Movie Trailers are giving away far too much

The trailers that are given to us before a feature in the cinema are supposed to hype us up. I don’t know about you, but recently I’ve been finding they (usually) do the complete opposite.

I know I’m not alone here, as others have pointed this out too. A new and currently trending example that a lot have picked up on appears to be the upcoming Spider-Man: Homecoming. The newest trailer is kind of ridiculous regarding what it gives away. I’d be surprised if there’s even any twists left for the movie at all.

I’m a massive fan of Spider-Man and Disney acquiring his rights for Marvel’s Cinematic Universe is a dream come true. Tom Holland gave a spectacular performance for Spidey’s debut in Captain America: Civil War and now the time has come for him to stand on his own two feet. However, I’m not sure I can be bothered with seeing this film on release anymore – I feel like the trailer has shown me literally everything about it.

Potential-Spoilers: Incoming

From this trailer we’ve gathered hell of a lot of things. Peter Parker fights crime under the name of Spider-Man using a super sexy suit given to him by billionaire genius, Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.). The movie’s antagonist Vulture (Michael Keaton) goes and does many bad things out of hatred for corporate innovators like Stark. Spidey takes these matters into his own hands and tries to fight him off, only to cause near-casualties in the process. Following the events of Civil War we obviously know this can’t be allowed, so Tony takes Parker’s suit away from him for biting off more than he can chew.

That in itself is quite a lot to reveal, but fair enough, It doesn’t seem like it’s too much to give away. Well, it doesn’t stop there. Next thing we know, Parker makes his own makeshift suit and sets out to inevitably defeat Vulture. The only bit missing is how he specifically does this, likely leading to an Avengers invitation. Okay, so we already knew that it had to end this way realistically. However, the approach on how it would be achieved was a mystery, until now. Not to mention that small clips of one of Parker’s buddies being in on his secret is also no longer going to be a surprise to us, since they showed us the exact point he finds out.

You pretty much get an entire summary of everything that’s going to happen within the space of a few minutes. After reading that, you may be wondering yourself if there’s any point going to see the film anymore. I don’t doubt the quality – it will likely be great. However, the delivery of the trailer just makes it feel a lot less exciting.

Another Example

I’m not nitpicking superhero films here, it’s just the way it is with Marvel and DC’s rivalry. Last year’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice as well as having a terrible title, was considered a flop. Even though it made $873 Million, it was expected to make well over the billion mark. The reason for this? Apart from the fact it’s a 3 hour bore-fest, the trailer probably had a big part in it.

The film’s trailer was horrible when it came to spoilers. The first release in the cinematic universe was decent enough. Compared to the average-at-best Man of Steel, it looked like an upgrade. However, the second trailer then came and ruined everything. Even Director Zack Snyder admits that he wasn’t happy with how that trailer panned out. While we thought the film was primarily focused on Bruce Wayne/Batman (Ben Affleck) and Clark Kent/Superman (Henry Cavill) pitting it out of a disagreement, this trailer threw out the film’s massive twist.

It turns out that the film’s very unconvincing Lex Luthor (Jesse Eisenburg) couldn’t get Batman to kill Superman so he releases a mutated monster that was very recognizable as one of Superman’s antagonists, Doomsday. Not only did they completely give this to be curve-ball event away, but all of a sudden Wonder Woman jumps in to help. I’m pretty sure most people that planned to see the film in cinemas just didn’t bother after that kind of spoiler being thrown into a trailer. Any keen DC fan (which is pretty much most of the audience) knows the presence of Doomsday means a Superman “death” – and that’s exactly what happened.

Trailers done right

Not all movie trailers manage to mess up the hype for our favourite upcoming titles. For example, the upcoming Star Wars: The Last Jedi trailer hasn’t given us a lot to go on so far. A few short but relevant clips and showing off a few new looks – that’s about it. The excitement is a lot more real since we aren’t given too much to go on.

If trailers weren’t so keen to expose major plot details, I believe box office earnings would be a lot higher. People would be forced to go to the cinema to see said film, as they want their questions answered. If you answer that question in a trailer already, then why should people bother?

Source: C|net