In another thread, some people were unhappy because a major plot point in the comic book series Watchmen was discussed. They feel it people shouldn’t have “spoiled” this plot point for those who haven’t read the series yet.
While I agree with the general concept of not spoiling major plot points, I also think it’s worth mentioning that this particular plot point was published in 1987. C’mon, how long are we supposed to keep it a secret? The endings of Psycho, Citizen Kane, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and The Odyssey were all surprise endings at one time, but I think we can assume that anyone who cares already knows how these works are going to end even if they haven’t seen or read them yet.
What’s a reasonable rule of thumb as to when you can just talk about a work, including its ending, without feeling the need to warn people?
In an open discussion (that is if you are talking to an open room and not a specific person who is saying, “Is this Crying Game thing any good? What happens in it?”), I give it about a year. I don’t think it’s reasonable for people to go around expecting everyone else in the world to censor themselves because they still haven’t seen Soylent Green. I say avoiding spoilers is their problem, not mine.
I also don’t think any grievous injury is suffered even if someone does get spoiled. So now you know that Ed Norton and Brad Pitt are the same person. Oh, well, you’ll get over it. There are millions of starving people in the world who don’t give a shit. It doesn’t even mean you can’t still enjoy the movie.
Even so, I’ll still be a little more careful about a major twist. I won’t spill the beans about Keyser Soze, but I might give an outline of the plot or talk about a given scene or line.
Some people are really obnoxious about it, though. They act all offended or outraged if you say the slightest thing. You mention that Clark Kent is Superman or that you saw this movie where Rambo plays a cop and they clap their hands over their ears, screeaming “Don’t TELLLLL me. I haven’t SEEEEN it yet.”
I think if people enter into a thread about a work that is not current, they should expect spoilers. If I click on a thread about Citizen Kane, I would expect people to discuss the identity of Rosebud. If it is a thread about a murder mystery currently out in theaters, I would hope people wouldn’t spoil it.
Obligatory Penny Arcade comic (warning: spoilers of a 70 year old movie called King Kong and an old story I’ve never heard of called the Passion of the Christ[sup]1[/sup]):
Personally I think some people get way too hung up on LALALALA I CAN’T HEAR YOU regarding spoiler stuff. I mean, I try to avoid them, but no big deal if it happens. Personally I think if a work requires the ending (or mid-story twist) not to be ruined it wasn’t well written anyway. It’s not what happens that matter, but exactly how things occur, how a character reacts and what they say that matters. However I feel I may be somewhat stranded in this school of thought.
[sup]1 Yes, I’m kidding on the never heard of part - for those of you with broken sarcasm meters.[/sup]
P.S. I was going to link a few relevant TV Tropes articles, but I started writing this post 3ish hours ago and got lost on that site reading over teh articles I was going to link, seriously, it’s worse than Wikipedia.
The real problem starts when multiple works are talked about in the same thread, as in the example in the OP. Frankly, considering that whole thread was spoilers, complaining unless it was a very recent event spoiled is kind of silly.
I think the specific Watchmen complaint was supposed to refer to this being done elsewhere too, though I can’t say I’ve noticed that particular plot point being more “spoiled” than another.
Good luck with this. We’ve been arguing about this since at least 2002, when people in this thread got all bent out of shape at me for “revealing” that Gandalf comes back in the second Lord of the Rings movie (you know, just like he did in the fifty year old book). To quote myself from that thread (and dear God, people, please don’t revive that zombie):
All those “spoilers” are for movies from the 1980s or earlier, and of course some are so vague that they could apply to almost anything. So, anyone think any of those are “spoilers”?
Aw, man! I had sucessfully avoided any Fight Club spoilers until just now… Oh, well, makes for a good example for this thread, I guess. Rats! My own fault for not seeing it earlier…
Heh-heh. There’s this one quote in that thread that strikes me as funny, in a non-spoiler way:
The funny thing is I don’t recall Gandalf ever casting any spells. Did he? There’s that time when he performed an exorcism or whatever on that king… that’s the closest I can come to Gandalf actually performing any “useful” magic.
