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Infobox updates

Just a couple of new things:

{{Infobox comic book title}} now does genres. There's a list of the 26 currently supported in the docs, further suggestions are welcome, but this is what I was able to cull from Category:Comics genres and Genre. Some examples of this in action:

{{Infobox comics character}} has been prepared for the images to be converted from

|image=[[Image:filename.ext|250px]]

to

|image=filename.ext
|imagesize=

Considering the volume of 'boxes with images, I've set it up so that both the old and new style will be supported while the markup is changed. Category:Converting comics character infoboxes is a full list of articles with the 'box containing an image in the old format. As the images are converted, adding |converted=y uses the new format and removes the article from the category. (I wish I had thought of this for the comic title infobox...)

- J Greb (talk) 01:27, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

That's great. I've made Category:Superhero comics and taken the opportunity to tidy up Category:Superheroes (both following the discussion in a section above) - seems to have gone well. The former fills a rather obvious gap and I think we have most of the main genres we'd want now. Suggestions on a postcard for any others we may be missing. Also it seems likely a few of those could get quite big but I assume we can throw in publisher information from the "subcat" (to give "DC Comics horror comics" and we can then sort out something like "DC Comics genres"). (Emperor (talk) 03:29, 26 July 2008 (UTC))
I can't seem to get the comic character one working - do you have an example I can look at? I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. (Emperor (talk) 03:36, 26 July 2008 (UTC))
Batman
(before)
|image = [[Image:batmanlee.png|250px]]
(after)
|image = batmanlee.png
|converted=y
Visually, you won't see anything unless the image is over 450px tall in the 'box in the old format.
- J Greb (talk) 04:36, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
Alexander Luthor, Jr. would be a (slight) example of that visual clue. - J Greb (talk) 04:41, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
OK cool - I got it right (I was leaving out the converted field). Thanks for that - I updated Superman and it seems to have worked fine. (Emperor (talk) 17:28, 26 July 2008 (UTC))

Copyright free comics

Has anyone checked out http://goldenagecomics.co.uk/ ? Supposedly they're free. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs)

I ask because I was doing a bit of work on A-1 Comics and according to the above site, it's copyright has expired. I haven't been able to get that site to work, but does anyone know about Golden Age comics that are now in the public domain? Could make illustrating certain articles very easy. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 09:23, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for that - turns out I'd bookmarked it last year and completely forgotten about it but I'm not going to make that mistake twice.
I am unsure if everything is 100% public domain but it largely looks solid (compare with Category:Public domain characters) and as you say should be useful for illustrating comics but we'd still need to double check on each one we upload just to make sure it is public domain as it'd be unwise to take a website's word on it. (Emperor (talk) 14:01, 26 July 2008 (UTC))

Amalgam Comics

Hello, I was cleaning up an article contained with Amalgam comics and I've come to the conclusion that it's not worth the effort - there isn't really the material with the sparse appearances of those characters to do much more than recap the issues. Can I suggest something radical? We merge all of the content to a single amalgam comics article? so we'd have something like "amalgam comics" discussing it as a publishing event and the back story to that happening and a "amalgam comics characters" giving an overview of the characters and some detail on the merged characters. --Throwawayaccounteditor (talk) 19:35, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

The Amalgam Comics article is OK... but just looking at the Amazon (Amalgam Comics) article... if they're all like that I agree. Too much information for a character that appeared in 3 or 4 comics. Amalgam Comics itself is notable... the character, not so much.
I'm not sure that the main article could handle absorbing all the character pages, so I'd suggest a "Characters of Amalgam Comics" or "Amalgam Comics title" or whatever and merge all the other stuff into it.
Duggy 1138 (talk) 03:01, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
Realistically all of the characters created for Amalgam should be covered in one article, with only two exceptions. Access went on to star in two limited series, All Access and Unlimited Access. Doctor Strangefate was featured outside of the Amalgam Universe as the villian in one of those series and interacted with the normal Marvel and DC characters. That appearance just barely makes him notable enough to deserve a separate article. I don't see an arguement that says any other Amalgam issue or character deserves a separate article. Stephen Day (talk) 03:31, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
If this is deemed necessary, then I would suggest that the Amalgam Comics#Amalgam books section be reduced to just the titles, with a "main" article covering all the characters. But I don't think that everything from the individual pages should be lost, since much of it is interesting and enlightening information, and just the sort of thing someone would want to know: who they were a combination of, etc. Amalgam Comics titles/Amalgam Comics characters would seem the best candidates for the subpage, probably. ntnon (talk) 03:43, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
I can see how this info might have a place. I'm willing to back off of my position to admit that the individual one-shots deserve separate articles too. The articles on the one-shots would then take in the info that's now spread across too many separte articles. For instance the Dare The Terminator and Catsai articles shouldn't exist separately when there is no article for Assassins (Amalgam Comics), the one shot those two characters co-starred in. Going past that seems like a bad idea. A separate Amalgam Comics characters article would get overwelmed with fancruft way too quickly. Stephen Day (talk) 04:09, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
So, as I see it the question is whether the individual articles should be merged (with two exceptions) but whether the spin-off article that they merge into should be a "character" page or a "title" page. I'm leaning towards a "title"-based page.
Duggy 1138 (talk) 05:03, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
I propose the following articles:
1)Amalgam Comics - Covering the topic in an overall fashion
2)Amazon (Amalgam Comics) - Covering the one-shot and the characters involved with it.
3)Assassins (Amalgam Comics) - Covering that one-shot
4)Doctor Strangefate - The one shot, characters involved and the main character's appearance outside of the one-shots
5)JLX - Covering the JLX and JLX Unleashed one-shots
6)Dark Claw - Covering the Legends of the Dark Claw and Dark Claw Adventures one-shots
7)Super-Soldier - Covering the Super-Soldier and Super-Soldier: Man of War one-shots
8)Bruce Wayne: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. - Covering that one-shot
9)Bullets & Bracelets - Covering that one-shot
)10Magneto (Amalgam Comics) - Covering the Magneto and his Magntic Men and Magnetic Men Featuring Magneto one-shots
11)Speed Demon (Amalgam Comics) - Covering that one shot
12)Spider-Boy - Covering the Spider-Boy and Spider-Boy Team-Up one-shots
13)X-Patrol - Covering the X-Patrol and Exciting X-Patrol one-shots
14)Bat-Thing - Covering that one-shot
15)Generation Hex (comics) - Covering that one-shot
16)Lobo the Duck - Covering that one-shot
17)Challengers of the Fantastic - Covering that one-shot
18)Iron Lantern - Covering that one-shot
19)Thorion of the New Asgods - Covering that one shot
20)Access (comics) - Covering that character and the two limited series DC/Marvel: All Access and Unlimited Access

These 20 articles should cover everything about Amalgam. I don't see a reason to go further than this. Stephen Day (talk) 05:47, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

I propose the following articles:
1)Amalgam Comics - basically as is.
2)Amalgam Comic publications(or the like) - covering all of the comics.
These 2 articles should cover everything about Amalgam. I don't see a reason to go further than this. Duggy 1138 (talk) 05:59, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
Your idea works too. I'll go with whichever one everyone agrees with. Although if your proposal is deemed the best, then I still say that the Access (comics) and Doctor Strangefate articles should remain, at the very least. Stephen Day (talk) 06:06, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
Maybe with:
3) Characters from Amalgam Comics or the like, *if* there isn't too much repeated information. Duggy 1138 (talk) 06:09, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
I don't like the idea of a separate characters article. It opens the door right back up to the mess we have right now. Only it'll be in one article instead of the dozens that exist right now. I think we either go with the twenty article proposal, or your proposal with Access and Strangefate as holdouts. Stephen Day (talk) 06:17, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
FWIW, I like the idea of compressing down to 2 and see if (and it'll be a big if) there's a need to split out additional articles.
On a side not though, such a compression is going to need to look at exactly which images get pulled into the articles — there is no way fair use is going to allow all of them to migrate. - J Greb (talk) 00:10, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
That's more or less what I was thinking when I proposed the twenty articles. If things still need to be compressed after that (admitedly a very likely situation), it seems like it would be a lot easier to go from 20 down to two, than it would to take dozens of articles and get all of that into two articles. Stephen Day (talk) 00:29, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry, I really don't understand what you mean by that.
Also what would be the most correct name for the "Characters of..." page.
Duggy 1138 (talk) 00:45, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
Last first...
List of Amalgam Comics publications, or "one-shots", and List of Amalgam Comics characters would be the way to go. And yes, list article can be made up of one or two prose paragraphs per entry.
As for Steve's concerns/proposed... the idea would be that all the Amalgam articles be gone through and then be compressed into the articles for the 20 titles. That allows for two things 1) less hard feelings because there will be 2) less hard choices. If, as is likely, the resulting articles are minimal, a second sweep can compress them into one (or two — 1996 and 1997 — and a third sweep) list article.
One of the other "upsides" would be that instead of purging down to 8 to 12 images across two articles, there would be the latitude for, likely, 45 to 50 in the first sweep. Again, this feed into less hard choices and hurt feelings. - J Greb (talk) 01:12, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
Exactly, it just seems like this would be easier to do in two stages rather than in one massive sweep. There would be fewer headaches as well. Stephen Day (talk) 02:33, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
(de-dent) - I agree with:
And anything that needs to be split to its own page from any of the three per WP:SS. - jc37 07:22, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Undent

The sheer amount of pages in the sub-categories in Category:Amalgam Comics lead me to agree with Stephen Day's suggestion for an initial 20 articles. The mass-condensation required to make just two articles would surely lose far, far too much information, and be unnecessarily complicated as part of J Greb's "first sweep".

Certainly there's no need to double up titles and characters, so why not - regardless of whether people support 20 or 2 articles as the end result - do this:

Instantly that will quarter (or thereabouts) the pages, but retain basically all the information (as a first pass, just dump the appropriate character/team pages into the body of the titles).

Then the next pass can be a tidy up, with the conceivable third run being whittling the pages down further - if necessary.*

Is it polite to mention to some of the major Amalgam contributors/editors that this is happening, also...?

*Does it strike anyone else that the ComicsProject seems to be spending most of it's time cutting and editing, rather than creating and adding...? ntnon (talk) 02:58, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Something like Category:Amalgam Comics superheroes?
Honestly, I'm not sure all the information really needs to be kept.
Duggy 1138 (talk) 07:16, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
My thought was to compact the pages, not the categories - I merely highlighted the categories to identify the pages..! Surely Category:Amalgam Comics would suffice for the only required category; and then the heroes and villains and teams can be inserted into the pages of the titles in which they appeared.
I tend to think much of the information should be kept in some form, but my proposed idea (first sweep: compacting to 20 pages) was to allow for secondary passes to weed out any information that might not be needed. Just (potentially) later, rather than all-at-once.
From 20 pages, if - after further editing - there's not enough to sustain 20 pages, then the more radical approaches could come into effect. Does that clarify what I was suggesting..? :o) ntnon (talk) 04:18, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Options

OK. From what I can tell there are two main beliefs here:

  1. Reduce the number of pages from (at least) 58 to 20, focusing on the titles rather than the characters and keeping the large amount of information that exists therein.
  2. Reduce the number of pages from (at least 58 to 2 or 3 (with the option for notable characters to be kept).

No one, as I see it, is suggesting we keep the 58 pages, which is a start. Here's my take: Let's look at Amazon (Amalgam Comics). Is she notable enough to get her own page or is the one shot notable enough to be the main content of the page? I say no. I think that on a Marvel or a DC or a comics wiki, sure, but on wikipedia, no. This is an Elseworlds or What If that combines Wonder Woman with Storm. And one of 16 or so released that week. I wouldn't want a page for every one of the DC Elseworlds Annuals, I wouldn't want a page for every individual alternate version of Wonder Woman or Storm. A List of Characters page would keep the important information and get rid of what is really just trivia. So let's look at the Amazon (Amalgam Comics) page. Do you really feel the need to protect all that information? Duggy 1138 (talk) 05:01, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

That's part of what sweeping through should do: tighten the information down for the end article not just keep every thing, but on fewer pages.
I'm not in favor of effectively indexing the individual issues, and don't think leaving the possibility of stopping with each issue getting its own page is a good idea. It's a good intermediate step to take stock of what can go immediately, but it needs to be followed by the next weeding. And looking at it, it does allow for a point to reflect on whether or not a character list article is warranted or not.
One thing I hope doesn't creep back in is the unsourced "This Amalgam character is a mash-up of that Marvel and that DC characters." We've had that fan-spec weeded out once, we don't need to go through it again. - J Greb (talk) 22:34, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
The fan-spec is a very real danger and the biggest reason why I'm hesitant to go with a character based solution. Stephen Day (talk) 23:39, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Speed Demon complication

I took it out from where I first mentioned it, but I feel the need to bring it up now because its a complicating factor that might have to be dealt with first. Speed Demon (Amalgam Comics) is a redirect to Speed Demon (comics) and the later is predominantly about the Amalgam character. Meanwhile, the more notable comic book Speed Demon is at Speed Demon (Marvel Comics). Shouldn't the information at Speed Demon (comics) be moved to Speed Demon (Amalgam Comics) with the little non-Amalgam information moved to Speed Demon (Marvel Comics). With that done Speed Demon (Marvel Comics) should then be moved to (Speed Demon (comics).

This situation probably should be dealt with first before we figure out how we're going to deal with the other Amalgam articles. Stephen Day (talk) 23:54, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Either that or "Speed Demon (comics)" get converted into a dab/set list. Personally I'd favor the musical chairs though. - J Greb (talk) 00:11, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Musical chairs - if the main article was unclear perhaps you might go for a set index but I say just move the Marvel one up to the top slot. Just make sure you've fixed the incoming links - I've run into this switching (which as legitimate) with no follow up on the links. (Emperor (talk) 00:05, 25 July 2008 (UTC))
Do either of you know how I can get an administrator to do these two moves. I'm not an administrator and can't move pages over redirects. Stephen Day (talk) 03:16, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
Done.... - J Greb (talk) 10:57, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, I just did the editing to the two articles. I hope things look good now. Stephen Day (talk) 22:29, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

YEAR comics debuts

I just noticed there is no "Category:1960s comic debuts" or corresponding subcategories for each year. Is there a reason for this or is it just a case of not having any/many articles to put in them? There is, however, a "Comic strips started in the 1960s". --hamu♥hamu (TALK) 05:27, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Because I have been working back by decade and haven't made the year specific ones (because people were following along behind and deleting the categories so I have been making sure I have filled the ones I've made before moving on). I would say we need the decades one like that as it allows them to be collected together so they are easier to sort into the year categories. Looking through them we have up to Category:1970s comics debuts and Category:1950s comics debuts. Seems like people have been adding them when they need them (makes sense otherwise they'd get deleted) but I can do the 1960s, 1940s and 1930s ones and we should be able to get them filled. (Emperor (talk) 16:41, 21 July 2008 (UTC))
OK there is now: Category:1960s comics debuts, Category:1940s comics debuts and Category:1930s comics debuts. (Emperor (talk) 17:58, 21 July 2008 (UTC))

Are these intended for titles as well as characters? As worded, they will probably end up with both. Postdlf (talk) 18:01, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Titles. (Emperor (talk) 18:56, 21 July 2008 (UTC))
I've been working on subcategorizing Category:Publications by year of establishment and have a couple of queries about the categories for comic debuts.
  • At present Category:YYYY comic debuts (e.g. this) are included in Category:YYY0s comics debuts (e.g. this). Do we want this switch between 'comic' and comics' here? There is no Category:Comic debuts by year or Category:Comics debuts by year.
  • Should Category:YYYY comic debuts be a subcategory of Category:Publications established in YYYY? If they are, I agree that we should make clear that the category is for titles not characters. Dsp13 (talk) 10:38, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
To answer the questions:
  • Yes this came up in a previous discussion - as it stands we can't put a years in comics template in because the naming is different and so can't be automatically generated using an existing template. I'll try and find that discussion.
  • Yes. I only recently stumbled across that and changed two decades worth and haven't got around to the other two (eighties and nineties) - see e.g. Category:2008 comic debuts and Category:1978 comic debuts.
Hope that helps. (Emperor (talk) 13:39, 28 July 2008 (UTC))
Actually that debate was a bit different - we have Category: 2000s comics and Category: 2008 in comics when we really need "Category: 2000s in comics" to make the template work. It is a subtle difference but we do also deal with the big comics news (like the Danish cartoon controversy). (Emperor (talk) 13:47, 28 July 2008 (UTC))
One odd thing is the co-existence of Category:Introductions by year and Category:Establishments by year. At the moment the comic debut cats seem constructed roughly along the lines of Category:Radio programme debuts by year and Category:Television series debuts by year, each of which is a subcat of Category:Introductions by year. On the other hand Category:Publications by year of establishment is one of the subcats of Category:Establishments by year Dsp13 (talk) 00:46, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

The role of admins in this project

I've been thinking about and looking at the Juggernaut situation in the last day, and I have some serious concerns about how it's gone.

I do not want this to become a discussion of the appropriateness of either Jc37's admin actions or my own. My concern here is larger - we had here a pair of users who were trying to edit articles in a manner inconsistent with our policies. We had an appeal for help on the talk page of the project. And we - and I include myself in this for a good chunk of time - left DrBat, who was trying to defend our standards on this article, out to dry. Multiple admins told him to go explain our policies, and set him on his way instead of stepping in themselves to try to explain the policies and settle the dispute, and as a result the dispute got worse. And then when I finally moved to help defend our standards in this area, I got left out to dry.

The admins in this project are the elder statesmen in this area, and we have an obligation to defend our standards and to use our influence and admin bits to improve comics articles, and help editors who are trying to improve comics articles.

We - and as I said, I include myself here - dropped the ball here, and we need to make sure we do better in the future here. This is a case where all of us are, I assume, on the same side of the content issue, but managed to devolve into bitter infighting over procedural issues instead of resolving the issue straightforwardly - by all joining into the discussion and making our views and policy clear. Phil Sandifer (talk) 21:04, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

There's a small item missing there Phil — what was happening on Juggernaut was that it was such at an edit was made (granted it was major) and then reverted in and out with the only commentary being in the edit summaries. When DrBat brought it here zero effort had been made on his part to 1) bring the guidelines to the attention of the other party and 2) move from cycling reverts to actually taking the issues to the talk page. Even when it was pointed out to him that should be the first step, these weren't done.
My understanding of the dispute resolution options is that, first and for most, the editors (this includes participating admins) involved need to show some attempt at handling the situation at the level it's occurring at. You don't go to RfC, mediation, or ArbCom if you haven't tried to engage the others in a discussion. You don't go to ANI for a block request if you haven't posted warnings citing where and why. That's the point I was at when DrBat first brought it up: I'd watch it, but there was an obligation for DrBat to get the ball rolling, not just revert.
When it had hit the week mark and it was still only edit summaries that boiled down to "No, this one isn't slanted, yours is.", then yes something further needed to be done. There seems to be a question though of what the "something" needed to be.
I can only speak for myself but, the reasonable "something" was to put the editors involved into actual communication, especially since neither version of the article the best it could be. To do that:
  1. The article needed to be locked for a short time. The idea was to get a dialogue going instead of continuing the reversion cycle.
  2. I tried to find a "neutral" or the last "neutral" edit. Brass tacks, I'm loath to leave one version up since it looks like a "win" that the one side can just bide their time.
  3. I created a talk section and then pointed all of the involved editors, registered and annom, to it to try and hash out how to improve the article.
As I say, that's what I thought was reasonable. The one thing I was kicking myself for later was that I forgot the padlock template - first time out with this so...
And that seems to be when everything went sideways.
- J Greb (talk) 22:18, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
I don't disagree that DrBat was discussing inadequately. But my point is that he sent out a call to help, and we should have gotten involved. Even if that involved making a revert and saying "See talk" and starting the discussion. We could have and should have entered as editors instead of as administrators, and by doing that we could have resolved this faster and without admin tools. And I think that as administrators and "elder statesmen" of the project, we had an obligation to do so. Phil Sandifer (talk) 22:40, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
As J Greb said - the problems initially arose because no one was bothering to actually discuss this, so the obvious first step is for those involved to discuss this. This went on and when there was still nothing being done J Greb did step in and started a section on the talk page asking people to discuss this (protecting the page to force people to actually talk to each other - which I think was needed here because of the edit warring and the complete lack of interest in talking this over). That is when things started to go wrong and then we had a series of accidents and misunderstandings which managed to establish a whole new parallel set of complaints which seems to largely have derailed or taken the focus off the original problem, which everyone was getting involved with to fix in the first place. A Comedy of Errors. I've said as much on the talk page and was hoping that we could draw a line under this unfortunate sideshow and yet it still rolls on.
I'm afraid this is kind of problem you are going to get when you have people working on a collaborative project in an decentralised manner - problems can occur from too little or too much attention. Juggernaut (comics) was unfortunate to be hit by both, with the involved editors apparently unprepared to talk to each other prompting an awful lot of cooks to get involved with the one broth.
That is my take on it but I have been busy and may have missed some of the finer points of the problem. I think the best thing everyone can do is put this behind us and move on and return to the issue that everyone was trying to fix in the first place - things like this are going to happen, I still think the best thing we can do is draw a line under it. (Emperor (talk) 03:15, 28 July 2008 (UTC))
First, I had/have little opinion concerning the content under discussion. (Not that there was much discussion until J Greb protected the page.)
Tha main issue I saw was: an admin - who was involved in editing the article - using their tools to unprotect that article. (Twice.) (Not to mention, prior to the first time, editing the article while it was protected (presumably accidentally, since, apparently as an oversight, the tag wasn't placed)).
Admins are reprimanded, blocked, or in some cases, can be desysopped, for such things. It's not a "threat" just an acknowledgement of how bad of an idea it is. (In looking over Wikipedia:Administrators#Administrator_conduct more than one would seem to apply here...) So when in such a situation: find another admin. We're fortunate now to have several at the comics project. (Hiding has my eternal empathy for being the only one or nearly the only one at times.)
The rest would seem to fall under the normal situation of WP:BRD and m:The Wrong Version (as noted by J Greb above). And the "statements" that phil made following both J Greb's and my reversion/protection would further indicate a lack of neutrality. (If you would like links, feel free to ask.)
In reading the above discussion, I think things have been covered, except one thing: "elder statesmen"? Not as far as I know. An admin is merely "just another editor" who also has a few added tools and responsibilities. I won't speak for others, but I'll gladly say that I am no better or worse than any other editor. I believe that we're all here to help.
With that said, in looking for a "solution" (so to avoid such in the future), I'd suggest: discussion and notices. For example. Considering the contentiousness of the situation, leaving a notice as to why and how the policies and guidelines applied to the edits, might just have made things a bit clearer. Or leaving a notice with other editors or admins for a WP:3PO. Hiding, Emperor, Doczilla, J Greb, John Carter, and so on. In my experience they all leave such notices on a regular basis. (And I'd like to hope that I do as well.)
And finally, to address something above, several times now, I almost added a "list of comics-project admins", but decided that since I wasn't certain who all would be interested in being on such a list, I thought I'd ask later (and just never got back to it). However, I would support such a list. Especially if it helps all of us (editors and admins). - jc37 08:50, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Yet another category qn: comics & magazines

