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InfiniteZero posted:My mind was loving blown at the end of the movie when it was revealed that Dracula was actually a vampire. On the other hand, I knew going into Twin Peaks that Laura Palmer was killed by Agent Scully but I'm a cool cat so it didn't bother me at all. I didn't understand the ending of The Sixth Sense at all though: it was pretty clear that Alan Rickman's character died when he fell of the building so what was the twist? This post is a loving treasure.
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Jun 25, 2015 15:04
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CineD moves a lot faster than the other forums I read. The poll is split, which I expected. However, I like the reasoning people here are giving for both sides, rather than just calling each other idiots. It seems that some people feel suspense from not knowing what is going to happen. The other half, myself included, are more like Lt. Danger, who phrased it better than I could: Lt. Danger posted:Spoilers only spoil the most superficial parts of a thing. To be honest I've felt more suspense when I've been 'spoiled' on something because when I recognise the spoiled scene I'm all "it's happening" and poo poo. While I get that people either don't want to be spoiled or at least want the option, I still agree with this the most in regards to going on the forums: Jose Oquendo posted:People want to talk about stuff they've just watched. Stay off Twitter/Facebook for a day until you've watched it. ... especially with huge media events, like the Game of Thrones season finale.
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Jun 26, 2015 13:55
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Getting worked up about spoilers is why people spoil stuff. Having said that, there seems to be an increasingly popular mindset that the people who don't mind spoilers should be able to make that decision for others. My friend has just started watching The Wire and asked me not to spoil anything. You can wax lyrical about it all day but it'd be dickish of me to deliberately do so.
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Jun 26, 2015 19:42
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I agree with not spoiling something someone is going to watch or do(games). But if you can tell they don't want you to talk about it because they I will usually look for spoilers and read the plot of any movie I am on the wall about seeing. Why?, because I don't want to waste my time. Reading the plot takes 10 minutes, watching the movie takes 2 hours. Tenzarin fucked around with this message at 19:50 on Jun 26, 2015 |
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Jun 26, 2015 19:48
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:deliberately provoking other people because you think their harmless preferences are wrong is weird and douchey Ding ding ding. Nail on head.  etc.
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Jun 26, 2015 20:59
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I care about spoilers, so I retreat from the internet until I see/play the new thing for myself and can reemerge and join the discussion about it. If I really care about it, I'll do it as quickly as possible so I don't have to languish in my self-imposed exile for long. It's my responsibility to avoid spoilers since I'm the one who cares, imo.
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Jun 27, 2015 02:50
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With me Spoilers are a complex thing. If it is a trailer or a clip designed by the makers of the movie/show then I'm fine, like I enjoy watching the preview clips from Steven Universe before the episode itself airs, as it gives a taste of what to expect without giving context away. However there are some things I'd rather not know. If there is a particularly metaphorical thing coming out, IE Inside Out or Psychonauts I don't want to know what metaphors the media will use. I like to be surprised. For example I don't want to know if Joy has to save Anger from rapids in Riley's Stream of Consciousness (To completely invent an example, haven't seen the movie, not out here for another week). There are also Character moments that I don't want to be spoiled for, like in the Tomb Raider reboot enemy reactions to Lara's upgrades are hilarious, and her development to stone-cold badass is really satisfying if you don't see it coming. You spend the whole game with Lara as a weak terrified college student and then you get "OH MY GOD SHE'S GOT A GRENADE LAUNCHER!!!" "That's right you bastards, I'M COMING FOR YOU ALL!". THat is a great sequence that works best if you don't see it coming. Also there are certain lines of dialog that I appreciated more not expecting *After failing to explain the supernatural enemies to her friends* Look If it comes out of there and it isn't me, shoot it! With me it's all about the context of what's being spoiled.
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Jul 11, 2015 19:04
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Obviously nothing really great will be ruined by spoilers, but plenty of films are crafted around manipulation of audience expectation, and unless you're either an oracle who can predict every plot thread based on the opening credits, or an above it all student of film who at every moment is aware of the movie as a mere-play-of-lights-upon-a-screen, the surprise can be a significant part of the experience.