I hope the writer wasn’t that upset when Gandalf lived and still didn’t do any “cool wizard” spell casting.
He does a bit of fire-casting. His healing of Theoden isn’t an exorcism (in the book), and whether it was magic at all is ambiguous. For Mithrandir, magic was generally contraindicated, as his role is primarily to guide the Second-Born into maturity so they won’t need Valar or Maiar. His job, in other words, is to put himself OUT of a job. If the Valar had wanted to deal with Sauron super-naturally, they could have just send Tulkas, Orome, Eonwe, and a brigade of Maiar to do it.
That’s why he got the job. His reluctance to put himself in a position of power was a bulwark against his becoming another Sauron. (That and the fact that he wasn’t nearly as powerful.)
To me, the whole Lord of the Rings thing is an excellent example of why there isn’t a statute of limitations on spoilers–it is a lot more jerkish to reveal important plot details about a story someone is presently interested in than it is to reveal important plot details about a story which doesn’t interest them. And when the first movie was released, suddenly a lot of people were reading or re-reading the trilogy, and so sensitivity was appropriate.
Today? I’d argue that less sensitivity is appropriate.
That said, people who get hysterical over spoilers annoy me. I read/watch/etc. for the journey, not the destination, and the reveal of a spoiler rarely would spoil my experience.
On a mostly unrelated note, I was once present for a discussion where the twist of Sixth Sense came up in conversation. The movie was old enough that one might assume anyone who wanted to see it had done so, but new enough that a couple of people involved in the discussion had not–namely me. Without hesitation I agreed that I had no plans to see the movie ever, and thus it would not be spoiling my experience to reveal the twist. Twist was revealed, and intrigued me more than a little. I’ve since seen the movie (albeit on tv, with commercial interruptions)–which I probably wouldn’t have done had I not known about the twist, although that really only proves that I’m weird.
I have to say, this seems a little like your personal bias showing. IMO, having seen those two movies virtually back to back, those two twists are of a similar type and magnitude, and dismissing one while protecting the other seems a little arbitrary.
I didn’t mean to imply that those two examples are not of the same quality. They are. Those were not intended to be connecting points. Plus I just figured that everyone knows the Fight Club ending by now, and if they don’t, well…they’ve had ten years to see it. There has to be a line somewhere.
My grandmother always tipped the pizza delivery guy $5 when she ordered (this was back in the 80s and 90s when $5 was still a pretty good tip.)
My grandpa was more frugal, and didn’t like tipping for delivery. His solution? When he ordered pizza, he went and picked it up.
The moral of the story? It’s your own responsibility to avoid the things you don’t like. The world is not obligated to insulate you from things you don’t want to hear/see/do, etc.
I happen to hate spoilers, which is why I take it upon myself not to read threads about books I haven’t read or movies I haven’t seen. To seek out a discussion about something you don’t want discussed is beyond absurd.
On reflection, is there anything specifically in Lord of the Rings that was sufficiently striking that it joined the vernacular? “Rosebud” being a sled is a metaphor for lost youth. “He loved Big Brother” is a metaphor for the individual destroyed by totalitarianism. I realize LOTR inspired or at least greatly advanced the whole pseudomedeival sorcery fantasy genre, but are there any specific spoilery images in it that could be instantly familiar to someone who’d never read it?
There’s a ring, and a long walk, and some wizards, and… something…
As Ferret Herder points out, you’ve misunderstood my complaint about the Watchmen spoiler just a little bit. OK, you missed my point by a lot. Good job.
What I was saying in that thread is that it amazes me that people who try to get other people to read Watchmen will often spoil the twist when talking about how great it is. On another message board, someone actually posted “You should read Watchmen. It’s great and the twist at the end where… etc, etc, etc… is awesome!”