Am I right that comics should not in general be thought of as a subcat of magazines? We do at the moment have Category:British comics as a subcat of Category:British magazines (ditto e.g. for Category:Croatian comics, but not e.g. for Category:Czech comics) Dsp13 (talk) 00:37, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Characters in other media sections and articles

These sections/articles are particularly prone to fancruft, but there's some simple ways to make them neat and managable. You basically want to focus on the adaptation itself and who portrayed that character. Remove all plot synopsis, keeping only what is necessary for context; basically stick to indicating how the character is different (like, say, that the Joker has dreads or wears makeup instead of having bleached skin). Don't divide these sections into subsections based on adaptation; often this will result in very short sections and will invite the addition of excessive fair use images and adaptation fancruft. I've been able to cut down the "Joker in other media page", and integrated back into Joker (comics). I'm almost done with Green Arrow in other media as well. It's pretty easy to cut these down, so I invite everyone to lend a hand (hopefully without spoiling themselves on plot points, because that's how unnecessarily detailed these things can be. WesleyDodds (talk) 22:34, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

One thing I'd like to point out is that in a lot of articles when the "in other media" section is split off, all that's left behind is a link. Per summary style, this is unacceptable. There should be a brief summary in the "in other media" article, as exemplified by Superman and Batman. WesleyDodds (talk) 04:23, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
Just a side note, but that happens with more than just the IOM section splits. I've seen it done with character splits and story arc/limited series — character intersections. The later is more worrying since it's done in the name of "reducing the 'telling a story' appearance", so the text is removed but the header and {{main}} is left and the FCB becomes stilted. - J Greb (talk) 10:29, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Category:Fictional mass murderers

Considering comics villains, and such, these both are rather filled with comics characters.

Anyone with a bot (or a lot of time, and presumably interest), would be very welcome to help by sorting these into subcats.

Something like:

And if these are large enough (and they likely will be):

I know they're large cats, and that this would require checking every article as to whether it's a "comics" article, so I won't hold my breath either : )

Incidentally, this is the situation in many "fictional x" categories. (As noted in several threads above.)

Did I mention: Please? : ) - jc37 09:30, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

This rings a bell - haven't we discussed this before? If I remember correctly there are some very comics-specific problems because with the nature of superpowers powerful superhumans are almost the equivalent of walking Weapons of Mass Destruction and can kill huge numbers either intentionally or by accident which rather takes them out of the league of human mass murderers and serial killers. I think the discussion involved Magneto but could easily include characters like the Hulk who can cause widespread devastation. Do we also include the anti-heroes who kill the criminals or do we class them in the same areas a soldiers and cops who might kill quite a few people in the course of their lives? How does the law even apply to someone like The Authority? They've killed an awful lot of people and have never been officially sanctioned by a government so are operating outside of the law.
I'm sure there are examples of superpowered serial killers and mass murderers (as opposed to the much larger group of superpowered beings who might fit the general criteria developed for humans) but it would be tricky to prove they are technically different from those who just happen to have killed a lot. So I think the whole thing could be a big headache to police.
That said I do notice there are quite a few comics characters in those categories so this might at least allow us to monitor the situation and clean things up. (Emperor (talk) 14:02, 28 July 2008 (UTC))
Let's check the definitions from our articles. "Mass murder (massacre) is the act of murdering a large number of people, typically at the same time or over a relatively short period of time... The USA Bureau of Justice Statistics defines a mass murder as "[involving] the murder of four or more victims at one location, within one event." and "Murder is the unlawful killing of another human person with malice aforethought, as defined in Common Law countries. Murder is generally distinguished from other forms of homicide by the elements of malice aforethought and the lack of lawful justification." So just general devastation as caused by the Hulk doesn't qualify, since it lacks malice aforethought. I would even argue that The Authority doesn't qualify, since they could, quite possibly, claim justification (justifiable homicide) in most cases, at least enough to make an argument out of it. Let's leave out the questionable cases, as letting them in rather makes the category useless. That still leaves plenty of others that would fit without question, for example almost all modern Batman villains. --GRuban (talk) 17:19, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Can we limit these cats to characters who are described as mass murderers or serial killers in their articles? Otherwise pretty much every apocalyptic villain is the former and many many street-level villains are the latter if we're going to do our own OR definitions. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:26, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I like that sentiment, but it becomes darn hard to police. Or invites trivia/cruft to be added to the article. - J Greb (talk) 10:35, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Request for comment at Faith (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

There is a request for comment at Faith (Buffy the Vampire Slayer), regarding the inclusion of the characters surname in the lead sentence. More opinions are needed. Please read the most recent discussion, Talk:Faith (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)#Name Redux, to understand why each side is opposing/supporting the inclusion of the name in the lead. Thank you. 11:20, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

catwoman

In the Catwoman: Year One story (Catwoman Annual #2, 1998), Selina (now an adult) achieved some success as a thief. Following a disastrous burglary, however, she accepted an offer to "lay low" by posing as a dominatrix in the employ of a pimp named Stan. Their plan was to trick men into divulging information that might be used in future crimes. According to this storyline, Selina trained under the Armless Master of Gotham City, receiving education in martial arts and culture. During this time, Catwoman was given her trademark cat-o-nine tails whip by a client, which Selina kept as a trophy of her time posing as a hooker.

but i have an issue of the one above but the year i have is 1995 is it a screw up or what

wyzard69Wyzard69 (talk) 21:50, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

If you have Catwoman Annual #2 and it says 1995, I would say change the article. Mistakes are not unheard of around here. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 22:17, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
IIRC, The Year One Annuals occured soon after Zero Hour, which was 1994... so 1995 sounds about right. Duggy 1138 (talk) 01:01, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
Catwoman Annual #2 - 1995. Well spotted as things like that can be missed even in a good thorough fact check. (Emperor (talk) 02:49, 31 July 2008 (UTC))

In-universe timelines

Timeline of the Marvel Universe and Timeline of the DC Universe: the pinnacle of fancruft? At a glance my first thought is that these should be deleted. WesleyDodds (talk) 10:52, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

At my first glance, this seems to be something that I would think is rather encyclopedic. (Though, granted, there probably should be a reference for every statement.)
As a comparison,are they that different than: Timeline of Arda?
That aside, what are you seeing that I am not? - jc37 11:50, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
See also Major events of the Marvel Universe and Major events of the DC Universe. Note that "events" itself is a little too 'in-universe' and , following previous discussion, we have tried to avoid that in the articles leads (going instead for crossover storylines/story arcs instead).
Surely there must be a way we can integrate the two to provide an out-of-universe overview to the major fictional events? It might be tables are hampering the expansion of these last examples as you'd want to include creators comments about the background and how the fit together, for example Secret Invasion plays on events in Civil War and War of Kings grows out of Secret Invasion but also draws on events portrayed in Annihilation/Annihilation: Conquest. Over in DC Final Crisis grows out of the previous ones but is part of a long series of titles going through the run up to Infinite Crisis and through 52 (and taking in Seven Soldiers, etc.).
I think the ones I note have been split off from their respective parent articles so jamming them back in might not be an option. However, the major crossover storylines allow the creators to tell the really big stories that effect a lot of characters and groups so there will obviously be some connections and longer term implications and it is worth having something on them. I am just not sure that, as they currently stand, those articles are it. (Emperor (talk) 13:08, 29 July 2008 (UTC))

Can this be done in a way that doesn't have the fanboy obsession with present continuity? One problem that arises from that is no reboot/retcon/whatever neatly lays out the answer to every continuity issue. Each instance instead creates new problems that inevitably require OR to put all the pieces together, or at the very least ensuing years of publication following a continuity jolt such as Crisis on Infinite Earths. Postdlf (talk) 14:44, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I think the pages certainly have problems. We had a major timeline change for the DCU at the end of Final Crisis. The existence of any events in a timeline can be assumed, but unless they are referenced it's really just guess work. The reliance on multiple published timelines which may no longer count worries me as well. And I think there citation problems. Sure something may have happened in Flash #1, but the point of the page (and thus the citations) IMHO is the timing. Duggy 1138 (talk) 16:05, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, one of the main problems with these timelines is that they aren't consistent because these companies can retcon or ignore fictional events all they want. Trying to create any sort of cohesive fictional timeline would instantly become original research. WesleyDodds (talk) 00:49, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
The by-year and the order aspect is covered by the 2 timelines that have been forced together. Originally, based those timelines, they aren't OR, however putting those timelines together, or changing them is OR. However, just transcribing the timelines have their own problem. Duggy 1138 (talk) 07:17, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
Reading both of them again today I really have the urge to nominated both of them at AfD. WesleyDodds (talk) 07:43, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
As much as I like the DC one and want it to work... I have to say that's been my feeling all along. The only "fix" I can think of and which covers the "in-universe" aspect as well, is to divide the continuities up. "Golden Age"/"Silver Age"/"Post Crisis"/"Post Zero Hour"/"Post Infinite Crisis", with a lot less "dating" and "ordering" and more vague chronology. Which stops it being a timeline, I guess. Duggy 1138 (talk) 04:21, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
Ok, after looking them over, I agree that a merge would probably be a good idea.
A couple thoughts:
  • I don't think we should use the word "Major" as it's subjective. And the DCU one (unlike the Marvel one) merely looks like a list of story arcs.
  • I also agree that the "origin of the moment" stories should probably not be shown as the "exclusive" origin, but one of several (if that is the case). An excellent example is the creation story of the DCU. Was it Spectre? Was it the Source? Something else? And which universe? Probably better to be inclusive (with references). I mildly did a Re-Org of 2 sections on the DCU Timeline. I think that more textual explanation noting at which "time" such an origin was considered to have taken place, would be more approriate, in order to maintain contextual unity, among other reasons
  • Very much not a fan of the "real" dates. Dates and the idea of "now" can be a fluid concept in comics (as noted above). History of the DCU had dates. 52 had dates. Which ones should we list? Some of each when they don't contradict each other? Sounds like WP:OR to me : ) - Compare this to the Timeline of Arda. In that case, we have a single author (with the addition of his son et al, as compilers/editors). In comics there are a multitude of authors/editors, and at any time what was "true" a moment ago, may not be "true" in the next minute, due to the lack of single-ness of vision.
So taking the above into consideration, I think that a merge could be a useful solution. On one hand, I think that much of this is valuable information. On the other, I don't think this should be a "current timeline" of the "x" universe. Especially in DC's case, showing how time, and the multiverse, "imaginary stories", and the concept of "crises" (note the "e"), all interact.
So let's come up with a "name" we can agree upon, and go from there : ) - jc37 11:25, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
On the issue of dates, I'd say use all of them, cite them and let the reader of the article go from there. Duggy 1138 (talk) 01:50, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Superheroes

Hey, this is Blackwatch21 from WikiProject Superheroes. I feel that this project is needed. WikiProject Comics doesn't just work pages like DC Comics and Marvel Comics, it is all that comic book pages, newpaper comics and according to you guys superheroes. To me thats alot. Thats why me and DJS24 have created WikiProject Superheroes to work just on superheroes. For example, WikiProject Video games works on all types of video game articles. Because there is alot of work there are decendant projects like WikiProject Xbox, WikiProject Nintendo, WikiProject PlayStation, WikiProject Sega and more. So in return, your project would be our parent project. Thanks. BW21.--BlackWatch21 16:53, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

See discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Superheroes. - jc37 17:42, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Superheroes project and portal

There's a new superheroes WikiProject, Wikipedia:WikiProject Superheroes and portal, Portal:Superheroes. They look to be still under construction. I've suggested a merger at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Superheroes, since it looks redundant to have another project pretty much duplicating this projects work in tagging and assessing. Thoughts welcome. Hiding T 07:54, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, I wish them luck at defining "superhero" in terms of project scope.
Anyway, as you note, it looks fairly duplicative. - jc37 10:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
Feel free to throw in a merge support at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Superheroes to build a consensus. Hiding T 10:28, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
I've left a question or so on the project creator's talk page. I'm hoping (possibly naively) that we may be able to resolve this without having to go through DR or XfD process. (I know, I know: who am I, and what have I done with jc37? : ) - jc37 11:32, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
Well, please see User talk:Blackwatch21#WikiProject Superheroes (Update: The user deleted the discussion from their talk page. See diff here.)
I'm going to give this 24 hours for possible further discussion, but following that, I think MfD is likely in its future. - jc37 16:45, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
First of all, we don't have time limits and why you think your in the position to give one ; I don't know. Second, I'm all for having a open discussion on possible solutions to better the situation. However I'm NOT going to have a bunch of Wikiproject Comics members voting on consensus. If a vote is needed we will have editors not involved in the situation vote. I will leave it up to you guys to decide where we will have this open discussion. DJS --DJS24 17:16, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
While you are right that there is no deadline, you misinterpreted my comments.
I was giving this 24 hours before I nominate at WP:MFD.
And further, you may wish to take some time and read over Wikipedia:Consensus. It's shouldn't be a matter of anyone "voting".
As far as the rest, I think it's great that you're enthusiastic about contributing. The issue here is merely that "WikiProject Superheroes" is (among other things) extraneous and duplicative. - jc37 17:33, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
I know what consensus means; I'm not a new kid on the block. Rather you call it agreeing, disagreeing or voting, its all the same in my book. The fact of the matter is, I was saying that i'm not going to have a bunch of comics members deciding on concensus. Now I got questions for you JC37. What's the purpose of WikiProject Comics? What areas/articles do you handle?--DJS24 17:56, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
Merge discussion: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Superheroes#Merge. (Emperor (talk) 18:00, 2 August 2008 (UTC))

Task Force Superheroes

Since Wikiproject Superheroes and Wikiproject Comics has mergered, I was wondering if anyone other than me would like to start Task Force Superheroes under Wikiproject Comics. BW21.--BlackWatch21 03:43, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

As I mentioned in the previous discussion I don't see it being viable, as there is nothing it can do that isn't done better within the various workgroups. (Emperor (talk) 16:38, 3 August 2008 (UTC))
Good point.--BlackWatch21 20:15, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
It is worth noting that there is nothing to stop you focusing on superheroes without a formal group (I suspect plenty of people just focus on what interests them). For example:
* If you were to go through the image and infobox requests (and article requests) in the DC and Marvel work group 80+% of them will be superhero articles in need of improvement.
* You can also use the various work group talk pages to organise any improvements - perhaps draw up a list of superhero articles to target.
* Any problems you spot you can always flag them on the talk page header, in the relevant workgroup and/or here.
* Note updates to {{Infobox comic book title}} now allow a genre to be inserted and this includes superhero which automatically assigns the page to Category: Superhero comics, which is currently underpopulated (as we just made it) so you could also focus on updating the infoboxes (they will get done eventually but a focus will speed it along). Equally {{Infobox comics character}} has been updated to allow an automatic assignment to a company's superhero category - again this will get done but focusing on superhero specific ones will get it done quicker. See Superman and Superman (comic book) for examples of the two (which I recently updated).
The same goes for anyone interested in focusing on any other of the comic genres (horror, sci-fi, etc.) - in fact I'd encourage people to do so. There is plenty of work that needs doing and so if people are interested and enthusiastic about a particular area, topic, creator, etc. then they should feel free to stay focused if that is what helps get the best possible results. The resources of the Comics Project are here to help people keep things consistent and help with improvements but people are free to do focus on what they want (it does lead to slight patchiness in coverage but enough people will mean that everything gets addressed in the end). There are plenty of people around and you can always get some extra eyes on an issue if you need it so never be afraid to ask. (Emperor (talk) 23:27, 3 August 2008 (UTC))
No legitimate comments to add, but I would like to say that "Task Force Superheroes" sounds like a bad anime that I'd be interested in seeing. Duggy 1138 (talk) 23:58, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Template:Infobox comics location

I would like some feedback on the recently created Template:Infobox comics location. I have some misgivings about it categorizing pages.

See Template talk:Infobox comics location#Categorization via template. --William Graham talk 20:41, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Best infobox?

I'm working on Action Comics 1 and I'd like to add an infobox, but I don't know which would be best. Any ideas? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 17:34, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

The issue as a whole or a specific story?
For a story, use {{Infobox comics story arc}}.
For the whole issue (and it looks like this is the case) use {{Infobox comic book title}}, definitely omit:
  • schedule;
  • format entirely;
  • genre; and
  • issues
Adding '' after Comics for title should work. And I'd omit creative teams, reprints, and characters.
(Side note: Infobox comic book title shouldn't be used for something like Giant-Size X-Men. Since the issue cover a single story, Infobox comics story arc would be preferable.)
- J Greb (talk) 23:04, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
It's going to be tricky unless some clever soul comes up with a tailored infobox for a single issue. And, realistically, such a box wouldn't be required very often. The best bet I can think of is a mish-mash of the two J Greb suggests, which might then look something like this. ntnon (talk) 03:15, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
Not quite on a few points:
  • I was suggesting and "either or" situation.
  • You don't link in the title.
  • The '' between "Comics" and #1 was an explicit instruction. "Action Comics" italicizes, "#1" doesn't and there are no extra characters. (Fixed in you example.)
  • The same for the omission of schedule, format, genre, and issues. This is a single issues, these fields aren't proper.
  • Over all, doing the forced "Issue" and "Story" 'boxes is indexing the issue. Not what we should be doing. Bluntly: Write the article on the real world impact of the issue (what the main focus of any article here should be), give a minimal overview of the issue's contents, and add a link to the indexes at the Grand Comics Database Project and the Comic Book DB.
That last point is also why there should not be a specialized 'box for single issues. Anything that gears towards indexing individual issues of a story, arc, series, or crossover should be given a send and third thought, at a bare minimum.
Yes, we have articles on Action Comics #1, Flash #123, Giant Size X-Men #1 and a handful of 2 issue stories. These are the exceptions. Best to work with what we have, tool wise, instead of making specialty tools that would make them look like the rule instead.
- J Greb (talk) 03:49, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
Oh well. :o)
I don't see why you wouldn't link the title (other than it being an overly obvious link), and there are very few precedents, likewise for "schedule". Genre is certainly irrelevent (and obvious - "Action" Comics), and issues isn't applicable either, but reiterating that it became a monthly (not quarterly or bimonthly) is surely fair enough.
Flash of Two Worlds and Giant-Size X-Men are completely different situations - both only contain one story, which is the be-all and end-all of why they are important. Action #1 is clearly almost-solely only important because of Superman, but it's also (generally thought to be) the first Golden Age comic, and therefore the full contents are important. Neither infobox seems really able to cover that alone, and a forced-index is arguably required, at the very least to underline that Action wasn't JUST Superman (or even just Superman and Zatara). Your points are well made, but at second thought, Action #1 is that important. At third thought, it's still that important, etc., etc...! ;o)
But I'm not that bothered, so maybe a single-box, slightly less coherent attempt would suffice, (coupled with a more thorough and accurate contents listing) so what about now..? ntnon (talk) 15:08, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

'Trimming'

User:DCincarnate appears to be 'trimming' a lot of comicbook character articles, I.E. removing large chunks and sometimes changing entire sections to one sentence. I admit I haven't been up to date on a lot of comic articles, so is this the general consensus of the community here?--CyberGhostface (talk) 18:01, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

