I hate spoilers. It’s like walking into a movie as someone walks out of the previous screening and says “I would have never guessed it was the good guy that did it.” Spoilers are like seeing your Christmas presents by accident. When I was a kid I did not want even a clue about what I might be getting. I still don’t.
And I don’t want to know what’s coming up on Coronation Street. So I avoid UK Coronation Street sites. I only read Canadian timeline sites said to be “spoiler-free”. So imagine my disappointment when I learn something I didn’t want to know, whether it’s in a post, a comment or a tweet. They may not be intentional spoilers, but they spoil anyway.
Right now, I know two characters are leaving, due to posts on Canadian sites saying something like “Since so-and-so is leaving the show, we wonder if this is how they are going to write him/her out.” Well, no, I didn’t know so-and-so was leaving and didn’t want to. To add insult to injury, I know the circumstances for the departure of one of those characters. That’s thanks to a tweet posted on a Canadian site and a well-intentioned ad on another one. For sure, the tweet and ad could have waited a week or so until we all in Canada see on our screens the particular event.
Some real life spoilers are unavoidable
Sometimes, real life events make real-life news and therefore spoilers are unavoidable. The death of actress Betty Driver made us all know that, sadly, we would also the face the death of her character Betty Williams. Real-life reporting of legal problems meant we would somehow see the characters of Kevin and Ken being written out of the show. Those things I can accept because they are newsworthy realities. Even the big anniversaries with special stories and lots of promotion – impossible to avoid.
But an actor deciding to leave or a contract not being renewed? If I were in the UK, I probably would know about it because of mainstream press coverage. But I do not live there. I learned the hard way, on British media sites, to employ tunnel vision when reading articles. I do not look at ads or promo lines for “in other news.” If I must go on a UK Corrie site, I have developed the ability to scan without actually reading to avoid digesting bits of information I don’t want to know.
I do everything in my power to avoid spoilers so it makes me feel let down when they pop up on Canadian sites that profess to be spoiler-free. They are enjoyable sites to read, to see what other Canadian Corrie fans are thinking. But too often, even there, I have learned things that ruin my pleasure in just watching the story.
At least now, being only two weeks behind the UK, the events in these spoilers come to pass quickly. But for that length of time, my viewing pleasure is lessened. And why? If something is a spoiler, even by a day, is it that difficult to remove or clearly mark it with “SPOILER ALERT”?
