Definition of "spectacle"

spectacle

/ˈspɛktəkl̩/

noun
plural spectacles
1. An exciting or extraordinary scene, exhibition, performance etc.
  Quotations
  VVith ſcoffs and ſcornes, and contumelious taunts, / In open Market-place produc't they me, / To be a publique ſpectacle to all: / Here, ſayd they, is the Terror of the French, / The Scar-Crovv that affrights our Children ſo.
  1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene vi], page 100, column 1
  In movie terms, it suggests Paul Verhoeven in Robocop/Starship Troopers mode, an R-rated bloodbath where the grim spectacle of children murdering each other on television is bread-and-circuses for the age of reality TV, enforced by a totalitarian regime to keep the masses at bay.
  22 March 2012, Scott Tobias, AV Club The Hunger Games
2. An embarrassing or unedifying scene or situation.
3. (usually in the plural) glasses (instrument used to assist vision)
4. The brille of a snake.
5. (rail transport) A frame with different coloured lenses on a semaphore signal through which light from a lamp shines at night, often a part of the signal arm.