summer doldrums and spoilers
The weather turned oppressive in NYC this week. It's finally summer, and along with the hot weather there's been a lackluster few days of television. I've been hearing good things about Beauty and the Geek, so despite Ashton Kutcher's involvement I'm giving it a try; the first episode is waiting for me on the tivo right now.
Last night was the season premiere of Six Feet Under, but I haven't watched it yet (and therefore you get no link, since I can't risk going to the site and getting spoiled). Speaking of spoilerage, I've been noticing lately that certain news outlets are much better than others in terms of what they'll ruin for you. Entertainment Weekly is pretty good; TV Guide is not, especially if you're a subscriber and get the issues a week early (we subscribe at work.) It's not even that they give away spoilers, really, but the articles tend to point your attention toward specific moments or episodes, as if they don't trust you to pay attention on your own. In the SFU article, they named a specific episode where important things will happen. But that begs the question: how much enjoyment would a viewer really get out of that episode if he or she hadn't been watching all along?
What they did for the finale of Lost was even worse: an entire article on the subject of the last scene on the boat, published the week the finale aired. Wait a minute, you mean they're not going to get rescued, and bad things might happen when they think that's happened? You mean I should pay attention? Thanks, TV Guide, but I think Lost itself dropped more than enough clues that something bad would happen to our rafters; if nothing else, the previously on segment featuring every "dun dun DUN" moment of the season should have tipped viewers off.
Not that I'm some kind of spoiler purist, but I do live in fear of accidentally learning something major about a show before I can see it. The moment before I choose to read a spoiler is always a little intense. I just want to have the choice, even if it seems like the spoiler itself doesn't reveal much of anything.
Last night was the season premiere of Six Feet Under, but I haven't watched it yet (and therefore you get no link, since I can't risk going to the site and getting spoiled). Speaking of spoilerage, I've been noticing lately that certain news outlets are much better than others in terms of what they'll ruin for you. Entertainment Weekly is pretty good; TV Guide is not, especially if you're a subscriber and get the issues a week early (we subscribe at work.) It's not even that they give away spoilers, really, but the articles tend to point your attention toward specific moments or episodes, as if they don't trust you to pay attention on your own. In the SFU article, they named a specific episode where important things will happen. But that begs the question: how much enjoyment would a viewer really get out of that episode if he or she hadn't been watching all along?
What they did for the finale of Lost was even worse: an entire article on the subject of the last scene on the boat, published the week the finale aired. Wait a minute, you mean they're not going to get rescued, and bad things might happen when they think that's happened? You mean I should pay attention? Thanks, TV Guide, but I think Lost itself dropped more than enough clues that something bad would happen to our rafters; if nothing else, the previously on segment featuring every "dun dun DUN" moment of the season should have tipped viewers off.
Not that I'm some kind of spoiler purist, but I do live in fear of accidentally learning something major about a show before I can see it. The moment before I choose to read a spoiler is always a little intense. I just want to have the choice, even if it seems like the spoiler itself doesn't reveal much of anything.
posted by Erica @ 2:42 PM
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