Do spoilers bother you?

[Lwaxy]

Spoilers determine whether I watch something at all.

For example, I watched seasons 1-3 of Dexter without seeing any spoilers, because I binge watched it. The story already got whacky so I read up the spoilers of the other seasons and decided I don't need to waste my time with it any more. I don't need impossible plot twists, stupid relationship issues and dumbly excused character deaths.

So I'm really glad for spoilers. It stops me from wasting time on stuff others think is great but is definitely not for me.

 

[Jhaelen]

Well, just think about 'The Sixth Sense'. Watching that movie after having read a spoiler is a complete waste of time. Without the surprise factor it simply doesn't work. It's a movie you cannot watch twice. It's just an extreme example of a general principle, though: Enjoyment is definitely lessened if evrything has already been spoilt. There's reason it's called 'spoiling', after all!

Recently I had the strangest sense of deja vu when watching the latest season of Game of Thrones: Up until the penultimate episode I couldn't shake the feeling I had already seen everything before. The reason of course being that I had read the novels. While I like the show, I cannot really get excited about it because it's just rehashing something I've already read.

 

[Lwaxy]

The show is utterly confusing to me, so I stopped watching it - I had to read detailed descriptions of each episode to get what was happening in the sometimes fast changing scenes, at least in the second season. I have had several people tell me they would have gotten as confused had they not read the books.

 

[Zombie_Babies]

Well, just think about 'The Sixth Sense'. Watching that movie after having read a spoiler is a complete waste of time. Without the surprise factor it simply doesn't work. It's a movie you cannot watch twice. It's just an extreme example of a general principle, though: Enjoyment is definitely lessened if evrything has already been spoilt. There's reason it's called 'spoiling', after all!

Umm ... no. That's how you feel about it. Many, many, many others do not.

Recently I had the strangest sense of deja vu when watching the latest season of Game of Thrones: Up until the penultimate episode I couldn't shake the feeling I had already seen everything before. The reason of course being that I had read the novels. While I like the show, I cannot really get excited about it because it's just rehashing something I've already read.

Again, it's a personal thing. How many people watching that show do you think have read the books? A handful? I guarantee you that quite a few of the show's rabid followers read every single book before they watched the first show. In fact, GoT is one of the best examples of spoilers having no impact or even a positive one as people watch the show because they read the books.

EDIT: Not to mention the many folks who read the books after seeing the show. Srsly, this GoT stuff is like the posterboy for spoilers not mattering or having a positive effect.

 

[MarkB]

Again, it's a personal thing. How many people watching that show do you think have read the books? A handful? I guarantee you that quite a few of the show's rabid followers read every single book before they watched the first show. In fact, GoT is one of the best examples of spoilers having no impact or even a positive one as people watch the show because they read the books.

EDIT: Not to mention the many folks who read the books after seeing the show. Srsly, this GoT stuff is like the posterboy for spoilers not mattering or having a positive effect.

That's not spoilers, it's more like repeat viewing. The Sixth Sense example aside, it's perfectly possible for a show to have major, shocking revelations and yet stand up to repeated viewings ("No, Luke. I am your father.")

Seeing a great reveal for the first time and experiencing the full shock and thrill of the startling revelation is one kind of enjoyment. Seeing that same reveal on a second viewing and noticing the minor foreshadowings, empathising with the poor, innocent characters who have no idea what's coming is another. And that second experience is enhanced by the memory of how you felt when seeing it the first time around.

Personally, even having read the books, I'm very spoiler-shy when watching Game of Thrones, because I very much don't want advance notice of how scenes and characters from the novels have been translated for the series. I want to experience that for the first time as it appears on the screen within the episode.

 

[Zombie_Babies]

That's not spoilers, it's more like repeat viewing. The Sixth Sense example aside, it's perfectly possible for a show to have major, shocking revelations and yet stand up to repeated viewings ("No, Luke. I am your father.")

Seeing a great reveal for the first time and experiencing the full shock and thrill of the startling revelation is one kind of enjoyment. Seeing that same reveal on a second viewing and noticing the minor foreshadowings, empathising with the poor, innocent characters who have no idea what's coming is another. And that second experience is enhanced by the memory of how you felt when seeing it the first time around.

Personally, even having read the books, I'm very spoiler-shy when watching Game of Thrones, because I very much don't want advance notice of how scenes and characters from the novels have been translated for the series. I want to experience that for the first time as it appears on the screen within the episode.

Wut? If you know something happens, how and when, that something has been 'spoiled'. It's the same thing. You can rationalize however you see fit, of course, but that doesn't make it any less than exactly the same.

 

[MarkB]

Wut? If you know something happens, how and when, that something has been 'spoiled'. It's the same thing. You can rationalize however you see fit, of course, but that doesn't make it any less than exactly the same.

A spoiler is a revelation out of context, that robs the revelation of its dramatic impact. If I've already read the book, then I haven't experienced the revelation out of context - I've experienced it in precisely the context the author originally intended, with all the dramatic tension that was written into it.

That may make no difference to you, but it makes a huge difference to me.

 

[Dog Moon]

I don't like spoilers. I hate them, in fact.

I don't want to know what happens. Sometimes previews for the next week's television episode completely ruins the suspense of how it ended. Like OMG how are they going to get out of it? Oh, by the preview of next week it looks like this guy is back somehow and saved the day.

And then the next week the guy saves the people and all I can think is "Man, that would have been awesome if I hadn't seen it coming..."

So yeah, I hate spoilers. Enough that I refuse to watch previews of the next week's stuff because too often previews have spoilers.

But if it doesn't ruin a plot twist or whatever, then it's not a spoiler and it doesn't bother me.

 

[lehcym]

Spoilers can make me lose interest in a show. The problem is that I love watching whole seasons in a week end or two and it's hard sometime to dodge them as people put a spoiler tag for the last week show, not for the last year show.