History Main / PraisingShowsYouDontWatch

*** This may no longer be the case with ''Metropolis'', as people can now see it restored, and be able to understand it. This means it will no longer be a film just for critics and film buffs.

** ''{{Nineteen Eighty Four}}''. Many phrases from the book, like "Big Brother", "thoughtcrime" and "Room 101", have entered pop culture, people can often quite convincingly claim they've read the book by simply quoting these phrases.

* Mark Twain would be displeased to learn that ''TheAdventuresOfTomSawyer'' now meets his definition of "classic." When most people discuss the book, they refer to one scene -- Tom tricking his friends into whitewashing a fence for him. This occurs in Chapter 2. Either that is an incredibly awesome scene, or most people stop reading around page twenty. You can tell that someone has actually read the whole thing when they refer to other memorable scenes, like getting lost in the caves, and Tom and Huck attending their own funeral.
* The UK PC Gamer magazine's review of ''FarCry 2'' was more like a review of the press pack circa six months ealier; features were mentioned that didn't exist, the main factions were repeatedly called by the wrong names, and much was made over the ability to pick factions and missions, something you can't do unless you really hate advancing the plot.

** Parodied by this FunnyOrDie vid: http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/662c3c3a0b/take-off-your-tshirt-if-you-cant-name-a-song-by-the-band-thats-on-it-from-watt-white
* ''TheDarkKnight'' received a score of nearly 10 on imdb... ''before the movie was even released''.
*** This had more to do with the untimely death of HeathLedger, and taking NeverSpeakIllOfTheDead beyond it's logical extreme.

** Likewise, many [[strike: [[DetractorNickname Twi-tards]]]] fans of ''{{Twilight}}'' gave ''New Moon'' and ''Eclipse'' ratings of perfect 10 the moment their pages were up.
*** Not to be biased, [[strike: everyone who isn't a hormonal teenage girl or an unsatisfied housewife]] non-fans pre-emptively gave them a rating of 1.

* ''{{Silent Hill}} 2''

** A lot of the classic foreign film directors- Fellini, Kurosawa, Truffault, Antonioni, Herzog, De Sica, Godard, Renoir, Tati, Tarkovsky, Bertolucci, Pasolini, Bunuel, Ozu, etc.
** Plenty of StanleyKubrick films, especially- ''[=~2001: A Space Odyssey~=]'', ''AClockworkOrange''

* ''SilentHill 2''

** 1984.

* The UK PCGamer magazine's review of ''FarCry 2'' was more like a review of the press pack circa six months ealier; features were mentioned that didn't exist, the main factions were repeatedly called by the wrong names, and much was made over the ability to pick factions and missions, something you can't do unless you really hate advancing the plot.

* ''{{Psychonauts}}'' is praised as a funny, challenging classic platfomer. Like ''{{ICO}}'', finding someone who holds that opinion AND has played the game is rather difficult.

* Has ''anyone'' who won't shut up about how "psychological" ''SilentHill 2'' ever actually ''played'' the damned game and not just parroting popular opinion?

** Same with 1984.
*** The reason people don't often read books like War and Peace or the entire LOTR series is because they're {{Doorstopper}}s.

** This may also explain why so many people don't see why [[AnalogyBackfire comparing your romance to Romeo and Juliet is not a good thing]] (made worse by the above statement that it's required reading in most high schools).

** The fence painting ''is'' pretty awesome, though.

** Why were people able to vote on a movie before it was released? IMDb FAIL!

* Has ''anyone'' who won't shut up about how "psychological" SilentHill 2 ever actually ''played'' the damned game and not just parroting popular opinion?

* Richard Feynman mentioned in his autobiography a case when one publisher sent to the California State Curriculum Commission a schoolbook, but it wasn't ready for print, so it has ''empty pages''. Six out of the ten members of the commission still rated the book with blank pages favorably -- literally judging it by the cover!
** That's less "praising books you haven't read" and more "praising books you can't read". Or, more likely, [[{{Sarcasm Mode}} "the illiterate praising books."]]

** Notably, many of the people who have read it completely are Biblical scholars, who tend to analyze and discuss it academically rather than raining praise on it.

-->''[[http://www.cracked.com/article_18530_5-pop-culture-classics-created-out-laziness.html "It's widely considered to be the greatest comic ever by millions of sweaty comic fans, about half of which have actually read it."]]''
-->-- '''{{Cracked}}''' on ''{{Watchmen}}''

** This happens ''a lot'' for books that have famous movie adaptations, especially LOTR. It goes so far that some people automatically will say things like "The book(s) was/were better then the movie(s)" without ever having read the book, or otherwise assume that they can get by claiming they read the book, just because the movie can't be that different, right?

* ''{{ICO}}'' is widely praised as being an simple yet artistic, touching game. Finding people who actually played it, though, is not quite easy.

** Regardless of who reviews it, classic games become more well known and praised after modern games emulate/continue them, especially when people want to appear to be a more "refined" gamer. Other examples: The effect of ''{{Fallout}} 3'' on 1 & 2, the effect of ''[[TheElderScrolls Oblivion]]'' on ''Morrowind'', the effect of {{GTA IV}} on earlier [[GrandTheftAuto GTA]] games, and so on.

* TheDarkKnight received a score of nearly 10 on imdb... ''before the movie was even released''.

** This may also explain why so many people don't see why comparing your romance to Romeo and Juliet is not a good thing (made worse by the above statement that it's required reading in most high schools).

* Similar to the above: the TropeNamer for EightPointEight was a review of ''TheLegendOfZeldaTwilightPrincess'' released before the game itself. [[InternetBackdraft The resulting outcry]] was Defending Games You Didn't Play.