Saturday 14 February 2009

To spoil or not to spoil?


GET ME A CAT.
WHY?
COS I’M GOING TO KICK IT.

Right. Now I can understand why some people might want to know what happens next in their favourite programmes. Some people follow casting rumours and gossip and guest appearance hubbub and shite like that.

I. Do. Not.

Dear readers. Cast your minds back to the heady days of good UK TV. Yes, we’re talking those golden, halcyon days of ‘Life On Mars’ and ‘Doctor bloody Who’, when TV was good and you actually cared if you missed an episode. You will probably remember that I ranted on about people TRYING to RUIN my viewing pleasure by letting slip certain names or plot points or in fact, casting. I did my very best to stay away from these things - I did. I managed it - and the waiting and worrying and nail-biting was worth it. Every single moment. Cos when the time came and I could actually sit down to watch said programmes, I could do so with genuine surprise and delight at whatever unfolded before my eyes.

Because. I. Didn’t. Already. Know.

So when, a year or two later, I’m in the same position with ‘Supernatural’s season four and what’s going on with all things Winchester, I avoid all spoilers like the plague. I do not want to know what’s about to happen. I do not want to be told who is being cast as who, or who is back in which episode, or whose contract has not been renewed. In fact, I don’t even want to know if they’re on for their final (planned) season five, as this would ultimately affect what transpires in the closing episodes of season four. Would they have wound up seasons ones and two like that if they’d known they were going to get series three after all? After all, there’s nowt like the words ‘imminent cancellation’ to make you whip your team of writers into an outstanding thread-tying up exercise.

So I make sure I am spoiler-free. I refuse to do owt at all but watch the mini-trailers posted on the CW’s own website. I don’t read gossip, I don’t follow links that whiff even faintly of rumours of holding spoilers, and I don’t give a shit who’s supposed to be killing / shagging / knifing / ganking who. Really. The only time I want to find this out is when I’m actually sitting there watching the damn episode.

So when I get a weekly newsletter round-up from BuddyTV, proudly proclaiming some fuck-off hyowj spoilerage IN THE E-MAIL ITSELF with no warning, I get angry.

No wait, I get to absolutely FUCKING RAGING.

Oh BuddyTV, why did you do this to me? Why? HOW DARE YOU type it out in simple, innocuous letters as if you’re printing ‘hey folks, SPN is back next week!’ rather than ‘such-and-such will do this and we will find out this-this-this’! How dare you just include a fucking big-ass picture and pretend it’s not the biggest spoiler since someone went ‘hey, did you hear Bobby Ewing’s back next week?

Suffice to say, I have removed myself from their mailing list and in fact their entire contact base. I am seething. I am so incredibly angry I might just redirect some Microsoft viruses their way in retribution. The size and nature of said spoiler has pretty much blind-sided me and totally fucked up whatever hope I had of ever enjoying a future episode again. If anyone ever said to you ‘You’re going to watch ‘From Dusk Till Dawn’? You know it turns into a vampire flick, right?’, you can probably imagine how I feel right now. It’s not like you’re buying tickets to summat like ‘Titanic’ and the bloke next to you int queue goes ‘Hey, it sinks at the end!’ It’s more like you’re buying tickets to ‘The Crying Game’ and the bloke goes ‘Isn’t that the one where you find out he’s not a girl?

Hang on. Going to get a good stiff drink. And turn up Led Zeppelin.

Right, where were we. Right right, got it. So here I am, kicking imaginary cats. And to top things off, I’m going home through’t MTR station tonight and see a trailer fert new Jensen Ackles film, ‘My Bloody Valentine 3D’ and find out that it’s STILL not out to watch. No no no, my friends, we over here have to wait till 19th February. Riiiiiiight. My sisters int UK saw it approximately three weeks ago, perhaps more. And - LEST WE FORGET - it’s supposed to be a Valentine’s Day movie. So not only do I have to suffer the torture and heartbreak of finding out what happens in ‘Super-bloody-natural’ through no fault of my own, but I can’t even take solace in the pure girlie porn magic of Jensen Ackles' arms in crystal clear 3D. Did I mention how fucked off I am?

No peach and lube. Not for anyone. Well alright, for me mate who has taken a very recent and lasting shine to ‘Firefly’.

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