10 Movie Twists Given Away In The Trailers

Summary

• Hulk’s appearance in
  Thor: Ragnarok
  was spoiled in the trailers, taking away a potential surprise for the MCU.
• Revealing key plot twists in movie trailers can impact the viewing experience negatively.
• Some trailers, like those for
  Cast Away
  , spoil the ending, taking a lot of tension away from the story.

Given the emphasis that movie-going culture puts on plot twists and the lengths the cast and crew go to conceal them, it is surprising to think that some movie trailers revealed some of the biggest movie plot twists that should never be spoiled. Certain examples are from before the rise of the internet and modern fandoms; these trailers may have revealed spoilers because comparatively fewer people were actually going to see the trailer ahead of time. In doing this, they still took something away from the movie.

On the other hand, some plot twists are so ingrained into the premise of the movie that studios decide they have no choice but to spoil it for effective advertising. However, if they had gone the other direction — keeping a casting secret until the movie’s release or outright lying to cover up plot twists — the effect could have been spectacular. Furthermore, some plot twists are better known than their actual movie, making the shock value of the twist a long-forgotten concept, and the idea that the marketing willingly gave it away scandalous.

10 Hulk Fights Thor

Thor: Ragnarok (2017)

Hulk’s appearance being a surprise would have been one of the best moments in the entire MCU.

Part of the marketing for any given MCU movie is which heroes are part of the movie’s line-up, even if it is a solo movie. Captain America and Iron Man have their own built-in supporting casts that tend to follow them from movie to movie. It would have taken a lot of work to hide that Bruce Banner was joining the third Thor movie, when this information usually leaks ahead of time. Thor and Hulk’s fight was a part of the movie’s advertising from its earliest trailers.

Even the briefest cameos are hard to conceal, let alone a character who is playing a large role in the story — revisiting the chronicle of Andrew Garfield and Tobey Macguire’s participation in Spider-Man: No Way Home is evidence enough of this. Yet Hulk’s appearance being a surprise would have been one of the best moments in the entire MCU. At this point, Thor: Ragnarok has already established that it is comedy. Thor seriously heading into a gladiator fight before the amazing twist of Hulk showing up and Thor’s delighted reaction would have been perfect for the movie’s tone.

9 Candace Is The Leader Of The Resistance

Phineas And Ferb The Movie: Across The 2nd Dimension (2011)

In Disney Channel’s favorite inventor brothers’ first feature-length movie, they find themselves in an alternate universe where Dr. Doofenshmirtz reigns supreme. While Phineas and Ferb’s counterparts are average citizens, their friends are all part of a resistance loosely inspired by the dystopias/rebellions of The Matrix, Star Wars, and The Terminator. Even better is the fact that their sister Candace — a typical giggly teenage girl in their world — is the leader of the resistance. This plot point was established early on by the trailers.

At least one short promo shows Phineas actually stating, incredulously, that Candace is their leader. Others trailers show alternate Candace fighting a lot of robots and barking orders at the other characters, so it is not hard to infer what is going on. However, if one didn’t know this going in, it is actually a good twist. First, 2nd dimension Candace is seen at home, apparently living a normal life. Then, a funny callback to Candace’s wild parsnips allergy makes it seem like the resistance leader is a typical, grizzled general archetype, before Candace herself is revealed.

8 The Aliens Are Humans

Oblivion (2013)

Oblivion is a visually stunning, but plot-wise average post-apocalyptic sci-fi movie, with action stars Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman leading the way. It features a plot twist that has been used before, where the main characters discover that they are essentially fighting themselves. Earth’s alien invaders are posing as the rest of humanity and passing orders to Jack and his mission partner Victoria, when the true remainders of humanity are also on Earth. However, the story is considerably weaker when the trailers make this fact clear.

The first third of the movie is very tense when Jack is apparently fighting the aliens who remain on the planet, rather than the scavengers actually being humans. However, just about everyone knew that this “reveal” was going to happen. Director Joseph Kosinski frankly said that the Oblivion trailers spoiled Freeman’s role because it was him: When they had such a big actor involved, they had to advertise it. He also says that if this were not the case, there is no way it would have put it in the trailer, which proves that it was to the movie’s detriment.

7 Chuck Makes It Off The Island

Cast Away (2000)

In a rather famous example, one of the original trailers for Tom Hanks’ milestone role in Cast Away does reveal that Chuck eventually escapes the remote island and makes it back to civilization. A conversation in this trailer reveals that Chuck has been missing for four years, and that his loved ones held a funeral for him. This may provide the audience with some assurance about what kind of movie they are watching. However, it also robs Cast Away of a lot of tension.

Watching Cast Away without knowing that Chuck is going to be rescued is that much more terrifying. His struggles to survive and maintain his mental health in extreme isolation invoke even more despair. However, Cast Away is such a famous movie that has been around long enough that most people know the ending anyway, and there are few surprises associated with it anymore.