2¢
DCI caught some flack with doing that to Alliance of Evil, effectively making the article AfD bait.
I don't think we've hit a consensus on gutting articles. Yes, a lot of the character an team articles need to have the in universe bios/histories gone over. Yes, a lot of those need tightening down to remove plot bloat. And yes, a lot of the articles need to have a solid real world context enforced. But that doesn't mean strip 90% of the FCB out and add nothing back in.
Beyond that, there is a fundamental problem with an editor removing information, either in large chunks or that includes cites, and not being bothered to provide an edit summary. Most time that's considered vandalism by blanking. There's also an issue with not being bothered to engage in discussions (see again the AoE article's history and talk page).
(On a side note, I'm not real keen on the logic presented on that talk page of "If it's in the infobox, it doesn't need to be in the article proper." By that reasoning first appearances, published, alter egos, bases, creators, everything that's in the 'box can be stripped out of the articles. Since the 'box is supposed to be an extremely condensed version of the article, that seems to be a fundamentally, stupendously bad idea.)
- J Greb (talk) 18:41, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
Yes this in particular is a very deep cut, beyond what is required - there needs to be some fictional biography to explain what the team actually does. You can't simply have a list of the issues they appeared in which is of little use to anyone (and is done better in something like a database. There is a process if you think there is too much plot, which includes flagging it or trimming it down. I don't think many of us would suggest cutting it out completely. (Emperor (talk) 18:51, 4 August 2008 (UTC))
I suppose it depends. We'd like to keep the plot trimmed down as much as possible (and definitely avoiding a blow-by-blow "and this happened and then that happened" approach) but beyond that I suspect it has to be dealt with on a case-by-case basis as there is always the possibility of someone getting overzealous or just making a mistake. Anything specific you are worried about? (Emperor (talk) 18:44, 4 August 2008 (UTC))
Well, I haven't really edited this article (it's only on my watchlist because I added his pic from USM), but one example would be Omega Red. Although after looking at his contributions, it appears he's done it to other articles. For example, he replaced Omega Red's section on the Ultimate universe saying "In the Ultimate universe, he is primarily a foe of Spider-Man". I think a lot of articles could be cut down a little, just not to the extent like this.--CyberGhostface (talk) 19:30, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, wow. That contribution list. As in the comments above, I do think that a lot of articles could use a good deal of trimming in their blow-by-blow commentary, but some of those edits essentially amount to blanking, and done without talkpage discussion or even, at the very least, edit summaries, is tacking towards disruptive territory. Ford MF (talk) 19:49, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
Yeah that is another good example - two consecutive difs show the page was gutted with no explanation [1] [2]. Then reverting someone's objection to what are clearly controversial edits [3]. They also seem to have started again, compacting other version and in other media to a paragraph. If nothing else that is going to cause a lot of bad will and is a hair this side of being vandalism (even if accidental vandalism based on good intentions). (Emperor (talk) 20:24, 4 August 2008 (UTC))

He's tried doing the same stuff to Magneto. --DrBat (talk) 20:37, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

He's actually cycling among a few. The heavies right now are Magneto, AoE, and Monarch. - J Greb (talk) 23:31, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Based on the concerns here, and the warnings on his talk page, I started with a notice to suggest talk page discussion, and since he's ignored that, I've now left a warning that the editor may be blocked if they continue without talk page discussion. - jc37 15:27, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

It looks like the editor is willing to now discuss on talk pages. If interested, please positively engage discussion there. (Checking the editor's contributions history should help in finding the talk pages in question.) - jc37 15:50, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

"Hellish" characters

On Satana (Marvel Comics) (and other "Hell" type characters, I think it's happened on Mephisto (comics) and probably other articles as well), someone keeps insisting on posting bogus information over the correct information. This has been happening for months. 204.153.84.10 (talk) 23:23, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Could you perhaps give an example? Ford MF (talk) 00:13, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
[4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], etc. 204.153.84.10 (talk) 14:56, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure it's completely bogus. From what I can understand from the changes, there appears to be a Satana character in the Spawn universe, and the contributor doesn't realise the article is about the Marvel character. --Pc13 (talk) 16:24, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
Ah, well then maybe Satana (comics) should be a disambiguation page? 204.153.84.10 (talk) 16:27, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
Would anyone else care to revert again, this time? My fingers are getting tired.  ;) 204.153.84.10 (talk) 23:05, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
We could certainly turn it into a set index - I am not aware of the Spawn character (but check this out, from what is probably the same user, someone seems intent on jamming a mention of them in) but there is a Satana in DC[10] and Tower Comics [11]. They are both minor characters but there does seem to be confusion being caused (although one would have thought reading the page might cause the penny to drop (especially as it is called "Satana (Marvel Comics)"). I'll make the SIA as it might be helpful to someone have to say this case is bordering on vandalism. However, this is currently in the Spawn (comics) infobox added last month by a different IP [12], however, the only Satana-Spawn links I keep finding come back to Wikipedia in edits added by anonymous users. If anyone knows any different (it might be a recent introduction to Spawn, for example) then let us know. (Emperor (talk) 14:58, 6 August 2008 (UTC))

A round-about route to sourcing

I thought this might interest you all - Peter Stanchek aka Sting (Valiant Comics) (from Harbinger (comics), and yes I think the name of the article needs changing too) has had a claim on it for a while about the character being gay in the original plans, which has been tagged as needing a source for a while. Brian Cronin from Comic Book Urban Legends spots it, asks Jim Shooter who confirms it and bingo we now have a source [13]. Plenty of lessons in there - I think the chief one is to keep using {{fact}} as someone somewhere could easily spot it and source it (although not usually in such a round about way). (Emperor (talk) 15:28, 6 August 2008 (UTC))

Otemple700

Has anyone noticed this editor's recent activity? (S)he is recreating various categories that were deleted via consensus. See this recent discussion. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 02:47, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

The CfDs have started already: Category:List of fictional characters who can manipulate wind (I suppose adding Johnny Fartpants to that would be unhelpful). (Emperor (talk) 15:00, 7 August 2008 (UTC))

Nationality + Character intersections cats

I hate to bring this up again, but did we ever hit a consensus on this?

Right now I'm looking at Category:American comics characters I'm still scratching my head over the parents for it:

So... are we catting her by in universe or real world context?

It almost looks like we need to split the entire set into Category:<Nation's> comics characters and Category:Fictional <Nationality> in comics.

- J Greb (talk) 23:11, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

This has always been a niggle for me as I'd assume they should be categories for characters published in that nations comics but it doesn't seem to work out that way. It'd be easy to fix (as say Marvel Comics characters go in their own category which can be moved easily) but there is something at the back of my mind that fictional characters by their fictional nationality is tricky, especially in the comics medium where things tend to be ongoing and usually characters are written by different people and things can change (didn't they make Psylocke Asian at one point? Later explained by some mind-swap gubbins or something but still...).
As I say if there is consensus to do this then it should be easy enough to do - at the moment it seems to the way it is done, e.g. Elsa Bloodstone is under "Marvel Comics superheroes" (i.e. characters who appear in American comics) and "British superheroes" (i.e. fictional comics characters who are aid to be British) so few changes would be needed and we can pick the rest up in routine editing. (Emperor (talk) 01:49, 9 August 2008 (UTC))
Here's the rub: "superhero" is one of the "profession" groupings. Added to "Company" if fills the bill for "Company's character" and "Character published in" since the "Company" is, IIUC, supposed to sub for "Nationality". "DC Comics martial artists" is the same thing. That also allows a little latitude for something like "British superhero".
"Comics characters" is a different situation since it isn't a "profession", its a definition of an intellectual property. - J Greb (talk) 04:29, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

"Versus" capitalization

I was looking at the Alien/Predator articles, and I noticed that some of their comic books capitalized the word "versus". When "versus" is abbreviated to "vs.", "vs." is never capitalized (as in Alien vs. Predator), which I can understand. However, the some of the comics articles do not capitalize the word "versus" spelled out in whole, which seems to violate WP:CAPS (which says prepositions five letters or larger are always capitalized in works such as comics). These articles include:

Additionally, the following video games adapt a similar capitalization scheme:

I was wondering if there was a reason that these articles went against WP:CAPS's guidelines. If there isn't, I'm going to capitalize "versus" in all of these articles. Thanks, Xnux the Echidna 03:23, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I've worked on all of them and at some point someone moved quite a few of them from "vs" names because some of them say "versus" on the cover. However, before you do any renaming I'd double check the Dark Horse catalogue as they list them as "Aliens vs. Predator" and without the "v" being capitalised [14]. However, it is Batman Versus Predator [15]. DC list it as Superman and Batman vs. Aliens and Predator [16] despite the cover obviously showing it as "verus." (Emperor (talk) 13:31, 9 August 2008 (UTC))
First of all, does this mean I should capitalize "versus"? Secondly, which is the authoritative source when determining "versus" or "vs.": the book cover or websites? Most of these websites use "versus" and "vs." interchangeably anyway (see here for an example). Xnux the Echidna 16:37, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Personally I'd either go to the inecia in the comics or a source that lists by those. When an article is titled by the title of the comic, then the indecia is the final source. If it says "versus" or "Vs." then that's what it should be. - J Greb (talk) 17:20, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Yes. The comic is the one we have to use and specifically the indica (printed on the inside with all the other technical information), if we have no one who can check them then I'd go with how the company catalogue it. I wouldn't go by what it says on the cover, as I argued when they were renamed to match the cover using "versus" seems to be a design decision as "versus" fills space well (if you look on the Superman and Batman vs. Aliens and Predator cover it is written vertically to separate "Superman" and "Batman" from "Aliens" and "Predator". It is the same reason we should be wary of using things like "&" often used on covers as it works well visually and may be no refelction of the actual name. (Emperor (talk) 17:38, 9 August 2008 (UTC))

Trinty (still)

Each time an issue comes out two or more paragraphs of story are added. Now I'm all for additional information being added when it comes, but at this rate we'll end up with 100 paragraphs of story by the end. Because I'm planning on getting this series in TPB, I'm trying not to read the stuff on this page - is there anyone who is reading the series or not reading and so not worried about spoilers willing to monitor it so it covers the story without retelling it in detail? Duggy 1138 (talk) 04:39, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I've been reading the series, but I plan to let my subscription expire after the first quarter. Doczilla STOMP! 08:50, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Now my curiosity is up; where is this page? Trinity disambiguation has nothing. Lots42 (talk) 10:22, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Trinity (comic book) which is listed on Trinity (comics) (comics level dab) and Trinity (disambiguation)#Literature. - J Greb (talk) 13:02, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
It is a concern I had when it launched. I'd suggest policing it hard, add a comment into the plot section and remove just about anything except the broadest plot outlines - it is going to get out of hand quickly otherwise. Once a large part of the series is done it'll be possible to provide a better plot outline but at the moment it'd be dangerous to think the best approach is to jam as much in as possible and then whittle it down later. (Emperor (talk) 13:37, 9 August 2008 (UTC))
Yeah, I think people are putting in detail that they think may be important later in the plot. Whereas they should put in the stuff that is important now and add import past detail later. Duggy 1138 (talk) 06:51, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

While I also agree that our comics often partake of too specific a plot summary, if you want to avoid "spoilers" about the media you are consuming, I would recommend not reading encyclopedia articles about that media. Ford MF (talk) 19:06, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Which is why Duggy is asking someone else to weed the article — while he is postponing reading it, he is also aware that the article is having serious plot creep. He's excecising a desire not to spoil it for himself, but still saying "Guys... someone want to fix this?" - J Greb (talk) 19:09, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
Exactly, I accept that there need to be spoilers, but I'm avoiding them. Duggy 1138 (talk) 06:49, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Bande dessinée

Today I created a portal dedicated to the Bande Dessinée genre, ie Franco-Belgian comics. I am a fan of BD, and I saw that english "comics" had nothing to do with the francophone BD genre. In the francophone Wikipedia, there is a portal "Bande Dessinée" and a subportal "comics", thus I thought it could be a good idea to do the contrary in the english Wikipedia, to add a subportal dedicated to BDs. Indeed, the comics portal and project are rather focused on english comics, and the BD genre deserve more attention. I think we can link the BD portal to the existing European comics work group, which is part of the Comics Project. I insist that he BD project and portal will not be an alternative to the comics project. I hope that all my fellow contributors to the comics project will approve of and enjoy of the creation of this new portal and help manage it.--Pah777 (talk) 19:02, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I've added the talk page header to it. As might be expected on the English-language Wikipedia a lot of articles do focus on English-language (and most often American, and more often than not Marvel and DC) comics but that is why we set up the various work-groups to try and get more focus on other areas, as there are easil enough people to give Marvel and DC solid coverage. So anything that can help is appreciated, if you know of more people who might be interested in the European workgroup then encourage them to sign up. (Emperor (talk) 14:04, 10 August 2008 (UTC))

How to get Rocko's Modern Life assessed for B-class?

How do I ask a third party to assess the Rocko's Modern Life article for B class? I contributed a lot of the material, so I am not sure if I am an appropriate "assessor" so to speak. WhisperToMe (talk) 04:32, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I'll do this later. It looks solid but I'd want the first two paragraphs of the "Music" section referenced - the second paragraph ends on a quote which is unsourced and that is a bad idea. (Emperor (talk) 13:34, 9 August 2008 (UTC))
I've flagged what needs sourcing and will leave it a bit to see if anyone can sort that out. There are a lot of claims about what people think/said and they need referencing. (Emperor (talk) 03:39, 10 August 2008 (UTC))
OK assessment done and it passed. Well done to everyone for the hard work on the article, looks promising for being taken further. (Emperor (talk) 14:00, 10 August 2008 (UTC))

Medicine Man

There is a member on Alpha Force called Medicine Man. Isn't he the same guy who was on the epidose "And the Wind Cries...Wendigo!" of the 1996 Hulk animated TV series? Leo11 —Preceding undated comment was added at 21:19, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

They're two different characters. The Alpha Flight character is called Shaman. Character's real name in the comics is Michael Twoyoungmen I believe. As far as the various Marvel animated series go, Shaman and Alpha Flight make an appearance in the X-Men Animated Series episide "Repo Man" where Wolverine does refer to him as Medicine Man during a fight and then refers to him as Shaman only seconds later. Medicine Man is a slang term for Shaman or, in some cultures, is roughly the English language equivalent. As for the Hulk series, I think that Shaman was just a character made up for that one episode of the show.Odin's Beard (talk) 23:04, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Category:Fictional pyrokinetics‎

Should this one be speedily deleted per this past discussion? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 16:52, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 17:39, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
Actually, how does the creation of something like Category:Fictional characters with weather control or Category:Fictional characters who can manipulate classical elements sound? This would certainly include famous characters like Storm, Captain Planet, Weather Wizard, and others. Pretty much characters who can control the classical elements to some range (not sure if Nami counts). Thoughts on that? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 22:01, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
About as good as the last time you brought it up: leave it to the lists. There may be a good argument about clarifying explanation atop the manip wind/earth/fire/water lists to inter-relate the four. - J Greb (talk) 22:20, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
Well I was thinking a good, sourced description in the category could be sufficient. Is adding references within the category unheard of or against the MoS? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 22:27, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
While Categories aren't article space, references for the text section aren't, to my knowledge, forbidden. However:
  • Categories do not retain a history of what articles have been added or removed. It is all but impossible to re-add valid items once they are remove unless you have that particular article on your watched list and/or you have a screen shot of the cat page when the article was in.
  • Categories are not the places to list citations for member articles. That is part of the function of a list article. Such cites and references, if on a cat page, would be a list in and of themselves and would not directly link to the item they support.
  • By the same token, adding references to the cats at the bottom of an article will not work. The ref numbers will "float" above the cat area, and any trailing templates (stub, wikia, navbox, etc).
  • Inclusion criteria with cats has historically been loosely adhered to and unevenly applied. Yes, a debate can happen at a cat's talk page, but it is rare. Rarer still are such debates that actually 1) yield anything or 2) have more than one or two participants. And even if it does yield something, it's darn hard to apply. "Character X was struck because the power is out side the list and/or that source is unreliable" is all well and good... but by looking at a cat page can you tell how many other listed characters fail the same way?
    The same problem of application exists with de-catting discussions on the individual articles. With a further complication - the discussion isn't referenced in a place where those editing the other articles will see it.
  • Cats cannot, ever, list red linked ("I think this may be notable enough for an article") or unlinked ("This isn't notable enough for its own article, but it is a notable example of the list criteria") items.
- J Greb (talk) 22:17, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Original English-language manga proposed merged

It has been proposed that the Original English-language manga be merged into graphic novel to address the issues of bias in the name and limiting the issue to a specific language. Discussion is taking place at Talk:Original English-language manga#Merge into Comic Books or Graphic Novels -- AnmaFinotera (talk · contribs) 00:42, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Split Stanley Stewart?

A thread began here. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 02:18, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Media franchises

Dear WikiProject Comics participants...WikiProject Media franchises needs some help from other projects which are similar. Media franchises scope deals primarily with the coordination of articles within the hundreds if not thousands of media franchises which exist. Sometimes a franchise might just need color coordination of the various templates used; it could mean creating an article for the franchise as a jump off point for the children of it; or the creation of a new templating system for media franchise articles. The project primarily focuses on those media franchises which are multimedia as not to step on the toes of this one. It would be great if some of this project's participants would come over and help us get back on solid footing. Please come and take a look at the project and see if you wish to lend a hand. Thank you. - LA (T) 21:15, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

I've signed up. We do a lot of work in the areas that crossover with other media and have quite a few franchises within our remit (I even suggested some kind of work group to deal with these but this may be a better alternative), for example:
I even wonder if it is worth an "X-Men (franchise)" to draw together the disparate elements in X-Men#In other media. You can see other articles fitting the general pattern like Tintin books, films, and media (and you can see the need for something similar for Asterix).
A franchise article would be different from a simple "in other media" as it would also include the various titles they've spun off (I think the Batman one would obviously benefit from including the various Bat Family titles) which, I think in the examples given, would give a more rounded and potentially useful article. See for example Alien (franchise), which features the films and the spin-off media which could all be considered part of the franchise.
We'd also be able to hook into Category:Media franchises, probably under a "Comics franchises" category. (Emperor (talk) 03:33, 10 August 2008 (UTC))
OK things are moving forward here - there is now an infobox for example: {{Infobox Media franchises}}. If people are interested I'd like to see if we can't work up a few articles within our general remit into full-blown franchise articles.
There are others that spring to mind (Spider-Man, Hulk (comics), etc. a skim down here is a handy indicator as those with a number of films under their belt - I'd forgotten about Hellboy#In other media, for example. Given the way comics are being snatched up and adapted, which in turn leads to spin-off media, this area is only going to grow) but if we focus on a few and get them sorted out we can apply anything we learn from that to other articles.
Also there is a bit of discussion on whether "X franchise" or "X (franchise)" (e.g. CSI franchise and Alien (franchise)) is the better approach so any thoughts on this are appreciate as it will help future-proof any renaming that gets down. (Emperor (talk) 00:24, 15 August 2008 (UTC))

Superman: Doomsday

See this section: Superman: Doomsday#Comparisons_with_the_comics. It could use some cleanup. Perhaps it should be converted to paragraph form (once cleaned up of original research and so on). Right now it's just a mess, and an ugly long list of bulleted items. RobJ1981 (talk) 11:55, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Robotech: The Malcontent Uprisings

The comic Malcontent Uprisings has been prodded by someone. 70.51.11.210 (talk) 06:38, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Franchise naming convention discussion at WikiProject Media franchises

Dear WikiProject Comics participants...WikiProject Media franchises is currently discussing a naming convention for franchise articles. Since this may affect one or more articles in your project, we would like to get the opinions of all related projects before implimenting any sweeping changes. Please come and help us decide. Thanks! LA (T) @ 22:06, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Help needed identifying people in images

Do people know if any of these people are comic creators? If so, which particular ones?

  1. [17]
  2. [18] - Trevor Goring
  3. [19] - Marjorie Lui
  4. [20] - Daniel Way added to article.
  5. [21]
  6. [22] - William Katt added to article.
  7. [23] - Wil Wheaton article contains image already.
  8. [24] - Michael J. Nelson in the middle? added to article.
  9. [25] - Jason Aaron article contains image already.

