I am a big believer in the importance of going into a movie completely blind and seeing it the way the director intended. We only have the pleasure of watching a movie for the first time once. A single chance to walk into a movie with no prior knowledge, being able to uncover the big twist, experience the crazy needle drop, or watch a main character meet a tragic fate. Unfortunately, social media makes it extremely hard to avoid spoilers; it seems you can’t go on TikTok or Instagram without discovering the entire screenplay in the form of edits— it almost makes you want to go off social media completely.
We are also losing the art of the “spoiler alert”; not enough people are using it these days and giving others the opportunity to safely scroll away. When a popular movie is released, there’s almost nowhere you can turn; spoilers are everywhere: Instagram, TikTok, X, and even Pinterest.
If the movie is a book adaptation, completely forget about the idea of maintaining an unaware, blissful ignorance. Spoilers can be found anywhere; no corner is safe. The unfortunate truth is that it is unavoidable. The majority of the time, you will be forced to forget or delude yourself into thinking you didn’t see what you just saw.
This year alone, I have personally been a victim of the spoiler epidemic three times. [Spoiler Alert!] When the first episode of the new season of “House of the Dragon” came out, I heard about a character’s death within an hour of the episode’s release (I am omitting the name to avoid contributing to the epidemic).
Another instance in which a movie was spoiled for me was when I saw every fight scene from “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” through TikTok edits, which prevented me from experiencing the exhilaration of watching a Spider-Man fight scene for the first time in theaters.
Lastly, my most anticipated film of the year has to be “The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping”. While I read the original trilogy, I have not read the most recent books because I want to go into the movie not knowing anything except the basics; however, I did not get that pleasure. The movie hasn’t even come out yet, and I have unfortunately seen about a billion videos debunking and analyzing the book-to-screen adaptation, including Haymitch Abernathy’s games and the characters. I have tried to scroll away, but due to the lack of “spoiler alerts,” spoilers become inevitable.
Respect for the audience has been completely lost to the social media race for engagement. Influencers and general users all want to be the first person to show their reaction to the big twist or their analysis of the heartbreaking ending, all for likes and views.
I would love to have a movie experience without waiting for a scene that I know is coming. I want to be present in the moment and completely unaware of what’s about to happen next. So I pose the question: how do you avoid spoilers these days without living under a rock or being at the first screening of a movie?