Spoiler alert: How soon is too soon to spoil?

One of the best things in life is watching your favorite television show with no commercials because you recorded it the night before. One of the worst things in life is checking any social media as you are about to turn on the episode – you are bombarded with status after status of spoilers. We all hate spoilers, yet all of us in one way or another has spoiled something for someone; whether it is a movie, a television show or a book ending, we’ve all been on both ends of the spoiling. I have come to a conclusion that, based on the different types of things there are to spoil, there are also different time limits you should respect before sharing any information.

The reason why I write this now is because on Monday, I went to go see the New Thor movie, (which Dani wrote a review about that you can read here.) As I was waiting for the movie to start I went on Facebook and someone posted the biggest spoiler ever! Which get’s me started onto the first subject: Movies.

Movies: Seeming Thor: The Dark World was released on Nov 8 and I saw the spoiler THREE DAYS LATER on Nov 11, I feel like that is a completely inappropriate time to spoil one of the biggest movies of this month. Two weeks is the rule for me to spoil the movie. I feel like if it is a really big movie that has lots of hype and you do not watch it within the first two weeks of it opening, you don’t really want to see the movie that badly.

Television Episodes: It depends a lot on the situation. Sometimes we are too busy to watch the night of the episode, so we wait until the weekend. However when it is on a Tuesday, for example, and you wait until Saturday to watch it, you need to expect a few spoilers coming your way. With that said, I have decided the proper time to wait to talk about a television episode is five days; it’s not too long and it’s not too short, so you can still watch the episode on the weekend without seeing anything you weren’t supposed to online.

Books: Everyone reads at different speeds, I get it, but that doesn’t mean you get to tell everyone the ending if you finish it before them. If it is a really big book with lots of hype, I am giving you one month before you can spoil the ending. Because again, like movies, if you don’t purchase the book after a month of it’s release, I don’t think you are that interested in reading it. One month still gives you a good amount of time to finish the book but isn’t to long for people to get anxious because they cannot tell anyone about it.

With all of this said, I am not saying you cannot discuss anything with someone who has already seen or read what you are wanting to talk about. Just make sure it is a one-on-one conversation and that both of you already know what happens and that no one else can hear your conversation. Don’t spoil it for everyone, just follow what I am going to call “spoiling etiquette” so everyone can enjoy the experience of finding out the ending themselves.