6 Will Proposes To Elizabeth In The Middle Of A Battle

Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End (2007)

Pirates of the Caribbean’s star-crossed lovers’ relationship is in jeopardy headed into the third installment (and the apparent final movie at that time). However, the trailer makes it pretty clear that Will and Elizabeth are going to reconcile when moments from their wedding in the middle of the final battle are shown — although people might have figured this out anyway because it is still a Disney movie. Still, Disney could have tried to preserve some of the tension and not admitted that everything was a forgone conclusion.

Will randomly proposing while he and Elizabeth are both trying to fight off adversaries is a bizarre twist, which benefits a movie that has weaker writing and is mostly getting by on spectacle. It oddly compliments what is going on, making for one of the greatest final battles in a Disney movie. All things considered, the producers shouldn’t have spoiled this when they really didn’t have to, and left this small surprise for the viewers to enjoy.

5 Hiccup’s Mother Is Alive (& A Dragonrider)

How To Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)

Valka’s survival is such a big plot twist that it is especially baffling they didn’t try to hide it. The only real reason to reveal it was so that they could advertise Cate Blanchette taking on a role, which wasn’t necessary for a movie that already had several big cast members, including Djimon Hounsou and Kit Harrington making their first appearances in the How to Train Your Dragon franchise. The trailer even treats Valka’s reveal like a plot twist, when Hiccup is certainly shocked.

How to Train Your Dragon 2 had enough plot to advertise without strictly revealing Valka’s presence. They still could have shown her with her mask on to hint at another character and prompt speculation and therefore more engagement. How to Train Your Dragon 2‘s trailers should have focused more on Eret, Drago, and the final battle, so the movie could also have the benefit of a solid plot twist.

4 Soylent Green Is Made From People

Soylent Green (1973)

The dated three-minute trailer for Soylent Green does not exactly say that Soylent Green is made from humans, but it strongly implies it. The advertising has never heard of subtlety, when it repeats the question of “the secret of Soylent Green” over and over again. The movie’s plot revolves around uncovering this, and the people in the dystopian society depicted are obsessed with the product.

The repetitive voice-over is at one point set against trucks scooping up people on the street. This is in addition to the voice associating the food product with “life” and “death.”The potential audiences watching this trailer can only imagine so many horrors that go into Soylent Green, and probably landed on the answer to that central question. It is an older type of advertising, which is more of a summary of the movie than a teaser.

3 The Deaths Of Everyone At Camp Crystal Lake

Friday The 13th (1980)

Friday the 13th, one of the most famous horror movies and plot twists of all time, also fell victim to an earlier style of advertising. However, the trailer is mostly effective for what the movie is. Friday the 13th‘s trailer strongly implies most of the characters’ deaths in the movie, including that of Kevin Bacon’s Jack. However, if the goal was to get people to go see a slasher where most people die, the trailer at least promises this.

The main thing is that the trailer does not reveal the identity of the killer, which preserves some surprises for the audience to enjoy. Friday the 13th is an earlier, genre-defining slasher, which means that some of the tropes it uses aren’t overused because it is the movie that made these tropes popular. People today might critique the trailer for spoiling everyone’s death, but they probably knew this was going to happen anyway, and some key parts of the movie were still a surprise then.

2 The Tidal Wave Planet

Interstellar (2014)

Interstellar is not Christopher Nolan’s best movie, but including just one more jaw-dropping twist could have worked in its favor.

The realization that the main characters are not looking at a mountain but an unimaginably massive tidal wave is a great moment that conveys the impact of what they are seeing. Sadly, the trailer also took this away from viewers. Interstellar still could have advertised the oceanic planet as well as Dr. Mann’s planet to impart that the movie would bring the main characters to strange new locations across time and space. However, if the tidal wave moment had been concealed, why they had to leave this planet would have been a mystery until the last minute.

The moment that clearly shows the tidal wave is actually very brief in the Interstellar trailer, which highlights that it could have easily been cut so it could be a twist in the movie. There are even clips of the astronauts panicking about getting off the planet that hint at something dangerous. Interstellar is not Christopher Nolan’s best movie, but including just one more jaw-dropping twist could have worked in its favor.

1 A Good Terminator Protects The Connors

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Terminator coming back reprogrammed to protect John Connor was a huge plot twist that changed the nature of the franchise. Perhaps if the team behind Terminator 2: Judgment Day had realized what this moment would be in pop culture, they would have made an effort to conceal it. However, the fact that the T-800 is on the Connors’ side this time around is ingrained into the marketing. On the other hand, knowing this ahead of time doesn’t really take much away from the best Terminator movie and one of the best action movies of all time.

The T-1000 is an awkward character for the first act of the movie if people think he is just a police officer, while there are still plenty of iconic scenes left with the T-800. Even with how movies are advertised today, the studio might still have gone ahead and included this in the trailer (especially considering that Terminator Salvation and Terminator Genisys also spoiled their twists ahead of time). It is along the same lines as the Hulk reveal, where knowing this “twist” is just the beginning of a great movie.