Answers on a postcard too... Thanks. Number three's telephone number would be nice too. Hiding T 22:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Number 6 is William Katt, star of The Greatest American Hero. I've got some pictures of him from Comic-Con too, but out on the exhibitor floor. He and Robert Culp were there promoting a GAH comic Katt is writing. Doczilla STOMP! 06:22, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
Number 8 = Mike Nelson and the bots from Mystery Science Theatre. (I interviewed them. Nelson didn't give a serious answer to a single question.) I don't know that anyone would necessarily consider Nelson's work on Happy Kitty Bunny Pony to be comics creation even though the book has more pictures than some comics. Doczilla STOMP! 06:25, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
William Katt - oh boy, he's looking like Robert Plant these days! BOZ (talk) 06:34, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
Since #4 was sitting next to someone called Jason Aaron I looked that name up and he appears to be #9 (going by picture on [26]) which says: "I'm an Eisner nominated comic book writer, author of THE OTHER SIDE and SCALPED for DC/Vertigo, plus stints on WOLVERINE, GHOST RIDER and BLACK PANTHER for Marvel Comics." Duggy 1138 (talk) 06:39, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
Number 7 looks like Will Wheaton to me, but I doubt Will's arms are that hairy and I don't know why he'd be signing something in Andy Bell's spot. Will does go to most of these conventions. (That's not Andy Bell.) Doczilla STOMP! 06:53, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
It's certainly the shirt he was wearing [27]. Duggy 1138 (talk) 08:18, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
It appears #4's first name begins with B,D,P or R. So who was on a panel with Jason Aaron and has a name starting with one of those letter? Duggy 1138 (talk) 07:27, 14 August 2008 (UTC) Daniel Way on the X-Men panel? [28] Duggy 1138 (talk) 07:35, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
As far as I can tell, #2 is Trevor Goring at the BLVD Studios booth. [29] Duggy 1138 (talk) 08:28, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
#3 seems to be Marjorie Lui [30] I can't find a number for a Marjorie M Lui, will Marjorie Y Lui do? Duggy 1138 (talk) 08:38, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks guys. Two to go. And I guess I'm out of luck on a phone number. Gorgeous picture though. Detective work indicates image 1 was taken 8 seconds after an image of Jeph Loeb, [31], so what panel or panels was he on. Camera time indicates it was taken 2008:08:07 00:54:40. For comparison the Jason Aaron one was taken 2008:08:06 20:03:00, so the camera's time may not be local time. Image 5 was taken 2008:08:06 20:03:35 so he was on the same panel as Jason Aaron and Daniel Way at a guess. Hiding T 14:09, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

They were both on X-Men panel and the Secret Invasion panel.
"Marvel Comics started off their San Diego Comic-Con International programming this year with their perennially popular X-Men line, bringing along editor Nick Lowe[32]?, writers Jason Aaron, Daniel Way, Matt Fraction & Craig Kyle[33]?, NYX writer Marjorie Liu, and the newly beareded C.B. Cebulski[34]. Marvel marketing’s Jim McCann[35]? introduced the panel, and noted that X-Men group editor Axel Alonso was still “stuck in New York.”" Well, #5 isn't Jason Aaron, Daniel Way or Majorie Liu...
"Quesada introduced the panel - Secret Invasion: Inhumans writer Joe Pokaski, Thunderbolts writer Christos Gage, X-Factor and She-Hulk writer Peter David, Incredible Hercules co-writers Greg Pak and Fred Van Lente, Ivan Brandon, Secret Invasion: Front Line Brian Reed, Secret Invasion: Runaways/Young Avengers co-writer Chris Yost, editor Nick Lowe, Deadpool writer Daniel Way and C.B. Cebulski."
Jason Aaron's panels according to his homepage, was:
Thursday, July 24:
1:45-2:45 – X-Men panel, Room 6B
4:45-5:45 – Mondo Marvel panel, Room 6A (Jim McCann(^), Warren Simons, Matt Fraction(^), Ed Brubaker, Jason Aaron(^), Mark Paniccia, Jeff Parker, Greg Pak, C.B. Cebulski (^), Kevin Grevioux and Mat Broome.
Friday, July 25:
4:30-5:30 – Vertigo: View of the Future panel, Room 5AB (Amy Hadley (x), Matt Wagner, Cameron Stewart, Jason Aaron (^), G. Willow Wilson, Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, David Tischmann,

Brian Azzarello, Matt Sturges, Will Dennis, Fabio Moon and Gabrielle Ba, Brian Wood, Johua Dysart.

Saturday, July 26:
4:30-5:30 – Secret Invasion panel, Room 6A
However, in #4 his name was handwritten, so maybe he wasn't scheduled to be on the panel...Duggy 1138 (talk) 02:02, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
Although the handwritten idea makes sense, remember the "maybe" part of that. One person on my panel had to use a handwritten name thing even though she'd always been scheduled to be part of that panel. Doczilla STOMP! 22:52, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
100% it was a thought, but it doesn't have to be so. Maybe they lost his and had to write one or there was a printing error, or whatever, just trying to get as much info out there to help things along. Duggy 1138 (talk) 04:42, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

How could I escape speedy deletion of an article about a webcomic

Hello. 2 hours ago, I have started an article on fredo and pid'jin, an english language webcomic verry popular in Romania. Well, as my article was a stub, and I forgot mentioning the popularity of the site, it got deleted really fast. As the administrator said: "This was done because the article seemed to be about a real person, organization (band, club, company, etc.), or web content, but it did not indicate how or why the subject is notable, that is, why an article about that subject should be included in Wikipedia. ". So, what should I do next time I create the article, in order not to loose it?

Olahus1 (talk) 22:47, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

  • You have to find reliable sources, Olahus. Find newspaper articles and/or other Wikipedia:Reliable sources. If newspapers and journalists often discuss the webcomic, you may have a case. WhisperToMe (talk) 00:43, 17 August 2008 (UTC)
I see it got deleted. You can work on it in your sandbox if you like until it seems more solid. Post a note here when you are happy with it and someone will look it over for you. (Emperor (talk) 03:07, 17 August 2008 (UTC))

Smurfs

A bunch of Smurfs articles were just prodded, see Category:Proposed deletion as of 17 August 2008 70.51.11.210 (talk) 13:00, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

Some are deprodded (one by me), the remaining ones are indeed charactercruft. Redirecting them to the main character list is an alternative of course. Fram (talk) 21:43, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

Spider-Man: Green Goblin Reborn! (the drug arc)

Hey folks, I have started an article on the famous " Green Goblin Reborn!" arc (Amazing Spider-Man #96-98), which was the first mainstream comic to feature drug abuse. Help and comments are appreciated. —Onomatopoeia (talk) 19:20, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Multiple Batmobile pages

Per a comment above, I've tagged all the various Batmobile articles with proposed merge tags pointing to the main article. These pages can be accessed via the totally unnecessary Batmobile template. I would normally do a bold merge, but I'm headed out of town soon. WesleyDodds (talk) 03:01, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I think that the 60s version might deserve its own page... however, merging that into Lincoln Futura might also work. Duggy 1138 (talk) 06:25, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Navigation templates

I just noticed that someone added a navigation template titled "Christopher Nolan Batman film series" to Batman. In addition the main Batman navigation template, there's also templates for "Batman franchise media", "1966-1968 Batman television series", and "1989-1997 Batman film series", in addition to the Nolan films template. Do all of these needs to exist? They more or less seem to be covering ground better handled by specific articles. Aren't most of the more specific template redundant to "Batman franchise media", and in some instances to the main Batman template? I think I've notice similiar issues with other comics character navigation templates. WesleyDodds (talk) 10:30, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

These could certainly all be collapsed into one template. Phil Sandifer (talk) 12:46, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
From what I've see, and the Bat-templates are the prime example here, a editor with a bent towards movies, TV, and cars decided to put up more templates that cover the details that routinely get excised from {{Batman}} — as not directly related to the comics — and {{Batman in popular media}} — as making the template unwieldy to the point of uselessness.
Even saying that... {{1966-1968 Batman television series}}, {{1989-1997 Batman film series}}, and {{Christopher Nolan Batman film series}} are so damn crufft cluttered that they are useless. And I'm very thankful that the auto collapse, otherwise the cases where 4 of the 5 show up would be an absolute horror show.
The Batmobile is a separate issue... we have 8 articles on it why?
- J Greb (talk) 16:49, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Oh dear lord. I hadn't looked at the Nolan template. That thing must die. Jesus Christ. Phil Sandifer (talk) 17:13, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
Coo. That is frighteningly fine-grained. I have seen similar ones that simply list the films, for example. They all seem to be the work of TMC1982 (they clearly love their template, see also {{Marvel animated universe}}). Even if they survive, albeit with a trim, they aren't needed on the Batman page - the main template and the franchise media are all that are needed as they contain all the relevant material. The others can be shuffled off to the franchise page and/or the relevant articles. (Emperor (talk) 03:06, 17 August 2008 (UTC))

How do you go about getting templates deleted? WesleyDodds (talk) 01:40, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

TfD... though I'm not sure being an eyesore will cut it... - J Greb (talk) 01:53, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Cite the much-ignored (but still right and a guideline Wikipedia:Categories, lists, and navigation templates, in particular the fact that "As with categories, all the articles in a template should substantially deal with the subject of the box" and "The article links in a navigation template should have some ordering, whether chronological or otherwise." Phil Sandifer (talk) 13:32, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Subheading in Impossible Man article.

Is "A Mxy-Up Between Universes?" really the best section title. Duggy 1138 (talk) 06:26, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I just went ahead and deleted the section. It was pure speculation with no basis in real-world facts. WesleyDodds (talk) 06:30, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
I think there's an equivalent section on the Mxy page. Duggy 1138 (talk) 12:57, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Disambig phrase in a title

Hello, I have a question. we're having a debate over at Talk: Concerned: The Half-Life and Death of Gordon Frohman on whether to move the article to Concerned (comics), or to Concerned (comic). This arose because of the naming conventions regarding comics. A lot of comic articles use the phrase "comics", for example The Amazing Spider-Man (comics). But Spider-Man is about a series of comics, while Concerned is about a single webcomic.

Do those naming conventions apply to every single case, or do they refer only to cases where the subject of the article is a series of comics. diego_pmc (talk) 21:28, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

The long and the short:
"(comics)" is the dab suffix used, when needed, for all works that fall under the umbrella of "comics" (book, series, strip, magazine, or web-).
"(comic)" isn't used.
A more specific one, "(webcomic)" in this case, is used only is "(comics)" needs to be reserved for a dab page or a set index.
- J Greb (talk) 21:50, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Good this was sorted, but I'm curious. Why is the plural also used for single comics, not just series? diego_pmc (talk) 07:13, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Probably because "comics" is the art form. Onc you have written one comic, you are a comics author. Fram (talk) 07:23, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Probably. But doesn't that apply for all other article categories? All other aticles use a disambig phrase thta indicates what it is, not the subject's genre or something like that (e.g.: "film", not "films", or "cinematography", "song", not "music", etc.). I'm asking because I want to understand the reasoning. I think it's normal to use "comics" for comicbook series, or for characters that appeared in multiple distinct comics, but I also want to know why it should be used for single comics. diego_pmc (talk) 07:35, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

It's not probably, it is the answer. The term used to describe the medium is "comics." This is rather distinctive, and to compare to your examples, none of those utilise a pluralised term to describe their medium, with the possible exception of music, although that is the singular and plural in the same instance. The reason "comics" is used is to indicate the topic is referring to something within the medium of "comics", as opposed to the medium of "film" or "music" or "sculpture" and so on. A good comparison is with the dab phrase (mathematics). The reason we don't use (comic) is to avoid confusion as much as anything else. The reason we use one term where possible is to keep things simple, something which has always been the spirit of both the naming conventions and Wikipedia practises, principles and policies. I hope that clarifies. Hiding T 08:54, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

But then why don't film, music, games and other such articles use a disambig phrase to indicate the medium, and not the object? Shouldn't Wikipedia try to adapt uniformity? As opposed to mathematics, physics, chemistry, which are sciences, non-material, so it is normal to indicate the medium. Not to mention that these are the only grammatically correct words in English. Comics on the other hand fall into the same category as films, songs, and games. These three other example also use the plural, but this when the article is about a series, not in every single case. diego_pmc (talk) 09:17, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

  • Other projects are free to do as they will, and I won;t speak as to what they do because I have never checked them all. Uniformity is not a goal of Wikipedia, as can be seen in the language and date conventions. Like I stated above, we prefer to keep it simple. Using one phrase where-ever possible is felt to be far more intuitive to the reader's experience, and avoids certain language specific arguments and issues (see the dab phrases (color) and (colour), both of which are used for an example). Comics is a short, easy to remember term and prevents us becoming overly technical and inserting longer and longer phrases, for example (American comic book) or (syndicated comic strip). Interestingly, the policy on Wikipedia is to avoid dab phrases where possible in favour of the commonest name possible, because dab phrasing is ugly, and where a dab phrase is needed keep it simple. Comics fits the bill. I'm intrigued that you keep looking for standards and uniformity; we're here trying to keep our dab phrase as uniform as possible. Isn't that a good thing? Why is simplicity something to be avoided? Hiding T 10:52, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Look at the media and how each is discussed collectively. By way of example:
  • the film industry
  • the music or recording industry
  • the television or broadcast industry
  • the video game industry
  • the comics industry
As far as dab naming goes: At some level for each media a consensus was reached as to what is are acceptable dab suffixes for that media. In general that wasn't an overall consensus, but one that was left up to the various Projects that look after content related to the particular media.
Here, with this media and Project, the consensus was that "(comics)" is the generic top level dab.
- J Greb (talk) 10:46, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Articles about songs use "song", not "music". Anyway, is there a comics related policy saying that subtitles shouldn't be included. In other words, is there anything bad about keeping the full name of the comic (Concerned: The Half-Life and Death of Gordon Frohman)?
And by uniformity I meant similar approaches to similar problems, not an universal approach no matter the problem. diego_pmc (talk) 11:39, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

  • The policy on Wikipedia is to use the most common name possible. Personally, I'd stick the page at Concerned and add a link to Concern in the form of a hatnote at the top of the article like {{About|the webcomic||Concern}} which produces
    This page is about webcomic. For other uses, see Concern.
    . I can't see why that's thought to be a major problem. Otherwise, no, we don't have a specific rule against using the full name, it just makes sense to use the shortest name you can. Hiding T 13:07, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
This would get my vote - I had a read through the talk page yesterday and not sure why it wassmoved but as Concerned redirects there doesn't seem any reason not to (unless someone has an unplayed card up their sleeve). (Emperor (talk) 15:43, 21 August 2008 (UTC))

Yeah, probably there should be such a note on the article page, and Concerned should redirect there after all.

But I still want to go back to the other subject - disambig phrases. It is clear that the disambig phrases of other projects don't represent the industry, but the object. This is because there also are disambig phrases like "film series", etc. - I don't think there is any 'film series industry'.

A minimum level of cooperation between projects should exist, as in cases like this, in order to add uniformity and professionalism to Wikipedia. The convention should also mention that "comics" is used for series, while "comic", or "webcomic" is used for a single comic, which has no sequels, like Concerned. Apostasy (another HL2 comic) on the other hand should use "comics", as it is a series of comics, not just one single comic.

This kind of formula is used in all other projects mentioned above, and it does not complicate things, proof being that no one suggested yet to change the disambig phrase to be changed to indicate the industry, and I witnessed no confusion from editors not knowing which to apply.

Other examples would be "actor", or "singer", phrases that indicate what the person is, not what industry the person is in "acting", "singing". diego_pmc (talk) 11:58, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

  • Thanks for your input on the dab phrase. However, as has been explained numerous times, we've found that using "comic" leads to confusion, with things getting tagged all different things, and we've found it easiest to use the simplest convention possible per policy. Note this isn't a phrase which represents the industry, medium or the thing itself. It's a phrase which indicates the relevant subject, per policy. As to uniformity, since we are using a uniform phrase where-ever possible, I hoe you can agree that uniformity and proffessionalism are ideals whose definition change depending upon which scale you are looking at. I hope that finally clarifies. Hiding T 12:56, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
It does clarify a few things, but not all however. Also please note the reason why I'm talking about this is because I'm not convinced about the correctness of this approach, and it's intended as constructive criticism.
What kind of confusion does "comic' lead to, for example you didn't make it clear.
And of curse uniformity and professionalism are dependent on the perspective, and sure, each project should be independent from each other, and should influence the way the content of a page is organized independently, according to the subject. However there are a few things that have to be universal, like for example the order of the ending sections ("See also, "references", "External links"). Same goes for article labeling - there should be a minimum coordination.
Another reason hy I think it's a good idea to add this modification to the policy is for the sake of correctness - you can't refer to a comic, as you do do with a series of comics. This small change that doesn't confuse people, if described properly (reason given above) (BTW, is there a naming policy of comics written somewhere?), would at the same time indicate the relevant subject, but also it would indicate it properly, not referring to a singular comic as you would do to a series of comics.
P.S.: So in the end should I move the article to Concerned?diego_pmc (talk) 14:52, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
It confuses the issue because, and you will have to trust me on this, but it has happened; pages end up getting endlessly moved between "comic", "webcomic", "graphic novel", "comic book", "comic magazine" and more, because there isn't actually a specific term that covers everything; except comics. I appreciate where you are coming from; you are saying that this thing, this Concerned webstrip is not a comics; therefore, because of this viewpoint, the phrase "comics" is the wrong qualifier. What we are trying to explain is that there is another way of looking at it; the term "comics" describes the subject the thing, in this case Concerned, is related to. This is done for purposes of uniformity per the guidance at WP:DAB which states to use a phrase which conveys the subject the thing is related to. That is the guidance on the issue. Yes we have a naming policy for comics. It is at WP:NCC. It states the agreed general disambiguation phrase used for articles related to comics, including creators, publications, and content, is "(comics)". This was established after a lot of debate and due consideration, to avoid the kinds of situations where pages get endlessly moved at the whim of editors and publishers. I hope you can now appreciate why things are why they are, and why, whilst we welcome your input, experience has taught us that the way things are works best. Hiding T 15:06, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Maybe you're right, I still have a few reservations, buuut perhaps you're right. So in the end Concerned with note to Concern, or Concerned (comics) with Concerned redirecting to Concern? Your recommendation as a member of the main project the article belongs to, since the article received no direct input from this project. diego_pmc (talk) 15:43, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I've tried redirecting Concerned to Concerned (comics) with a hatnote there to Concern, as someone suggested; IMO it works rather neatly. Pi zero (talk) 15:49, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, if we're going to redirect Concerned thre, there's no need for that disambig phrase in the title anymore, is there? I mean that's the reason we put it there in the first lace, to remove ambiguity, but since that note is there... But I can't move the page, an admin must do it. diego_pmc (talk) 16:24, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Calling the article "Concerned (comics)" disambiguates references from other articles, making it clear that the references are to something in the comics genre (without requiring a long name). Redirecting "Concerned" to "Concerned (comics)" makes sense because there's a good chance that's what was wanted, and if it wasn't wanted, there's the hatnote. Pi zero (talk) 16:40, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

That's not what i said. Remeber why we opted for a disambig phrase the first time? Because we thought Concerned shouldn't redirect here. But now, since we figured it's better if it did, there's no need for the disambig phrase anymore. It's just a 'longer title'. In other words we should simply name the article Concerned. diego_pmc (talk) 17:31, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Say what? We opted for a disambig phrase because we thought calling the article "Concerned" would be confusing. Your comments made it clear that was why you didn't want it to be called simply "Concerned", and you didn't seem to object to redirecting "Concerned" to "Concerned: The Half-life and Death of Gordon Frohman".
If you really want to reopen a long, sometimes strained debate over the name of the article that had had finally arrived at an arrangement acceptable to all (including you, at the time), I suggest we take it back to Talk:Concerned (comics), rather than imposing on the hospitality of these good folks at the Wikiproject. However, before you decide to do that, I remind you that one of the things said here about the phrase "(comics)" was that it prevented endless moving of articles at the whim of editors and publishers. Pi zero (talk) 17:46, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Is my English that bad or is it you? I said: we wanted/opted "Concerned" + "(comics)", because "Concerned" too abmbigous. BUT NOW we figured it's better if we just redirect Concerned to the actual article, and place a note indicating to "Concern", just in case. SO if we do this, there is no need to use a disambig phrase anymore. Seesh. diego_pmc (talk) 18:16, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I have started a new section for this back at the article talk page, here. (BTW, I accidentally hit "Save page" before I meant to on that last comment... so don't take it too much to heart, there were some phrases in it I really meant to change or remove. Hopefully we can leave that behind, too, going back to the other page.) Pi zero (talk) 19:18, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Apostasy

Does anyone here know if the webcomic Apostasy was canceled? diego_pmc (talk) 14:53, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

need FURs for images

Sfan00_IMG has been tagging images without FURs for deletion, including some comics article images. I'll try to get what I can. 204.153.84.10 (talk) 17:49, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Batman R.I.P.

Is there too much plot on this page? Duggy 1138 (talk) 14:23, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes. We should try and keep the plot of current series trimmed back hard, once we have a better grasp of the story we can see what are the important aspects which need discussing in a plot section but too much plot before then and you get blow-by-blow plot bloat in attempt to throw everything against the all and see what sticks. That approach just means the whole section will need rewriting and personally I'd rather expand an outline than have to hack back something overly long and detailed. (Emperor (talk) 15:38, 21 August 2008 (UTC))
This is a particularly hard one, since it's far from clear what is going on in the story. Still best to err on the side of less, rather than more. Phil Sandifer (talk) 15:39, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
I think that, to a degree people are trying to tell the story and give us elements that they feel need to be told for later revelations. It's better to give a brief outline and if something earlier becomes important, add it then. Duggy 1138 (talk) 03:36, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I've done some trimming (from a position of ignorance, I'll admit). Anyone want to have a look and make any corrections/changes? Duggy 1138 (talk) 04:35, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Healing Factor

I looked over the latest issue of Wolverine: Origins it shows a character is shown in the issue healing the wound left by a severed leg but not regenerating it. It got me to thinking about the healing factor article itself and articles in which "regenerative healing factor" is listed as a power in the superhero box and in the P&A section. Healing superhumanly fast is a fairly common fictional superpower, but should there be a distinction between it vs. healing superhumanly fast AND being able to regenerate missing tissue? The two qualities don't necessarily have to go hand in hand. Wolverine's healing factor, for instance, was originally just accelerated healing without the full tissue regenerative qualities that writers added later on. Same thing with Sabretooth and Deadpool if I'm not mistaken. Any thoughts?Odin's Beard (talk) 16:06, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

C-Class articles

I'm of the opinion that A-Class and B-Class articles should receive some sort of review before stating that they have achieved that point, and if not they should be C-Class or even Start articles. There are a ton of articles in the B-Class category, but I don't think most of them have even been properly evaluated to make sure they meet the B-Class criteria. For example, I started a list of a number of Marvel Comics articles that are currently rated as B-Class. In fact, I'd say that everything in the A-Class comics articles category and the GA-Class comics articles category should probably also be rated as a C unless they have been properly reviewed using the A-class criteria or the GA criteria, as the case may be.

