Spoilers are just a fact of life today, the price we pay for living in such a connected society. You’ve really got to watch out for website headlines and Facebook updates ruining new developments from your favorite shows and movies, which is hard enough without spoiler trolls out there purposefully trying to screw everyone over. On that note, there are Star Wars spoiler trolls out there purposefully trying to screw everyone over.
The biggest and most organized example of this is ‘The Alliance to Preserve the Expanded Universe’, a Facebook group of Star Wars fans trying to overturn Disney’s decision to shut down the extensive book and comic universe that existed for decades before they decided their reboot needed to wipe the canon slate clean. As you’d imagine, many of the Star Wars fans who grew up reading X-Wing and Jedi Academy books were not happy, and now many of them plan on spoiling Star Wars: The Force Awakens in protest. Via Bleeding Cool:
Do you really have to worry about 3,694 people ruining things when the internet is such a big place? It depends. How many people do you figure were responsible for initiating the so called Snape Spoiler that ruined the end of the Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince book? Once it was out there, others found it so devious they couldn’t help but share it, and from there it became ‘a thing’ to throw it out in chats and message boards.
So, if Star Wars: The Force Awakens has some cool plot twists that can be boiled down to a simple meme (think “Luke, I am your father!”), watch out. People like ‘The Alliance to Preserve the Expanded Universe’ could weaponize it and release it upon the internet before you have a chance to experience it in theaters. I’d advise avoiding comments sections and forums until you’ve seen it for yourself, or use technology to help you out. Someone went ahead and made a browser plug-in that hides any Star Wars-related content from you unless you specifically opt in to look at it. If you’re not going to be able to see the movie until after Christmas, that may be your only hope.