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Jul 11, 2015 20:14
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Most people are worse storytellers than the filmmakers who made the movie. I'd rather see the carefully constructed plot unfold the way the filmmakers intended.
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Jul 25, 2015 02:47
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People who care a lot about spoilers are losers - both those fretting about their immersion being ruined, and those actively putting effort into spoiling other people.
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Jul 25, 2015 11:51
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Most of the time I'd prefer not to be spoiled, but I get spoiled, and I really have no-one to blame but myself for reading a forum too much or actively trying to hang around the outskirts of a subject for some info and accidentally seeing something I'd rather not know. I laugh at people who complain about social media spoilers because yes, for most of us, they are completely avoidable if you care that much. If I get spoiled than whatever, I might be robbed of a particular experience but I can still enjoy the media regardless. People who turn into whiney babies about them feel like they just want to have their cake and eat it too However if you go out of your way to spoil other people for your own enjoyment, you're just a dick and just as bad as the whiney babies who demand the world conforms to their rules of spoilers. Not all spoilers are bad, even. Some have sold me on their media. Some have saved me from serious disappointment. I got BioShock Infinite spoiled for me two days after it came out by an over enthusiastic friend and while he was a jerk for just spouting the ending to me when I asked him not to it actually sold me on the game because I thought that weird surreal ending sounded pretty cool and I wanted to know how it ends up there. Then I played the game and it was a giant pile of poo poo with a bad twist for the sake of having a big twist, so actually gently caress my friend for selling me on that turd
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Jul 26, 2015 21:50
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I find that after watching movies for a while you just get smart enough to know how to avoid spoilers, know what is a spoiler ("Would knowing this ruin someone else's enjoyment" which is loving HARD to explain to a "I love science!" nerd with no empathy) and just be surprised with how it panned out if you were spoiled.
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Jul 27, 2015 06:50
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Just change 'being spoiled' to 'knowing things' in a given sentence. "Most of the time I'd prefer not to know things, but I get knowledge, and I really have no-one to blame but myself"
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Jul 27, 2015 07:11
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:Just change 'being spoiled' to 'knowing things' in a given sentence. To what end? It doesn't mean the same thing, but I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt if you had something less trivial in mind.
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Jul 27, 2015 14:26
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:To what end? It doesn't mean the same thing, but I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt if you had something less trivial in mind. Nah, don't worry, its trivial.
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Jul 27, 2015 14:37
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Basebf555 posted:Nah, don't worry, its trivial. I'm not interested in taking shortcuts around conversation because the forums think it's cool. I am pretty interested in the difference between knowing and experiencing, though.
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Jul 27, 2015 14:42
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:I'm not interested in taking shortcuts around conversation because the forums think it's cool. I am pretty interested in the difference between knowing and experiencing, though. Hey, its your free time, knock yourself out.
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Jul 27, 2015 14:43
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Justin Godscock posted:I find that after watching movies for a while you just get smart enough to know how to avoid spoilers, know what is a spoiler ("Would knowing this ruin someone else's enjoyment" which is loving HARD to explain to a "I love science!" nerd with no empathy) and just be surprised with how it panned out if you were spoiled. At the end of the day I'm pretty okay with keeping my mouth shut to keep from spoiling people who don't want to be spoiled, and if something gets spoiled for me I've never really gotten worked up about it.
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Jul 27, 2015 18:08
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The 'plot important' stuff talked about in hushed tones is usually the interesting parts of a work. Which is why spoiler-free show/movie discussion is usually so totally boring that it's never worth reading. Like, try describing anything without describing its most interesting properties. Does that work? I think being non-spoiled is for people who specifically enjoy stories as plot-boxes designed to surprise you in the most straightforward way possible, which isn't an approach I've ever seen to be productive or fulfilling. It is for people who want to 'turn their brains off', and think in very simple terms, about how surprising it was when Jimmy got killed suddenly, or how scary dying would be. Talking about spoilers also engenders a cultish, in-groupy mentality. It makes you feel like you have some unvarnished piece of truth, because you've seen all of a thing and know what happens, and not everyone does. Inevitably, the actual conversations the 'spoiled' have about the show are boring as poo poo, even more than the spoiler-free stuff. The work's artistic merit or the ideas it communicates are rendered totally vestigial to the act of knowing who dies in what episode, or whatever. People love to talk about the part in Game of Thrones where you see? You see how special it makes you feel to highlight the spoilered text and feel like you're in-the-know? It's almost visceral satisfaction. From selecting blacked-out text. The spoilers have you. For example we could describe a painting and what it communicates, but there's a certain enjoyment to be had in talking around it, trying to drum up interest in looking at it and what it might contain. It's like an ad-campaign. Suddenly, you're not really appreciating art or performing reading, but part of the experience of having seen an image. No literacy required.
