have occurred in Friday Night Funkin'. The game itself is set on the Fridays of various weeks in unspecified years in the 2000s. The order of events has been subtly confirmed by PhantomArcade.[1] The lore behind the weeks is subject to change.
Pre-Tutorial
The rockstar Daddy Dearest meets Mommy Mearest, a popstar, possibly through the music business.[2]
According to a Tweet[3] and a piece of art[4] by PhantomArcade, 14 years prior to the events of the game, Daddy Dearest seals away a person inside Girlfriend's favorite dating sim video game. That person would come to be known as Spirit. Who he was or what his relation to Daddy Dearest was remains unknown. Many other people who have crossed Daddy Dearest are suggested to have suffered similar fates.
Daddy Dearest retires from being a rockstar.
Boyfriend and Pico are shown to be a couple in Pico's School: Love Conquers All, but they break up sometime after the events of Pico's School. Years later, Boyfriend drops out of college[5] to pursue a rap career and later meets and falls in love with Girlfriend through fingerboard tricks.[6]
Tutorial: Teaching Time & Week 1: Daddy Dearest
Boyfriend has started dating Girlfriend, and the two are about to have sex. Daddy Dearest, Girlfriend's father, stops the couple before they can get freaky, as he does not welcome his daughter's new partner. After some warm-up training with Girlfriend, Boyfriend has a sing-off with Daddy Dearest to decide whether or not he is worthy to date his love. Boyfriend emerges victorious, but it is made clear that Daddy Dearest will be keeping a close eye on them.
Week 3: Pico
After being humiliated by losing, Daddy Dearest is unable to come to terms with the defeat and thus hires a trio of contract killers, Pico, Darnell and Nene, to kill Boyfriend. Only Pico is sent for this mission, having been given a location for the target, which happens to be on the rooftop of the Newgrounds office building, but not the identity. Once Pico arrives at the specified destination, he realizes the target is Boyfriend, his ex-boyfriend. Out of nostalgia and old habits,[7] Pico decides to challenge him to a rap battle instead of killing him. Darnell and Nene are not happy about their friend's failure to complete the task.
Week 4: Mommy Must Murder
Boyfriend has a rather dangerous sing-off with Girlfriend's popstar mother, Mommy Mearest, on top of moving limousines surrounded by Henchmen that act as backup dancers. Boyfriend wins, and with this victory, he is finally "accepted" into the family, but only so that the parents can keep their enemy close.
Week 2: Spooky Month
On Halloween night, Boyfriend is invited over to Girlfriend's family home to give out candy to trick-or-treaters. Skid and Pump pass by when Monster tricks them into retrieving Girlfriend for him. The spooky kids, wanting to play,[7] agree to the plan. When the two arrive at the house, they challenge Boyfriend to a sing-off for Girlfriend as their "treat" if they win. Boyfriend wins the battle, but after the kids leave, Monster steps up to the challenge himself, threatening their lives in a gruesome song. However, he ultimately loses as well, and the couple lives.
The comic Smile Good, Boyfriend! seems to take place sometime after Week 2, as Boyfriend has been accepted by the parents and allowed into their home by this point, but it does not seem to be wintertime yet, so it is presumably before Week 5.[8]
Week 5: Red Snow
Boyfriend and Girlfriend take a nighttime trip to the mall around Christmas time to meet Mall Santa, but both Daddy Dearest and Mommy Mearest take the mall Santa hostage to have another sing-off with Boyfriend in front of a large crowd. However, Monster later crashes the sing-off and uses his demonic abilities to twist everyone's perception, causing the mall to look abandoned (except for Boyfriend and Girlfriend) and making the once bright location suddenly dark and gory. He challenges Boyfriend once more but is beat once again, leaving the two with their lives.
Week 6: Hating Simulator ft. moawling
Boyfriend and Girlfriend are playing video games in her room when she pulls out an old dating sim that she used to play all the time. While they are playing it, Daddy Dearest, being the vindictive man he is, sneaks up and pushes them both into the game. Inside the game, Boyfriend is quickly challenged to a duet with Senpai, a love interest in the game, in front of the school and several avid fangirl students. As Senpai loses to Boyfriend, he breaks down due to not being able to win over Girlfriend, having only ever been programmed to win and be loved.
