Discussing titles of forthcoming episodes?

October 19, 2016 8:02 AM

It is considered a spoiler to discuss the title of a forthcoming but as yet unshown episode of a show? It's quite common these days for future episode titles to become known or even be announced, but I could imagine some people might try to avoid even these. Do we have a FanFare policy on this?

The episode titles for the remaining Season 1 episodes of Westworld are available, and some of them tie in to emerging plot threads. Is it legitimate to post speculation that mentions these titles?

posted by Major Clanger (8 comments total)

My personal opinion is that I can't see where you could discuss this in fanfare and not violate my personal minimal effort to avoid spoilers. Not to say anyone has to care about my position, but just to offer my perspective. Even in a full-season thread, titles that reveal the direction something is going would be a bummer.

Personally I don't care about revelation of the upcoming episode's title, as someone who watches the "next week!" shorts, but I wouldn't want to see/know past that point. Speculation based on the stuff we've all seen up till that point I don't mind either. But those titles are outside facts and I wouldn't have gone looking for them.
posted by phearlez at 11:01 AM on October 19, 2016 [2 favorites]

Understood; that's two comments against such discussion (here and on the main discussion thread) and none in favour. I will just sit on my ridiculous speculation inspired theory for the time being!
posted by Major Clanger at 2:52 PM on October 19, 2016

Maybe for shows where people would like to see them they could start a "[Show title] Spoiler Discussion" thread in FFTalk where absolutely all rules are off?
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:41 AM on October 21, 2016

Actually, I could go for that in general. I'm a compulsive reader of sites that try to suss out upcoming storylines through future episode titles, casting calls, set pics, etc.

If such a thread existed in FFTalk in the below format, would it be permissible?

Post Title: "Arrow Spoiler Discussion"

Above the fold text: discussion of rumored/potential spoilers for the television show Arrow. Clicking into this article will very likely expose you to potential spoilers.

Even if you just wanted them to be specific to one kind of spoiler, it seems like FFTalk could work for that.

Post Title: "Future Arrow Episode Titles (SPOILERS)"

Above the fold text: Discussion of reported episode titles for the television show Arrow. Clicking into this article will very likely expose you to potential spoilers.

That would be fine, too, right?
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:48 AM on October 21, 2016

This maybe could have gone in MeTa, since it's at least sort of a policy question, though. Not sure how many people will even see it here...
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:06 AM on October 21, 2016

I think MeTa is a good idea, but while I'm here, I think maybe having a spoiler/speculation thread would work; it could be added as needed/wanted, with a "spoiler" option in the drop down menu. You'd just need one per show, and people could read down as far as they wanted. But if we're not supposed to discuss "next week on" I think this falls in the same category.
posted by Room 641-A at 7:01 PM on October 23, 2016

We could kludge spoilers and speculation under the "Books Included" option, or ask that it be revised to "Expanded Discussion" to address comics, alternate media (prior shows, movies), teasers and speculation, or add "Expanded Discussion" as its own option, with the idea that BI was only for "strictly canonical" materials, while "ED" includes hints, theories and expanded or multi universes.

For instance, I'm watching the new Dirk Gently series. It's very loosely based on the books (really "inspired by" or "a tribute to" instead of "based on the books"), which also have lead to six separate iterations of the title character, if not the base stories. Books Included could only cover the books, while Expanded Discussion could cover everything, and more.
posted by filthy light thief at 2:05 PM on November 15, 2016

This tab has been open in my browser for a while because boy howdy something must have distracted me, but:

1. Talking about it in MeTa would be totally fine, yeah, and
2. As a general solution having a dedicated Talk thread for spoilery stuff that clearly disclaims that in the title and above the fold while (obviously) keeping any such spoiler content out of the post text itself seems okay with me.
posted by cortex at 2:56 PM on November 16, 2016