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Jul 28, 2015 03:19
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Spoilers as a concept died for me last year when I watched The Sopranos with dozens of scenes, including the final scene, "spoiled" by YouTube. Not a single one ruined my enjoyment of the show. In a couple of cases, I even appreciated knowing what happened so I could pay more attention to how the scene played out.
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Jul 28, 2015 03:22
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Terrorist Fistbump posted:Spoilers as a concept died for me last year when I watched The Sopranos with dozens of scenes, including the final scene, "spoiled" by YouTube. Not a single one ruined my enjoyment of the show. In a couple of cases, I even appreciated knowing what happened so I could pay more attention to how the scene played out.
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Jul 28, 2015 03:33
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Hbomberguy posted:For example we could describe a painting and what it communicates, but there's a certain enjoyment to be had in talking around it, trying to drum up interest in looking at it and what it might contain. It's like an ad-campaign. Suddenly, you're not really appreciating art or performing reading, but part of the experience of having seen an image. No literacy required. This is similar to how SMG described video games. People don't derive enjoyment from playing them, they derive enjoyment from anticipating them. Anything that ruins that anticipation (eg, a bad review) ruins the game for them. In the same way, spoilers ruin the anticipation of the film, so people are disappointed with the final product.
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Jul 28, 2015 03:44
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You're seriously undervaluing the experiential / participatory side of fiction because, by your own admission, you don't get it. I'm sympathetic to a degree because it's not really my preferred mode either, but it's not a barrier to narrative literacy and it's not any more "cultish" than the set of shared assumptions you need to talk about stories in terms of ideology or technique. Like, at the most basic level, fiction works because it hooks into the way we think about actual people and events. Uncertainty about the future is how people experience most of the events in their life, and being able to invoke that uncertainty in fiction can make it more powerful. If you're comfortable enough with artifice (probably because you've thought about and been exposed to it so many times) to skip that step that's great, but at the same time, without that experiential, emotional component fiction wouldn't have any advantage over other forms of communication. Being told "pop culture is predatory and alien" would be just as good as watching They Live. "MY IMMERSION" is a joke not because immersion is wrong, but because you shouldn't be so weak- and narrow-minded as for it to be broken by the little things.
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Jul 28, 2015 04:14
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computer parts posted:This is similar to how SMG described video games. People don't derive enjoyment from playing them, they derive enjoyment from anticipating them. Anything that ruins that anticipation (eg, a bad review) ruins the game for them. Exactly, yes. 'Spoilers' are simply contextual information. No-one goes into any film as a blank slate, without preexisting knowledge. And, yet nobody worries about this 'everyday' knowledge that contextualizes (and thereby completely alters the experience of watching) a given film. The fear of 'spoilers' is actually the fear that someone has access to extreme pleasure - the 'unspoiled', 'uncorrupted' experience - and is stealing it from you. This Despoiler amasses jouissance in the same way that 'George Lucas' is accused of raping so many childhoods. In reality, 'George Lucas' does not exist. He's a fantasy figure - a total boogeyman invented to explain why things go wrong. Why don't you like Star Wars as much as when you were ten? It's obviously not because you're older and smarter. It's because the Lucas-boogeyman stole your innocence. The Despoiler is likewise a fantasy figure, who can be blamed for the theft of something that never existed. There is no such thing as an unspoiled film and, consequently, there is no such thing as a spoiler.
