Spoilers?
I’m really enjoying Torchwood this week. Watching it along with thousands of fellow viewers whilst commenting on Twitter has been an interesting and rather different viewing experience. But what about spoilers? Thanks to the level of tweets about the Torchwood storyline last night #torchwood was joined by #Ianto in the trending topics. Anyone who is yet to see the five night special only has to log in to Twitter to find out what they are missing.
I am very adverse to spoilers. I caught the Harry Potter bug in between book four and five and so for the final three books had them delivered to my doorstep on the day of release and read them cover to cover within 24 hours whilst being cut off from the outside world so as not to expose myself to any spoilers. Even yesterday whilst discussing the latest Harry Potter movie and Harry Potter 7 in the staff room our discussions were in the guise of not saying too much until we’d established no one would be offended if we discussed what happened at the end of the series. If Twitter had been going when Harry Potter was about would it have been silent until people had read the book, or full of spoilers threatening to ruin the ending for everyone?
I take the view that it is my responsibility to avoid spoilers. Whilst The Apprentice was on I was unable to watch a couple of episodes on the night of airing. I didn’t want to know what happened so I avoided Twitter until I had caught up the next day. It’s fair enough that people want to chat about what’s going on. I did have pangs of guilt (mainly dampened by a bit too much wine) on the night of The Apprentice final as I tweeted away commentary the action as it happened, revealing the winner to all my followers in real time.
But despite my aversion to spoilers I don’t think you can blame people for tweeting them. If you want to remain in ignorance then the question is what do you want to do more? To tweet? or to have some Twitter free time and be surprised? It is just another method in a long line of media allowing people to comment and chat about what is happening on TV and in movies as they hit our screens.
What’s even more interesting is in this age of Sky+ and iPlayer (plus everything else that lets you watch what you want when you want it) will this increased threat of spoilers actually keep us watching TV when it’s on rather than when it suits us? Torchwood has been an amazing example of the UK returning to gather round their TVs at the same time to watch the TV event of the year.
Hey
Im commenting for you
I suffer this sort of thing more when im out and dont want to know results of the Grand Prix or something, but avoid twitter or web pages if im missing something I want to watch live. They do ruin the show, im following LOST with friends and we like to speculate about whats going on, but other than the occasional hint i don’t want to know till i see it on tv, which is at least getting easier as they show it stateside at about the same time as us now so you don’t have to avoid all the internet for weeks on end.
Tweet live though, to hell with it, its a live medium, talking to friends real and virtual in real time while watching something is fun, and as u said to someone else – if u dont like it dont follow it
Stephen
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