If you agree with me, I'd like to start reassessing them as C-Class (if I can't easily locate notes on how they were reviewed) and then we can work them back up to B, A, GA, or even FA as the case may be. I wouldn't dream of messing with anything that's got an FA status since we know those have been reviewed to death already.  :)

If I'm coming out of left field, I'll be glad to leave this stuff alone and let someone else worry about it.  :) BOZ (talk) 19:24, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

For article to make B, A and GA they have to be assessed and in the case of GA heavily reviewed. You can't just decide to bump it up one day.
For example, there is a set of criteria for being made a B and we do have a check list so people can show they have been through and ticked all the boxes. Unfortunately it appears this isn't being done - compare Category:Reviewed B-Class Comics articles with Category:B-Class Comics articles. The former should be full and the latter should have a few examples that are awaiting assessment, the fact that they are completely the other way round is a bit of a problem (there are 10 reviewed and 1,152 unreviewed). I'm not sure what the others think but it strikes me they should all be dropped to C until someone bothers to review them. This is quite a bit of work though and ideally I'd prefer it if they were assessed, but somehow I don't see that happening magically. Would it be possible to do something that flags up the fact that it is an unassessed B and will be dropped to C unless someone goes through and checks it against the criteria? It might prompt people to sort it out. We could also drop a note into each workgroup pointing people to the workgroup specific category? Might get some of them done. Perhaps get everyone to chip in and rate 10 or more, spread that out and it'd get quite a slice done.
Also is it possible to remove the B-class checklist from the non-B-class articles? Perhaps if it wasn't there all the time (so people end up just ignoring it) it might help prompt people into addressing it when it crops up? (Emperor (talk) 21:02, 21 July 2008 (UTC))
Aha, maybe I'm not crazy then.  ;) Yes, I had noticed all of the non-assessed B articles some time ago, which was what prompted me to speak up now that we have a C class. Maybe a bot could go to all the unassessed B pages and make a note, and then a week later all will be dropped to C? I think the checklist should stay, as it gives people something specific to shoot for (in case they happen to be looking). BOZ (talk) 21:57, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
I can probably cover most of this on and off by hand over the next few days. My bot is approved for assisting with project assessment so I think that would cover this sort of task. What's the proposal then. Immediately drop all B-Class without review to C-Class or leave a notice? What's the wording of the notice, it'll be easier to subst it I should imagine so we could set one up in a sub-page somewhere. I can drop the check list for the stub and upwards. There is also a checklist for use on A-Class articles but I haven't as yet activated that. Do people want that activated? There are review processes for the comics-proj, it just seems to be really hard to get editors involved in them. I don't know if it is a feeling that editors don't feel they have the right to do the reviewing, which they do, a lack of awareness, a time thing or something else. Have a look at Category:Comics articles by review. This is why I haven't as yet set up the A-Class review process. To be honest. looking at the backlog of cleanup tasks we have, for example, 628 articles in Category:Comics articles without infoboxes, which has remained fairly static since the 9th July, actually increasing by 5, it appears we have issues with cleanup tasks on the project. Is there a way of achieving better collaboration on such tasks? We all seem to plough our own field at the moment. Would a Cleanup To-Do task list help, with people taking ownership of specific areas, so that we could get this backlog better worked through and then be in a much better place and start implementing better review processes and so on? Hiding T 09:10, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
On initial thought, I would have just dropped the unreviewed B's to C's with a note on the talk page, but Emperor is more reasonable than I, so I'm now thinking it would be best to leave a warning with a time limit, and then set the bot to work. Not sure what to say on the notice. I'd definitely like to see a checklist on A-class, and it's my personal preference to have the B-class checklist on all articles, but I won't complain if you cut it on less-than-starts. As far as cleanup, I try to do what I can when I can. I think the cleanup task looks like a mountain of work so it's intimidating to most people, but maybe we could set up some "jobs" (like hit these 10 articles for grammar, hit these 10 articles for present tense, etc), and see where that takes us? BOZ (talk) 12:27, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
OK how about this as a modified plan?
  • I was just looking at Chamber of Darkness and while updating the header to ask for an infobox I noticed it was on a B and yet it has only one footnote and lacks an infobox, so I dropped it to C and added the B-class checklist Talk:Chamber of Darkness which got me thinking.
  • The B-class checklist is obviously useful for all categories of B and below as people can flag areas that need work. However, to find the checklist you have to look down to where the templates are listed and click through and then copy and paste it into the header. It strikes me this is something only an experienced editor would do - if they thought to do it. Any people passing through might not even know where to look for it even if they wanted to add it.
  • So we send the robot through and add this checklist to all B, C, Start and Stub class articles.
  • We introduce something which flags that the checklist needs updating (even if that is simply "=no" on all fields for, say, a stub).
  • Perhaps also get the robot to drop a boilerplate note into B class talk pages saying something nicer than "use it or lose it", but with that general meaning.
  • We should then be able to do another automated sweep in a months time and anything that was classed as B, that has either not been updated or has been updated but failing one area, can then be bumped down to C.
If we have an A checklist then I'd say we implement that - there aren't a lot of them so we could just drop a list in here and people can strikethrough anything they've assessed (and other editors can look them over to be sure).
So we should end up with everything from A down having a checklist and all the As covered, with the unassessed Bs dropped down to Cs but with all of them having the checklist so people know which areas need attention.
One question: Is it possible to have a template like "insertcp" which could use as "subst:insertcp" which would drop in the comics proj template with fields ready to be filled, including the checklist? This would allow us a quick and easy way to get all the future headers off to a good start (with the robot covering the ones that have already been created). (Emperor (talk) 16:39, 23 July 2008 (UTC))
Sounds like an excellent plan. BOZ (talk) 21:41, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
For example, Galactus was just changed from a B-Class to an A-Class by an anon with no explantion. It wasn't even checked for B-Class in the first place. BOZ (talk) 21:39, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
Assessment is just like any other edit. People are going to do it for any number of reasons, with or without knowing what they're talking about or reading guidelines or using checklists. Point being, just change it back and don't let it stress you. --hamu♥hamu (TALK) 22:02, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
I'm not particularly worried, just bringing that up as another symptom of the greater problem.  :) BOZ (talk) 22:05, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
I think this is where the A-class checklist comes in - you would have a visual representation of someone having checked against these criteria (rather than simply saying "Yep that is an A") so if you find it failing in an area you can downgrade and state which isn't being met. II saw an A-class article today that was not meeting the reference criteria for a B-class - you could then knock it down to a C and use the B-class check-list to highlight the problem. (Emperor (talk) 23:54, 23 July 2008 (UTC))
And Galactus is a good example of that situation. :) BOZ (talk) 15:09, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
I have done a quick skim through some of the B-class articles needing review and an awful lot seem to be failing on at least one point (the commonest ones are lack of supporting materials and lack of references to support statements) - I also found 2 articles on my quick skim which were redirects to other pages. As best as I can tell people seem to often be throwing in a B by default. Something really does need doing or the classification can be considered a joke. Looking through I stick by my plan as outlined above - it should spur people to actually assess them and will make the process easier. Also I think we'd all like to try to get as many assessed as possible (if nothing else so we can target their failings) and by adding the checklist it means that people may be prompted to do some assessing further down the line (I know I'll only be able to do a small percentage of those on my watchlist but will then try and assess anything I run across in the course of editing - we should be able to get reasonable coverage eventually).
Basically it seems if we bump down the unassessed we will be more right than we are now with them all on B. (Emperor (talk) 02:16, 25 July 2008 (UTC))
I'll give whatever support I can to your efforts, even if it may not be in the form of doing actual full assessments, which we badly need. BOZ (talk) 12:17, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
It isn't rocket science - a read through will show you if it is a good rounded overview in a well structured article and whether it contains grammatical errors. Whether it is missing infoboxes and supporting images can be seen with a quick glance. By this point you should also be able to see if it is well referenced and for most articles on creators, comics or characters that is going to mean if it has footnotes and the like (lists of titles is probably a bit different but I'd prefer redlinks or new/upcoming titles to have some kind of inline reference). So if you are familiar with the topic you should be able to assess it pretty quickly - there will clearly still be a bit of variability in what people think is satisfactory but that will always be the case and an assessment is better than none (and could help provoke a debate if people disagree) and from my quick survey when things are failing in an area they are failing pretty obviously - I had to bump 2000 AD (comics) down as not only were there few footnotes for such a long article but there were also a number of citation needed notices on the page. Equally there are B-class articles lacking infoboxes, any images at all, etc. Once you get your eye in it is fairly straightforward but if you are unsure about anything then drop it in here and we'll look it over. (Emperor (talk) 12:54, 25 July 2008 (UTC))
True, and I can add the checklist without filling out every item on things I'm not sure of (i.e., "not checked"). BOZ (talk) 15:02, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
I went ahead and did exactly that to the first 11 items in my list of B-Class Marvel Comics articles needing review. Just checked really quickly on each one; some of those parts need more time spent per article but I got the ball rolling. BOZ (talk) 15:20, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
I just had a look at the reviewed B-Class comics articles category. Man, there's a huge disparity between the ones that have not been reviewed for B-Class and those that have been. And most of those articles that have been completely reviewed were done recently by Emperor, so he's right in saying that people were just adding that class to articles (or, to assume good faith, that when people actually did review an article first, it was just not indicated via the checklist). BOZ (talk) 23:14, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
I hit all the articles in my list starting with the letter "B"'s, as I did the ones starting with "A" yesterday. I'll add more checklists later, but don't have time at the moment. BOZ (talk) 15:03, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Sorry, been busy. What's occurring? Do I still need to do anything? I'm confused by what people mean by adding the checklist. If memory serves, it should be coded to appear on B-Class and below. It used to show up on GA class but it was felt inappropriate there. If people want the A-Class checklist activated, where do they want that to show up? Just on A-Class articles, or A-Class and reviewed B-Class? Hiding T 14:32, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
What I was thinking of was running the robot to actually include the checklist code on the talk pages for class B and below. As it stands someone wanting to add the checklist code needs to know they can find the templates listed at the bottom of the page when they are editing and then click through, copy it go back and paste it in. Most people aren't going to bother. However, if the checklist code was already there then more people would be tempted into giving a quick rating and it also acts as a reminder that there are quite a few boxes that need ticking to get to B (I know it is already there but it underlines the fact and makes it harder to simply add a B rating without going through the criteria). I'd also then add something to {{comicsproj}} that flags up a notice saying "unassessed B-class articles will be downgraded to C on XX XXXX 2008." People should see their watchlist light up (might be worth using an edit summary like "Adding B-class checklist - please assess this article." Once we've added the checklist to the existing articles it will be easy enough to keep an eye on new creations and add them in when they appear so it gets us off to a good start that we can then keep rolling along and seems like the best way of making sure as many of the articles as possible get a rating.
Yes I think the A-Class rating is a good idea - we can do them by hand. Once the above has been done and we now only have assessed B-class articles I'd suggest we add the A-class checklist to them so people know what areas need addressing to bring it up to scratch.
So basically the first step would be adding the B-class checklist to all Bs and below (uisng a robot) and adding the A-class checklist (by hand) to the As. We then try and assess as many Bs as possible and then downgrade the rest after a set time (using a robot). The third stage would be adding in the A-class checklist to assessed B-class articles (alongside the B-class checklist. This should mean that everything up to an A has at least one checklist which will allow people to flag the areas that need approving. (Emperor (talk) 15:00, 28 July 2008 (UTC))
Yeah, Emperor was adding them by hand, and I've done a few myself, but a robot would be a whole lot quicker.  :) For an example, see this [36]. BOZ (talk) 23:42, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
Being impatient, I hit all the articles in my list starting with the letter "C" and "D", for a checklist.  :) BOZ (talk) 15:22, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
Got the "E"'s, "F"'s, and "G"'s on my list, except Galactus because I don't know what an A-Class checklist looks like.  ;) BOZ (talk) 19:33, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
Got the "H"'s, "I"'s, "J"'s, "K"'s, and "L"'s, except for Iron Man for the same reason as Galactus. :) BOZ (talk) 03:03, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
  • I can't find a way for the bot to add the check-list without adding it into every project template on a talk page. The bot can append a message to the bottom of the page though, which I've been doing, see [37]. I may need to tweak the language to clarify it is for the COmics project, but I can get the bot to add that message. Then after the deadline, I think we'll have to go through and reassess as C-Class. I can get the bot to hit any article where the syntax is {{Comicsproj|class=B, but beyond that it gets complicated working out variations on the theme. Also, there isn't an A-Class check-list, instead we simply review them at a review page. So once we have the B-Class sorted out, we can start reviewing the A-Class articles for A-Class, and then possibly the GA and B-Class articles. Hiding T 11:50, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
That looks good to me; just do what you can with it, I guess? BOZ (talk) 12:26, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
Aaaaand... I got the rest of the articles in that unassessed B-class articles list. I rememeber checking them all for completeness previously, so I didn't see a reason to check that again now.  :) BOZ (talk) 15:37, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
I agree - anything we can do to highlight this issue and help people work towards assessing the articles has to be a good thing.
I've now been through quite a few and downgraded perhaps 80% of them - the occasional one is a mystery as to how they got the rating, some lack infoboxes and images but the large majority fall over on referencing. You'll often find a number of sections heavily referenced and then there being very little elsewhere (presumably because someone interested in that specific aspect of the story got stuck in) - it is especially telling in the parts dealing with their early life and origin which can often be stated as fact when it is unclear when this origin was told, if it was dropped in later or retconned or anything. Equally the powers and abilities is often completely lacking in source - I know it could be tricky sourcing them but when simply stated it reeks of original research and is almost in-universe when we know powers can be highly variable depending on the needs of the story and often the best you can say is that "in issue #X we see them doing Y," this doesn't mean they can always do it but it is within the general 'ability envelope'. A good example of what can be done is Superman#Powers_and_abilities (and a bad example is, ironically, Powers and abilities of Superman). This is often pretty obvious as the article can be peppered with citation requests and/or has the need for references flagged at the top of the page.
I've also added the B-class checklists to any article I stumble across (and when I remember ;) ) and that is pretty helpful for focusing on the problem areas and I've bumped quite a few up to a C class as they are close and only need a bit of work to push them up a notch.
Everyone should have a go at it as it isn't rocket science - lack of images/infoboxes and poor structure can be spotted with a quick scan. A read through the page will reveal coverage, references and grammar - it doesn't have to be perfect (that is for the push on to higher classes) but if you come to the end and you can't spot any obvious gaps and you haven't had to work to understand what was written and you weren't left thinking "when/how/why/are you sure" over some points then you can address the boxes. You get your eye in quite quickly after doing a few and, as I've said, you can always ask for a second opinion here. (Emperor (talk) 15:48, 30 July 2008 (UTC))
Note 80% is probably a tad optimistic. Also once I did get my eye in it was clear some of my early assessments were a little generous. I won't do anything about them unless someone objects (as they have done, rightly, on Tabitha Smith - a clear sign that if nothing else this will help prompt debate and focus people on improving the article) but when the whole process is over I'll go back through them to make sure they are consistent and adjust them accordingly if they aren't. So it is an ongoing process but it is promising start and looks like it should help with improving articles across the board. (Emperor (talk) 16:54, 30 July 2008 (UTC))
Well, they don't have to be perfect to get a B-class. Tabitha could use more sourcing, I agree, but get a couple of sections and it's good to go back to B (and B-Class articles should at absolute minimum have at least a stubby pub history/out-of-universe section). I'd argue that Captain Britain, for example, could use better sourcing as well, but it's less spotty than Tabitha. Getting stuff like that fixed is what would help make an article better than B. Glaring omissions on sourcing, such as a long stretch of unsourced character bio history, should withhold a B. But regardless, what I mean to say is that I think we can afford to be a little more generous in granting a B-class status than we would for something higher. BOZ (talk) 17:12, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
The problem is that half-way through the X-Force section the references just stop so there are large swathes of the bio with no explanation of what happened when and in what issue. Powers and abilities are also unreferenced. Both of those would have made me reconsider the rating on a second sweep - it just came up a bit earlier but was on my reassess list. I'd also argue that the Nextwave section is too large and should be in the "other versions" section. So it has its problems but feel free to start a section on the talk page - as I say one of the good things to start emerging from this is it does spark discussion, which can only be a good thing. Captain Britain is borderline and I ummed and ahhed over it (and is one of the ones I'll be looking at again when we've gone through the ratings, so if you can further source this then do so now ;) ). (Emperor (talk) 02:57, 31 July 2008 (UTC))
Yeah, I saw those discrepencies myself and felt the same way. Like I say, I'd say mostly sourced is good enough for a B if the other requirements are met. Improving the sourcing can get it higher up the chain. I was observing some of the talk pages you edited, and at least one of them besides the Tabitha page had the checklist further edited (can't remember which page though). BOZ (talk) 14:31, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
Unfortunately "mostly sourced" isn't a criteria for making it to B. I think the important thing is that this only a stage in the process of improving the articles - I'll be going back and flagging the specific statements that need sourcing and we can keep working on them to get them all up to grade. (Emperor (talk) 16:18, 31 July 2008 (UTC))
Just for fun, I added the checklist to the articles on my list of Stubs that are probably Starts which start with "A" through "G". If you do any assessment work on anything in that list, or the list of unassessed articles above it, or the list of unreviewed B-class articles below it, feel free to remove them as you go.  :) BOZ (talk) 15:01, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
  • I worked out a regular expression that seems to cover only adding checklists inside the comicsproj template so I have the bot running. It still misses any where the template spans two lines, like:

