A Minor Rant

Morrus

Well, that was fun
Staff member
I once read on a forum a comment about Rome season 1 ending with Caesar being assassinated by his nephew Brutus, and someone asking for a spoiler warning, stating that not everyone has seen the series in full at this point. I couldn't determine if the poster was serious or not, but I fear he was.
I kinda get it -- not as to whether he gets assassinated, but whether the show is about his life, or if he's just in the first season. The spoiler isn't so much about Caesar as it is about when in the show it happens, and the consequential nature of the show. You get a very different show if it happens in the first episode, the end of the first season, or after 10 seasons (if there were 10 seasons).

But yeah, I'm stretching there!
 

log in or register to remove this ad


Staffan

Legend
Also, the play itself spoils its own ending in the opening number. It's one of those things where the tension is more about seeing how the foretold ending comes to pass.
Yeah, some stories are all about the journey. They come out stating "This is the story about how X happened", and the enjoyment is in seeing the pieces come together. For those, saying "X happened" isn't really a spoiler, but you can still have surprises along the way that change the context of what happens.
In an early episode of Babylon 5, the Centauri ambassador Londo Mollari explains to another character that Centauri often have dreams about their moment of death, and that once he came to the station and met the Narn ambassador G'Kar, he recognized him as the person who would, at one point, strangle him to death. In a later episode, we see a glimpse of the future, when Londo has become emperor. But it turns out that he's been infested by a parasite that can control him, except for when he's just drunk enough to put the parasite to sleep but still retain enough sense himself, and in this glimpse of the future we see him do a heroic thing. But in order to keep the parasite from finding out and stopping it once it is again awake, he calls on his loyal friend G'Kar to kill him before it wakes.

So, "Londo will be killed by G'Kar" is not a spoiler. But "Londo will be killed by G'Kar because that's the only way for Londo to save his former allies from the parasite infesting him" is.

Other stories try to surprise you, by revealing something at some point that puts the rest of the story in a new perspective. The Sixth Sense is the classic here, where knowing the twist makes you see the rest of the movie in a new light. And of course there's regular old suspense, where you don't want to know what happens next until the story is good and ready to tell you about it.
 


Dannyalcatraz

Schmoderator
Staff member
Supporter
Behold, the movie TITANIC!

So …. The ship sinks.

#sorrynotsorry
I’m sure that M. Night Shaymalan could give us a version with a twist ending. Like…icebergs are sentient predators, and that one needed to feed.

Or there was a Siren involved…

Or the ship’s captain was a time traveling assassin sent to kill key passengers before ____________ could happen, and crashing the ship was the last chance he had.
 

billd91

Not your screen monkey (he/him)
I’m sure that M. Night Shaymalan could give us a version with a twist ending. Like…icebergs are sentient predators, and that one needed to feed.

Or there was a Siren involved…

Or the ship’s captain was a time traveling assassin sent to kill key passengers before ____________ could happen, and crashing the ship was the last chance he had.
Sweet Christmas! Please stop, you'll just give him more bad ideas!
 




Remove ads

Top