Definition of "unspool"

unspool

verb
third-person singular simple present unspools, present participle unspooling, simple past and past participle unspooled
1. To remove (film, cotton, etc.) from a spool; unwind.
  Quotations
  Next, unspool twenty cubits of the thin silver wire thread and cut this length in half. If you have less than twenty cubits, unspool all you have, and cut it in two equal parts.
  2010, W. R. Maxwell, Letters from the Inquisition, page 123
  He lifted out the roll of tickets and began to unspool a dozen.
  2013, Laurien Berenson, Best In Show
2. (aviation) To reduce the thrust of a jet engine to idle in flight.
  Quotations
  During this 14-second period, the airplane accelerated to about 173 KIAS, and the first officer retarded the throttles. By 1805:15, despite the instructions in the Delta L-1011 Pilot Operating Manual (POM), which states, “do not unspool the engines,” all three engines were either at, or very near, flight idle EPR and remained at that thrust level until 1805:22.
  1986 August 15, National Transportation Safety Board, “1.16.3 Airplane Performance”, in Aircraft Accident Report: Delta Air Lines, Inc., Lockheed L-1011-385-1, N726DA, Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, Texas, August 2, 1985‎, archived from the original on 13 March 2021, page 38
3. (slang, of a film) To play; to be screened.
  Quotations
  Let all the films of Keaton and Wenders unspool blackly across your mind like the negative of the white line still unspooling down a road in God's imagination, long after the end of his road movie of the end of the world.
  1998, W. N. Herbert, The Laurelude, page 110
  Trailers for upcoming movies unspool—The Nutty Professor is playing on Tuesday, along with Cinderfella.
  2015, Patton Oswalt, Silver Screen Fiend: Learning About Life from an Addiction, page 8
4. To flow forth, unfold, or play out.
  Quotations
  The landscape and the living figures of that summer, as in some umber-smeared snapshot found in the brittle black pages of an old album, had become more dusty and indistinct as time for me unspooled with negligent haste into my own middle age, yet that summer's agony still cried out for explanation.
  1983, William Styron, Sophie's Choice, page 262
  At first, he was vague about his reason for coming in, talking about his uncertainty regarding the future and a few other stressors, but as he let his story unspool, he revealed the real reason.
  2011, Dave Verhaagen, Therapy With Young Men: 16-24 Year Olds in Treatment
  I'd watch birds, trail my hands in the water, duck under the boughs of sweeper trees, and watch the river unspool before me.
  2012, Margie Crisp, River of Contrasts: The Texas Colorado, page xi
  All the things I couldn't know sat somewhere inside, embroidered into me—maybe not quite fixed to the point of inevitability but waiting, in any event, for a chance to unspool.
  2013, Amanda Lindhout, Sara Corbett, A House in the Sky, page 89
  Once we realize that gun ownership is now deemed a constitutionally protected, legal right, we cannot know how it may unspool over time.
  2014, Michael Waldman, The Second Amendment, page 153
  Whether on the warm coast or in the San Juan Mountains, he wrote his novels, and she wrote songs, and the life they had imagined, as teenagers, unspooled with a grace exceeding their most extravagant dreams.
  2017, Dean Koontz, The Silent Corner, page 159
5. To lose or cause to lose one's composure; to fall apart.
  Quotations
  Normally, the worse a situation got, the calmer and more efficient Kelly became. But not this time. This was so bizarre, her mind unspooled.
  2003, David Best, The Judas Virus, page 123
  This tragic illness which had so unspooled members of her family in the past was now directly on her doorstep maybe caused by the incessant explosions he had heard in South Africa.
  2009, Alexandra Richardson, Passionate Patron, page 40
  I survey the damage, the guilt enough to make me glitchy, and if you get too glitchy you start to unspool, which means you end up a quivering hot mess in the fetal position, vomiting, your body's way of ending the rush to spare your mind.
  2016, Chris Howard, Night Speed
6. To relax; to unwind.
  Quotations
  After that, he felt exhausted— but unspooled inside— and drove to his Wilshire Boulevard home.
  1981, Dodge Temple Fielding, Fielding's Favorites: Hotels & Inns, Europe 1981, page 183
  Instead, Marion felt herself unspool inside and it was lovely and she wanted to touch Joe Lanigan's arm, lightly, as she wanted to smile to him and even curl herself at his feet.
  2009, Megan Abbott, Bury Me Deep, page 53
  The moment I saw the sign, tension unspooled inside me. Haven's Bay was the place I went when I needed to get away, although I hadn't been here in almost four years. It was home in a way that nowhere else was.
  2018, J.H. Croix, Naughty Wish