In a recent post on EmptyBlue, Feal87 discusses the issue of spoilers in anime review blogs, particularly how to make spoiler-free episodic posts and post titles. Since I only write full series reviews of anime, I thought it would be interesting to address the topic of spoilers in regards to those kinds of posts, and for anime reviewing in general…
Since it’s the age of Web 2.0 we’re talking about, it’s become increasingly more difficult to avoid spoilers when looking up information about or places to discuss any given media work. Some blogs and forums incorporate spoiler-tags to ensure that those who don’t want to be spoiled can safely read through their site, while other site authors make a conscious effort to avoid spoilers when writing or recording reviews. There’s no sure-fire way to avoid spoilers nowadays, especially on social networking or other sites where censoring spoilerific content cannot be done; probably the safest way is to stick to sites you know are spoiler-free or investigate carefully beforehand.
For myself however, anyone who’s read my anime reviews knows that they’re spoiler-filled. As for why I choose to make them that way, there are a couple of reasons. The lesser reason is because I mostly review seasonal anime and post my full reviews not long after each series ends, with the intention of sharing my thoughts about it with people who also just finished watching it. The readership I’ve built up over the years either watches the same series I do at roughly the same time I do, doesn’t mind being spoiled if they read my review of a series they haven’t seen, or just avoids reading such reviews altogether. Like Feal87 mentioned in his post, having spoilers in your reviews could potentially alienate new readers who want to avoid spoilers, but that’s the sacrifice I’m willing to make to keep reviewing anime the way I prefer and the way that’s been fine for me all these years. Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a comment on a post where someone complained that I spoiled a series for them. I guess people can easily see how I review anime and, if they care about being spoiled, either go elsewhere for their anime reviews or only read my reviews of anime they’ve seen already.
Which leads to the other and more important reason I choose to not make my reviews, or my posts in general, spoiler-free. I believe it’s impossible to properly critique something if you place limitations on what parts of it you can and can’t discuss. How can I properly criticize or praise an anime’s ending or major plot point if I can’t, well, actually talk about those things in detail? Some people say you can just use spoiler-tags for the spoiler content, but that still creates restrictions on how your review looks and it may end up being nonsensical to those reading it with spoiler-tags. I’d rather have it one way or the other. I’ve read/listened to some reviews that strive to be spoiler-free and they end up being very vague, with the reviewer having to throw out a lot of their own ambiguous opinions such as “That just didn’t make sense” or “That came out of nowhere” in place of actual examples from the thing they’re reviewing. However, while this type of review isn’t my preference, I don’t believe they’re bad and they definitely serve a purpose. Obviously, they’re the ideal review for someone interested in knowing about an anime, movie, or whatever without being spoiled. They’re sort of like detailed recommendations to me than actual reviews, which isn’t a bad thing if that’s what you’re looking for. The way I see it is that in a spoiler-free review, the author is most concerned about a general audience reading their review who may or may not already be familiar with the work, while in a spoiler-filled review, the author is most concerned about getting their thoughts out there and explaining exactly why they feel the way they do about what they’re reviewing.
While I don’t hold anything back in terms of spoilers in my anime reviews, I myself actually prefer not to be spoiled for anime I haven’t yet seen. I make rare exceptions for series I’m very much into and can’t wait to find out what happens next, like the Haruhi novels and Pokemon games for example, but in most cases I don’t want to know anything major beforehand. I’ve been spoiled a few times by in-person discussions with friends, mostly about later events in Naruto and One Piece I hadn’t yet gotten to. But for the most part, I’m pretty good at avoiding spoilers. How I’m able to do so is simple – I don’t read reviews of series I haven’t seen yet and rarely look up info about such series other than on sites with spoiler-free synopses like MAL and ANN. I also rarely go on forums or other chat locations, especially for series I haven’t finished.
And that pretty much concludes my thoughts on spoilers in anime reviewing. The reviews I write are spoiler-filled because their purpose is for me to express my thoughts about anime in the way I most enjoy. But I also understand not wanting to be spoiled, which is why spoiled-free reviews are great too :3
Exactly why I don’t generally read most review posts. I still subscribe because I want to get an impression of whether or not a show is worth watching. Most of us do not have the luxury of watchimg shows the season they come out. Even when I do watch “new” shows, I wait until the season is finished.
