That title threw me for a loop. Man.

1. For movies? I think two years is, for most movies, fair. For instance, saying that Old Spock shows up in the new Star Trek isn't really a spoiler anymore, because A) If you were ever going to see that movie, you probably already have and B) if you haven't yet, Old Spock being in it probably won't be as big a deal to you. Of course, there's a line. If it's The Sixth Sense, and someone doesn't know the ending, telling them isn't okay.

1A. Because TV shows are harder to access than movies, I think rules should be a little stricter. You can see Django Unchained ten times today if you want, but Game of Thrones doesn't air too often, and if you don't have HBO, you're basically fucked for a year until the DVDs come out.

2. I think so. A twist works much better if you aren't expecting it. If you're anticipating a twist, it's not going to be as effective, and you might even be able to predict it in the moment.

3. I usually don't go any further than what the trailer gives away. I think that's fair. After all, if the studio is comfortable giving that stuff away, it should be fair game.

4. Not that I can think of. I've told people that there's a cool twist ending. I may have described one kick-ass scene or great line, but that's probably the extent of it.

5. ALMOST spoiled the season 4 finale of Breaking Bad for someone when we were about to watch Dark Knight Rises.

6. This is embarrassing, but true. Just hours after I bought the sixth Harry Potter book, I dropped it on the ground, and in picking it up my eye happened to fall on a sentence talking about a certain character's funeral. That was not my finest hour.

Actually, here's an interesting point. Sometimes I intentionally spoil myself. I really hate seeing horror movies in theaters, because I hate jump scares. So sometimes I'll read the Wikipedia synopsis ahead of time so that I can anticipate what's coming better. If I know what's coming in the story, the scares become fun, instead of just terrifying.

Last edited by Doctor Submarine (2013-01-18 23:16:55)

This. I heard (Teague edit: title of a movie we've done here at DIF)

1.A year or two. Give the film time to have been seen on dvd/blu but in forums, it is always safe to have a spoiler warning just to be safe.
1a. From what I can gather, I haven't seen This Is 40, the 'spoiler' they give is wrong anyway. *whistles*  I agree with Doc about TV spoilers, it is a lot harder to tell when it is ok to give them. I hear on other podcasts people giving spoiler warnings to, say The Wire, which has ended but not many people have seen it and  can still find it on repeats or on dvd.

2. Yup but I think it's safe to say we've all done it even if by accident.

3. If I know the person and what they like, I'll drop hints as to

4. Don't think so.....

5. Yup. Nothing major and my shitty memory is refusing to help me remember exactly what but I'm sure I have.

6. I read the end of The Sixth Sense by reading the back of the soundtrack a mere hour before going to see it at the cinema.

I like the poll format. Imma follow it.

1. That would depend on the spoiler itself. If it's about a major character dying in a TV show, it's awful - but it won't ruin the whole show for you, as the show probably isn't about that character only. Now, it still is a spoiler and it should avoid being told for a certain amount of time, but if the whole movie is based on it, I'd say this amount of time has to be far greater.

To be honest, I hate spoilers so much I don't even consider such a thing as public domain for them. A warning is fair when talking about a movie, and I don't see any reason why anyone would go like "Oh what the hell, it's an extraordinary movie but it's twenty years old, you can't possibly care, can you?".

2. Most definitely. When people tell me "There's a huge twist at the end but hey, I'm not telling you anything", it feels like a spoiler to me. As Doc Submarine said, if you're expecting it, it won't work as well as it should.

3. Not further than the official pitch would. Setting up what the movie talks about is enough, and if the person wants to know more, hell, let them watch it.

4. I never would. If anything, it would cause the opposite effect to me.

5. I think it happened once, but it was so long ago I can't quite remember it. Hating getting spoiled makes you wary about it.

6. Back when I still watched Dexter, someone spoiled the season 4 ending for me right after I started it. I was NOT happy, especially since it was, and still is its most thrilling season to me.

But I have a weapon now. Tons of people around me watch Game of Thrones. But I'm probably the only one who has read all the books. They'd better be careful.

Talking about The Sixth Sense. I still haven't seen it, but I already know what its great Shyamalanian twist is. It's old stuff now, it's become a joke - even Cox says it in Scrubs. But the fact that I already know it is probably a good reason why I still havent watched it. It certainly does lower the excitement.

...I'm quite the spoiler freak, ain't it.

EDIT : Dave, you bloody aussie bastard.

Last edited by Saniss (2013-01-19 00:02:39)

As I recall, the soundtrack to Episode One was released slightly ahead of the actual movie - or there were announcements about the soundtrack beforehand, something like that - in which it was revealed that one of the tracks was titled "Qui-Gon's Funeral" or something similar.    So, oops.

I know. It's a bad habit, and one I'm trying to put an end to.

Soundtrack listings giving spoilers bugs the everloving shit out of me. It's not that hard. Look at the Skyfall soundtrack, or Dredd, for example. The titles are vague enough as to not give away plot details, but if you've seen the movie, you know what scene they're referring to. But when a track is literally called "______'s End," there's a problem.

Last edited by Doctor Submarine (2013-01-19 00:35:50)

I'd just returned from buying my copy at the 12am early opening at the local store, popped onto a Harry Pottery forum to post a "hey guy, just got the book, will be avoiding this place until I'm done read" message, first thing I saw when opening up the forum was about 64 messages with "Dumbledore Dies" as the message header. A little bit of magic died that day . Spoilt the whole book (about 800 pages worth), and spoilt the rest of the series. 

