My Opinion On Post-Credit Movie Scenes

[tomandtish]

I've always liked Jackie Chan's style of end credits scenes - stick the bloopers and behind-the-scenes shots of a movie as the credits roll.

As an example, the Police Story credits, complete with Jackie Chan singing lasts 2:36. In comparison the first part of the Infinity War credits lasts about long, before the mid credits scene and the full credits (which goes on for much longer).

Yeah, credits got a lot longer since I was a kid. Even if you exclude an end-credit scene, they are still 5-6 minutes at a minimum these days.

Case in point. Outland (1981) has 2:48 worth of credits. Now part of that is because a lot of info is given up front. But movies back then didn't list EVERYONE involved in the movie. Heck, these days it is not unusual for a big release to list the babies that were born to people who were working on the movie at the time.

[BeerMug Paladin]

I tend to not watch many movies with these, as far as I know, and when I do watch a movie with them, I'm not sure I end up seeing the scenes in question. But to my mind, the implication for the art would be sort of like an admission that "it's not really over". To this effect, I think the typical horror ending scene of "the monster/killer/threat is not vanquished" would be improved delivered as a post-credits sequence. Because you thought the threat was over, but it's not.

I'm aware this is not how they're used, it just strikes me as a possible use for the art of the movie. Otherwise I guess I have no opinion on them because I don't watch movies with them. Pontypool is the only example of one that I remember off-hand.

[Aedilred]

I've always liked Jackie Chan's style of end credits scenes - stick the bloopers and behind-the-scenes shots of a movie as the credits roll.

As an example, the Police Story credits, complete with Jackie Chan singing lasts 2:36. In comparison the first part of the Infinity War credits lasts about long, before the mid credits scene and the full credits (which goes on for much longer).

I'm less keen on it, depending on the movie. I think I'm unusual in that, when I've seen a movie that's actually good, I don't want to see how the sausage was made. It feels a bit like being shown how magic tricks are done: it spoils the fun.

And I don't tend to find blooper reels all that funny anyway. Occasionally you get an actor deliberately destroying a scene and it's hilarious (see: Nathan Fillion) but most bloopers are just along the lines of "someone forgets their lines and everyone laughs" and that's rarely as funny as the actual joke that was in the script.

With that said, the Police Story credits do work, and I still have recollections of one particularly ambitious stunt going wrong in... I think Police Story 3? But they are fundamentally unserious, stunt-heavy movies which demand relatively little suspension of belief to begin with even by the standards of comedy, so a blooper reel can both deliver stuff worth watching and not spoil the movie in the same way that blooper reels often do. I do think it's very much an exception rather than a rule.

[Peelee]

I have considered that; I think making it clear it's a post-scriptum to the movie itself is paramount, but mid-credits scenes do accomplish that without having as much of the staff pressure issues. I think having those be the only kind of of stinger would be a decent compromise.

Mid-credits or early-credits is a fine compromise, IMO,

I've always liked Jackie Chan's style of end credits scenes - stick the bloopers and behind-the-scenes shots of a movie as the credits roll. It doesn't affect the "I wish they'd make it publicly known" like they do with the movie on general but I don't have any good answers for that.

As an example, the Police Story credits, complete with Jackie Chan singing lasts 2:36. In comparison the first part of the Infinity War credits lasts about long, before the mid credits scene and the full credits (which goes on for much longer).

Fun fact! Jackie always sings to the end credits of his movies. He loves singing

I'm less keen on it, depending on the movie. I think I'm unusual in that, when I've seen a movie that's actually good, I don't want to see how the sausage was made. It feels a bit like being shown how magic tricks are done: it spoils the fun.

And I don't tend to find blooper reels all that funny anyway. Occasionally you get an actor deliberately destroying a scene and it's hilarious (see: Nathan Fillion) but most bloopers are just along the lines of "someone forgets their lines and everyone laughs" and that's rarely as funny as the actual joke that was in the script.

With that said, the Police Story credits do work, and I still have recollections of one particularly ambitious stunt going wrong in... I think Police Story 3? But they are fundamentally unserious, stunt-heavy movies which demand relatively little suspension of belief to begin with even by the standards of comedy, so a blooper reel can both deliver stuff worth watching and not spoil the movie in the same way that blooper reels often do. I do think it's very much an exception rather than a rule.

Fake blooper reels (eg in animated movies) are the worst. Painfully unfunny IMO, since the point of blooper reels is to capture real unstaged moments (even if most of them are funnier in the moment on set than in a theater)

[Bartmanhomer]

I forgot that bloopers exist. But yeah, I don't care for bloopers that much these days.

[The Glyphstone]

Mid-credits or early-credits is a fine compromise, IMO,

Fun fact! Jackie always sings to the end credits of his movies. He loves singing

And he's very good at it, too.

[Brother Oni]

I'm less keen on it, depending on the movie. I think I'm unusual in that, when I've seen a movie that's actually good, I don't want to see how the sausage was made. It feels a bit like being shown how magic tricks are done: it spoils the fun.

And I don't tend to find blooper reels all that funny anyway. Occasionally you get an actor deliberately destroying a scene and it's hilarious (see: Nathan Fillion) but most bloopers are just along the lines of "someone forgets their lines and everyone laughs" and that's rarely as funny as the actual joke that was in the script.

With that said, the Police Story credits do work, and I still have recollections of one particularly ambitious stunt going wrong in... I think Police Story 3? But they are fundamentally unserious, stunt-heavy movies which demand relatively little suspension of belief to begin with even by the standards of comedy, so a blooper reel can both deliver stuff worth watching and not spoil the movie in the same way that blooper reels often do. I do think it's very much an exception rather than a rule.

I think in Jackie's particular case, it only emphasises how difficult and dangerous the stunts by showing how they could (and did) go wrong. I'm more than happy to concede that his movies are an exception to the rule though.

By the way, it was Armour of God, where Jackie had a near fatal fall which left him with a permanent hole in his skull.

Fun fact! Jackie always sings to the end credits of his movies. He loves singing

I know - I've seen him sing "A Man Should Better Himself" live in a concert in Hong Kong back in the early 2000s, with a guest appearances by PRC soldiers doing melee/unarmed weapon drills as 'backing dancers'.

Unfortunately things have changed significantly since then for reasons I can't discuss on this board and I can't enjoy his work like I used to.

[Aedilred]

Fake blooper reels (eg in animated movies) are the worst. Painfully unfunny IMO, since the point of blooper reels is to capture real unstaged moments (even if most of them are funnier in the moment on set than in a theater)

There is a special place in Hell for the people who come up with those. A place where they are strapped to a chair Clockwork-Orange-style and forced to endure an unending loop of said fake bloopers.

[Rodin]

Early-mid credits works fine. It's a nice compromise from having 5 minutes at the beginning of every movie where the cast is listed, and it works for having a palate cleanser at the end of a movie to get the audience leaving with a laugh or excited about an upcoming movie.

Post-credits was a fun bit of novelty for a while, but the credits are simply too long for a 15 second (or less) clip to be worth waiting for.

[Manga Shoggoth]

I always stay through the end of the credits, even before post-credit scenes were a thing, because I consider it a sign of respect for those who worked on the film to watch as their names go by. Yes, even when it's impossible to actually read them, it's enough to observe their passage.

Also, I like listening to the ending music.

Very much this - I've always stayed through the credits. The post-credit scenes were a bonus, and were a thing long before the MCU stuck them everywhere. Occasionally the films made the credits interesting as well - I think Pixar were good at that, and there were a few anime films as well...

The bloopers for animated films?? OK if they are animating actual bloopers, less so when they are making them up.