Spoilers are everywhere. On social media sites, television and even in just casual, around-the-office chatter the day after something big is revealed on a hit TV show. They’re difficult to avoid and have ruined surprises and probably soured many friendships.
All of this is exactly why “Talking Dead” host Chris Hardwick watches AMC’s “The Walking Dead” exactly like the rest of us – the day it actually airs. Though as part of the AMC and “Walking Dead” family he has full access to the material weeks ahead of time, he resists the urge to binge on episodes simply to avoid blowing key moments for fans.
After “The Walking Dead” airs, Hardwick, along with guests that usually include the shows producers or cast members, discuss the episode and take questions from fans for an hour on “Talking Dead,” the show after the show.
He said AMC and the cast and crew of “The Walking Dead” have been respectful of his request not to expose him to anything he didn’t already know, but there have been instances where he’s accidentally seen too much.
“I was down in Atlanta on set doing stuff for ‘Talking Dead’ and all of a sudden a very bloody Lori comes around the corner and I was like, ‘Oh (crap)!’,” the 42-year-old king of the Nerdist empire, TV host and stand-up comic said during a recent phone interview.
Hardwick was referring to actress Sarah Wayne Callies, who played Lori Grimes on the show until she met her dramatic end in Season 3. “I knew that was happening all summer and I had to go to Comic-Con that year and I had to pretend I didn’t know. It crushed me inside because I thought I was going to blurt out like, ‘Sarah, I’m so sorry that you died!’”
“It’s tempting,” he continued. “But I’ll wait until Oct. 12 to watch the season premiere because then it’s fresh in my mind. I always want to be genuinely curious about things that are happening on the show and not be so tense and worried about spoiling something that happens the following week or in the next handful of weeks.”
As for those who wait to watch and later get angry at others for spilling the details, Hardwick says he understands that not everyone can possibly watch something at the same exact time, but just because some information has leaked, it doesn’t completely ruin the experience.
“It’s unfair for people to expect the world to conform to their viewing habits,” he said. “I think we’ve become such a whiny culture about spoilers. It’s like, the show is still good. Even if you know what happens, it’s still a good show.
“People spoil (stuff) for me all of the time because they assume I see every TV show the second it airs, so I had ‘Game of Thrones’ spoilers the minute they happened because people were tweeting at me, but I don’t get mad. I’m still going to watch it and I’m excited about how it will play out. I don’t think we need to treat people like drug dealers who accidentally spoil things for us. We don’t need to prosecute them like they’re selling crack to schoolchildren. It’s fun, but it’s just television, everything’s going to be OK.”
Hardwick is a longtime fan of the horror genre and like all of “The Walking Dead” devotees, cannot wait for the fifth season to start.
“After the season finale in the spring, people are instantly sad that they have to wait until October, especially when it ends on a cliffhanger,” he said. “I’m excited to see how everything will unfold and move forward. You form a relationship with this show and the characters. They become very familiar to you and you’re like, ‘I wanna know what’s happening with my friends! They’re stuck in a train car!’”
Contact the writer: 714-796-3570 or kfadroski@ocregister.com
