I'm on the other side of the scale, I don't want to know anything about a book or movie. I often don't even look at the posters, never mind trailers. I just need the genre of a book and to know if it's good.

The reason is just that I want to go in surprised. Very often I've read books or watched movies that I probably wouldn't've because I thought "that story is dumb" or "that setting isn't for me". I don't want to read a book and think "When do we get there?". I've even disabled the progress display on my Kindle because I don't want to know if what I'm currently reading is still set-up or the grand finale. If I know a thriller has 100 pages left when the murder has been found I know that something is still going to happen and that affects how I read the rest.

It may have to do with how much you like being surprised and why you read a book. If it's for the prose then the surprise doesn't matter. If you enjoy a story well told then the surprise doesn't matter. But I like being surprised and going into it without any bias and as little prior knowledge as possible.

This is sorta funny to me as when I read I can sometimes skip several chapters ahead or to the end of the book, even with movies and shows I can watch them in whatever order. What happens later in a story has no impact at all on whether I will like the road to it. Most of the time I find myself not even remembering the parts ahead when I re-read them either, or just vaguely remembering them.

I've had it explained to me many many times, the thing about surprises and plot twists and whatever but really it doesn't phase me at all.

Did you go to school with me 20 years ago? :D

I had a classmate who was a voracious reader. They happily read book series with overarching plots out of order and didn't bother them the slightest bit.

"The second book was on loan, so I grabbed the third instead and read that".

Like what?

Haha, maybe. If you live in Sweden. But I'm guessing by your username that you are a few years older than me. However, I have read books in the wrong order!

Are there ever actual surprises though? I remember how amazing it was to see movies as a kid and find out about Darth Vader being Luke Skywalker’s father, but after 40 more years of watching movies, surprises are very few and far between. I have a better understanding of the language of movies.

I agree with you though for whodunit movies where there’s a lot of misdirection and surprise is the point. But knowing a lot about Barton Fink or some James Bond movie doesn’t diminish my fun.

It is not just a matter of surprise, though - in the presence of foreknowledge, it is harder for the author to create, and the reader to feel, any sort of dramatic tension.

There is a decline in big mind blowing conceptual shifts in media, like we experienced in Star Wars after decades of Spaghetti Westerns. Social and conceptual shifts are happening in real time, out in the world now. The big media build up to change has been reduced signficantly.

Goldeneye could have been more thrilling if the trailers withheld the reveal of Alec Trevalyn as the bad guy.

1995 was a year where most people couldn't look up movie information on the internet... going into the movie theatre blind, it would have been awesome to get the secret revealed on the big screen.

I very rarely get surprised even if I do read a book from page 1 to X and don't read ahead. Not sure why that is.

I went to see Cabin in the Woods based on nothing but the title and the 18A rating. It was quite an experience.

I really enjoyed the shock of seeing future Thor smack into the invisible barrier - his determination, the crescendoing music, the hope that _finally_ someone is going to do something... Splat.

Absolutely. I’m “surprised” by every new plot point in every book.

I'm also confused by this. I actually dislike the antsy "what happens next" feeling, because it's a better-than-even shot that the upcoming twist I can feel coming up is just disappointing and not worth the buildup. I'd much rather just know what's going to happen and appreciate the artistry in invoking the buildup, then how the twist is touched on by every other part of the narrative.

I also try not to spoil anything for people, but I will almost always spoil myself as soon as I get any real interest in what's happening, so I'm not distracted away from appreciating the craft of it. [It also means if, e.g. the character that intrigues me the most dies off early, I can just not participate in it.]

For example: The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones is a horror novel, which is alright, but the angle of horror it's taking is $familiar_theme + $native_framework. Knowing this makes me more happy to read the book, not less. Otherwise I see some really dumb opinions, like panning The Only Good Indians for having native american-centric conflict in it... when it is very clear in every jacket, blurb, author bio, etc. about the book screams "this is about native american stuff".

I agree with all of this.

>I actually dislike the antsy "what happens next" feeling

This part is especially true for content that is supposed to be.. cringe.. embarrassing.. sort of? Like imagine things like a comedy or drama that is supposed to evoke those feelings. I can't take it. It physically hurts. Sometimes I have to pause or stop watching. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was such a movie, I just couldn't finish it. I read about the story instead and figured out what was going to happen and then I could watch it, no problem.

Yes! Especially the cringe! When the twist is cringe inducing I also have to put that stuff down and leave for a while. I once blind-watched a movie, and some chick in the movie screamed upon seeing a surprise corpse that was clearly actually a pretty female actor with full hair and makeup pretending to be dead. It was so cringe inducing I had to leave the theater for a few minutes, in what was meant to be a thriller or scary movie or something. If I knew the corpse would be there I could at least go 'yep, here is the cringe bit, it'll get better later'.

That being said there is work I'm happy to go into blind because I trust the creator of the media. I will buy and read my favorite authors with no summary or anything, e.g. the Murderbot series. I simply trust they have their craft down that nothing hits wrong, and chances are good, they just pull it off and it all works.

I go in blind with some authors too but more often then not I just spoil it anyways, even if I know I can trust the author. Because the journey is still what matters. :)

I used to often flip to the end of the book when I was in the middle of reading it, just to get the answer to some question that I knew wouldn't be resolved for a while. I wouldn't do that with mystery novels, but otherwise yeah spoilers have never bothered me.

But I'm someone who has re-read favorite novels dozens of times, which I suppose is about appreciating great writing.

I do the same, but also with mystery content. I re-read stuff on and off as well. Also re-watch movies and shows too. If I like something, I like something.

For me it takes away from the dopamine of the situation.

If I'm not predicting and anticipating things happening, I'm not really getting much out of the story. The edge of the seat feeling has been taken away so it feels like it's not really worth spending the time.

Oddly enough this somehow still works fine for things I have already seen and thoroughly enjoyed - for example I could go binge Breaking Bad twice in a row at any time, no bother.

I guess in that case I'm looking forward to the great plot points and storylines I know are coming, but if something of unknown quality has been spoiled then I don't know the journey is good enough to plow through, so there's no anticipation and no dopa to be mined.

In summary spoilers take away the dopamine so there's no longer any drive or desire to begin consuming it in the first place.

It's like I understand the meaning of what you are saying but not really comprehending the feeling of it. I honestly get the same edge of the seat feeling with new media as with old media, even if I know what is going to happen. I get the same dopamine from a good story whether I know about it or not, so for me it's always better to know because then I also know if it's worth watching or reading.

That's fair that! The world would be a boring place if we were all the exact same :)

I do know dopamine levels/production/uptake vary from person to person (ADHD being one of the more famous results of a lack-of, for example) - Sounds like you've landed in the sweet spot to enjoy media however it's presented! :)

It sure would! And I have, as long as I can convince people to spoil things for me! :)

That sounds super weird to me. Even a minor spoiler for me ruins everything. My goal is to be immersed in any kind of entertainment I spend time with, and spoilers are my absolute worst enemy.

Which in turn is super weird to me, is what I'm saying :)

If I know the key cliffhanger or major plot point in a book, I don’t even bother reading it. I can also never really read a book or watch a movie/series more than once.