What are your thoughts on SPOILERS?

[Excalibur]

You can just say "This gun was seen at the end of the film in the hands of Mark Walberg." How can that spoil anything?

[MoviePropMaster2008]

Originally Posted by Excalibur

You can just say "This gun was seen at the end of the film in the hands of Mark Walberg." How can that spoil anything?

YES, That's what I figured. How hard is it NOT to put forth spoilers. Some of the new members put in TONS of extraneous details that are really bad spoilers. Sometimes I just edit them to make the details more generic while still being accurate.

[MT2008]

Originally Posted by MoviePropMaster2008

YES, That's what I figured. How hard is it NOT to put forth spoilers. Some of the new members put in TONS of extraneous details that are really bad spoilers. Sometimes I just edit them to make the details more generic while still being accurate.

Well and done, but here's the thing: IMFDB is a Wiki for identifying firearms in movies. The entire idea of this site is that if somebody's trying to identify a particular firearm they saw in a movie, they come on here. What that means is that generally, they will have already seen in the movie in the first place, and thus know all the spoilers. After all, why would they be trying to ID the guns in a movie unless they had seen the movie already?

Again, don't get me wrong; you are correct that it might be best to warn readers about spoilers at the top of the movie entry. But I think it's still a little too extreme to suggest that we should make things as simple as "Character A uses a Beretta 92F, which is later used by Character B."

Also, there's one other thing to consider: Sometimes the screencaps themselves serve as spoilers. A recent example occurred to me after looking at the "Red Heat" page, where you see a character lying dead with his gun (a Taurus PT99) sitting nearby. Doesn't that by itself tell you something about what happens to the character in the movie?

[MT2008]

Originally Posted by Excalibur

You can just say "This gun was seen at the end of the film in the hands of Mark Walberg." How can that spoil anything?

True, but that just seems a little too generic.

[MoviePropMaster2008]

Originally Posted by MT2008

True, but that just seems a little too generic.

How is that too generic? How is the reader being cheated out of information? That would only be the case if the reader was confused if the character used multiple guns at the end, but by this time, it is assumed that we have educated the reader as far as recognizing the firearm.

Not everyone has seen a movie before looking at a page. I am (unfortunately) AVOIDING some pages that Gunmaster45 has worked hard on, and have not been able to comment on them (despite his request for input) because I have NOT seen the movie yet. I will see them soon and hopefully not keep him waiting forever Also people, like me for example, are sometimes encouraged to see a movie we would otherwise not see if we see that the film has a slew of interesting firearms.

Anyway, that's just IMHO.

[Gunmaster45]

I have to be careful here since I'm not sure MPM has seen Wanted yet.

You see a screencap of Wesley shooting a main character, kind of hard to not spoil that one.

[MT2008]

Originally Posted by MoviePropMaster2008

How is that too generic? How is the reader being cheated out of information? That would only be the case if the reader was confused if the character used multiple guns at the end, but by this time, it is assumed that we have educated the reader as far as recognizing the firearm.

Not everyone has seen a movie before looking at a page. I am (unfortunately) AVOIDING some pages that Gunmaster45 has worked hard on, and have not been able to comment on them (despite his request for input) because I have NOT seen the movie yet. I will see them soon and hopefully not keep him waiting forever Also people, like me for example, are sometimes encouraged to see a movie we would otherwise not see if we see that the film has a slew of interesting firearms.

Anyway, that's just IMHO.

True, although I think this isn't too likely with most readers. Personally, I'm not in the habit of looking at pages before I've seen the movie, but then again, I've seen so many movies featuring guns in my (short) lifetime that it's rare I find one on here I haven't seen.

But again, don't forget that the images can still ruin surprises for a reader. I really think we just have to accept that by nature of what we do, we're gonna ruin surprises for people who haven't seen movies. So it seems pointless to go to such ridiculous lengths to avoid spoilers.

Oh, yeah, and here's another one: Have you seen a "A History of Violence"? There's a gun in that movie that is used by a particular character. The fact that I even mentioned this character, and the gun he uses, is another spoiler. Telling readers that he's even in the movie ruins a surprise.