{{comicsproj
|class=b}}

  • but they will be few and far between and should still get tagged with the notice. I won't be around for a week or more, but when I get back I should be able to have the bot run through and downgrade any articles still awaiting a review to C-Class without a problem. There's also a way in awb of comparing articles in categories, so you can build a list of articles which are assessed as stubs but which do not have a stub template on them. I reckon once we have this run through, we should look at putting some work in on improving our articles. I have a few tools which will identify which ones to start with, based on page view and importance and so on. Let's keep the steam going here. Hiding T 15:28, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
That all sounds good - thanks for that. (Emperor (talk) 16:18, 31 July 2008 (UTC))
It's caused an issue with one user. [38] and [39]. I have contacted the user and p[ointed them here in a bid to clear up any confusion over our intent. [40]. Hiding T 21:21, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
Yes I'm afraid trying to cover a 1000+ articles is going to seem distinctly impersonal and misunderstandings are going to happen (I'm surprised I haven't got any angry messages - this isn't a request for angry messages though, everything is fixable and the assessment should lead to medium and long term improvements across the project). He is a good editor and very knowledgeable so if there are any shortfalls on related topics we should be able to fix them (the ironic thing is the article passes, as I've found it is often easy to get good solid coverage on a tight, well-defined topic but it can be tricky for long-running characters and titles as there is so much ground to cover). (Emperor (talk) 22:27, 31 July 2008 (UTC))
I was trying to help, not harm, by bringing this up.  :) By ensuring that all the criterion are met at the B-Class level, it will be that much easier to bump an article up to the next level all the way up to even FA. I don't think that moving something down to C-Class because an assessor did not "show their work" is a lack of good faith, and I will assume good faith on anyone who claims to have reviewed an article for B-Class (unless it's very clear that they have not). BOZ (talk) 22:46, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
I added the checklist to the rest of the articles on my list of Stubs that are probably Starts. If you do any assessment work on anything in that list, or the list of unassessed articles above it, or the list of unreviewed B-class articles below it, feel free to remove them as you go.  :) BOZ (talk) 21:27, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
And, just to finish off that page, I got all the ones on my little list of unassessed Marvel articles. :) BOZ (talk) 16:52, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
Thanks that's really useful. I took a bit of a run at the B-class list there to try and at least do the big names (or anything that took my interest) - I'll have another go in a day or so but probably need to hit up some of the DC ones and anything else that I see. Coverage is only ever going to be patchy unless we can get a lot of people working through the unassessed but then again the ones I've seen that don't make it yet would have probably been assessed as a C if that was around at the time - you can see that people have been in a quandary with an article that is much better than a Start article, all you are left with is putting it B because it is closer to that than a Start. So downgrading unassessed articles to C is probably actually putting most of them in the category they should be in at the moment. Obviously assessment would help people work out where to improve the article so it can make a B (and nearly all the articles I've seen could make it easily).
Just a reminder to people coming here to find out more about the message dropped on the talk page: If they want something assessing or have assessed an article but want a second opinion then drop a link in here and we'll cast our eye over it as a priority (so if you spot something that really needs assessing as a priority then do let us know). I've also said if people want I can go through articles I've assessed as needing more references and flag which statements in particular need a source (even if it is a primary source) - I will be doing this with some that nearly make it after the assessments are done but can do it now on request (or I can give a second opinion on something I've not reassessed) - I'd just like to focus what time I have here on getting as many articles as assessed. As I say this is an ongoing process so an assessment/reassessment is only one of the steps and we will, as always, try to provide what help we can to enthusiastic editors looking to improve an article. (Emperor (talk) 17:08, 3 August 2008 (UTC))
I'd be happy if someone else than me would would rate a "B class at the moment" article I wrote: Hungarian comics. I think it reaches B standards, but it wouldn't be correct if I would check in those boxes. (If someone would give me some tips on further directions on developing the article, I would be grateful). Zoli79 (talk) 19:43, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
OK done - I've left you further notes on how to improve things. The content is really good, if you can add more references to the more modern history it should be good for a B and it looks in good enough shape to go much higher. (Emperor (talk) 20:22, 3 August 2008 (UTC))
No problem - I don't want to monopolize anyone's time with the Marvel articles, but those are what I know so those are what I'm looking at.  :) And I agree with you on how people were handling the "Start or B-Class?" conundrum. I'd say just as often, people left an article as a Start when it wasn't quite a B, and a lot of our better-than-average Starts can be bumped up to C's now.
As for requests for assessment, well that could be a super long list (and of course, all Marvel coming from me), but I'll keep it short for now to help the focus.  :) First off, I'd say we need the obvious ones, you know characters who have had 40+ year ongoing titles of their own, such as Spider-Man, Hulk, X-Men, and Thor. Next, I'd say characters who have been around since at least the 70s and had at least one long-running series of their own, such as Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D., Namor, Ms. Marvel, Wolverine, Ghost Rider (Johnny Blaze), Spider-Woman (Jessica Drew), Moon Knight, Punisher, and Mar-Vell. And of course, what are superheroes without supervillains, so how about some of the most enduring, recurring archnemesis type bad guys, such as Red Skull, Green Goblin, Loki, Mephisto, Kang the Conqueror, Mandarin, Masters of Evil, and Apocalypse? Heck, many of those are currently Starts, especially the villains. BOZ (talk) 20:07, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
OK That seems a reasonable list (I spotted Spider-Man when I looked at it before and kicked myself for not doing it earlier) - there are so many in the category that it can become a bit overwhelming, so it is handy if they are distilled down to bite-sized chunks like that (if a DC expert wants to do the same as BOZ has done over on the DC Workgroup then you'd earn our gratitude). Consider them all on my to do list, although that shouldn't stop anyone else from jumping in and sorting them out before I get round to them (it'll free me up to do more elsewhere). Thanks again for all the hard work on the Marvel side of things - it should really help now and in the longer term. (Emperor (talk) 20:22, 3 August 2008 (UTC))
Just to keep momentum going, I added the checklist to a bunch of stubs and starts on one of my (offline) lists. I'll probably do this until I'm done with that list, since I have already (unwittingly) checked #2 and #3 on each of these, and item #5 is easy to spot check, so I can partially do a bunch of them quickly that way. Later on (eventually...) I'll try to come back and check points #1 and #4 on ones that still need it. BOZ (talk) 21:37, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
Got some more. BOZ (talk) 15:53, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
Got a few more today. BOZ (talk) 16:07, 6 August 2008 (UTC) - Well, a lot actually.  :) That's enough for today, will try to get more tomorrow. BOZ (talk) 21:25, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
Added the checklist to quite a few more! Will keep going tomorrow. BOZ (talk) 16:29, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
Got the checklist on quite a bit more today! I think I'll take a break for at least a few days. :) BOZ (talk) 18:03, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Went through the List of Avengers members and added the checklist to everything which didn't already have it.  :) BOZ (talk) 21:34, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the work - it does make the process simpler. I did a few of eh high profile creators the other day and worked through the big name characters listed above. I hope to do the rest BOZ has flagged and try and spot some others from skimming the category. As I said above, if anyone spots any others that need it (usually of higher importance) then drop a note in - I, or someone else, will sort it out.
As he says BOZ has been adding them to other non-B class articles and I've been adding and rating as I go along and it is a handy tool for giving people a quick guide to where the article needs work and it is pretty straightforward as most will need references and a lot will need expanding. If something needs an image/infobox then flag it with the image/infobox field. (Emperor (talk) 15:55, 12 August 2008 (UTC))
  • I've set up a breakdown by workgroup at User:Hiding/Cleanup/B-Class, click the links will review the article lists. There'll be some overlap, but the smaller lists may be better hit first which hopefully will bring the larger lists down. Hiding T 22:26, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, that is helpful! BOZ (talk) 00:30, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Burning the midnight oil! I was going through List of X-Men members as I did with the Avengers list a few days ago, and got about halfway - it's time to go to bed.  :) BOZ (talk) 07:25, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Too many mutants! I got quite a few more on that page, but I'll get the rest later. :) BOZ (talk) 18:32, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm back from Gen Con! I'll try to get more checklists added, but this week might be a bit busy, especially at first. BOZ (talk) 14:11, 19 August 2008 (UTC) Oops - I hadn't been paying attention! [41] :) BOZ (talk) 14:34, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

OK, finally got back on the horse and did some more today.  :) BOZ (talk) 19:20, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Thoughts going forwards

We've got some great momentum going here, so I thought I'd post up some thoughts on how to take that forwards. Ideally:

  • Get the B-Class articles reviewed
  • Get the unassessed articles assessed
  • Get the A-Class articles reviewed
  • Push the more important B-Class articles through GA review
  • Push the A-Class articles through the peer review and FA process
  • Review stub articles for any mistagged. I think I can do this with awb.
  • Review any start articles for C-Class.

I think we're working well here and it would be great to get the top two done, because then the rest will be easy and rewarding. Boz, what I'm going to do is focus on the non-Marvel, if you can perhaps start on the Marvel? That way once I get them done I can give you a hand and it will start to come down. What do you fancy tackling, Emperor? I've made a bash at the creators? I was thinking we should get an edit summary, you know, like reviewed for B-Class, you can help too. Milhist have a FAQ somewhere on how to review, I'll look at writing one up for us so we can link to it. Hiding T 08:57, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

That sounds like a good plan! In fact, the steps you've outlined pretty much mirror what I've been thinking. I'll do what I can, including continuing with adding checklists and spot-checking for things here and there. BOZ (talk) 14:22, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
I've taken a run at some creators and was going to do the Marvel ones BOZ flagged and then move on to checking the more important DC and other US comics (I did Green Arrow and Green Lantern the other night). I'm also happy to look over anything else anyone feels needs assessing now.
A few thoughts:
  • The B-class creators articles (and those that nearly made it which can be sorted out easily) are all pretty solid and could drive on to higher classes easily.
  • The B-class comics/characters articles are troubling as quite a few tick all the boxes but will require heavy rewriting to go any higher - plot needs reducing and out-of-universe needs increasing.
  • The majority of Bs are really Cs but before we had that grade it seems people were tagging as B if they were a lot better than a start when they weren't really meeting the B standard (they were just closer to B than Start).
  • The review process for every article below A is useful as it can help focus attention on areas that need work.
  • Danger areas of articles include: legal matters, inspiration, motivation of creators (especially when leaving titles/companies), powers/abilities and parodies/in popular culture (this last one is an open sore and petty much dooms an article - see Green Lantern).
What I've said I'd do is go back and flag sections that need sourcing in some articles which are just failing, this should help focus the improvement efforts. It is certainly a handy process as I've seen the same problems crop up again and again - this could be seen as a problem but I see it as a good thing as it allows us to spot where articles go wrong when trying to improve them further so we can intervene earlier and keep them on track:
  • For creators this includes motivation and legal matters
  • For characters/comics this is too much plot and for characters this can include what inspired the character and their powers and abilities (far too often stated as fact when powers can vary, often according to the dictates of the plot - in well done sections you'll see people referring to them being shown performing a certain feat in a specific issue, which is often all we can say about a specific power/ability that is rarely used as we don't know if they can always do this but rarely need to or that the writer just felt like throwing it in or even made a mistake).
We should try and squeeze the plot early and never be afraid to throw in a lot {{fact}} - it not only means the specific item gets sourced sooner but it also sets a good example for people following on behind who, you would hope, would add in further resources.
So it is certainly well worth doing and it will lead to an increase in quality across the board. (Emperor (talk) 15:36, 13 August 2008 (UTC))
  • Well, I've knocked up the FAQ, at Wikipedia:WikiProject Comics/Assessment/B-class FAQ. If you want to use it as an edit summary, maybe [[WP:COMICS|WikiProject Comics]] B-Class review: pass/fail. You can [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Comics/Assessment/B-class FAQ|help]] too. Hiding T 22:07, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

I've reformatted a section on the Marvel Comics articles assessment for Starts with potential for C-class and better advancement. I added a few there, and will add more later. BOZ (talk) 14:45, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Am I going nutty?

Or is this original reasearch, as I suspected? [42] and [43]? 204.153.84.10 (talk) 21:45, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd say "yes" it does read as OR... and
  1. Cites need to go with the text, not in the edit summary.
  2. We don't cite other Wikipedia articles as a source. We may crib a ref, but it should be relevant and support the text of the destination article.
  3. We definitely don't cite wikia.
It also reads as peacocking and slanted.
- J Greb (talk) 22:22, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Please comment on category scope

An ongoing debate and drawn out edit conflict needs to be resolved Category talk:Comic book characters originally created in other media

No actual edits in over a month, time to archive this. Fram (talk) 08:23, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Gaiman academic criticism

As I said I would, I've been adding information about academic criticism to some Neil Gaiman related articles based on the recent issue of ImageTexT. So far I've added to Stardust (novel), Neil Gaiman, Tori Amos, and Marvel 1602. Since I was involved in the production of the issue, I'd appreciate if people checked over to make sure I wasn't leaving any COI problems.

I'm done on this front for the night, but in the next few days will probably add more to Neil Gaiman, as well as some stuff to The Sandman (Vertigo), Mirrormask, Cages (comic series), and will probably start an article on Barker's Hellraiser comics so I can integrate an article about those. I'll let you know when I've got that all done. Phil Sandifer (talk) 03:42, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the note I'll check those over later.
I also agree we need something on the Hellraiser comics - we have Tapping the Vein (comic) but there are a lot more adaptations and Hellraiser is the main (Pinhead got his own series and crossed over with Marshal Law - I'd love to see that!!). (Emperor (talk) 19:09, 31 August 2008 (UTC))

Thanos

Could we get a few extra eyes on this as ome of the editors are at an impasse and can't seem to agree a way forward.

I've dropped a note in here asking for more discussion and less reverting but am not too sure everyone is going to go with that. (Emperor (talk) 19:09, 31 August 2008 (UTC))

Source for creative origins and development?

I was just reviewing the Abomination's article a little while ago, and I remembered something that I was meaning to get around to posting about.  :) I was at my friend's house a few weeks ago, and I saw a book called "Bring on the Bad Guys: Origins of the Marvel Comics Villains" by Stan Lee, so I took a few notes on it to mention it here. It appeared to be part of a series, and this book was published in 1976 by Simon and Shuster. It featured 6 supervillains – Doctor Doom, Dormammu, Loki, the Red Skull, the Green Goblin, the Abomination, and Mephisto. Each character had his own chapter, each of which featured a few pages of commentary from Stan Lee on the character's origins (and sometimes notes on other characters; for example the Loki entry also talks a lot about the Absorbing Man) and how they were developed and such, and then it reprinted the character's origin story and/or first appearance (usually 2-4 full comic books worth of stuff). I think that if anyone could get their hands on a copy (I may be able to borrow it, not sure when though) or any of the other books in the series, it would go a long way to developing some out-of-universe content for characters that badly need it! BOZ (talk) 17:17, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Just ordered a copy from Amazon. Thanks for the heads up! Ford MF (talk) 17:36, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
Let me know how useful that is - it looked pretty good.  :) BOZ (talk) 04:23, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
Fireside/Simon and Schuster produced [a number of similar books in the 70s and 80s. Mostly Marvel titles, they are basically reprints of the origins of heroes/villains with some of Stan Lee's memories and thoughts, which can be helpful.
The (main) titles are:
  • The Origins of Marvel Comics (1974)
  • Son of Origins of Marvel Comics (1975)
  • Bring on the Bad Guys (1976)
  • The Superhero Women (1977)
  • Marvel's Greatest Superhero Battles (1978)
  • Mighty Marvel Team-Up Thrillers (1983)
Also in the loose series was How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way, some character-tailored reprints and a plethora of other cookbooks, health books and tie-ins. F/S&S also produced three semi-similar collections of DC comics - War, Romance and Sci-Fi - these are reprints with an introduction. Also, Marvel later continued the reprints (although I've no idea about any commentary) with titles including Bring Back the Bad Guys (1998). ntnon (talk) 15:34, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, that's awesome! BOZ (talk) 16:28, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
Just keep in mind that the essays in this book series are Stan Lee's reminisces, and claims of other witnesses to the goings on at Marvel will occasionally contradict Stan Lee’s version.--Drvanthorp (talk) 16:24, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
True, but that's why any citation from such a book should begin with, "According to Stan Lee..." :) BOZ (talk) 16:29, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
What "other witnesses"? The staff of Marvel in the early days consisted of like five guys, tops, and they were all involved creators, not "witnesses". Ford MF (talk) 02:39, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Has it arrived yet, FMF?  :) BOZ (talk) 00:28, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Anything yet? BOZ (talk) 14:10, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Are we referring to Marvel Fireside Books? 67.162.108.96 (talk) 12:45, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
It looks that way. BOZ (talk) 19:20, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
Oh, it came all right. But I haven't been able to pry it away from my girlfriend so far, who is right now dead set on changing her last name to "Von Doom". She's never read Lee or Kirby before and she has, understandably, fallen in love. I'll get it back eventually, I'm sure. Ford MF (talk) 02:35, 28 August 2008 (UTC)
Hah - awesome.  :) BOZ (talk) 05:57, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Any luck yet?  ;) BOZ (talk) 17:36, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Fan fiction in alternative versions of...

I suspect this is a no-brainer but thought it worth bringing up, if only to highlight a potential problem. A user has gone through and (correctly) flagged that a number of the entries in "alternative versions of..." articles are erotic fan fiction:

They are all the same work of fiction and were added by the same person, who has sneaked mentions into other articles. I can't seen any reason to keep these in and it might be worth keeping an eye open for such things as they have been sneaking into alternative version, in other media, novels (and, weirdly, video games) and parodies (the last one being a general cause of concern). Rogue was hit by this and the barefoot vandalism (both now fixed), which is also doing the rounds of comics articles again, so it is important to keep an eye out for these things.

I'm not sure if we want to have a rule of thumb that it has to be "official" media/publications or just notable but I prefer the former as the latter could leave it open to trivia bloat - which is the problem with the parodies sections (for example I just removed this from the Rogue article). (Emperor (talk) 15:29, 2 September 2008 (UTC))

Fan fiction in alternate versions? No no no no no no no no no no no no no no no. No brainer is right. Doczilla STOMP! 20:48, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
The alternative versions are for official publications. In very rare instances, fan fiction may be notable, but then it's in the same category as third-party parodies/pop culture references to a fictional character or public reception. Postdlf (talk) 20:53, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
Uh, yeah, bye bye. BOZ (talk) 22:23, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

HTML Weirdness; Comic book style

Resolved

Top page of Infinity War, someone seems to have been trying to add a category called 'Superhero Comics'. First off, it seems this category is redundant and would bloat near instantly, secondly, the category is typed wrong and third, it doesn't actually show up on the edit page and thus, cannot be removed. I checked from top to bottom on the edit page...nothing. Weeeeird. I blame Doctor Doom. Lots42 (talk) 20:31, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

  • It's something to do with {{Infobox comic book title}}. I'm trying to pin it down now. Hiding T 20:38, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
    • There's a parameter in {{Infobox comic book title}} which allows you to categorise by genre. Can't say I'm sold on it, but it is there, but, if you add it you also have to add a sort key to the sort parameter. Someone hadn't doe that, which was causing the error. I'll go mention this in the documentation. Hiding T 20:50, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
I guess that was me. Per a few sections up from here, I added that infobox to a number of articles. Oops!  :) 204.153.84.10 (talk) 21:06, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
I think I fixed them all. Did you start after doing some D&D work, around 16:00 UTC? Also, have you thought of getting an account? Not that you have to, but... Hiding T 21:20, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Yes, that's when I started, so if you stopped there then you should have it all.  :) 204.153.84.10 (talk) 21:29, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Cool. Think I got them all. Hiding T 21:40, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Is this for real?

Bait and Switch (comics)? Or is someone just playing a joke on What If (comics)? 204.153.84.10 (talk) 17:19, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, good catch. Nominated for deletion. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bait and Switch (comics) --GRuban (talk) 18:47, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
No problem! 204.153.84.10 (talk) 18:56, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
I speedied it. Hiding T 18:56, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Atomic Robo needs your help

Atomic Robo needs some serious attention. ("has multiple issues") -- 201.17.36.246 (talk) 17:25, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

  • I've taken a pass, stubbified it. There's not a lot in there though. Hiding T 18:39, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
    • I have, over time, added a number of reviews and interviews there so it should be possible to take them and add some solid out-of-universe material on the background to the series as well as the reception as that is always going to be the best approach to improving an article - jamming more plot in never helps. So the material is all there to use and I'll dig out the sales figures to help with the reception. The material is all there it just needs someone with the time to go through everything and knock something together. (Emperor (talk) 23:25, 7 September 2008 (UTC))

User:189.87.58.52

This user continuously violates the original research policy by adding OR statements to the Powers and abilities of the Hulk and Hulk (comics) articles respectively. The latter article is currently protected due to disputes, so he/she decided to start placing the exact same statement into the Hulk article instead. He's been warned about his actions and was blocked for violating the 3RR. The block has ended and the user's back at it, trying to add the same statement as before. I've reverted it twice this evening so everyone might want to add the Hulk to their watchlist for a bit. Thanks. Odin's Beard (talk) 00:22, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

They never learn do they? Maybe if you request page protection (s)he will stop. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 06:31, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Lists of publications

OK this has been niggling at me for a bit but I suppose now is the time to sort this out. It came up with a bit of back and forth on Seven Seas Entertainment and I proposed the solution on the talk page but this applies to a number of articles, especially those of the big US comic publishers outside of the Big Two, like Dark Horse Comics, Image Comics, IDW Publishing, etc. but also Devil's Due Publishing, Avatar Press, etc. They are weighing down those articles and titles important to the publisher should be mentioned in the text. Also moving them out will not only help to encourage expansing of the main article but it could mean we can expand the lists to include other relevant information (which they can't currently do as they are kept trimmed right back for size reasons), after all being able to redlink, add source and extra details are the advantage of using lists instead of just relying on categories.

I will be putting in split suggestions on these but I wanted to run it past everyone to make sure we are all on the same page so I don't end up having to fix things immediately after splitting. Sooooooo:

  • Name the article: "List of X publications"
  • Keep the columns and eventually aim for tables like those we have at List of DC Comics publications and List of Marvel Comics publications. If so have we finalised what we do and don't want in these tables (might be worth a separate sub-section) and is it possible to somehow template them to make them easier to use?
  • Avoid/merge in any "List of current titles" - it might work for the Big Two (DC, Marvel) but really falls down with others that are not kept up-to-date (e.g. List of current Image Comics publications and # List of current Archie Comics publications, given that there are no title articles for these might be worth moving/merging to create full title listings). Also while it may be possible to maintain them for the Big Two it might not be desirable and I see a merge for the Marvel one was proposed but appears to have died a death. Depending on how things turn out here (maybe start a new sub-section?) we might want to put both up for merging again depending on how things work out here.