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Jul 28, 2015 04:57
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Tony Hawk Pro Skater 3 is pretty fun tho
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Jul 28, 2015 09:02
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:You're seriously undervaluing the experiential / participatory side of fiction because, by your own admission, you don't get it. I'm sympathetic to a degree because it's not really my preferred mode either, but it's not a barrier to narrative literacy and it's not any more "cultish" than the set of shared assumptions you need to talk about stories in terms of ideology or technique. You may wish to think critically about what you've written here, and how it proves my point. It's a rant about how I've failed to 'fully understand' the 'experience' of being uncertain about the future...as part of a group with others. If someone talks about the problems with Scientology do you tell them they're undervaluing the participatory side of religion? I said I don't get it because I don't see the point in it, and you haven't done anything to demonstrate what the point may be beyond vague fantasies of being 'immersed' in a made-up story and a group that feels like they're in on something. Which was exactly what I described. By the way, 'my immersion' is a joke because immersion shouldn't be the priority at all, since you cannot immerse yourself in a film or show. There is nothing beneath the screen. It's the same as the 'muh x' joke: The hypothetical person you're paraphrasing is complaining about something unimportant in the face of a larger issue. When people talk about immersion they're talking about how 'natural' or 'real' the story feels to them. Things that 'break immersion' are things that 'cannot', or 'should not', happen, as they see it. They are things the person's ideology views as 'unnatural', or don't make sense in their little mind-world. People like to feel 'immersed' not because they want to feel uncertainty in a story's path, but because they want a fictional world that behaves exactly as they expect it to because the show has a complementary ideology. Hence the 'immersiveness' of certain video games - people don't talk games in terms of how realistic they are but in terms of how much the world 'makes sense' to the player. Immersion is broken specifically when the rules change or have exceptions - even though it is still part of the game when skyrim characters bug out and stare at you or the NPCs ragdoll to death in the elevators in Chaos Theory, the illusion of a continuous world where you understand what is happening breaks down. So immersiveness is the specific fantasy of a box with transparent parameters - things can happen, and even be surprising, but only a certain way. The instant this box and the assumptions that make it up are challenged, then you can no longer be comfortable. In real life, since so many things are uncertain, no-one (sane) ever talks about how immersed they are in the real world. Because, frankly, we aren't.
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Jul 28, 2015 11:59
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Hbomberguy posted:You may wish to think critically about what you've written here, and how it proves my point. It's a rant about how I've failed to 'fully understand' the 'experience' of being uncertain about the future...as part of a group with others. If someone talks about the problems with Scientology do you tell them they're undervaluing the participatory side of religion? No, but if someone uses Scientology as an example of what's wrong with all religion, then I might be concerned with how facile that is... even though I'm an atheist. That's where I'm coming from. Hbomberguy posted:I said I don't get it because I don't see the point in it, and you haven't done anything to demonstrate what the point may be beyond vague fantasies of being 'immersed' in a made-up story and a group that feels like they're in on something. Which was exactly what I described. I never said anything about being "in on" something, in fact that's specifically what I was reacting against. It's not about being in on something, it's about how you and me and someone who cares more about spoilers are all looking for and enjoying the same thing, which is to say, a property of fiction which can't be reduced to just information. If it sounds like I agree with you or I'm proving your point, then it's probably because we both think that if something can't be reduced to just information, then it shouldn't be affected by "just information" i.e. spoilers. But the ability to separate those two is a by-product of literacy, possibly not even a guaranteed one, and certainly not a prerequisite. Hbomberguy posted:By the way, 'my immersion' is a joke because immersion shouldn't be the priority at all, since you cannot immerse yourself in a film or show. There is nothing beneath the screen. It's the same as the 'muh x' joke: The hypothetical person you're paraphrasing is complaining about something unimportant in the face of a larger issue. One moment you're saying immersion doesn't exist, the next you give it a definition of something which does exist. I'm not 100% sure about your definition, but you do see the problem here, right? The perfect integrity of the illusion isn't the important thing, and I agree that to think otherwise is to miss the point, but we enjoy fiction and give it cultural and personal significance because at some point, we embrace the illusion. Oblivion might not be significantly diminished because a character gets snagged on geometry, but even the notion that they're "characters" is part of the illusion. An Oblivion entirely populated by abstract geometric shapes while still obeying the same mechanical rules would mean something very different. It's not even possible to talk about a film or a book or a narrative game (coherently) without reference to things that don't actually exist, as if they do. Hbomberguy posted:In real life, since so many things are uncertain, no-one (sane) ever talks about how immersed they are in the real world. Because, frankly, we aren't. That's completely backwards. No one talks about it because we so obviously are -- not being "immersed" in the world would imply you're somehow aware that it's artifice, meaning either you're in a state of genuine religious epiphany, or you're a solipsist.
