Spoiler (media)
A spoiler is a summary or description of a narrative (or part of a narrative) that relates plot elements not revealed early in the narrative itself. Moreover, because enjoyment of a narrative sometimes depends upon the dramatic tension and suspense which undergird it, this early revelation of plot elements can "spoil" the enjoyment that some consumers of the narrative would otherwise have experienced.
In recent years, spoilers have mostly appeared on specialist Internet sites and in newsgroup postings. Usually the spoiling information is preceded by a warning, or the spoiler has to be highlighted before it can be visibly read on the Web page. But in recent years these warnings have been omitted, and some unwitting readers have had films, books, and other works they were looking forward to experiencing spoiled.
People who "spoil" may argue that:
- people don't need to read the spoilers that they reveal (even though most of them are obviously accidental)
- a reasonable amount of time has elapsed since the first emergence of the work for those truly interested to have completed it (e.g. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which was released almost a year ago as of this writing)
- the work is so old, important, or omnipresent that it can be expected that a majority of people have already been exposed to it (e.g. Citizen Kane, a movie that was released decades ago with a twist ending that has since become embedded in pop culture)
- if a work is no longer enjoyable because it has been spoiled, then it is not a "good" work
Some may reveal spoilers just for the malicious pleasure of ruining a narrative experience for others. People who consciously look for spoilers of their favourite series or franchise are sometimes called "spoiler-sluts," a term which, surprisingly enough, is not derogatory.
On Usenet the common method for obscuring spoiler information is to precede it with many blank lines known as "spoiler space", traditionally enough to push the information on to the next screen of a 25-line terminal. A simple encipherment using ROT13 is also used in newsgroups to obscure spoilers, but is rarely used for this purpose elsewhere. However, it is widely accepted that spoilers can be freely posted after 2-4 months.
Examples of spoilers
In general
In most detective movies and novels (and "Whodunits"), telling the identity of the culprit before the climax is a spoiler.
In movies and film
Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
Darth Vader's "secret" revealed to Luke in The Empire Strikes Back is one of the most famous movie plot twists of all time. An IMDb poll on 10 November 2003[1] asked users to choose which one of a set of movie spoilers was too infamous to be considered a spoiler anymore; Vader's true identity was a clear winner, by a forty-percent margin.
The film's creators went to great lengths to keep this scene under wraps. Every script had a false page, with the line "no, Obi-Wan killed your father", and so even the actors and others were completely unaware. Mark Hamill (Luke) was told at the last minute by director Irvin Kershner before shooting of the scene.
After the three prequels have come out (clearly showing the origins and identity of Vader), this secret has been nullified.
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
A classic spoiler example occurred in 1999. Someone calling himself Mr. Spoilsport posted a message to the newsgroup alt.fan.starwars and spoiled the long awaited Star Wars film, The Phantom Menace. The post caused some subscribers to the Star Wars newsgroup to read the spoiler without having to open the article, since the spoiler was put in the subject field of the message.
This angered many alt.fan.starwars subscribers, since although they were fans of Star Wars, many had been waiting 20 years for the prequel, and running up to premiere of the film, they had been making a conscious effort not to read any spoilers. Although the original posts by Mr. Spoilsport have been deleted and wiped from the Internet by angry alt.fan.starwars moderators, many of the replies are still available online. [2].
Million Dollar Baby
In 2005 the spoiler controversy hit mainstream media when Million Dollar Baby was nominated for the Academy Award's Best Picture. In discussing the film, which was released in late 2004, newspapers, magazines, and television news routinely revealed that Hilary Swank's character becomes fully paralyzed and later dies when Clint Eastwood's character takes her off life support.
The Usual Suspects
The Usual Suspects is infamous for often being subjected to spoilers (mostly on the Internet), especially by telling the secret identity of "Keyser Söze".
The Crying Game
That the leading female character of The Crying Game is actually a cross-dressing man has often been cited in depictions of transvestism in media.
- In the movie Shallow Hal, Hal discusses with a friend how he is going to cope with Rosemary when he has discovered she is obese after being broken from his hypnotic state. They then cite the transvestite of The Crying Game as an example of a deceived love still ending happily.
A movie about a man who helps a child who can see the spirits of the dead, only to reveal at the end that the man was one of those spirits all along. Notably, in the movie 50 First Dates, the twist ending is used as a joke. Drew Barrymore's character loses her memory every day, which means that although each time she sees The Sixth Sense is like the first time, her father and brother have practically memorized the movie, leading them to be less than excited when she exclaims, after viewing the movie, "I can't believe Bruce Willis was a ghost!" In addition, one of the final music pieces of the soundtrack for the movie is named "Malcolm's Dead", giving away the revelation that Bruce Willis' character has been dead all along.
A film often called the "best movie ever made" with a suspenseful plot, the identity of "Rosebud" (which is a sled and not a person) has been a long-time favourite of spoiling.