And probably some other stuff I've forgotten that might be important, so feel free to remind me. (Emperor (talk) 15:22, 9 September 2008 (UTC))

I'm curious as to why we're using series rather than volume in the DC list. Other than that, I think you have it all covered. Remember to write a strong lead for such lists and put inline references into it. Some sales figures might not hurt, something like, Dark Horse is a comics publisher which has been in business since blah blah blah. It has published under a number of different imprints, including the Legends and Comics Greatest World imprints. According to whomever it's highest selling title was whatever it was. Then set out what the list is collecting, and how it is broken down. Does it cover graphic novels, art books and so on? Dark Horse has perhaps a broader range than some of the other companies, for example. Anyway, those are some thoughts. Hiding T 17:08, 9 September 2008 (UTC)
Good call. That is all the kind of thing I was hoping for - if we can work out a general standardised approach it'll make it easier to slot the information in. It actually might be worth knocking up an example lead to kick around (and/or possibly splitting one off and working it up to standard and using the lessons learned with the others). I like the idea of including sales figures but which ones? Is there a specific month that we can use a snap shot for the shape of the industry? I'll have a look around to see if someone does a yearly summary - here is July 2008 for an example of what kind of monthly numbers we have to play with and it looks like "Percent of Top Comics By Units" might be the one we'd look at or mix in percent by dollars as this throws up interesting variations (as IDW are #5 in the former but #3 in the latter).
I would suggest that publications also covers graphic novels as falling within the boundaries of comics but art books seem to be a different deal. However, I'm open to suggestions as this is the kind of thing we'd want to thrash out. It might for example be worth having them in a separate list or something similar. (Emperor (talk) 18:38, 9 September 2008 (UTC))
I was thinking about sourcing their best selling book period, but thinking about it that might be hard. For Image it would most likely be Spawn, but for Dark Horse, maybe one of the Terminator Aliens Predator books. Maybe it would be best to use the previous years figures? Or an overall market share? I'd agree graphic novels are publications, I'm unclear on the art books myself. I know Dark Horse have produced an art of Hellboy book, as well as some books about comics. It might be an idea to list those separate. I'm not sure we could separate Graphic Novels into a separate list, that may be too hair splitting on what a graphic novel is. Unless we called it graphic novels and collected editions. Hiding T 19:12, 9 September 2008 (UTC)


Yes, I think including graphic novels is fine as you'd struggle to fit a hair between them and other comics - I don't know where you'd draw the line between some prestige format one-shots and a graphic novel and I suspect it'd come down to what the marketing people decide to call it. Equally some series have started as graphic novels and transferred to comic book series (especially off the back of Marvel Graphic Novels, Void Indigo and Starstruck (comics)). If only for those last case, they should be included with the other publications. I think art books are a separate beast as they don't tell a story through sequential art.
I agree that we'd struggle to define the best selling title but it could be possible to identify a handful of titles which sold strongly in recent years (for example I'm sure Buffy Season 8 is Dark Horses top seller recently and in fact the Angel ones are IDW's. Beyond that Star Wars and Hellboy sell well for Dark Horse and The Walking Dead is a big one for Image) but beyond that we might have to rely on marketing men which gets tricky as they are likely to spin the numbers in the best way to suit their needs at the time making comparisons difficult. (Emperor (talk) 23:23, 9 September 2008 (UTC))

B-Class assessments

Hey there, time for a new section, since it looks like the old one was too big and went stale, and dropped off.  :)

I haven't done anything on this in a couple weeks or so (I blame connection problems at home, although they started less than a week ago, heh), but glad to see Emperor and Hiding continuing. I'll also take this opportunity to remind you that I have been partially keeping track of some assessment issues at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Comics/Marvel Comics work group#Assessment, which you can use to your benefit. Feel free to remove anything you review, and I have just removed several that Hiding has taken care of.  :) BOZ (talk) 16:03, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks to Hiding, removed Ares as well.  :) BOZ (talk) 15:23, 8 September 2008 (UTC)
For reference:
Currently standing at (respectively):
  • 857
  • 98
Things are moving along slowly. You can cross Decimation (comics) off your list, ironically it was missing an infobox!! (Emperor (talk) 03:05, 11 September 2008 (UTC))
Good work, man!  :) BOZ (talk) 04:16, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Fictional timelines

This is a bad idea: Batman's career timeline. WesleyDodds (talk) 07:07, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

All fictional timelines are a bad idea, as far as I am concerned, since they are nothing but plot summary. Fram (talk) 08:07, 9 September 2008 (UTC)
Feel free to chip in at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Batman's career timeline then. Hiding T 09:52, 9 September 2008 (UTC)
Fram closed it as a copy-vio. (I didn't see the text, but I suppose I'll take Fram's (and others') word for it.) - jc37 10:05, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Universe "debuts"

I wound up at Multiverse (Marvel Comics) a short while ago, and was musing over whether the table ought to be easily alignable by date when I spotted an instant problem (double - or triple - "origin" dates for some issues), that led me to notice a pair of fairly serious errors: dates of "origin" of the two key universes, the 616 and the DC Universe.
The Marvel Multiverse list is a very helpful resource, but as far as those two Earths go, it does not have them accurately pegged. As I just commented there, the DCU should certainly not (as I understand it) be dated back to New Fun #1, and didn't first appear in the Marvel Universe with JLA/Avengers. DC #1, Action #1 or All-Star #3 (or some combination thereof) are much better candidates.
(Incidentally, I see a paucity of information at Multiverse (DC Comics) about Marvel crossovers, and no mention at all of DC vs Marvel/Marvel vs DC as a collection featuring contact between multiple worlds, let all the Crossover Classics volumes.... is there a reason for this?)
Then the suggestion that the MU crossed over with the DCU only from JLA/Avengers discounts not only the Superman/Spider-man Treasury crossovers, and a slew of others, but ignores wholesale DC vs. Marvel/Marvel vs. DC, which is only mentioned as it relates to the Amalgam Universe. Anyone know why JLA/Avengers takes such pride of place..?
As for the Marvel Earth-616, it can't seriously be back-dated to Motion Picture Funnies Weekly, surely..? I find it mildly odd that Namor includes that issue as his "debut," too, since it wasn't (to the best of my knowledge, nor as per the page here's slightly confusing text, or the CBG Standard Catalog..) distributed. (N.B. Can anyone clarify that what is meant at Motion Picture Funnies Weekly by the second-to-last sentence "..generally credited as the cover artist for the remainder, except for #3.." is that, as per this auction record covers were produced for #2-4, but never published or sold..?) So the first (later-)Marvel Universe character should really be said to have debuted in Marvel Comics #1, and the first crossover between characters may well have been after that (my reprints are elsewhere).
Further-even-more, surely the -616 doesn't properly predate FF #1, (the myth about the name deriving from the publication date of that title having been reasonably debunked, it's surely the Stan Lee-Jack Kirby Marvel Universe that is known as "the 616," and not the Timely pseudo-verse) giving that title as the "first" appearance, with character interaction shortly after.
Anyone care enough to debate this..?! ntnon (talk) 00:29, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Sure. Multiverse continuity is an illusion. No consistent thought or paradigm has existed regarding the multiverse at either Marvel or DC, and key events in the history of the concept at each company clearly had no intention of being a lasting shift to continuity. For instance, it is far from clear that FF #1 was, at the time of writing, intended to occupy the same world as Captain America. Indeed, the idea of a shared universe has a stuttering history within superhero comics. Similarly, the degree to which Marvel vs. DC or JLA/Avengers are "in continuity" is unclear both within the comics and within the larger context of both companies. Certainly Busiek has referenced JLA/Avengers in his later DC work, but that is largely insufficient - certainly it's hard to reconcile Infinite Crisis with JLA/Avengers.
Indeed, I think the whole idea of a coherent shared universe continuity is a fanboy invention that is erratically supported by the comics, and that trying to make articles adhere to "cannon" is a foolish and doomed endeavor. Phil Sandifer (talk) 01:13, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
I have to agree with the sentiment that, unlike things like Star Wars or Star Trek, attempting to discern "canon" from Marvel or DC would be ill-advised, and nigh on WP:OR. Too many writers, editors, editorial policies over the years. However, these things can be noted in relevant articles, indicating how the various editorial policies have changed (ofen as a result of a popular (read that as decent sales) refactoring or "redirection" of the continuity). - jc37 01:21, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
Fairly accurate comments, of course, but... I hope neither of you is advocating removing or gutting the Marvel Multiverse page? It's a really rather helpful resource, even if it is in parts somewhat confused and confusing. I'll ponder it a bit. Access came out of DC vs Marvel and popped up afterwards, so with JLA/Avengers also being referenced, it might seem as if the DC/Marvel meets have more of a resonance with the DCU than the MU, perhaps.
But, yes. Absolutely the shared universe is a fallacy, but then shared continuities in most mediums have flaws under scrutiny; comics continuity has flaws under rather mild scrutiny. But does not attempting to originally discern canon backdate the DCU to Detective #1, All-Star #3, neither or both..? Certainly it isn't New Fun #1. And does the MU date back to Timely's Namor, the Stan&Jack reintroduction of Namor, neither, or "all of the above"? (And surely Marvel Comics #1 not Motion Picture Funnies Weekly?)
Maybe for the purposes of the table it would be most sensible to list not "First Appearance" but "First named," and put the first appearance information (with all due caveats) with "notes"? Would that work? ntnon (talk) 21:56, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
I am all for having an article on the Marvel multiverse, but find the current article to be pretty crap. The table is nice, I guess. You're right that it should be first-named. But as it stands the article is almost wholly in-universe with no reference to publication history, and it largely assumes a coherence I don't agree exists. So yeah - I am saying the current article is pretty worthless. Phil Sandifer (talk) 22:12, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Assistance required

Assistance and opinions are needed at Talk: X2 (film)#Deathstrike over whether or not to use the word "killed" or "defeated" when talking about Deathstrike's fate in the film. The debate largely stems from the character surviving in the game but not the film. Any and all input from project members would be most appreciated. Anakinjmt (talk) 04:58, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Chang Tzu or Egg Fu?

Does anyone think Chang Tzu's article should be at Egg Fu? --DrBat (talk) 21:08, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Not really. - J Greb (talk) 22:48, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Yes - the character should be under the name used for most of his history. Phil Sandifer (talk) 23:02, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Probably. ntnon (talk) 00:30, 13 September 2008 (UTC)
Yes - the infobox image should also be changed. Egg Fu clearly gets precedence from being the longer running name. (Emperor (talk) 01:50, 17 September 2008 (UTC))

Publication history

This section has always been tricky - everyone knows what needs to go in a FCB but there can be a lot of variation in the PH. I tend to prefer a longer one, as it allows for a lot more out-of-universe material (I like what has been done at Psylocke, for example) and when it swings the other it can just become an unreadable mess - I ran across this, for example, the other day: Luna (comics) - you might as well just make a bulleted list. So given the variability in approach I thought it'd be worth throwing this open for further discussion about the best approach. (Emperor (talk) 18:09, 16 September 2008 (UTC))

With Pyslocke, it seems to be a merging of the publication history and FCB - not my preferred method, but I can see why and how it works. With Luna, it's more like a bibliography than not, and not particularly descriptive - I'd say it should be filled out with more interesting information, and the less important appearances can be cut or relagated to an extended bibliography or something. I, personally, prefer something more in the middle of those two approaches.
I do agree with you though about needing a nice-sized PH section. This is one of the big complaints I see about fictional character articles, is that too many of them rely on purely or mostly in-universe story text. While that content definitely has a place, it should not comprise 70% or more of the article. That's why, like I said in the above section, I dropped anything down that had little or nothing in the way of a PH section. I've been trying to do the same thing with D&D articles, although that model won't work quite the same with comics articles since they usually don't have anything like "editions" that they've gone through to clearly separate one era from another. :) BOZ (talk) 18:26, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
I co-authored the rewrite of Psylocke, so it is quite clear where I stand. I don't really understand the distinction a lot of people make, or the need to write about these fictional characters as real, but I have been convinced there is a need, and that it can be met by a short section of four or five paragraphs. I really hate our exemplars as well, and I co-authored them too. They were written a long time ago and hashed out between a couple of people with clear disagreement, so they became a compromise that didn't suit anyone. Since we have manual of style guidance now I rarely ever use them. I'm amazed people edit war over changing the name of a section back to "publication history", to be honest. I guess my exemplar now is Superman, it's my favourite of all the articles I have worked on. Hiding T 19:49, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
"Not how I would do it" isn't the same as being wrong; in fact, it may be the opposite more often than not. ;) It does read well though, and I agree that more FCBs should be briefer. BOZ (talk) 21:12, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
This might be another example: on the talk page of Justice Society of America someone has complained because the article doesn't really concentrate on the characters. I have left a few suggestions in how this could be improved and said I'd be against having an article looking at the title and another looking at the team, but it is a possible approach. (Emperor (talk) 04:27, 17 September 2008 (UTC))

Something the project as a whole needs to be aware of.

Based on a point raised with a disagreement over an infobox image change, I've posted for some clarification with regard to acceptable/unacceptable uses of non-free images. See: Wikipedia talk:Non-free content#In need of a points of clarification

Depending on what comes of it, a lot of the images in our articles are gong to need to be reviewed. Both from the stand point of original source material and how we've handled them.

- J Greb (talk) 23:05, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Corrupt image

Anyone know if there is anything that can be done with this: Image:Wildstorm logo.JPG. If not should I just revert it or get the uploader to try again? (Emperor (talk) 01:41, 17 September 2008 (UTC))

Should be fixed... this one was relatively painless, just reverting to the older version. Some of them don't have an old image to revert to. - J Greb (talk) 01:51, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Image at Kristin Wells

This notice is a request for others to take a look at the discussion concerning the image at Kristin Wells.

Note: The page in currently protected due to recent issues in the discussion. So be aware that this may be a heated situation, and perhaps it might be worthwhile to refresh yourself of WP:EQ, and WP:COOL, before joining in. - jc37 08:48, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Infobox initiative

There are currently 196 comics articles flagged as needing an infobox (and many more that aren't flagged). It is a a bit dull to work through the category, Category:Comics articles without infoboxes (for ease of use this is broken down further by work group - they are all linked in via the to do list at the top of the work groups' talk pages), so what I've been doing is whenever I come across an article without one I stick one in (I've also been checking things on my watchlist as they pop up). It can be pretty quick to get a rough version in, so you don't have to devote hours to it and if all of us did one or two a week we'd get through them easily (I'm keeping an eye on new creations and adding infoboxes were needed so hopefully we'll not have the pool of infobox requests topped up as we clear them).

90% of the time you are only going to need {{Infobox comic book title}} or {{Infobox comics creator}} or {{Infobox comics character}} - note these have been updated so go to the page for the most up-to-date version.

If you put one in and want someone to look over it then post the link here, if you really aren't sure which to use then post the link. (Emperor (talk) 04:30, 1 September 2008 (UTC))

That's a good idea - I'll see what I can do! 196 isn't all that bad when you break it up. BOZ (talk) 13:56, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Note that the Marvel subcat is not listed on that page, but I did track it down.  :) BOZ (talk) 14:21, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
There are enough that need doing that the Marvel and European categories have sneaked over to page 2. As I say they are linked through from the respective work group to do list and people should feel free to flag anything that needs other work on the to do list (I've dropped in a number already). (Emperor (talk) 15:14, 4 September 2008 (UTC))
I just cleared out a few dozen. About half of them already had an infobox, but this was not corrected on the talk page yet. Feel free to review my contributions. 204.153.84.10 (talk) 18:18, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for that. Just remember that some of the infoboxes have been updated so things like embedded colours have been depreciated [44] and it is always best to grab the most up-to-date version, which for comic characters is {{Infobox comics character}}. And yes, quite a few infobox requests have been covered and everyone is encouraged to check the talk page when they add one so they can remove the request - removing them should really help us focus on the ones that need doing. (Emperor (talk) 02:59, 5 September 2008 (UTC))
Just something I noticed - it was 106 because that was the number on that page. So I'm not sure what the total was but I suspect we've done dozens and the complete total is currently 630 (I suspect it was closer to 700 before). Still eminently doable. I'm going to focus on creators - I've done quite a few but just focusing on the one box should make it quicker and easier and they are simpler boxes so I should be able to get a lot done (although you always end up noticing something else that needs doing at the same time...). (Emperor (talk) 03:38, 5 September 2008 (UTC))
I'll check some more today. I think since I got going on comic book titles, I'll check to see if any need infoboxes and aren't indicated as such on the talk page (betcha I find some!) 204.153.84.10 (talk) 15:01, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
I did a few, but I'm definitely planning on getting a lot more today. 204.153.84.10 (talk) 16:54, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
OK, I've done about as much as I want to do with that, which is probably a lot more than I really intended to do. ;) If you want to review my contributions as regarding the infoboxes, they begin today at 16:42 and end a few minutes ago. 204.153.84.10 (talk) 19:31, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for that - these needn't be mutually exclusive. I added around a dozen infoboxes yesterday, few, if any were flagged on talk header and some didn't have a Comics Project talk page header - one of which was actually of B-class quality. It is exactly clearing the backlog but it is addressing the same problem. I am also adding the B-class assessment list to everything B and below which should help flag problems and make the process of assessing the articles quicker and simpler in the future.
Update on the numbers: we are down to 589, which is a good slice into things. (Emperor (talk) 15:43, 9 September 2008 (UTC))

Infobox advice

There are going to be articles that are difficult to classify so post them here.

Me first:

  • Dial H for Hero - it is a story (or series of stories) that has run in other titles and falls part way between a comic book title and a story arc (something that might also apply to stories told in anthologies). Strikes me "story arc" would fit OK unless someone can foresee a problem. Unless in cases like this it would be worth focusing on the character/team... If so would team work? (Emperor (talk) 16:57, 9 September 2008 (UTC))
  • The Bojeffries Saga - similar problem to the above, it was a story in an anthology and has been later reprinted in their own comic book, it would be inaccurate to focus on just the later reprints (one reason I am unsure the infobox and lead at V for Vendetta really reflects the publishing situation) but none of the infoboxes accurately cover the topic unless we instead focus on the family as a comic group and go that route. (Emperor (talk) 13:54, 11 September 2008 (UTC))
Is it too out-there to say: make a new one. One that is better tailored to V, Bojeffries and even Dial H. So: Story Title. Debut titular comic, company & year OR Debut publication, company & year; Subsequent publication(s), company(ies) & year(s). Subsequent titular comic(s), company(ies) & year(s). Collection details (inc. companies). Creator details (possibly also 'main teams on X incarnation'?), etc.
They may not be much used, and the "wrong" boxes may continue to be used, but this might mean that the "right" box will exist, at least... ntnon (talk) 00:22, 13 September 2008 (UTC)
It is certainly an idea - something like "Comic story" to cope with stories that have been serialised in other titles and it might be useful for something like the following too where I'm not sure what fits but we do often have stories told in limited series ongoing series and graphic novels, often switching between formats or starting in one and moving to another and pinning it down is tricky. They are somewhere between a story arc and a title. (Emperor (talk) 16:44, 17 September 2008 (UTC))
  • Sin City - it is a series of mini-series. (Emperor (talk) 16:44, 17 September 2008 (UTC))
    • Same goes for Hellboy. I think a box for "story" works well, because we have a lot of stuff where it's been serialised any which way you can do it. Hiding T 08:47, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
      • Indeed that is another case where it is possible to paper over the cracks with a character/team infobox but the result isn't always 100% satisfactory. ntnon has outlined some things that might make worth fields which make sense - anything else? (Emperor (talk) 15:37, 18 September 2008 (UTC))
        • General thoughts... It is possible to put up a "meta" or "franchise" 'box. I'll take a swing at it tomorrow evening or on Saturday, but I'd like a littl input on the title for the template... - J Greb (talk) 01:21, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
          • There is a franchise infobox and by its nature it would have a much broader focus. I'd go with either my suggestion or ntnon "comic story" or "comic story title" as it also encapsulates the idea that it is somewhere between a story arc/storyline and a title (the former being a tighter tale that can occur within a broader story - I'm thinking of something like the Cursed Earth storyline within the broader Judge Dredd story for example. The latter could include one or more stories, either like an anthology or as in the Dial H for Heroes case where the story runs in a broader title. You could also have a number of titles within the same story, as in the Hellboy case which is composed of mainly mini-series, with some appearances in anthologies). The important thing will be to make sure it is properly described so people know which box is best for the job, although I have found it is fairly simple switching from title to story arc boxes so it is a good idea to have most of the fields the same - as I'm sure you'll do). Reading through my reasoning I'm lead to favour "comic story title" which seems to encapsulate it. (Emperor (talk) 01:52, 19 September 2008 (UTC))

Notability help

Hi all! Interloper here. Interloper, at that, whose comic knowledge is limited to Archie and Veronica. I came across Allen Freeman in the backlog and cleaned it up a bit but I really have no idea if his anthology makes him notable, and can't find anything about the movie he made. If someone can help when they get a moment? I'm not watching here, but I'll watch the article talk if there's any way I can help. TravellingCari 13:49, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Yeah...looking at the article, which has a single source and appears to be a stub that's been tagged since October 2007, I'd say it's something worth deleting. I'll nominate it for deletion. Anakinjmt (talk) 13:58, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
I have nominated the article for deletion and shall notify the creator of the article. Anakinjmt (talk) 14:09, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

A request - DC Comics Super Hero Collection

I spotted these two articles:

They are in essence the same and both have a very short history. Obviously they need to be merged, but the info listed varies slightly so I don't feel confident myself to just go ahead and pick which bits need to be kept (I know nothing about the topic). Could someone from here maybe have a little look and see what needs doing before they develop independently any further? Very much appreciated, Sassf (talk) 15:19, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Brian Boru is awesome

Does anyone understand why he is removing Category:Legion of Super-Heroes from several articles? I thought it was only on the Invisible Kid pages, but it seems to be more than that. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 00:39, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I am not certain, but I would guess it's because there is prior consensus that team members should be listified, not categorised. - jc37 00:45, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
I see he isn't answering questions so it is guess time: It is because we don't have team categories (based on previous consensus here), so that category should be for LSH-related articles (storylines, locations, etc.) but not the actual members. This would be the reason I'd remove Invisible Kid and others from that category and I'd be "right" to do so (I would hope that I would explain my actions a bit better, though). However, that is just a guess. (Emperor (talk) 00:48, 18 September 2008 (UTC))
He has replied and it looks like we were both right (jc37 was just right a little quicker than I was ;) ) [45] - he did explain this in one edit summary [46] and if you check the edits he was just removing an anon editor's addition of that category and then checking the category and removing the others which seems perfectly reasonable. It would be a courtesy to include a clear (and accurate) edit summary with each edit though, and I seem to recall we did discuss this (there is even a setting in your preferences which reminds you, which I find very useful) as not doing it can lead to misunderstandings as in this case. (Emperor (talk) 00:56, 18 September 2008 (UTC))
Ok, I'll take those categories off per this discussion. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 01:01, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
A more constructive edit summary would have been nice. Incidentally, that anonymous user was me; I wasn't on one of my normal computers and forgot to sign in. In any case, shouldn't mention of this be made in the Wikiproject:Comics Editorial Guidelines? I actually looked in there BEFORE I reverted Brian Boru is awesome's edits, and only did so because there was no mention of category rules in the editorial guidelines. Nutiketaiel (talk) 12:16, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
I've left him a note on this and I'm sure it has come up before.
And yes it might be wise to get that in writing somewhere and throw in a few links to previous discussion as it'll help people catch up. (Emperor (talk) 01:54, 19 September 2008 (UTC))
It would be my pleasure to write an entry on this subject for the editorial guidelines, if someone would be so kind to provide me with alink to the aforementioned discussion (unless you'd rather have someone you're more familiar with write it). Nutiketaiel (talk) 02:01, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
Fine by me - anyway it is a wiki and if it needs a tweak you can bet someone will tweak it. The tricky thing is the links - this largely came up over a CfD and may have spun-off into a thread here (or there was a follow-up thread here) and I am not sure if there is a clever way of finding the links without just trawling through old threads looking for it. I'll see what I can can come up with. (Emperor (talk) 02:36, 19 September 2008 (UTC))
Well butter my buns that was easier than I thought (just checked the what links to the category and the category talk page - worth checking out for J Greb's comments on this):
It might need a bit if distillation but that is the bulk of it. (Emperor (talk) 02:45, 19 September 2008 (UTC))
Done; see here. Let me know what you all think. Nutiketaiel (talk) 13:51, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
Looks good to me. Very nicely worded. Excellent job man. Anakinjmt (talk) 14:12, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
Thanks.  :-) Nutiketaiel (talk) 14:35, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
Looks good. (Emperor (talk) 14:45, 19 September 2008 (UTC))

Are these lists necessary?

