There are no spoilers in this article. Well, apart from a small reveal about the Empire Strikes Back. And something about the Bible. It’s been long enough… right?

 

On Tuesday this week my partner casually announced that she already knew what had happened in Sunday’s Game of Thrones despite not having time for either watching the show or browsing the dozens of main stream media pieces brazenly discussing the episode. She’s very busy and far too serious for that sort of thing.

I thought that was a shame but decided to ask what she thought had happened (having already watched it myself). I suspected she’d know a headline but she proceeded to give me a blow by blow description of the final scene. Who was disappointed. What canine activity took place. How it all transpired.

Bloody twitter.

Except it isn’t really just the unwashed masses is it? We’ve had mainstream publications proudly announcing *in the headlines of articles* key plot points of seasons before they have even aired. Which characters are still filming. Who has not been seen on set. The potential outcome of the plot, as if anyone in their right mind would rather discover these things in a smug off the cuff remark in a Guardian article rather than by watching the story unfold first hand.

I remember going to watch the Empire Strikes Back as a kid. [Here comes a spoiler, look away kids] Would my glee have really been greater had I known before going into the cinema that Darth Vader was Luke’s father? No. And newspapers would never have dreamed of spoiling that journey for me back in the day. Now, possibly driven by that obnoxious innovation, the internet, everyone’s scrabbling for a “scoop” because shows like Game of Thrones inhabit a netherworld, simultaneously both a tale told well and sincerely and some kind of plastic commodity to be hyped, advertised and promoted.

If you are one of those people who would quite like to wait for the DVD boxed set to come out before watching the latest season at your leisure (in the way you might do with a book) you’ve got fat chance of even buying the series before some media outlet has revealed some of the most delicious surprises. Is it any wonder that some, wrong thinking individuals, decide it’s simpler and easier to download it illegally the moment it becomes available because it’s the only way to be sure to watch the show without already knowing what’s going to happen.

Was it always like this? If someone spotted you reading the Bible back in the day did they wander over and say “Oh, the ending’s great. The dead rise up out of their graves and then there’s literally an apocalypse!” Only to receive puzzled stares because the hapless reader was still working their way through all the begatting. Books were all sex and violence even then.

For me it got to the stage with GoT that I read the books just avoid any more wedding based give-aways – but bizarrely the books turned out to be just pages and pages of spoilers for the show themselves anyway. There was just no hiding place. So what’s the solution?

• Stay off twitter until you’ve seen the latest episode?
• Steal a pre-release review copy of all your favourite shows to watch them well before everyone else?
• Maybe save up enough money to buy all the media outlets and close down their multitudinous spoiler monkeys?

I’m not sure any of that is realistic really.

Something I would like to see though is shows starting to fight back by planting vast numbers of fake spoilers so that all information on what’s going to happen becomes utterly worthless. The Red Viper has been seen filming on set! How on Earth are they going to bring him back? Sansa Stark marries the Ice King you say? That’s an unexpected alliance. Lancel Lannister tires of the religious life and starts touring a puppetry of the penis theater piece? That’s a new turn for the show.

I fear it’s the only way.