I respect that you are targetting those who have already watched the exact same shows you watched, but that’s a bit egotistical. There is certainly a place for spoiler-light reviews that isn’t filled well. This is why I tend to rely more on anidb to choose what to watch than anywhere else – it tells me what a show is about and a general idea of the quality without giving away the whole plot. Few reviewers can restrain themselves like that, assuming they are talking to someone else who blindly watched the same show as soon as it came out.
As a person with a literature degree, I understand that a detailed review has its place. However, that is often find in low volume literary journals, not in major media reviews which people rely upon to help select reading material. Likewise, in anime, many people are looking for high quality reviews targeted at those who have not yet watched, not a detailed literary analysis for those looking are wanting to discuss something they already watched.
By ignoring the one audience in favor of the others, you are making your reviews much less useful for readers like me. In the ideal world, both types of reviews are valid. Episode reviews go into detail mid season, with spoilers. Then a summary review at end of season, covering the show without spoilers, giving a general discussion of themes and quality, possibly with links back to spoiler ed episode reviews. I would like that.
I understand what you’re saying, but like I said in the post, the main purpose of my blog is for personal enjoyment and for me to express my thoughts about anime the way I like. If other people enjoy my writing style too, that’s great, and if they don’t, I assume they’ll look for other bloggers who write in a way that’s more appealing to them. I don’t feel I have an obligation to compromise my writing style in order to attract a wider audience when that’s not my goal for the blog to begin with. But there actually are some blogs that review anime the way you seem to prefer – spoiler-filled mid-season reviews and spoiler-free full reviews. I’m sure you could find some on Anime Nano if you take a look.
I generally try to avoid major spoilers, but do discuss minor spoilers or those I know will not give away too much. when I review anime series as a whole or episodes and even books. I decide on if I can recommend the series based on content and if it is a book, how well it was produced, not just content. For example, in Negima! Volume 34, I rated quality of the release poor due to a bad job done in the TOC and AstroNerdBoy linked to it, since my review was posted before his. However, the content was good enough to still recommend.
Talking about how well something is produced is a good way to avoid spoilers. For some people, production values are very important. Making your review double as a recommendation is also a good way to go, especially if you don’t want to go into detail about the content for fear of spoilers.
If I see a review post from you about an anime I haven’t yet seen, I just don’t read it. It’s not that hard to do lol, if a person actually comments on your blog and complains about spoilers then it’s more their problem than yours. Also, even reading a review with few spoilers tends to unconsciously give the reader an opinion of the series before they’ve even seen it, which can marr the viewing experience – hence IMO it’s better just to avoid reading anything about a series before seeing it, if possible.
I agree that it’s difficult to write a good review without spoilers. I love to rant in my reviews and it’s sometimes difficult to do if you can’t make specific examples.
You reminded me that a good way to tell if a blogger or other reviewer tends to have spoilers in their reviews or not, without getting spoiled on something yourself, is to just read one of their reviews of something you’ve seen already. If they do indeed include spoilers in their reviews (like mine), then it’s very easy to do what you do and just avoid reading their posts about series you haven’t seen. But yeah, I’m like you in that I don’t care to read much of anything about a series before I’ve seen it other than a quick synopsis. I’m typically just not motivated to research something I’m not even sure I’ll like yet.
Writing a good review without spoilers is difficult, but not impossible. I think too many reviews are watered down into half-plot summaries exactly because it is easier to do things this way. Anime bloggers don’t get paid per page, let’s cut out the parts that are only there to make the article longer ;).
I’d say there are two golden rules regarding spoilers when writing reviews. One is knowing your audience, like you mention. You can either write with no regard for spoilers whatsoever for people who have already seen the series, or make sure to spoil nothing for newcomers. I don’t think there’s any room for middle ground solutions. Spoiler tags in the middle of a review look silly to me – if you can read the review while omitting a paragraph here or there, then the cohesion of the entire piece probably wasn’t that great to begin with…
The other thing would be to make the spoilers count. If you mention specific plot events, they better have a decisive on how you viewed the entire show. If it’s not about commentary, it ends up as a summary and not a review.
