Spoilery Expectations
Feb. 8th, 2010 10:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deird_ljSo, I was watching Normal Again and remembering the first time I watched it.
You see, back when I was first watching Buffy, I knew quite a bit about what was going to happen.
In fact, the very first thing I remember hearing about the show was that, at the end of a season, Willow's girlfriend Tara would die, and Willow would turn evil, get black hair, flay a guy alive, and then try to destroy the world.
(Did I mention I really dislike spoilers? *glares*)
But anyway...
See, the first time I watched season six, I knew that at some point Tara was going to die. But I didn't know when. And there's this moment, during the big basement fight towards the end of Normal Again, when Tara comes in and starts running down the stairs to help, and Buffy grabs her ankle and makes her fall the rest of the way.
AND TARA WAS DEAD. SHE'D SNAPPED HER NECK AND DIED AND WILLOW WAS GOING TO TURN EVIL, AND IT WAS ALL BUFFY'S FAULT. THIS SHOW WAS SO AWESOME AND HARD-CORE.
...clearly this did not happen.
But every time I rewatch that episode, I get a momentary flashback to what it was like thinking that Tara was going to die right then.
And yeah, I like going into things unspoilered, mostly. But occasionally, knowing some spoilers without knowing all the specifics can actually make you react to scenes in entirely unexpected and interesting ways.
Anyone else do this?
You see, back when I was first watching Buffy, I knew quite a bit about what was going to happen.
In fact, the very first thing I remember hearing about the show was that, at the end of a season, Willow's girlfriend Tara would die, and Willow would turn evil, get black hair, flay a guy alive, and then try to destroy the world.
(Did I mention I really dislike spoilers? *glares*)
But anyway...
See, the first time I watched season six, I knew that at some point Tara was going to die. But I didn't know when. And there's this moment, during the big basement fight towards the end of Normal Again, when Tara comes in and starts running down the stairs to help, and Buffy grabs her ankle and makes her fall the rest of the way.
AND TARA WAS DEAD. SHE'D SNAPPED HER NECK AND DIED AND WILLOW WAS GOING TO TURN EVIL, AND IT WAS ALL BUFFY'S FAULT. THIS SHOW WAS SO AWESOME AND HARD-CORE.
...clearly this did not happen.
But every time I rewatch that episode, I get a momentary flashback to what it was like thinking that Tara was going to die right then.
And yeah, I like going into things unspoilered, mostly. But occasionally, knowing some spoilers without knowing all the specifics can actually make you react to scenes in entirely unexpected and interesting ways.
Anyone else do this?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-02-10 02:24 am (UTC)I watched S1 to S3 pretty much un-spoiled, but then I started to get obsessed enough to read reviews and episode guides online. And when I do that, I always have the best intentions of reading the review only for the episodes I just watched, and then I read ahead like, half a season. But I only skim, so sometimes I get very warped perceptions.
Like, I remember thinking dark!Willow and then Warren!Willow were going to be a much bigger, longer-lasting thing, and I was NOT happy. And I knew Buffy and Spike got together, and that he was her last significant love interest in the series, and before I saw S5, I thought that was beyond dumb. But then, I got the huge pleasure of being dead wrong about all of the above!