Trailers have this incredible power to get you all hyped up for a movie.
I mean, a good trailer can make you practically drool with excitement. It sets the stage, teases you with tantalising glimpses of the plot, and leaves you counting down the days until you can finally see the film.
But, man, when a movie’s trailer falls flat, it’s like a punch in the gut.
You’re all geared up for this epic adventure or mind-bending thriller, and then the actual movie turns out to be a total let-down.
It’s disappointing, frustrating, and it can make you feel betrayed when you feel like they sold you a roller-coaster ride and send you off to the merry-go-round instead.
It’s a shame because a bad trailer can really tarnish the reputation of an otherwise decent movie because it can rob a film of a fair chance to shine.
I’ve always been fascinated by the relationship between trailers and movies.
Sometimes, the whole movie is told in the trailer and watching the movie adds nothing to the story.
There’s nothing worse than watching a trailer for an upcoming movie you’re really excited about—only to realise halfway through that the trailer is giving away the entire plot.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is one of those movies.
There were several trailers for this mega-movie, but with the second promo trailer, the studio apparently decided to just give away the entire plot and hope fans were too devoted to the brand to care.
The trailer shares all the critical plot points, with scenes in order:
- Lex Luthor introducing Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent,
- then manipulating them both to get them to fight,
- the superheroes fighting each other,
- until surprise!—Doomsday comes to fight them both,
- but surpruse! Here’s Wonder Woman to save the day!
- The duo becoming a trio and working together to battle the bad guy and save the world.
Despite all the spoilers, the movie made over $870 million at the worldwide box office, so the strategy paid off – and this is made possible with a devoted (and large enough) fanbase.
Marketing companies have been putting major spoilers in trailers for years.
Cast Away is one of Tom Hanks’ most celebrated roles, but anyone who saw the trailer had the entire plot spoiled for them.
In the preview, we’re shown the plane crash Hanks’ character survives and his arrival on the island where he’s stranded. Standard trailer stuff, raising the question, “Will he survive?” – and if you keep watching the trailer, you’ll get the answer!
In the trailer Hanks’ character builds a raft, writes a note detailing how long he’s been on the island, shows him talking to Wilson, and making fire, yelling, “I… have made fire!” – yep, they even snuck that in there.
But even worse, the trailer tells us that he survives this harrowing journey and makes it back home!
The Cast Away trailer is one of those previews that uses the last shot of the movie as the last shot of the trailer, so there are literally no surprises left.
In the Kingsman: The Golden Circle tailer, Colin Firth’s character Harry Hart is shot in the face by Valentine. It’s implied that Hart is out of the picture, with Eggsy taking over his role within the Kingsman spy organization.
But with the first official trailer for The Golden Circle, the Fox marketing team decided to spoil a huge secret in the final seconds of the trailer – namely that Harry isn’t dead.
This didn’t sit well with director Matthew Vaughn, who said: “I begged the studio not to reveal it. Because it’s the whole driving force of the first act and if you didn’t know that scene it would’ve made the whole audience gasp.”
Other times, the trailer is utter crap but the movie is brilliant, and you’re left wondering how the trailer did the movie such injustice.
The sweet spot is obviously having a trailer that gives you a taste of what the movie will be like without spilling all the beans in the intro – and even when you give away key plot points, it should still be the kind of story that you just have to know how it happened.
Some trailers that don’t do the movie justice.
Baby Driver has a long, heavy trailer that’s at odds with the high-paced movie that effortlessly flows from beat to beat. The movie flies by in an instant but the trailer feels like it just slogs on.
John Wick: Chapter 1 has a trailer completely misses the point that John Wick is effortlessly cool, and makes the movie seem like just another, generic action flick. John Wick is one of the freshest and most engaging action movies to come out of the genre in recent years. This one movie spawned a series of its own showing just how iconic it really was.
Gattaca is one of the best sci-fi films ever made, but it got the world’s most basic trailer. The film is a brilliant rumination on eugenics, destiny and personal agency, but the marketing really did this movie dirty. And that dreadful voice-over is just cringe.
Edge of Tomorrow could have done some really cool things with its trailer, playing on the time-warping powers Tom Cruise’s character gets as he restarts the day over when he dies. Instead of showing a story about a guy who repeatedly tries to better himself, it made it seem like just another mech action flick with zero draw. Emily Blunt absolutely elevated this movie to a whole other level, but that’s not clear from the trailer either.
While Tarantino trailers aren’t necessarily bad, they rely heavily on the Tarantino name to draw the audience in – it’s usually a bunch of characters saying a bunch of iconic one-liners, but without much depth. While the movies themselves are stellar, the trailers aren’t nearly as skilfully made.
Some of my favourite trailers ever.
The Dark Knight has Heath Ledger’s legendary Joker set up for Nolan’s Batman. We get a rundown of the key players in the game, what the stakes are and what the mood is going to be.
Logan has to face some hard truths about life in his trailer that pulls us in with a narrative that shows us a new side to Logan.
300 is legend among trailers and films. Stakes? High. Fight choreography? Spectacular. Cast? Star studded. Vibe? Epic retelling.
The trailer for Alien is like a little abstract mini-movie in and of itself.
And my all time personal favourite trailer is not for a movie, but a game: Assassin’s Creed Revelations.
And another amazing trailer for a game comes to us from Fallout 3, where we first get introduced to one world and a worst-case-scenario. Then we find out we’re gonna be playing in the worst-case-scenario. Epic.
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