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+SPOILERS?
JUST SAY NO!+
VERY
BIG Season 6 references up to 6.19 'Seeing Red' - you have been warned!
This is the first
season I've ever watched more-or-less in sync with the US, so
the first time I've been exposed to proper actual spoilers -
that is, learning about events which haven't yet happened on
the show. I'm really not impressed.
It's a stupid way
to watch the show. Instead of watching events as they happen,
you learn about them through someone else; instead of Joss Whedon's
vision of the storyline, you get some unknown person's. Spoilers
are why, I'm certain, that there's been such a backlash from
fans this season; take Tara's death - the way it was revealed
was only going to make events worse. The wording of the original
spoiler was reminiscent of a neighbour coming round to say how
sorry they were for the death of some friend or relation; it
was apologetic, and treated the issue as if it were a real death,
rather than what it was - a plot development and the 'death'
of a fictional character who, loved as she was, was never real.
But to be honest,
no matter how it was worded, there was going to be 'outrage';
because, instead of allowing Joss and M.E. the opportunity of
playing out this storyline how they wanted, it was left
up to the fans to decide. So when the events actually do
happen, they're almost irrelevant. Anyone who's read the spoilers
probably already has an opinion, and any 'shippers are already
completely fixed in theirs. Even if you decide to reserve judgement,
you still have hundreds of other spoiled people presenting their
own views. You're bound to be influenced by them, whatever you
do. So actually watching the show and accepting events as they
happen becomes harder - the individual episode becomes not just
40 minutes of footage, but many hours of spoilerly discussion
before that, too; instead of an episode, followed by
discussion.
If you read spoilers
you're essentially flipping the bird to Joss Whedon, and the
whole of Mutant Enemy - we know that they hate spoilers,
and I think rumours of their inventing fake spoilers are wildly
exaggerated or completely false. By reading spoilers, you're
not respecting Joss' vision for the show, you're seeing the
vision of a) people who give out spoilers, and b)
people who read spoilers. Sure, the fan community is always
going to influence anyone's opinion of the show, but this way
you're taking away the possibility of ever watching the show
without someone else's opinions getting in the way. Even the
original spoilers themselves are inevitable biased, so it's
not possible to read them soley, and expect to be able to watch
the show as if you were seeing events for the first time.
Anyway, that's
why I hate spoilers. I don't think reading spoilers has actually
spoiled this season for me, but it's taken me almost
to the end of it to finally get past all the crap I've read
and start watching the show properly - watching events as they
happen, and making up your own mind based on what happens on
the screen, not what other fans think. You can have people tell
you what to think after you've made up your own mind.
Just say no.
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