I have been a comic fan for many years and I generally try to avoid getting spoiled when it comes to major plot points.  But, its getting harder and harder to avoid spoilers in today’s world.  Its not always social media that is the source of these spoilers either.  More and more often, big publishers want to get the press from mega events and do interviews with large publications.  That’s great except for the fact that these articles come out the day the book drops containing said event.  If an article publishes at 6:00 AM it spreads like wildfire and it never fails that I get spoiled before my local comic shop even opens.  Before I even have a chance to buy the book and read it.

How about an example?  When Peter Parker unmasked as Spider-Man in the Civil War books, this event was front page news on  USA Today.  And the front page news spoiled many comic fans before they even had a chance to pick up the book and read it for themselves.  How about another example then?  This is from roughly the same era in comics with the death of Captain America. Again this was published news both on the Internet and newspapers.  As a comic reader I was spoiled before I could even get to my local store.  Its a trend that is going across both Marvel and DC.  Similar things happened when Batman ‘died’ in the Final Crisis event.

This brings us to today and what has sparked me to write this semi-rant.  The final issue of Amazing Spider-Man is released today.  Understandably there has been a lot of hype behind the issue since the series ends at the milestone of issue #700.  The fact that its supposed to be the end of Peter Parker as Spider-Man has also generated a lot of buzz.  Needless to say there is probably going to be a ton of spoilers out there for this book.  In fact ASM writer Dan Slott mentioned this on twitter.

Fair warning: If you haven't had AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #700 spoiled yet– GET OFF THE INTERNET NOW! You should probably avoid news outlets too!

— Dan Slott (@DanSlott) December 25, 2012

ASM #700 SPOILERS will be out soon! Both online and in the news! Please don't check them out until you've read the issue. Thanks! Please RT.

— Dan Slott (@DanSlott) December 25, 2012

I saw this and I thought kudos to you Dan Slott.  Advising the fans not to ruin the experience of the reveal in ASM #700 is something I can get behind.  The problem is that avoiding the internet nowadays is just really hard to do. We use it for everything.  But it is possible to avoid the places you expect to see comic reviews and spoilers.  I know that my favorite message boards will be talking about what happens in the book, just like I know my Twitter feed will explode.  I can reasonably try to avoid those places until my local comic shop opens.

You might be asking, did I get spoiled for ASM #700?  The answer to that is yes, and I rather expected it to happen based on the way my newsfeed and Twitter feeds blew up.  I allowed myself to get spoiled by logging into Facebook and Twitter. That’s on me.  However, I’m sure people were spoiled by other sources.

Here’s the real problem, or at least what I perceive to be the problem.  By about 6:30 AM publications like USA Today were carrying the news of what happens in Amazing Spider-Man #700.  Don’t worry I won’t be going into the spoilers here, this article will be spoiler free.  This article was filled with quotes from the creative team including Mr. Slott.  Before anyone suggests it, no I am not trying to criticize Dan Slott with this article, comics being spoiled in mainstream press is just how things work now.  He is doing what he can to get extra publicity for his book and to bring in new readers.  I blame the culture of the Internet-age media for spoiling the comic readers before they can even buy the book in their local stores.  The media today wants to get the headline and the hits before they get beat by their competitors.  And the people that suffer are the fans who want to read the book and experience the big reveal for themselves.

Let me put this in context here.  Both comics and movies are legitimate art forms and sources of entertainment.  If a review of The Empire Strikes Back came out the morning the movie released and spoiled the reveal of Vader as Luke’s father everyone would cry foul.  Or, if the newspaper spoiled the death of Spock in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan the outcry would be incredibly loud.  So why is it okay to spoil comic books the day they release?  In my opinion, spoiling the end of ASM #700 is on par with spoiling the big reveal in The Empire Strikes back.  Simply put, its unacceptable.

Right now, the fans are stuck.  You either avoid the Internet and news sources until you can pick up your books, buy digitally, or accept being spoiled.  Personally, I don’t think this is really fair to the fans who have been reading the books for a long time.  The big reveal in any book is an awesome moment and to have it ruined sometimes ruins the book for me.  I don’t have the magic solution for how to solve the spoiler problem everywhere, but if the mainstream press could hold off on their articles until the day after a book drops it would help.  It doesn’t solve the social media problem, but its easier to avoid social media instead of the entire Internet.  However, my suggestion will never happen because to hold of a day on announcing the news means most of the buzz will be gone.

So, where does that leave us now?  The culture of spoilers just continues and eventually will become impossible to avoid.  As it is now, you have to make a special effort to avoid spoilers.  I shouldn’t have to go to extraordinary measures to avoid spoilers for these mega events.  Or should I?  You guys let me know if I’m being too sensitive.