Another week, another saga of Horror Discourse™ happening online. This time, however, there was some merit to the discussion du jour. Okay, a lot of merit. We’re talking horror trailers. While Abigail unfortunately failed to take a huge bite out of the weekend box office, it did manage to successfully win over both the critics and audiences who saw it. In our review, we said, “Directing duo Tyler Gillett and Matt Bettinelli-Olpin are back to their best with an original, gory story about a heist gone wrong and one nasty juvenile vampire in a tutu,” awarding the film 4.5 stars out of 5. Abigail, really, is great. There was just one problem—the trailer spoiled its biggest twist.
Some genre fans online were disappointed because Abigail, for its first half, plays coy about the true nature of Alisha Weir’s kidnapped, titular ballet dancer. Abigail endeavors to cull tension from its audience not knowing she’s a blood-sucking fiend, but for anyone who saw the trailer, that tidbit had long been known. So, naturally, it brought with it heaps of discourse about whether trailers should spoil movies and, more broadly (and importantly) whether those spoilers even matter much.
Do Trailer Spoilers Matter That Much?
They do. At least to me. Is a spoiler enough to tarnish my enjoyment of any given movie? No, not necessarily. Yet some movies, by design, swagger around an eventual reveal, consciously withholding information until the storyteller decides, on their own, to share more. Some key beats, traits, and twists are withheld for a reason. Preempting them via a burgeoning marketing machine, letting everyone in on the secret, undermines not only the creative process, but also the act of filmmaking in general. The camera is a lens. The entire time, audiences are privy only to what they are meant to be shown. A second or third-act reveal is measuredly timed—to see it before it’s ready risks shattering the illusion.
Abigail is not the first movie to do it, and its marketing is hardly the most egregious example. It’s worth noting, too, that the filmmakers rarely have any involvement in the process. Trailer houses and executives do, and their primary motivation is butts in auditorium seats, spoilers be damned. A vampire ballerina was a remarkable way to get Abigail on radars, so whether Radio Silence wished to withhold that reveal or not didn’t matter—there was money to be made, so Abigail needed to bear her fangs.
Just, for a moment, however, imagine seeing Barbarian, Malignant, or the much-lauded The Coffee Table for the first time well-versed in what surprises were in store. Would it have ruined the movie? No, but it certainly would have dampened the filmmakers’ intentions. So, in the spirit of all things Spoilerific (also trademarked), we’ll be revisiting some of the worst modern examples of horror trailers that ruined some of the fun.
Scream (2022)
I’m not trying to rag on Radio Silence here, I promise. I’m a huge fan. I think their rebooted Scream is excellent, even if it did spoil almost the entirety of its opening kill (so to speak). While the movie expands on star Jenna Ortega’s inciting phone call and attack, the first trailer released hit all the key moments. From the trailer alone, audiences could easily piece together what was going to happen and when, including where Ghostface would ultimately pop out of. While the movie subverted expectations nicely by having Ortega survive the encounter, it would have been nice to go in as blindly as possible.
Quarantine
One of the key spoiler-crowd refrains is to simply not watch trailers if you’re worried about having anything spoiled. Even the best trailers will show you something you’d wish you hadn’t seen, so when the latest, buzziest trailer arrives online, just avoid it. I do. The problem is I go to the theater a lot. An ungodly amount. I’m there every week (I have a rewards card and I love accumulating points). Part of the problem, especially at national chains, is the sheer volume you’re subjected to before your showtime starts.
At Arcadian last week—a movie I wisely went into blind, truly the best way to watch movies if you can—I sat through seven trailers before the feature started. Sure, I could get up and leave until they finished, but be for real with me right now—who is going to do that? If the trailer for Quarantine, 2008’s remake of [Rec] had been screened, I would have seen the end of the movie. Literally, the final shot. Quarantine is a good movie, but its trailer is infected with the worst modern marketing impulses.
Smile
Smile is the middle of the pack here. I have my issues with Parker Finn’s runaway success, though, despite that, there was plenty of haunting imagery to be found, especially with those damned, smiling faces. Too bad the best of them, including the movie’s standout scare, were spoiled in promos leading up to release. Smile conceptualizes the jump scare problem. Jump scares don’t work in a trailer. There’s a process for making a good jump scare a good jump scare—I’ve even written about it—and that’s almost impossible to achieve in two minutes. So, it won’t scare anyone streaming the Smile (2022 Horror Trailer HD 1080P) video on their phone, but it will ruin its impact when they finally watch the movie in full.
