When I was very young, my dad would take my brother and I to the movie theater, usually to see whatever big tentpole was out that summer. Reserved seating wasn’t common everywhere in the U.S. at the time and in order to actually ensure the perfect seats, one needed to get there early enough to enter the theater right when the doors opened. Once we got in and the lights dimmed, my favorite part of any visit to the movies started: the trailers.

As a young boy growing up in the 2000’s with no smartphone and very little understanding of the internet, I was as uninformed as can be. Watching movie trailers in the theater was how I found out about upcoming movies. I vividly remember being around nine years old in the movie theater watching the trailer for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and the absolute thrill of discovering a new Transformers film was on the way. If you were to offer me a million dollars to name the actual movie I watched that day I’d stay poor, but I do remember my giddy excitement at discovering that Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen would grace my tender 10 year old eyes a year later.

Did I end up liking Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen? Sure, but I was a dumb kid who liked almost everything he watched. While the first Transformers film wasn’t a critical darling, it was certainly popular enough with audiences to justify a sequel. Unfortunately, the production was mired by the 2007 Writers Guild of America (WGA) Strike. The movie received significantly worse reviews from critics, though it did out-gross its predecessor.

Obviously, as a nine year old, I was unaware of any of this information. I doubt it would have affected my experience much at the time either. So why is this relevant? Growing up is inevitable, and my curiosity about the process of filmmaking would grow along with me, yet I can’t help but dwell on the memory I have of the trailer for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

Building the Hype

The film industry has certainly gone through some significant changes since I was 9 years old. Movie trailers are almost always uploaded online before they’re shown in theaters save for a few exceptions, (Christopher Nolan, and James Cameron basically).

And with highly anticipated trailers comes the inevitable onslaught of commentary. Film commentary has existed long before the internet, but there was a time where to be heard, you needed some amount of credibility. Now, literally anyone can be a critic and upload their reviews and reaction videos for the entire world to see.

Discourse that was once relegated to online forums and chat rooms is now all over most social media. “Film Twitter” was coined as essentially a derogatory term to describe the type of toxic film discourse rampant on social media sites, specifically Twitter (now X).

This has created more and more fans that hear of a film from a director they like or A24 or whatever, but can’t stop complaining when the film can’t meet their incredibly high expectations.

This discourse breeds disappointment. However, this is not always the fault of the fans. Studios are not averse to putting out misleading trailers they know will generate interest. Sony used Spider-Man imagery in the trailer for Morbius, only to remove most references to the character in the final product.

There are three films from this year I want to discuss that were hotly anticipated by different types of film fans and garnered interesting responses from both casual fans and cinephiles.

Mickey 17

Bong Joon Ho’s follow up to his Academy Award winning feature, Parasite, was always going to be highly anticipated for film fans. The Best Picture winner is one of the most celebrated movies of the last decade being met with wide acclaim when it was released.

When the project was announced it sparked heavy interest from fans of the filmmaker, and he was suddenly on many more people’s radar. The film is also based on a famous novel, but it was when the cast was announced with Robert Pattinson starring that the hype grew greater than ever.

Then Mickey 17 came out and made barely over $130 million on a budget of $118 million, not counting marketing. It received positive word of mouth, but the overwhelming response was that it was good, but not as good as Parasite.

Warner Bros has to take the blame for this one as they did not market the film well at all. They were relying on people seeing it purely for Robert Pattinson and the director of Parasite. The trailers didn’t paint the best picture of the actual story and audiences had no real hook.

This film was never going to succeed, unfortunately. The fact that it had to follow Parasite and flopped will probably make Mickey 17 a footnote on Bong Joon Ho’s stellar career.

Weapons

In a year where horror films have thrived, Weapons stands as maybe the biggest success story of 2025. Similarly to last year’s Longlegs, Weapons had a terrific marketing campaign. The film’s premise was enough to lure many audiences, but the trailers and promotional material were the cherries on top.

The director, Zach Cregger’s previous film Barbarian also sparked a lot of interest and caused plenty of discourse itself. A new project from this director would almost certainly receive some attention.

Weapons currently has a 94% on Rotten Tomatoes (RT) and has made almost $260 million worldwide on a budget of $38 million. The reviews from audiences are also positive on sites like IMDb and Metacritic as well as RT.

While still a success story overall, one thing many audiences were not anticipating in the film was the sense of humor. Weapons can be very funny at times in ways that might feel jarring to some people. Certain horror scenes are executed in ways that may come across unintentionally funny, while others are very much intentional.

Famous YouTuber and Twitch streamer, Penguinz0/Cr1tikaL/MoistCr1tikaL who I will refer to by his real name, Charlie, made a review about Weapons titled, “I Disagree with the Hype.” In this video, he basically explains that while he didn’t hate the movie, he was disappointed by the horror elements. He explained that the comedy in the movie undercut much of the horror and left him feeling overall disappointed by how little he was actually scared. His criticisms of course are completely subjective, however it is a sentiment I’ve heard from people I know as well.

I mainly bring up Charlie here, not to call him out at all, but just because he has a huge audience. He reaches more people than most creators online who primarily review movies and this isn’t even his main area of focus. He represents a more casual film goer’s perspective, albeit a very critical one.

Superman

Superman was easily one of the most anticipated movies of the year for many people and for many reasons. It’s the beginning of a fresh reboot from the DCU, James Gunn actually seems to have some semblance of a plan for this franchise, and it looked like they actually made a joyful version of Superman.

While the actual audience reaction ended up being predictably positive overall, as James Gunn has never directed a comic book movie that reviewed poorly, there was a pleasantly surprising reaction from many Gen Z audience members.

The interesting reaction to Superman, at least to me, has been the amount of people refreshed by the way it handles such romantic themes like hope and altruism in such an earnest way.

When the movie released, a trend called “hopecore” went viral on TikTok with users sharing videos embracing the film’s positive themes.

While these reactions aren’t directly linked with anticipation, I expected to hear more of a Last Jedi-esque response from people used to a more dower and serious Superman. It goes to show that people like seeing this type of character during a time where the entire world is run by stupider versions of Lex Luthor.

Closing Thoughts

I’ve always been a huge fan of the entire journey leading up to a new film’s release. The talent announcements before filming even starts, the set photos, the trailers, and the endless commentary and speculation from fellow fans is an aspect of this community I will always love. However, I have in the past couple years, really changed the amount of content I will consume about a film prior to seeing it. I pretty much avoid all trailers or any information other than the people making it or the basic premise. I also stay away from most reviews before watching movies as well.

These rules aren’t a standard I believe everyone should follow, but I’ve found that my experiences with films are far more rewarding the less information I know about them.

The three films I discussed were some of my most anticipated of the year. I watched one trailer for each movie. The one I watched for Weapons was a short teaser that gave little indication of what to expect. I ignored most of the reviews for these movies and simply went in and made up my own mind. I wound up enjoying all three movies quite a bit.

I don’t say this to express some sort of superiority in my own watch habits. This works for me and helps me regulate my own anticipation. I used to watch trailers for movies I was hyped for countless times. I watched nearly every piece of promo for The Batman (2022) and while I still love that movie, I would have loved it more if I didn’t become so familiar with all the footage released prior. There would have been far more surprises for me than there ended up being because of the sheer amount of footage I watched. I watched one trailer for Superman and I’m so glad I did.

I understand that not everyone can experience films like this. People need to make sure they’re sold on a movie. Movie tickets are expensive and they can be a big time commitment depending on the person or movie. For my own experience, watching movies this way is the closest I’ve felt to being that nine year old, staring in awe and wonder at a trailer for one of the worst movies ever made.