Trailers are misleading on purpose, and if they did their job, you shelled out your hard-earned cash at the box office to go see the movie.
Once you're seated in the auditorium, the succession of previews is over, and the lights dim, the anticipation runs high.
How disappointing then, that a certain element in the film that you dedicated time away from home to go see turns out to be underwhelming.
What is it that indicates you're in for a non-refundable time of entertainment?
Moviegoers online shared their thoughts when Redditor Snoo_19146 asked:
"What’s the first sign that a movie is going to be bad?"
Pandering to the audience with lame humor is such a turn-off.
Soph-moronic Humor
"Also references to farts or weed. (Not jokes: references.)"
'Hey guys who wants to smoke some weeeeed?'
"Pause for laughter"
– Beingabummer
Premature Review
"It's advertised as one of the best movies of the year."
"And it's late January."
– M-Test24
The Poster Says It All
"There’s someone shrugging whimsically on the poster. 🤷"
– findlestick
Trailers alone can be a red flag.
Cliff's Notes Version
"When the trailer already tells you the entire movie."
– JAR_Melethril
"I've scratched titles off my watch list because I feel I've already seen the important parts of the film through the trailer, why bother?"
– butter00pecan
Recycling One-Liners
"If there are multiple trailers for a comedy movie, but they use the same joke in all of them."
– jelecel865
"And then you sit in the movie or on netflix and you're like. Oh, the joke from the trailer, I think that's where the movie starts to get funny, but it just transitions into the serious end arc and then is over."
– candybomberz
Familiar Jokes From Deadpool
"Something that always bugged me was the first Deadpool movie and it’s trailers. Don’t get me wrong, I love the movie, but here you have a character wearing a mask, played by an actor known for comedy in a movie that probably had a ton of jokes and multiple takes left on the cutting room floor."
"They could have EASILY dubbed different jokes into the trailer and used the final ones in the movie for an extra surprise. But nope, trailer jokes -> movie jokes. Kind of a bummer."
– LegendaryOutlaw
Some movies are destined for failure.
If It Ain't Broke
"It’s a remake of something that didn’t suck."
– Diesel07012012
"I hate that there’s so many remakes of decent/good movies. Feels like it’s just a safe money-grab. It would be cool if movies that didn’t do so hot, get reworked into good movie remakes, but I guess that’s too much of a risk for studios to bother with."
– AnEpicHibiscus
A Very Telling Intro
"An exposition in which one character explains everything that's going on to another character that should already know what is going on."
– rohawe8491
Familiar Setup
'Stacy sweetie, you know I haven’t been the same since your brother disappeared 4 years ago at the creek, & then we moved here to get away from the bad memories but it didn’t change anything & now you’re moving to college & I’ve been finding it hard to accept, & I’m struggling to hold down my job at the diner & that new guy I’m seeing is acting really shady & disappears for days, & completely unrelated to all that there’s mysterious murders happening since he arrived in town. You know all this Stacy..'
"whilst unpacking the shopping in the first scene."
– bluerain80
We Need A Reset
"Doctor: what we have here is a case of transcranial temporal reinforcement. If the patient is not restored to his original nacency the Einstein Bozeman condensate will reseed throughout the multiverse and congeal with unfortold consequences!"
"Other doctor: in English please!"
"Doctor: we need to send him back in time so his brain can restart the universe."
– ActorMonkey
Multiple Cooks
"Not always the case but when there are more than 3 writers a movie tends to lack vision. It can also occur due to rewrites. Not A Bomb Podcast reviews movies that bombed financially or critically and this is a subject often discussed if anyone is interested."
– earball1996
Maybe it's all about the journey.
Trailers do have to entice you with the best parts of a film promising audiences they'll be in for a good time.
However, movies just have to deliver on that promise by not revealing all the best bits in the trailer.
One movie I thought was going to be a succession of cheap one-liners with nothing but action was Disney's animated film Big Hero 6. The trailer was never appealing to me.
But after reading many positive reviews, I decided to give it a chance and I'm so glad I did.
It ended up being a very intelligent, emotionally mature film dealing with grief and an internal struggle about doing the right thing. While those are common tropes, it was all the more impactful watching animated characters dealing with serious themes and issues.
The bottom line is don't be quick to dismiss every movie based on its trailer.
You might be pleasantly surprised.
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