I've recently found List of Spectacular Spider-Man characters and Characters in Spider-Man: The Animated Series which are lists similar to Recurring and minor characters in 24 and Characters of Lost. However, the two Spider-Man lists are characters, for the most part, that have comic-book counterparts and as such, the information about those characters, such as Doctor Octopus (whose article was actually the means that I found these lists) could be fit into their articles. Keep in mind that having that list may be a requirement of Wikipedia:WikiProject Television, in which they obviously have to stay (although of note is that neither list has been tagged by that project), but if it is not, are the lists really necessary? It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me to have them. This is probably true of a good number of lists. Even if they do stay, can we not give brief summaries in the articles of the respective character's articles while having a link to their section on the list for more detail? Anakinjmt (talk) 17:32, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I'd say merge or delete them. These are adaptations of the comics, so you could always refer to the main character lists. WesleyDodds (talk) 21:54, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
(sigh) This is going to get ugly, fast... and for the record a similar list exisits for The Batman.
Major, and I do mean major problem with getting rid of these — what we'll be left with is next to nil information for the major characters.
As it stands, there are editors reducing the information in the primary articles to what amounts to " 'Character <foo>' appeared as a villain in one or more episodes of 'Series <foo>'. The reasoning being that the information related to the television versions:
  1. Doesn't belong in an article primarily covering the comics character.
  2. The short character history is covered elsewhere — specifically these lists.
  3. Plot synopsis of the episodes belong in the articles for the series, season list, and/or episode/arc.
By the same token, images that could be justified as underlining how the characters have been adapted visually are being chucked. As an example: the version of the Joker for The Batman is markedly different from all of the previous representations. This is mentioned in the section in Joker (comics), but the image was removed as "Too many images, slows the upload and clutters the article." The passage now lacks something that would help in understanding it. - J Greb (talk) 23:39, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I know what you mean. That happened on the Doc Ock page, and when I tried putting brief (and I mean brief) summaries of his appearances in Spidey 2, Spectacular, and Animated Series, it kept getting reverted by a single editor who claimed that the info was already on the lists. But if the lists are gone, which is what I'm currently thinking should happen, then it could go in. A compromise that works for me is linking to their section on the list and having a brief summary, but making it clear that for more info and a picture to visit the list. Either way, I'm still not a fan of these lists or of not giving some summary of appearances in other media on a character's main page. Anakinjmt (talk) 23:48, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
It might be worth speaking to DCIncarnate and/or thrashing out a consensus here as those lists aren't really like the Lost/24 lists (which conform to WP:FICT's approach to minor characters) and largely replicate the content of the main articles. I'd much rather have an extra sentence or two in the "in other media" section than those lists and I'm sure a compromise can be reached. (Emperor (talk) 00:04, 19 September 2008 (UTC))
Well, I have been talking to him on his talk page about this issue. So far, nothing. I'd like to get a consensus made here. One other thing I didn't think of is I'm sure those list articles have far too many fair-use images on them. Anakinjmt (talk) 00:09, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
And to be honest, Doc Ock is just the latest article that he's purged. I can see his point, even though I don't fully agree with it. The sections shouldn't be over blown, but they shouldn't be a step above trivia either. There should be a reasonable amount of substance covering the variations.
That said, the list articles still have a purpose — covering the portrayals in the show in a little more detail. This eases the size on the mains and allows for the information to be written towards the show. The odd thing is this would build a nice link structure between the list and the character article — Major (long) articles would have lead type nutshell ending with a "see:..." that points to the entry in the list article where there would be expanded text. And the list would have minimal information on characters that have short (minor) articles with the expanded text being in the character article (an example of this type of article is Gearhead). And even then, the list should have a "see:..." linking back to the character articles for each entry. - J Greb (talk) 01:01, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
And an addendum on the NFC images with the lists:
  • In general a number, even a large number, of image can be used if they are providing significant aid for understanding of a section of text. A paragraph of character bio and description, like the situation with Characters in Spider-Man: The Animated Series or List of The Batman villains, can be seen to satisfy this.
  • The NFC guideline for lists presents that "group shots" are preferable to one image per entry. This is why List of The Batman villains only has the one image — the individual images were removed under NCC#3a and the list guide since the top image was also present. At the time it was pointed out that even the characters not pictured should not have individual images under the guideline. As an aside to this: I would argue that for this to hold, the "group shot" should come from the same source as the potential singles. That is, a comic book art poster of the Spider-Man characters should not be used for a character list article for one of the cartoons.
  • The idea has also been put forward that, if an item is covered in more detail in another article, with an image there, it shouldn't have one in the list.
Characters in Spider-Man: The Animated Series is an odd case since all of the image were purged, comic book group shot and screen cap singles. I'm tempted to revert that with an edit summary asking for clarification.
Also note that the type of purge DCI is doing removes one of the points for not including a image in the list. - J Greb (talk) 01:16, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
Wait, can you explain that last point about "removes one of the points for not including a image in the list"? Everything else I got, just not that one. Anakinjmt (talk) 12:16, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
The argument goes: "Since Doc Ock (for sake of the example)
  1. Has an entry on the list of villains from the 1994 cartoon, and
  2. Has an "In other media section" in his main article, then
  3. If there is an image (and practice has been that it's the same image) at the list entry and the IOM section, one of them is redundant. further
  4. Since lists are generally considered secondary to full articles, the image should be removed from there."
By removing the image from the main article, DCI would have made the image in the list the only one in place to support describing Ock in the 1994 show. That would remove the above argument for removing the image from the list.
And to be honest, I've only seen that line of reasoning as an interpretation of the NFC policies and guide. No ones ever really been able to show me where it's the result of a consensus, or incorporated into an MoS. And I really would like that since there are some set indexes/hub articles that do the same thing. - J Greb (talk) 22:29, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Comic Book Publication Dates

Question. If a comic book cited as a source is described with its volume number, and a user know its month and year of publication, should the volume number be deleted in lieu of the date (an Either/Or situation), or should both be included when they're known? Has there been a ComicsProject discussion/consensus on this? Personally, I think they should both be used, since they're two different things, and volume number can be important, especially for verification purposes, regarding comics that have had more than one incarnation over the decades, since some reference sources may have one but not the other. Having both makes the information seem more comprehensive and helpful. Thoughts? Nightscream (talk) 04:03, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Original Research

I was just reading through Jenny Sparks: The Secret History of the Authority again and noticed (again) that a lot of it contradicts previously established continuity regarding character origins and Jenny's knowledge of the characters. Would it be original research to point these out in the article (with citations of course)? If it would be original research, does anyone have any hints or advice as to how (or even if) this stuff can make it into the article? - ChimpZealot (talk) 03:14, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

There are numerous cases of differing origin stories (I'm sure I saw one today) and the best way to deal with it is to present both versions and let people draw their own conclusions. We don't, for example, have to try to show which one is currently considered canon and this approach means we don't get caught in the synthesis trap. I'll see if I can find an example of it but basically if you say there are two different origins and give a brief outline you should be OK - once you start saying "in X it says this and in Y it says this" then you might be on rockier ground. (Emperor (talk) 04:25, 17 September 2008 (UTC))
On the topic of Jenny Sparks; In the terms of the fictional universe, the character of Jenny Sparks (AKA Jenny Quantum) IS so very, very powerful that she -could- rewrite parts of her own history. Relatedly, she has access to friends who also have vast cosmic powers. In conclusion, the contradictions might be intentional. Just a head's up. Lots42 (talk) 05:02, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Article alerts

A while ago, there was a request for a bot that would notify WikiProjects when articles within their scope are entering or leaving some workflow, e.g. when nominated for deletion or as GA candidate. (See User:B. Wolterding/Article alerts.) In the discussion, it seemed that your project was interested in this kind of automation.

The bot is now implemented in most parts, and currently awaiting approval. Following that, it will be run in a test phase with selected WikiProjects for a number of weeks.

We would like to invite your project to participate in this test phase. That is, a list of article alerts will be posted (or is currently being posted) at Wikipedia:WikiProject Comics/Article alerts. It can be transcluded into your main project page (see example). There are no obligations when you participate, but your feedback about the bot is requested. See User:B. Wolterding/Article alerts/Test phase for details.

If you do not wish to participate in the test phase, please leave me a short note on my talk page. Many thanks, --B. Wolterding (talk) 17:54, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia 0.7 articles have been selected for Comics

Wikipedia 0.7 is a collection of English Wikipedia articles due to be released on DVD, and available for free download, later this year. The Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team has made an automated selection of articles for Version 0.7.

We would like to ask you to review the articles selected from this project. These were chosen from the articles with this project's talk page tag, based on the rated importance and quality. If there are any specific articles that should be removed, please let us know at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.7. You can also nominate additional articles for release, following the procedure at Wikipedia:Release Version Nominations.

A list of selected articles with cleanup tags, sorted by project, is available. The list is automatically updated each hour when it is loaded. Please try to fix any urgent problems in the selected articles. A team of copyeditors has agreed to help with copyediting requests, although you should try to fix simple issues on your own if possible.

We would also appreciate your help in identifying the version of each article that you think we should use, to help avoid vandalism or POV issues. These versions can be recorded at this project's subpage of User:SelectionBot/0.7. We are planning to release the selection for the holiday season, so we ask you to select the revisions before October 20. At that time, we will use an automatic process to identify which version of each article to release, if no version has been manually selected. Thanks! For the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial team, SelectionBot 23:12, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Please join us in discussing this project at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Comics/Wikipedia 0.7. :) BOZ (talk) 18:05, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Watchmen FAR

Watchmen has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. Gary King (talk) 15:47, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Are we meant/allowed to comment at that second page..? Because most of the "un-referenced" sections are simply references to the source material itself. I thought that referencing was only necessary for deeply contentious or unsourcable claims, not for facts (broadly - there is scope for more referencing, if need be) easily confirmed by reading the subject of the article. ntnon (talk) 22:03, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
Make any necessary comments on the review page please. A lot of what is unsourced in the article is original research. Gary King (talk) 18:57, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm on it. Had been planning to do some work on it previously. WesleyDodds (talk) 07:41, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Alright, who's really good with plot summaries here? I need someone to write a bitchin' plot summary for the revision of Watchmen I'm working on here. Aim for the three to five paragraph range. Just ignore the Black Freighter stuff and the supplementary material; it's not part of the main narrative and will be dealt with in a themes/motifs section. WesleyDodds (talk) 02:18, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
This has been brought up at the Watchmen FAR: what does everyone think of redirecting all the character articles to Watchmen? They are all characters exclusive to that story, and all aspects of their notability can be covered in that article. as it stands the character articles are primarily detailed plot synopsis. WesleyDodds (talk) 04:45, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

AfDs

Could we get a few more eyes on Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Comics and animation? The current couple have had to be relisted (one has been relisted twice) and more input means we can make the right call.{Emperor (talk) 17:10, 23 September 2008 (UTC))

Just a technical point - my comment in the War Wagon AfD isn't showing on the main page but is at the AfD and I was wondering if it is Just One of Those Things or some kind of problem that needs fixing (although quite what it might be escapes me at the moment). (Emperor (talk) 15:59, 25 September 2008 (UTC))

Splits

I'm starting to split off some of the publication lists from within the main articles about comic publishers (as mentioned previously). They are weighing down the articles and both halves would benefit from being separated. I've started with Image Comics (discussion) and will move on to IDW Publishing if things go well. Dark Horse Comics is tricky as it is probably going to be in the 0.7 release (above) and splitting it now will leave a mere stub so I'm going to leave it for now unless someone steps in and does a big expansion. (Emperor (talk) 17:10, 23 September 2008 (UTC))

Also if this does happen I'd appreciate a bit of input on this - should we separate core Image titles from their many imprints? Top Cow titles are dealt with with elsewhere so it seems best to avoid replication there but Wildstorm titles are also listed elsewhere but some were published under Image and some under DC and just linking to the list of Wildstorm publications may not be so useful, so perhaps the Image Comics titles need listing as such in the Image Comics publications lists. That kind of thing. (Emperor (talk) 13:36, 25 September 2008 (UTC))

A practical question about "Debut" categories

So I've been adding categories such as Category:1990 comic debuts to character articles. However, I've been noticing the categories seem to have inconsistent uses, and are being used to hold both debuts of characters and debuts of series, usually in a mutually exclusive sense. Like, an article might have the debut category marked for the debut of its character, or it might have it for the debut of the series by that name or about that character, but almost never both. And the categories themselves don't have any kind of instructive header that would indicate to a reader or contributor what, exactly, is supposed to be in that category. Personally, I think it should be characters. Angel and the Ape is not really a 2001 comic debut, even though a revival series came out in that year. Thoughts? Opinions?

I'd be happy to go through and do the grunt work of changing everything and maybe cobbling together an explanatory template, but I'd like to get some consensus here first. Thanks! Ford MF (talk) 21:59, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately it's a "six of one" situation - "debut" can be applied correctly to the initial issue of a magazine series and/or the first place where a character appears. Splitting the characters out into "Year first appearance" might alleviate the situation, but it's possible that this will add to the number of categories for an article. Using Angel and the Ape as an example (and assuming that it is expanded to cover the characters), you would see "1968 comics characters first appearance" (the characters) and "1968 comic debuts", "1991 comic debuts", and "2001 comic debuts". - J Greb (talk) 23:43, 24 September 2008 (UTC)
That categories are based on the television debuts and are for the start of the series (so sometimes this might coincide with a characters first or lag behind it until they got their own eponymous series) - the naming was discussed a few months back before starting this - if they are being added purely for character debuts then they should be removed. If people want one for characters that it is a whole different beast and I seem to recall all character debuts categories were removed (I certainly can't seem to find any for TV characters) so I'd check around before starting anything like that. I don't have a problem with such a category but some might and I wouldn't want anyone wasting their efforts. (Emperor (talk) 13:09, 25 September 2008 (UTC))
That's what I thought I was doing here! At least it seems clear now that characters should not be in those categories. The big problem is that comics aren't TV shows. And the vast majority of our comics articles are about characters and not series, as comics and television work differently, and characters can move freely between series. Ford MF (talk) 18:23, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Format

Is there any particular, accepted format when it comes to the titles of the various sections of the articles? The reason I'm asking is that an editor is going around to a lot of articles and changing the "Fictional character biography" to "Fictional history". His reasoning is because "Fictional history" is what's used in Superman and Batman and both are GA articles. Does it really matter or what?Odin's Beard (talk) 13:40, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Superman and Batman are both FAs, FYI. Anakinjmt (talk) 13:48, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
Whatever. That doesn't answer the question I posed.Odin's Beard (talk) 13:51, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
Well, I have no real opinion on the matter, as both are fine with me, so that's why I didn't give an opinion initially. Anakinjmt (talk) 13:54, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

You oughta check out the project's nifty template. On it, not only will you find some great information, and help with editing, collaboration, and other things, you'll find a link to something called: Exemplars. It might help provide an answer for your questions. - jc37 14:25, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Yep - if in doubt go back to the guidelines. It might be the FA reviewers didn't know about that naming convention or it was overlooked or someone could have changed it since or it was felt (wrongly) that another convention may apply. If you run through the exemplars you'll find it is given as "Fictional character biography" and that is the convention used in almost all character articles within our purview and if anything should be changed it has to be Superman and batman rather than everything else (this side of a shift in consensus). (Emperor (talk) 15:55, 25 September 2008 (UTC))
I'm the one making the changes and I never understand why the term "fictional character biography" is used for subsections detailing the character's backstories and storylines. For starters its redundant since the fact that its about a "character" already establishes the subject to be a work of fiction. You will never hear the terms "non-fictional character biography" and "fictional person biography" used.
I would suggest to use "fictional history", "character history" or "character biography" instead, since it basically says the same thing in one word less. Jonny2x4 (talk) 17:10, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
I suggest then that you bring it up at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Comics/editorial guidelines. Anakinjmt (talk) 17:36, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
I've weighed in over there. We really have talked about this a lot. There have been a lot of discussions about it, spread throughout talk sections all over the place. Both "fictional" and "character" are important for a lot of reasons. Doczilla STOMP! 06:45, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
It is a topic we have kicked around quite a bit - the key is that you can indeed have characters in comics (and TV and film) who aren't fictional (this webcomic is about Jack Parsons and other non-fictional characters, most notably L. Ron Hubbard in a fairly accurate biographical story based on his life - I've read both his major biographies and it sticks to them pretty closely). Now you could argue that some real people when they appear as characters are fictional (Superman vs. Muhammad Ali isn't factual, and Ali is really a fictional character based on a real person) but I am unsure if it extends to them all (although it could) because the logical extension of this is that all biographies are novels, which is a step too far for most people). On such matters we basically have to stick to the broader guidelines on writing about fiction, which tend to stress that we make all efforts to flag that the specific character (object or group) are fictional creations. It isn't an unreasonable requirement and the solution (as you'll see on most articles) isn't too clunky. (Emperor (talk) 18:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC))

Oh, those wacky Bierbaums

Do we really need separate articles for Tom Bierbaum, Mary Bierbaum, and Tom and Mary Bierbaum? --GentlemanGhost (talk) 19:59, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Definitely not. I'd say have an article for Tom and one for Mary. The info from the Tom and Mary can be put in each article. Anakinjmt (talk) 20:46, 24 September 2008 (UTC)
See also: Talk:Tom and Mary Bierbaum#Needed?. (Emperor (talk) 21:53, 24 September 2008 (UTC))
Since Don Thompson redirects to Maggie Thompson, because there's (currently) little to separate those two, perhaps the joint article is the one to hang on to; redirect the individual ones to the joint one, and maybe pile in a double infobox..? Is there a joint info box, or would it just need two? Certainly there's little-to-nothing in the separate articles that's not in the main one; the partnership is the thin, and so that's clearly the one to keep. ntnon (talk) 15:12, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
cf Wendy and Richard Pini
I'd say that 1) if the infomation is scant and 2) the pair is "joind at the hip" Sitck with a joint article. - J Greb (talk) 15:58, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Copyright violation question, and a call to anyone who has the first edition of the DC Encyclopedia

I recently noticed that an entire paragraph of our entry on Bekka was identical to her character biography in the current edition of Dorling Kindersley's DC Comics Encyclopedia. Here's the thing, though: the edit that introduced this text, by User:68.151.70.78, was from 2008-02-21. The DC Encyclopedia (this edition I use now, ISBN 0-7566-4119-5), came out on 2008-09-28. The most likely answer to this, is that that anon IP just copied the entire paragraph from old edition, which has the same entry as the current edition.

It is, however, not entirely beyond the realm of possibility that the first edition doesn't have a Bekka entry, and that the second edition text was copied from ours (I've seen sentences I've written on Wikipedia pop up in newspapers before). Does anyone have the old edition of the DC Encyclopedia (2004-10-04, ISBN 0-7566-0592-x Parameter error in {{ISBN}}: invalid character) to check?

In the interim I've removed the offending text from the article. It will probably stay gone, since the text is almost certainly copyvio, but in that case someone should try to rework that character bio so that the information on Bekka isn't lost. Ford MF (talk) 22:18, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Comics/Archive_35

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