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I really enjoyed The Dark Knight Rises and want to send a grammatically correct tweet about it. Unfortunately correct punctuation of the following eludes me:

In other news The Dark Knight Rises was better than The Dark Knight. Not just a good super hero or action movie just a great movie, period.

What is the correct punctuation before the word "period?" Am I correct in using a comma or should an ellipsis or emdash be used instead?

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    "grammatically correct tweet" - now there's an idea. I would probably put "... great movie. End of." Which is twitterese for the same thing. Commented Aug 3, 2012 at 8:01
  • Sorry, questions on correct grammar and punctuation aren't on-topic at Writers.SE. I'm closing this; English.SE might want it though.
    – Standback
    Commented Aug 3, 2012 at 9:45
  • Better punctuation (and spelling): In other news, The Dark Knight Rises was better than The Dark Knight; not only a good superhero/action movie but a great movie, period.
    – CocoPop
    Commented Mar 31, 2023 at 12:57

4 Answers 4

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I think you've punctuated it correctly, period.

NOAD agrees with us:

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Macmillan lists this usage as a third meaning of the word, with the qualifier SPOKEN:

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In other news The Dark Knight Rises was better than The Dark Knight. Not just a good super hero movie or a good action movie, but a great movie, period.

It's still not grammatically correct as a whole, but it's good for every day language.

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When ending a thought with the word period for emphasis, you can precede it with a comma followed by the word period and then a period to end the sentence, OR you could end the first sentence without emphasis and a period, and then start a new one-word sentence with the word period capitalized and then a period for punctuation.

Examples:

I think you've punctuated it correctly, period.
I think you've punctuated it correctly. Period.

You are not going out tonight, period.
You are not going out tonight. Period.

He is the sole owner of the trademark, period.
He is the sole owner of the trademark. Period.

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In other news, The Dark Knight Rises was better than The Dark Knight. Not just a good super-hero movie, or a good action movie—a good movie, period.

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