I actually make a conscious effort to avoid summarizing in my anime reviews and will try to thoroughly discuss a plot point only if it’s relevant to the opinion I’m expressing (I might falter on this here and there, but that’s what I try to do ^^,,,) I agree that one should either go with one style or the other – stuff like spoiler tags can inhibit reading enjoyment, especially when they occur in mid-sentence (like on TV Tropes).
I don’t mind spoilers all that much; as someone who has thought about becoming a critic, I agree with the paragraph that mentions avoiding spoilers ruins the ability to properly critique shows (and this can go for other non-TV mediums, for that matter). Also, describing a show can only give away so much without actually seeing it for yourself; sure, the actions that take place can be described, but words can only cover a part of the feeling behind a scene or entire episode and even with that being said, the emotion of something is ultimately subjective unless described in concrete terms (e.g. what the show meant to convey versus what was actually presented).
That’s a great point. Even if someone spoils the ending of a series for example, they (usually) don’t describe things like the exact cinematography, voice acting and music, every scene that played out, etc,. So while the events of the series were spoiled, the experience certainly wasn’t because that’s something that’s unique to each viewer. Even if I know everything that happens in a show, I want to see how it comes about with my own eyes and what kind of personal emotional impact, if any, it has on me.
I prefer reviews with lots of spoilers, and information. I will not read a review about something that I’m interested in watching. Like you, I will just read the synopsis, and then make a decision to watch it from that. If I like the first 3-4 episodes, I’ll keep watching. If not, I’ll drop it, and then may read a full review to see if I missed anything.
I do prefer full reviews, with spoilers and all, because they do make for a better discussion… Otherwise, we’ll end up talking like Asahina about *classified information* all over the place simply not to reveal about *classified information* regarding the *classified information*… Kind of bothersome :S
I’ve noticed that you read my reviews even for series you haven’t seen ^_^ People like you who don’t care about spoilers are few, but they’re certainly there. Like I said to CoolCARTGuy above, sometimes it doesn’t matter if you know everything about a series beforehand because you still won’t know you’re personal reaction to it unless you watch it.”Seeing is believing” if you will. You may read a spoiler-filled review that either praises or condemns the series, but when you watch it yourself, you form a totally different opinion than the author. So spoilers don’t necessarily equal definite ruining of a series.
I agree with you, I think you can’t really talk about a series without talking about all of it, and especially the major twists and turns. My impressions are basically spoilers for each and every volume I do, but I always provide the manga I’m talking about in the title, so if someone hasn’t read that particular volume, they know to avoid my impression of it. Most people seem to do this, so I’ve rarely gotten spoiled by a blog post. In fact, that’s why I find it hard to follow anime blogs as I rarely watch the most current anime, so I avoid posts about them. I like to watch things that have already finished airing to got at it at my pace. I also find it much more likely to get spoiled on forums where sometimes someone just states something because the discussion goes in that direction and they assume since the show/manga is old, it’s not really spoiler territory anymore.
I also provide very straight-forward post titles for my reviews, always with the name of the anime in the title or the first paragraph so people will know right away whether I’m going to be talking about a series they’ve seen or not. Actually, in the post I linked, Feal87 talks about how it can be tricky to have a post title that stands out from the rest and grabs readers’ attention, without spoiling anything. But I think that’s more of a problem for episodic posts, or for people who are particularly concerned about having their review posts stand out from the rest.
Yeah, definitely. My impression and review titles are pretty standard: Impression: Name of manga/anime + volume # or the specific episodes I’m dealing with. Review: Name of the manga/anime/game + which volume/DVD. The downside is definitely that the titles are less eye grabbing, but I figure if someone has read/watched the series, they are probably more interested in someone else’s thoughts; and if they haven’t, they would probably avoid it even if I tried to get their attention. Granted, I do try to keep reviews more spoiler free since they are suppose to be a general overview of the manga/anime/game in question for those curious. Impressions are massive spoiler mines though. xD
I can tell that most people in this comment’s section don’t seem to agree with me, but being spoiler-free in your reviews does not limit a writer. It all depends on how you approach a review, and just because you aren’t mentioning the exact detail of a major spoiler, it doesn’t mean you have to dance around it writing vague words to achieve a similar idea. For example, in a spoiler-free review you could say “the ending was bad because it still left unanswered questions to the crime…”, it’s to the same degree in a spoiler-filled review saying ,”the ending was bad because we never found out why Johnny wanted to kill Jones…”. In both cases, the same meaning is said, except in the case of the spoiler-free one, it can appeal to both people who have seen it (since they’re smart enough to know what you’re referring to) and people who haven’t seen it.