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Jul 28, 2015 14:36
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:In reality, 'George Lucas' does not exist. He's a fantasy figure - a total boogeyman invented to explain why things go wrong. So we've moved beyond denying authorial intent to literally denying the existence of authors? Feels like crossing some sort of Rubicon, but hey sure whatever I'm still onboard 
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Jul 28, 2015 14:59
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"George Lucas" is just the figurehead-name given to a certain part of the military-entertainment complex.
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Jul 28, 2015 15:08
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"Lucas" is a killing-word
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Jul 28, 2015 15:59
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People who think spoilers don't matter aren't psychologically healthy but as far as online discussion of fiction goes, maybe don't come to class if you're not caught up on the work?
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Jul 28, 2015 16:18
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The Time Dissolver posted:People who think spoilers don't matter aren't psychologically healthy but as far as online discussion of fiction goes, maybe don't come to class if you're not caught up on the work? Yea there's plenty of room for both sides to be wrong on this one. On the one hand deciding for others how they should experience entertainment is rude, but on the other hand 99% of the times I've had something spoiled for me its been my fault due to browsing internet forums and having no will power.
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Jul 28, 2015 16:26
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The Time Dissolver posted:People who think spoilers don't matter aren't psychologically healthy What?
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Jul 28, 2015 17:02
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:No, but if someone uses Scientology as an example of what's wrong with all religion, then I might be concerned with how facile that is... even though I'm an atheist. That's where I'm coming from. Immersion is impossible, but a sense of immersion is achieved and violated regardless. This really isn't hard. We are not immersed in reality.
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Jul 28, 2015 17:14
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Hbomberguy posted:Immersion is impossible, but a sense of immersion is achieved and violated regardless. It's an abstract, subjective experience. There's no difference between the sense of it and the thing itself. e: Immersion is "experiencing something as if it were real." It can be by degrees -- a necessity for fiction, because it would be really weird and dysfunctional if it were 100% or 0% -- and barring extreme mental states, we experience our life as if it were fully real. Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 17:32 on Jul 28, 2015 |
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Jul 28, 2015 17:16
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They portray not wanting a story spoiled as dumbing one's self down in search of cheap thrills (see posts in this thread such as "'I hate spoilers' means 'I hate knowing things'", "film is not some new elaborate jack-in-the-box"). They claim to have discerned the border between emotion and intellect and that is a delusion.
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Jul 28, 2015 17:43
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The Time Dissolver posted:They claim to have discerned the border between emotion and intellect and that is a delusion. Here I am writing pages about this poo poo and this guy does a better job in one sentence.
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Jul 28, 2015 17:44
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:e: Immersion is "experiencing something as if it were real." It can be by degrees -- a necessity for fiction, because it would be really weird and dysfunctional if it were 100% or 0% -- and barring extreme mental states, we experience our life as if it were fully real. The paradox of fiction is really interesting. It's completely irrational, but when that suspension of disbelief happens, it's amazing. Like, I don't want to get all Neil Gaiman about it ("Stories are magic! Storytellers are literal wizards!") but it really is the best loving high.
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Jul 28, 2015 17:45
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The Time Dissolver posted:They portray not wanting a story spoiled as dumbing one's self down in search of cheap thrills (see posts in this thread such as "'I hate spoilers' means 'I hate knowing things'", "film is not some new elaborate jack-in-the-box"). They claim to have discerned the border between emotion and intellect and that is a delusion. By the same token, isn't trying to maintain a border between society and pop culture a delusion?
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Jul 28, 2015 17:48
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There's a massive difference between feeling a certain way and actually being it. One isn't real. If it tastes like butter, it might not be butter.
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Jul 28, 2015 17:50
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