1. How long until the spoiler moves into spoiler-public-domain...?

It's never acceptable to spoil any good movie twist for anyone who hasn't seen it. TV shows with a big twist are the same, especially now that everything is coming available for streaming.

2. Is saying "there's a huge twist at the end" a spoiler?

Also not cool unless you're trying to get the person to watch the movie, and you don't make such a big deal about it ("Great stunt work, some really funny lines. It has a clever twist, even. Really good movie."). It can ruin the movie if the person is scouring the story for clues.

3. In discussion of a movie with spoilers, with someone who has not seen it, how far do you let yourself go when giving them the pitch?

Tell them the setup (what happens in the first act) and mention a couple of non-spoiler-y highlights ONLY. Generally, tell a little less than trailers do these days. I swear, the trailer for Rise of the Planet of the Apes told the WHOLE ENTIRE STORY, pretty much IN ORDER.

If I were trying to get you to watch $ (Dollars), I would say it's a cool '70s heist movie where Warren Beatty and Goldie Hawn are trying to rob the safe deposit boxes of these three bad guys who use the same bank because criminals can't complain to the cops. It's Germany in the winter, so it's pretty bleak but it's got a dark sense of humor, and there's some boobs and some really clever heist stuff. You get almost all that in the first 20 minutes, which is the hook part of a movie anyway. The most you should say about the ending is that it's got a nice, slick ending or whatever, to assure the person that the ending doesn't fall apart, which sometimes happens with otherwise great movies (The Prestige).

4. Have you ever had to spoil something just to get someone to watch it?

That would defeat the purpose. I HAVE spoiled movies that I think are crap and the person SHOULDN'T see them.

5. Have you ever accidentally spoiled something?

If you talk about movies a lot, like I do, you're bound to mistakenly assume your audience has seen something they haven't. However, I mostly stay away from REAL plot-twist-type spoilers anyway, because why would ever bring up the end of The Usual Suspects outside of an in-depth conversation with someone you know has seen it? I'm convinced that people who spoil movies mostly do it maliciously so they can feel superior to people who haven't seen the movie. It's like when people say "YOU haven't seen Rochelle, Rochelle?!" It's like, fuck you, no one has seen every fucking movie you have. Have YOU seen Firestorm? Harrison Ford jumps out of a plane and shoots back up at it while he's falling. Helicopter falls on a car. Hell of a picture.

6. When were you worst-spoiled?

As I was walking into South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut, a couple was walking out of The Sixth Sense and said the exact thing you shouldn't say. I actually still enjoyed The Sixth Sense later anyway, because the film is so brilliantly constructed that I mostly convinced myself that they must have meant something else.

Also, several times, I've looked up a movie on IMDb to decide if I should watch it, and some jackass has posted something on the message board with a spoiler in the title. If you complain, some other jackass will invariably claim that you shouldn't be reading the message board of a movie you've never seen (as if the subject lines don't appear right there on the front page of the movie's entry).

Last edited by Zarban (2013-01-20 15:04:52)

Spoiling Citizen Kane is especially weird because not only is it supposed to be one of the greatest movies of all time (I don't love it) but it's also not a movie for young people. You have to be a mature adult to appreciate the themes of loss of youth and squandering of opportunities. Couple that with the fact that it's 70+ years old, and you have to assume that no one under 30 has seen it.

Last edited by Zarban (2013-01-19 01:55:48)

I know plenty of films that I've never seen thanks to The Simpsons.

Er, that movie is maybe a bit of a special case... the so-called twist is really just the premise and except for a detail or two it's all been revealed by the end of the first act.   The rest of the movie is that setup being played out.  There are surprises, which any good plot should have, but really nothing else happens that would classify as a plot twist.

1. As a rule of thumb, I generally don't spoil. Whatever it is. When people haven't watched Fight Club, I don't instantly go "Well, then it's ok, because it's an old film now", instead, I think they might not even have heard of it. So, I just encourage them to go see it. Trying to explain Cabin in the Woods is hard, so I just tell them it's the best scary movie ever, because it isn't a traditional one. And they should just trust my judgement and go see it.
1A. Same rule applies. Although Norwegian TV stations spoil them all the time. Guessing that you've already seen last week's episode, and then do flashbacks from it while previewing this week's episode. I hate it. Instead, just watch it. If the spoiler is actually a spoiler, I won't spoil.

2. Yes. They'll be expecting a twist. But also no; because if you don't inform what the twist concerns, it could be irrelevant whether or not it's a spoiler.

3. I tell them the general plot/story without giving away too much details, leaving them wanting to see the film. I did that recently with Looper. "It's a film about time travel. There are these assassins called Loopers, whose victims come from the future. The twist there, is that their final contract is themselves, 30 years from then." That actually worked well enough.

4. Depends. I had to explain how Time Lords can regenerate. It's a spoiler because if you didn't know, you'd think Tennant's Doctor dies in the season 4 finale, and the show would end there. But if you know how it works, it's not a spoiler per se, so it's ok.

5. "what? Rose is okay, what are you talking about? She got her Doct- Oh, snap, you're only at series 3. NEVERMINDMOVEALONGNOTHINGTOSEEHERE!"

6. Never, as far as I know. I stay away from info about something I haven't watched. Like the plague. And if I don't, I just don't care. Example: I knew how TDKR ended before watching it, but I wasn't that interested in watching it to begin with, so I didn't care.