This whole situation surrounding movie spoilers almost seems like it’s out of a movie itself.
Everyone knows that you don’t spoil a movie for someone that hasn’t seen it yet, but everyone should also know that you don’t ever point a gun at someone else over a movie either. Both of those rules were broken in Australia when an officer drew his firearm at one of his fellow officers when he started to spoil Top Gun: Maverick.
Court documents reveal that 30-year-old officer Dominic Gaynor became fed up Morgan Royson, another cop at the same precinct, when he threatened to spoil Tom Cruise’s Top Gun sequel, which released in the summer of 2022.
When Royson, who had seen the movie the day before, said that he would spoil the movie for Gaynor, it is reported that Gaynor took out his firearm and pointed it in Royson’s direction.
If you are looking for some exact quotes from the incident, the court documents say that Royston first said:
“I’ll spoil it for you.”
To which Gaynor replied:
“I’ll shoot you.”
Some pretty straight forward stuff from the two officers who were clearly not joking around about the Tom Cruise led blockbuster that potentially “saved the movies.” Gaynor apparently took it so seriously that he “pointed the gun for five seconds” at his colleague.
As you might imagine, the whole thing didn’t go over well for the guy getting a gun pointed at him, even though Gaynor insisted that it was all a joke, and apparently was laughing throughout the incident (which might have only made it more scary in the moment).
Royston ended up leaving the force because of the ordeal, and decided to press charges against his fellow officer, saying that he was left with constant shock and fear and wasn’t able to look at the police force the same afterwards.
Though Gaynor and his lawyers insisted that it was all a mistake, he was eventually hit with a two-year community correction order, 100 hours of community service, and a conviction added to his record.
The moral of the story here is to never, under any circumstance, spoil a movie for someone else. I once spoiled a portion of Avengers: Endgame for a friend, and I still wake up in a cold sweat about it sometimes.
But I do have to play devil’s advocate here. There aren’t any set-in-stone spoiler rules or guidelines, but I do wonder if this particular incident happened when the movie had just come out, or if it took place rather recently.
If it happened when Top Gun: Maverick had just hit theaters, the guy pointing the gun is still not in the right, though he has a little bit better of a case. If this happened maybe a couple of months ago, meaning that the movie had been out for over a year, then the guy pointing the firearm is a certified madman.
I think a year’s grace period is plenty for spoilers, but regardless of when it happened, I hope the guy that drew his gun has fun in his role in the newest addition to the Top Gun franchise…
Top Gun: Community Service.
Tom Cruise would still manage to make a movie with that title a must-watch.
