4 ms·

About 15 years ago, my family watched a movie without seeing the trailers. Then, we happened to see the trailers, and the trailer revealed the major plot twis

About 15 years ago, my family watched a movie without seeing the trailers. Then, we happened to see the trailers, and the trailer revealed *the* major plot twist in the movie (it was a thriller). We all loudly agreed that we were grateful we didn't see the trailer. As a result, for any movie that I really care about watching, I now actively avoid almost all trailers. YouTube and TikTok make avoiding spoilers quite difficult, though. Thankfully, some movies have started to recognize the importance of hiding details, and don't reveal everything in the trailers anymore. Specific examples include Marvel changing the contents of the scenes to hide important details, like which Infinity Stones Thanos had at a given point.

delecti 4y ago
In addition to Marvel, the last decade of Star Wars movies applies too. The trailers feel like they're spoiling things, but then you watch the movie and realize they're only showing things from the first ~1/3 of the movie, or entirely removed from context. I try to avoid trailers these days, but I've never regretted watching too many Marvel or Star Wars trailers.
- Retric 4y ago
  I do appreciate the effort, but Big reveals reframe the films narrative in some important way. The recent Marvel and Star Wars films have been such a mess they didn’t have much to hide this way. Ray’s family doesn’t really matter narratively, while Luke’s father killing / becoming Darth Vader shifts it away from a story of revenge. Contact is a great example of how subtle this can be with static on the recording vs hours of static on the recording.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    >Luke’s father killing / becoming Darth Vader shifts it away from a story of revenge At the risk of dating myself, when Empire came out the question of whether Darth Vader was telling the truth was a matter of considerable debate. That summer, at one point, someone at the AI Lab printed out the discussion (from rec.arts.sf-lovers) on the lab's doubtless hugely expensive laser printer and bound it. I was just reminded up this because a memory popped up on my Facebook feed about totally confusing one of my editors because I apparently made some reference to this in something I wrote and she had never known this was a topic of debate.
dwringer 4y ago
This always makes me recall the trailer for the movie Twister in which a large tractor tire smashes through one of the truck's windshields - the scene wasn't actually in the movie, but I was on the edge of my seat any time they were in a truck with high winds around.
secabeen 4y ago
I went to a lot of movies in college, at the university film center. They put out a quarterly calendar, with a little blurb for each film. Most were pretty pedestrian, but I still recall that they somehow got me to the theater for _The Usual Suspects (1995)_ without giving away any details. Obilgatory reference here to Rick Polito's summary of _Wizard of Oz_: "Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets and then teams up with three strangers to kill again."
jvm___ 4y ago
I watched Avatar 2 in theaters without watching or reading anything but the title. Sorely disappointed in the movie. I guess if I expected a Rambo shoot-em-up I would have been satisifed, but a plot based on revenge, with 75-100 on-screen deaths by shooting, drowning, burning, impaling or dismemberment (loss of arm). Torturing of kids, threatening of pregnant women, targeting mothers of new-born animals, burning of innocent villages, scantily clad children, killing animals to make a point (instead of killing the pregnant lady). There were almost no positive relationships. Parents yelled at eachother, Parents yelled at kids, kids yelled at eachother, people on the same team yelled at eachother. No one showed empathy, love or respectful communication. Out of the 50-75 characters in the movie, I think 4 (including a whale in that number) showed a positive relationship, everyone else was selfish and yelling when others didn't meet their expectations. I guess I went into it expecting a happy adventure and found a hate-based blood-bath instead. 1/10 happiness/empathy/love 9/10 visuals/graphics.
- TeMPOraL 4y ago
  I'm yet to watch the movie (reconsidering after reading this), but now I have to ask: does the sequel involve humans, and if yes, does it explain why the original antagonists didn't do the obvious thing, which is to drop a thermobaric bomb on that stupid tree, or otherwise sterilize the whole area from orbit, and then get back to their mining operations?
  - mac01021 4y ago
    If you liked the first one you'll probably like the second one too. It sounds like the GP probably hadn't seen an avatar movie before?
    - jvm___ 4y ago
      We watched them back to back over two days. The first movie had a romantic couple and lots of characters exploring the beauty of Avatar and discovering it's world. It felt like that part was missing from Avatar 2.
  - 4y ago

