Stay until the end of the credits

      Anyone who has had the pleasure of going to the movies with me knows two things: I don't share my popcorn and I always stay until the very end of the credits to every movie I watch. The popcorn thing is more for their safety, as I tend to put enough butter and salt on mine to kill a small pachyderm. The credits thing, on the other hand, is a bit more complex. There are three reasons why I do this, and why you should too.

1) You get what you pay for
     The price of movie tickets has gone up quite a bit since I started going to and paying for them myself. And with the boom of 3-D movies, Imax movies, 3-D Imax movies...the prices get a bit outrageous. So my thought on this is, if I'm paying these prices, I'm gonna watch the ENTIRE movie. Other people may have to scooch by and wonder why I'm still sitting there. Theater ushers come in to clean up and give me dirty looks because now they have to wait for me to leave to clean that row. I don't care. I paid for it, I'm entitled to be there.

2) Respect for the movie makers
     There was a time when you could read every name and what all the different jobs were in making a movie. Hell, they used to have the credits at the BEGINNING of the movie a few decades ago. So many people are now involved in creating this medium that it is nearly impossible to read each one, unless you happen to be a speed reader. I am not. But this does not stop me from scanning the names and jobs of the people who brought what I just watched to the screen. Sometimes you come across a funny name or one familiar to someone you know. Some of the titles are amusing and interesting also. I once saw "Bee Wrangler" as a credit. I have learned what a "Gaffer" is because I always see that credit rolling by and had to research it. (It's a term for an electrician or Head Electrician, in case you were wondering)
Every one of those people scrolling by had a part to play, and I like to give them the respect of acknowledging that name is there, even if it goes by too fast to read it.

3) More Movie at the end!

     Here's the one that maybe you can relate to the most. Sometimes, there is more movie at the end of the credits! I first ran into this at the end of the original "Lethal Weapon", where at the end of the credits, there is an entire building that is blown up from another bomb threat that Riggs and Murtaugh are called in to investigate. I thought that was the greatest thing ever. There are a lot of movies that do this, some have links to sequels, such as the Marvel movies. Some are one minute clips that can be funny or interesting as a part of the movie, such as the "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies. Others are even a few minutes long as part of a wrap up of the plot. I recently wrote about this when I saw "Battleship" not too long ago. I was the only one left in the theater while a 5 minute conclusion and sequel starter played at the end of the credits. I also told many of you to stay until the end of the "Avengers" movie, and some of you didn't listen and were faked out by the "tease". A few minutes into the credits, there was a sequel scene thrown in that most of you saw. However, at the very end of the credits was what, in my mind, was the greatest end of the credits scene I have ever seen. It took a lot to knock off the original that I experienced all those years ago in a darkened screening of "Lethal Weapon", but kudos Marvel...you accomplished it.

Until next time, see you in the center seat....until the movie is completely over.