When a Stranger Calls
I revisited Simon West’s When a Stranger Calls just a few weeks ago, actually. I’m glad the movie has its fans, but nothing—not overly critical nothing, either—happens until the final fifteen minutes. So, I can sympathize with the trailer house responsible for selling a glossy teen slasher with just ten minutes of worthy footage available to use. The trailer is basically the finale of the movie. Save yourself an hour and just watch that. I’m kidding… but also…
What Lies Beneath
As a counterpoint, What Lies Beneath holds up on subsequent watches even when you know what’s going to happen. It’s a testament to Michelle Pfeiffer’s sensational performance and Robert Zemeckis’ craftsmanship that, despite knowing the twists, What Lies Beneath manages to cull sufficient tension whether it’s a first-time or hundredth-time watch. In fairness, anyone who has ever seen a movie before will guess what’s going to happen within five minutes, but that doesn’t make its trailer—which spoils everything—any less egregious. We were probably going to figure it out anyway. At least give us the chance to do so. The trailer is basically that grade school parent who does your science project for you, even though you’re capable of doing it on your own. Let me make my own volcano!
Scream VI
Hello, Radio Silence. We meet again. There’s got to be some hidden beef the trailer houses have with Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett because, when given the chance, they spoil the best parts of their movies. The Scream VI trailer isn’t as egregious as 2022’s trailer, but it does, in no particular order, spoil; the ladder escape, Gale’s attack, and Mindy’s subway showdown. All three moments come in either the second or third act, though the trailer doesn’t just preview them—it shows audiences the concluding note to all three scenes. Scream VI was tense, but I knew how each of the above scenes was going to play out.
Friday the 13th
Marcus Nispel’s remake of Friday the 13th is a great movie. Take it from our own Tyler Doupé who recently argued it outclasses the original. Unlike some other seminal slasher franchises, Friday the 13th has never been particularly concerned with chronology, lore, or canon events. Stuff just kind of happens in a timeline that, based on dialogue in the films, has the later sequels taking place in the late 1990s and early 2000s (despite being released years before). So, a remake didn’t really have a ton of baggage to contend with. Just let Jason loose to slaughter some folk. And that’s exactly what Nispel and company did.
The only problem is that, despite being remarkably stylish, the theatrical trailer thought the best way to market the movie was to reveal every single kill. Counting up from one to thirteen, the trailer cuts from death to almost death with ease. It looks great, but it also renders the movie’s biggest surprises moot.
The Conjuring
This will be short and sweet. I imagine most of the attendees at my 2013 showing of James Wan’s The Conjuring either hadn’t seen the trailer or had seen it so long ago that they’d forgotten most of it. That’s the only explanation I have for the raucous explosion of screams as Lily Taylor’s Carolyn Perron, lighting a match while locked in the cellar, is terrified by spectral hands that appear behind her and clap. You know the scene. It’s the movie’s best scare, the perfect illustration of why The Conjuring is the premier haunted house flick. Too bad the first theatrical trailer ended with that scene exactly. Like with Smile, jump scares don’t work in a trailer, and showing the best one just feels like a waste. Imagine if The Exorcist III trailer had opened with the statue scene.
One Missed Call
You know how when a trailer drops, there’s always someone who remarks, “Great, now I’ve seen the entire movie.” Sometimes that’s an embellished bit of online vitriol—social media makes everyone contentious over the most inconsequential things—but sometimes, those concerns are valid. Take 2008’s remake of One Missed Call and its first theatrical trailer. Not that it’s a movie worth watching, necessarily (though I have it on good authority Takashi Miike’s original is sensational), but if you were a teenager like me at the time, it probably had some appeal. Too bad the trailer is one of the worst iterations of truncating an entire movie into a trailer I’ve seen. This marketing reel basically has its own three-act structure, detailing deaths, twists, and even the movie’s conclusion. It’s a call worth missing.
The Strangers: Chapter 1
To end on a newer note, I can’t say for certain whether Renny Harlin’s The Strangers: Chapter 1 will be any good and, more importantly, whether its trailer spoils quite as much as it seems to. Smaller enterprises like this are tough because, whether I want to or not, I’m always aware of proximity. If there are just two leads, I can’t help but wonder where one is as the other is assailed by killers. Have they been killed by that point? Are they just vibing somewhere else? I’m not sure, but the trailer is so chock full of action in its latter half, that it’s hard to feel like I haven’t, much like One Missed Call, seen a truncated cut of the final movie. I’m hoping not as a Renny Harlin stan, but the trailer isn’t a great augur for what’s to come.
So, those are just ten examples of movies spoiled by their trailers. Mileage will vary, of course. For some, spoilers don’t matter all that much. Movies, whether sensemaking mechanisms or forms of escapism—or maybe even something more profound than that—serve different purposes for different audiences. For me, especially with horror movies, going in as blindly as possible makes for the best experience. No matter where you land, let me know what you think over @Chadiscollins on Twitter, and be certain to share with me which trailers you’ve loved and those you wished you hadn’t seen.
Categorized:Editorials Lists