If you couldn’t tell, my reviews tend to be spoiler-free for the most part. Much like you and your spoiler-filled reviews, it’s what I prefer. I actually don’t do it with the intentions of making my reviews be able to target those who haven’t seen it either, it’s just the way I’ve been taught to do things and the way I’m most comfortable with. When I write a review, it doesn’t even come to mind that I’m not revealing spoilers, I just feel that I can express why I liked and disliked in a show in great deal without having to give key points away.
Even if you’re someone (I’m not implying you!) who chooses to write reviews and explain exactly what happens throughout a show in great detail, it doesn’t mean that you’ve managed to express yourself better than someone who managed to write a more concise and comprehensive critical analysis of a show without using spoilers. Ultimately, people’s own preference aside, if someone cared to put enough practice into this way of reviewing (which is the most common amongst professional film critics) , they should be able to express what they want to say without using spoilers, if they choose to. Both are perfectly fine ways to write a review, but I just personally feel that in a spoiler-free review doesn’t have to limit someone.
You’ve brought up good points and I can definitely see how, in many cases, you can have a spoiler-free review that’s still pretty specific, like the example you gave. But I also feel that if you want to really back up your opinion, you’d have to describe spoiler-filled events. For my style of reviews, if I feel an ending left unanswered questions, I’d say which questions, why leaving them unanswered was detrimental to the story, stuff like that…but again, that’s just my style and a review that’s spoiler-free can be just as beneficial to someone else. I understand that professional film critics use spoiler-free reviews because it’s their profession, with millions of people reading what they say for movies they haven’t seen, so it wouldn’t do for them to write while disregarding their target audience. But with unofficial blogging, we can write how we want – you’re right that if the author is writing for themselves first and their audience second, they should write in whatever style they prefer :)
Well, I believe that if someone is following episodic posts, spoilers should be expected. It’s not always going to be just “Wow, that was a great episode, etc, etc”, there’s a high chance they’ll might be spoiled in some way. This applies even more to series review posts, since I don’t think you can fully trust someone’s opinion about a series as a whole without them properly dissecting the series’ plot in order to do it. A good review isn’t always spoiler-filled, but a good run around the plot is usually integral or hard to avoid. If an ending’s particularly good or controversially bad, it’s hard not getting into specifics or going into a huge rant about it.
Though, I do think that common courtesy should be applied, such as putting major spoilers after the cut-off. Once readers click that “more” button, it’s all on them. I mean, if someone is following an anime and decides to read about the episodes online beforehand, I really don’t think it should be the writer’s responsibility to hold their hand by making everything spoiler-safe. Ultimately, it’s all based on decision with both the writer and the reader. Hopefully most people do realize this, like you said, I have not seen that many comments on your blog or others that complain about being spoiled. When fear of being spoiled comes into play, it’s best not to do things halfheartedly and just avoid anything that can possibly spoil you..
The only time I think bloggers should be cautious of spoilers is when what they’re doing is merely recommending a series to their readers. That’s just my honest opinion. As a blogger, I do this, and as a reader, I read posts about the series I’m following after I’ve already seen it.
Yeah, I like to review anime series as a whole, so obviously the endings of plot-driven anime are important in rating them. And if I want to properly explain why I rated them the way I did, I have to talk about the ending or other major plot points. I could find a way to dance around the specifics if I wanted to, but that’s just not the style I prefer.
Heh, I follow your advice for series I haven’t seen and just avoid reading anything about them other than a brief synopsis on MAL or something. I can generally get an idea of how people feel about the series just by Anime Nano post titles or tweets on Twitter, which are surprisingly not full of spoilers ;)
Given the popularity of social networking, encountering spoilers is increasingly being difficult. At one instance, I had to apply filters on my timeline to prevent spoilers when Madoka was airing last year. I think spoilers can ruin an experience for plot-orientated shows or ones that have surprises. For comedy and slice of life shows, it doesn’t really matter if that gets spoiled since it’s just some life stuff and jokes. Not much to spoil there.