- In a Peanuts strip, Linus is watching the movie on TV, telling Lucy he's never seen it before. Lucy says she has seen it several times, then tells him that "Rosebud" is Kane's childhood sled. He sits there for a panel, staring at the TV, and then emits the time-honored Peanuts anguished cry: "AUGH!"
- The Tiny Toons made a spoof of Citizen Kane, though they did not disguise the secret of Rosebud. It infuriated many viewers.
- In an episode of Family Guy, Peter is revealed to have been banned from the video rental store after he taped over their movies. A flashback shows the opening scene of Citizen Kane, and then Peter's face comes on the screen to tell the viewer that, "it's his sled from when he was a kid."
- In the Wallace and Gromit short, A Grand Day Out, Wallace has a sled in his basement, labeled Rosebud.
- In an episode of The Real Ghostbusters, the team spends most of the episode trying to discover that this episode's particular ghost simply misses his old sled, Rosebud. This is interesting in terms of spoiler culture because with this, children are being spoiled on the plot of Citizen Kane before they even know that there is a movie called Citizen Kane.
- In the first issue of Green Arrow, by Kevin Smith, Batman mentions sledding down a hill when he was a child. Superman jokes, "Was the sled named Rosebud?"
- In an episode of The Simpsons, Mr. Burns wants his teddy bear named Bobo. The episode is a direct spoof of Citizen Kane.
- In an episode of Veronica Mars (I Am God), Veronica says, "And Rosebud was just a sled."
Planet of the Apes (1968 version)
Planet of the Apes' final scene of the broken Statue of Liberty lying on a beach on the ape planet, therefore showing it is planet Earth, has been endlessly spoofed and referred to. On some video and DVD editions, the box cover even shows this same image, which could be considered as spoiling by the very editors.
Fight Club
In Fight Club, the fact that Tyler Durden and the narrator are one and the same is hinted here and there in the novel and film but only revealed at the end, thus making it foreshadowing and not a spoiler.
Soylent Green
The sentence "Soylent Green is people!" has become a classic and has been ranked in the top movie quotes in the century.
Psycho
The secret identity and name of the killer in Psycho has become a classic in every sense of the word.
In video games
The information that Sephiroth kills Aeris is a popular spoiler, especially among online gaming communities such as GameFAQs and IGN. It is so widespread that even people who have never played the Final Fantasy series have heard of the spoiler.
Monkey Island series
At the end of The Curse of Monkey Island adventure game, Guybrush Threepwood asks LeChuck what is the secret of Monkey Island, and he tries to guess by suggesting the "secrets" of classic movies (although they are unnamed): Citizen Kane, Soylent Green, The Crying Game, Old Yeller and Chinatown.
On television
In 2004, Ken Jennings was amassing record winnings on the TV game show Jeopardy! Immediately after the show where he lost was taped, several media reports and Internet newsgroups posted information about Jennings' loss (the information presumably supplied by audience members who attended the taping). Production officials with Jeopardy! and Jennings himself repeatedly refused to divulge or verify information and rumors surrounding the loss until the actual show aired, but viewers had already been tipped.
WCW Disney Tapings
In 1993, the professional wrestling promotion World Championship Wrestling began taping in-ring footage for their syndicated television programs at the Disney/MGM Studios in Orlando, Florida. At the tapings, various wrestlers frequently wore championship belts that they would not win in the WCW storylines until months later. While WCW tried to keep actual wrestling fans out of the audience, some managed to sneak in, and promptly reported the results to insider sheets and then-obscure Internet groups such as rec.sport.pro-wrestling. The tapings laid out WCW's booking plans months in advance; one poster to rec.sport.pro-wrestling remarked that "they've taken exposing the business to a whole new level."[3] This episode is an example of an entertainment organization spoiling itself—a phenomenon not uncommon in professional wrestling, but extremely rare anywhere else.
The plot detail "Snape kills Dumbledore," along with a list of chapter titles, were leaked on the Usenet group alt.fan.harrypotter, as early as July 14, 2005—one day before the official release date. A number of direct scans from the book were also leaked, with the spoiler highlighted to attract viewers' attention. This leakage enabled a number of troublemakers to run around midnight release parties shouting the spoiler. It has since grown to become one of the most popular and widespread ever. Offensive t-shirt maker tshirt hell even printed it on a t-shirt.
See also
External links
- http://www.theplotspoiler.com
- Amuse Yourself!'s collection of movie spoilers
- http://www.spoilsport.info
- Moviecheat
- Moviepooper
- Ruined Endings
- Movie stories scene-by-scene - The Movie Spoiler
- StarWars Spoiler a collection of spoiler content on Star Wars
- What now-infamous spoiler shouldn´t be considered a spoiler anymore? (2003 Internet Movie Database poll)