About 15 years ago, my family watched a movie without seeing the trailers. Then, we happened to see the trailers, and the trailer revealed *the* major plot twis

delecti 4y ago

In addition to Marvel, the last decade of Star Wars movies applies too. The trailers feel like they're spoiling things, but then you watch the movie and realize they're only showing things from the first ~1/3 of the movie, or entirely removed from context. I try to avoid trailers these days, but I've never regretted watching too many Marvel or Star Wars trailers.

Retric 4y ago
I do appreciate the effort, but Big reveals reframe the films narrative in some important way. The recent Marvel and Star Wars films have been such a mess they didn’t have much to hide this way. Ray’s family doesn’t really matter narratively, while Luke’s father killing / becoming Darth Vader shifts it away from a story of revenge. Contact is a great example of how subtle this can be with static on the recording vs hours of static on the recording.
- ghaff 4y ago
  >Luke’s father killing / becoming Darth Vader shifts it away from a story of revenge At the risk of dating myself, when Empire came out the question of whether Darth Vader was telling the truth was a matter of considerable debate. That summer, at one point, someone at the AI Lab printed out the discussion (from rec.arts.sf-lovers) on the lab's doubtless hugely expensive laser printer and bound it. I was just reminded up this because a memory popped up on my Facebook feed about totally confusing one of my editors because I apparently made some reference to this in something I wrote and she had never known this was a topic of debate.

dwringer 4y ago

This always makes me recall the trailer for the movie Twister in which a large tractor tire smashes through one of the truck's windshields - the scene wasn't actually in the movie, but I was on the edge of my seat any time they were in a truck with high winds around.

secabeen 4y ago

I went to a lot of movies in college, at the university film center. They put out a quarterly calendar, with a little blurb for each film. Most were pretty pedestrian, but I still recall that they somehow got me to the theater for _The Usual Suspects (1995)_ without giving away any details. Obilgatory reference here to Rick Polito's summary of _Wizard of Oz_: "Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets and then teams up with three strangers to kill again."

jvm___ 4y ago

I watched Avatar 2 in theaters without watching or reading anything but the title. Sorely disappointed in the movie. I guess if I expected a Rambo shoot-em-up I would have been satisifed, but a plot based on revenge, with 75-100 on-screen deaths by shooting, drowning, burning, impaling or dismemberment (loss of arm). Torturing of kids, threatening of pregnant women, targeting mothers of new-born animals, burning of innocent villages, scantily clad children, killing animals to make a point (instead of killing the pregnant lady). There were almost no positive relationships. Parents yelled at eachother, Parents yelled at kids, kids yelled at eachother, people on the same team yelled at eachother. No one showed empathy, love or respectful communication. Out of the 50-75 characters in the movie, I think 4 (including a whale in that number) showed a positive relationship, everyone else was selfish and yelling when others didn't meet their expectations. I guess I went into it expecting a happy adventure and found a hate-based blood-bath instead. 1/10 happiness/empathy/love 9/10 visuals/graphics.

TeMPOraL 4y ago
I'm yet to watch the movie (reconsidering after reading this), but now I have to ask: does the sequel involve humans, and if yes, does it explain why the original antagonists didn't do the obvious thing, which is to drop a thermobaric bomb on that stupid tree, or otherwise sterilize the whole area from orbit, and then get back to their mining operations?
- mac01021 4y ago
  If you liked the first one you'll probably like the second one too. It sounds like the GP probably hadn't seen an avatar movie before?
  - jvm___ 4y ago
    We watched them back to back over two days. The first movie had a romantic couple and lots of characters exploring the beauty of Avatar and discovering it's world. It felt like that part was missing from Avatar 2.
- 4y ago