On the other hand, I agree that it’s difficult to write a review without spoilers. I feel that they are needed to back up opinion or analyze a part that one particularly liked. This is why I am careful not to give away some crucial details in post titles. However, I only focus on a few aspects of a show or series so that the reader won’t get completely spoiled and still have an incentive to watch it for themselves.
I don’t follow many people on Twitter, so that could be one reason why I don’t get spoiled there often. But I think the main reason is because most of the people I do follow are watching the same seasonal anime at the same time I am :3
I also sometimes focus on a specific aspect of a show for a finale review, like I did with Nisemonogatari and Madoka, rather than spoil everything. But even for my regular series reviews, I won’t give a synopsis of everything – just what’s important to back up my opinions.
I have always wondered why a lot of people seem to have problems writing reviews that are spoiler-free. I never had that sort of problem. You can still often criticize the series properly, it’s just that it’s in a different manner as Losty said.
However, there is a risk of the review feeling generic if you do that. It’s the typical review you can apply to any series, which can be bad. But once again: it depends on HOW you do it. Don’t focus on EVERYTHING just for the sake of it; focus on what makes the series unique! A series by Shaft would naturally have focus on the art, a character-driven story would have focus on that and so on. Mirror that in your review.
And of course, you can still bring up examples that have spoilers (once again, depending on the show, the definition of a spoilers depends (in a comedy, go on, spoil a funny scene and I don’t mind)).
Do this, and other things, and writing a spoiler-free review is a piece of cake. Some people even seem to mistake a review for an analysis, which is weird to me. Sure, you can bring up something that caught your interest, but this is a review, so don’t make it deep. In that case, do an indepth analysis instead.
I’m getting a bit confused, this feels all over the place. Hope you understood :p
I understood XD I think I would end up being too generic in my reviews if I strive to be spoiler-free. I like to point out the unique aspects of each anime when I talk about them, whether they’re good or bad, and that often involves talking about major plot points. My posts can turn into analyses that way, as you mentioned, but if my thoughts about the series end up going in a specific direction like that, I’ll chance the post title and focus appropriately. For example, I focused on a certain aspect of Nisemonogatari when I wrote a post about the series, so I didn’t title it “Nisemonogatari review” since it ended up not really being a review.
I can pretty much agree that it’s going to be really difficult to write an anime review without at least mentioning a spoiler or two to either tell a reader why you liked it or why you hated it. This doesn’t mean I would want reviews of all spoilers. I think those types of reviews just add a nice number to the word count. Control that use of spoilers :3
Also, I noticed someone commented about movie reviews. Aren’t they usually pretty short? Especially since it’s a film as opposed to a TV series.
I agree that spoilers should only be used to back up your opinion or serve another purpose for your review (unless you specifically are trying to also write a full synopsis for the series). Saying more than is necessary isn’t good for any type of writing =P
I’ve read/watched some pretty long movie reviews actually – so I think it just depends on the person doing the reviewing and how much they want/need to say.
I am exactly like you when it comes to spoilers. I generally like to write about spoilers as well – often they are the ‘meat’ of a series, and since I prefer to write about themes and characters rather than full-on reviews I find myself writing about spoilers pretty often. I try to make sure I warn readers of spoilers, however, because I also hate being spoiled. It took me a long time to get around to watching Princess Tutu because I had the ending of the anime spoiled for me, and I still haven’t been able to watch Escaflowne because I know what will happen.
Yeah, spoiler material is often what makes or breaks a series for me, so if I’m reviewing it, I want to bring up spoilers in order to make my claims. Calling it the “meat” of a series is a good way to put it.
I don’t think I’ve ever been spoiled on a series I hadn’t actually started watching, not yet that is =P
Yeah, this post certainly reminded me of a few times where I should have set my curiosity aside, and avoid checking out on more info or going into anime discussions. I had been spoiled countless times on MAL discussions, and also on various other anime forums. The only problem with these discussions, is that some of them read light novels/visual novels (or other original adaptions) before the anime, and of cause, some people just like to brag, and ended up spoiling everyone of future events in the anime.
I think your points in regard to reviewing is valid too. My review are mostly spoilers-free (at least I hope they managed to accomplish that), but now that when I think about it, they mostly lack the details and in-depth look that spoilers-filled reviews manage to accomplish.