/dev/null/kevin

I blogged previously about hating spoilers.  Thus, I avoided any and all references to the new Harry Potter book.  Now that I finished the seventh book I went looking to see what could have spoiled it for me.  As expected, there were lots of spoilers out there.

Note: while there are no spoilers in this blog, I do link to several sites that contain spoilers.  Use caution if you're like me and don't want details of HP7 revealed to you.

Professional book reviews, like movie reviews, are supposed to be free of spoilers.  The whole point is to read the review to see if you want to spend the money on the book or movie.  The New York Times got into some trouble for posting an early review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  I read the NYT review and it does contain some minor spoilers (like what "Deathly Hallows" means) but nothing too bad.  Nothing like this horrible review from my own San Jose Mercury News.  Do not read that review if you don't want the book spoiled for you!!  The Seattle Times also made a similar blunder and gave away too much because they used "clever" hints that were too transparent.  Sometimes even opinions are spoilers.

Other web sites had actual photographs of the first 500 pages.  I'm not linking to them because they are piracy.  Some sites printed summaries of the book based on those 500 pages.  Still more web sites printed fake spoilers, sometimes mixed in with real spoilers.  It's hard to know if these are pro-Potter or anti-Potter sites.  The could be pro-Potter sites trying to fill the web with lies so even if you read a real spoiler it won't have the same impact.  When you have lots of lies mixed with lots of truths then you really have nothing more than the usual speculation that occurs before the release of a big title.

There was also one lunkhead, a participant in a hot dog eating contest shown on ESPN, who displayed a Harry Potter spoiler on the back of his sign as he was introduced.  I won't say if his spoiler was true or false, but his intent was cruel, so I hope he chokes on a hot dog someday and is then saved by a Harry Potter fan.  Here's the video.  Don't view if you don't want to read the spoiler, and definitely don't read the comments on that page.

I hate spoilers.  I don't like having movies, TV shows (or books, Harry Potter leakers) ruined for me and will do everything possible to avoid anything that could reveal major plot points.  Even in the way back days of USENET, I would avoid discussions of upcoming shows.  I also don't watch movie previews of movies I know I want to see.  The same goes for the "scenes from next week" at the end of some TV shows.  The people who make those teasers and trailers don't care about what they spoil; they're job is just to get you to watch it.  I won't even watch the beginning credits of the new Battlestar Galactica because it contains spoilers.

My problem is that almost anything can be a spoiler.  I have a pretty good memory, and a fairly logical mind, so it doesn't take much for me to connect things together.  Show me someone in a certain situation and I can pretty much guess how they're going to get into it.

With so many "web 2.0" feeds and instant communication, avoiding spoilers is harder than ever.  I am on the west coast, so huge plot details appear in my RSS reader before I even see some shows.  I found out who won the first season of Survivor while I was online years ago.  Recently, I actually deleted quite a few RSS feeds in anticipation for the inevitable Harry Potter leak that was to come (and it happened within hours of me doing so).

I had the season finale of Heroes spoiled for me due to a careless Twitter tweet.  The worst spoilers are the careless ones.  People who don't think before they speak (or tweet).

Sometimes people try to be clever and just give a little "hint" at a spoiler.  Don't.  Telling me that "you'll never see the surprise ending coming" means that I will.  Telling someone there is a surprise ending spoils the surprise.  Saying the ending made you happy or sad ruins the surprise.  Pretty much anything you say will spoil the ending.  So shut up! 

What really confuses me are people seek out spoilers!  People watch Entertainment Tonight, read TV Guide, or visit Ain't It Cool to get every piece of gossip and news about something coming out (TV Guide is really bad because they get advanced viewings of everything and then write articles like the shows have already aired).  Then people spread those spoilers carelessly because they assume everyone already know this stuff (bastards).  And then do you know what these spoiler-mongers do after the movie comes out or the TV show airs?  They will complain about it and say thing like "I could see the ending coming" or "it was too predictable."  Of course, dummy!  You read the script Harry Knowles posted!

So, in conclusion, seek out spoilers if you must, but don't assume that anyone else wants to know what you do.  I don't.

For this post only I am disabling comments just in case some jerk wants to put some spoilers in the comments.

I read Watership Down as a child and have fond memories of it.  My four year old daughter is always asking me to "make up" stories for her so I usually just tell her modified versions of books that I've read or movies that I've seen (She really liked the adventures of the "robots" R2-D2" and "C-3PO".

Recently she wanted a story about bunnies, so I tried to remember Watership Down.  I remembered a few character names, but couldn't recall enough of the plot to tell her a good story.  So, off to the library we went to get the book and DVD.  The book is to wordy for a four year old to sit through, and there is a whole mythology and language to learn.  As a result, I've taken to reading chapters on my own and then summarizing for her.

*** Spoiler Warnings for Watership Down. ***

My recollection of Watership Down, filtered over these many years, was a story about "bunnies on an adventure."  I had forgotten how violent parts of the story are.  It's hard enough explaining a military command structure to a child, but there are quite a few dead bunnies to contend with as well.  I knew I was in trouble when my daughter was upset that the OWSLA didn't let Fiver eat a cowslip.  And that's just in the first chapter.

Suffice it to say that General Woundwort and Captain Campion are making few appearances in my abridged version of the story.

The DVD isn't much better.  The "next chapter" button will be my friend if I ever let her watch it.  I previewed it and it's quite gory.  It also suffers from something I call "not enough closure" syndrome.  My daughter can handle stories with the characters in some peril, as long as she sees that they are okay at the end.  The problem with lots of "kids" movies is that after showing the characters in lost, hunted, or otherwise unhappy for over an hour, she needs to see them found, safe and happy again for more than just a few minutes.  Just saying "happily ever after" doesn't always cut it.  She wants to see it.

In the case of Watership Down, after the big (and bloody) fight with the General, they fast forward over all of that "safe" time and show Hazel and friends safe for about a minute.  Then the Black Rabbit of Death comes to take Hazel away. 

Good night, sweetie!  Sleep tight!

I can't protect her forever, but I'm going to try for as long as I can.  Long live Hazel-rah.