With Senpai in his most vulnerable state, he is brutally killed when Spirit awakens. He reveals himself to be one of Girlfriend's father's many victims who has been trapped inside the game for a long time. He challenges Boyfriend to a sing-off, hoping to steal both his and Girlfriend's bodies for himself to escape the game and take revenge should he win. Boyfriend, however, ends up winning, and he and Girlfriend are able to escape the game, leaving Spirit inside alone once more.
Week 7: Tankman ft. JohnnyUtah
At some point, Daddy Dearest hires Pico, Darnell and Nene once again, this time to confirm Boyfriend's death. During the events of a week taking place before Week 7, Daddy Dearest and Mommy Mearest send Boyfriend and Girlfriend on a "vacation," when in reality, it was a plot to have Boyfriend killed. Pico, Darnell and Nene are sent to the "vacation spot" in secret, tasked with confirming that Boyfriend is dead and killing him if he is not. Boyfriend and Girlfriend are both secretly equipped with trackers that detect their life signatures as well, though her parents already knew Girlfriend would be fine. Suddenly, they fall off the plane they were on and end up in a desert.[9] Regaining consciousness, the couple finds themselves in the company of Tankman and his army, who hold them both captive. Meanwhile, Pico, Nene and Darnell take a van to the Restricted Military Zone, as Boyfriend's falling out of the plane made it uncertain that they could finish their jobs.[10] The van breaks down in the middle of the desert, and friction starts to build between Pico and Nene.[11] Once they arrive at their destination, Nene and Darnell are ecstatic to discover that Boyfriend has survived, as they can finish the job that was meant to be theirs.[10]
Since their day has been going so slowly and to alleviate their boredom, Tankman decides to challenge Boyfriend to a sing-off instead of killing them on the spot. After being humiliated in battle twice, Tankman orders his men to open fire on Girlfriend. Just as she is about to unleash her demonic powers, however, Pico arrives on the battlefield in the nick of time to shoot down Tankman's army. Rather than sit idly and confirm Boyfriend's corpse like he was supposed to, Pico comes to his rescue and spares him. Boyfriend, now with Girlfriend at his side and Pico assisting him by single-handedly fending off the Tankmen, is challenged by Tankman one final time. He is ultimately defeated, and the trio survives.
Unfortunately for Pico, he's in deep trouble with Daddy Dearest and Mommy Mearest now for failing them twice.
WeekEnd 1: Due Debts
Pico is walking through Philadelphia, calmly eating a burger with a soda. However, he soon notices that Nene is looking for him. Terrified, Pico hides behind a building. He is perfectly aware of why Darnell and Nene want to "deprive him of his bullets," as his failure to follow orders left the three without any pay. Pico uses his hand to check his gun's reflection and see if Nene is still nearby. Unfortunately for him, Nene notices him. She begins to chase after him, attacking him with knives as they run through the alleyway. Pico, with his high IQ, manages to slow down Nene. While running away, he is hit by A-Bot. As he composes himself, he notices Darnell, who is spray painting. A rap battle between Pico and Darnell ensues, after which the two throw away their weapons and start a bare-knuckle fight. After the fight, Pico and Darnell reconcile with each other (Pico and Nene supposedly do so too, but it doesn't seem as noticeable as in Darnell's case), while Nene is still angry about the failure to assassinate Boyfriend.
Upcoming
Daddy Dearest and Nene are set to return in the future, with Hank J. Wimbleton, Ritz The Rat and Cassandra possibly appearing as future opponents. The unused stalkers are also set to appear in Friday Night Funkin' in the future,[12] but their original designs have been scrapped.[13]
Additionally, a future level will be about what happened after the end of Week 4,[14] and another upcoming week is confirmed to take place before Week 7 and is set on a plane.[9]
