Talk:From Out of the Rain

Capitalisation of "out"

Please note that "out" in the title should not be capitalised. "(From) out (of)" is a (composite) preposition and as such should be in lower case. Many sources mistakenly capitalise "out", but unless the producers of Torchwood confirm this as intended, standard capitalisation should be followed. See Wikipedia:Naming conventions (capitalization) for more information. Thank you. — Edokter • Talk • 00:42, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The BBC capitalises 'Out' in this episode title. This is the confirmed, official episode title and should be used regardless of grammatical errors. Source: [1] Starhunterfan (talk) 00:53, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

This discussion has been held over and over, countless of times, on many many articles. That is how WP:CAPS eventually came to be. So again, unless this is the producers' intended title (and that needs a cite), proper naming convention should be followed. The article has been move-protected. — Edokter • Talk • 01:15, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

So not only do you insist on breaking Wiki rules by remove an officially-sourced title and replacing with an entirely unsourced title YOU INVENTED but you have abused your admin powers to ensure people opposing you in a debate are now allowed to contribute? Starhunterfan (talk) 01:18, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

I invented nothing; titles have strict naming convention, and the article is titled accordingly. I am merely following policy. Now please give it a rest. If and until we can confirm the producers' intent (and even then Wikipedia still follows it's own rules), the article has to be titled according to our own convention. — Edokter • Talk • 01:23, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Your title is unsourced. The actual title is officially sourced. Please tell me what Wiki rule states that titles that are not grammatical should be changed. The official title is confirmed and official. Why you insist the BBC is not an acceptable source for BBC shows is beyond me. Starhunterfan (talk) 01:30, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The title is sourced. The capitalisation however is not subject to sourcing unless an artistic deviation is implied (ie. as with Straight Outta Lynwood), which it is not in this case. So the title has to follow common English style, which is what Wikipedia convention is based on. — Edokter • Talk • 01:38, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Third opinion

Edokter's right on this one: the "out" should be lowercase. Quote from WP:CAPS:

"In general, each word in titles of books, films, and other works takes an initial capital, except for articles ("a", "an", "the"), the word "to" as part of an infinitive, prepositions and coordinating conjunctions shorter than five letters (e.g., "on", "from", "and", "with", "about"), unless they begin or end a title or subtitle."

"Out" falls under this categorization, and should be lowercase. — HelloAnnyong ^{(say whaaat?!)} 01:41, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The capitalisation of "Out" in this title is deliberate and is a reference to an specific thing within the episode. I do not understand why a fan-invented, non-sourced title takes preference over an officially-sourced actual title. Aso I feel protecting any page where one's own edit are challenged to ensure no edits but your own are allowed is a massive abuse of admin powers. Starhunterfan (talk) 01:44, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Like I said before, if the producers inteded the capitalisation, and/or the story itself reflects that intention, then it can be renamed. Until then, "Out" is just as unsourced as "out" and convention is followed. — Edokter • Talk • 01:58, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

FYI where did you get your cast list from? That is not the official cast list. Starhunterfan (talk) 01:48, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Then what is it? The cast list lists the main characters. Guest stars which were not already confirmed are added after the show has aired. — Edokter • Talk • 01:55, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The WP:CAPS guideline is itself contradictory since the word "about", given as an example, is not in fact shorter than five letters! 83.104.249.240 (talk) 11:39, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Fourth opinion

The official BBC Torchwood site lists the episode title here... http://www.bbc.co.uk/torchwood/sites/episodes/series2/ep10_preview.shtml ... as having a capital 'O' and, to be honest, I'm surprised this discussion even needs to take place. Despite whatever conventions Wikipedia has it was fairly plain from the start that the 'O' would be capitalised. Episode/Song/Book titles do not follow standard English grammar. They are titles, not sentences. I'm not a regular Wikipedia contributor but this is very obvious in other places (magazines, other websites). I don't understand why it isn't the same here. Passing Scottish Bloke —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.203.45.113 (talk) 05:22, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia has it's own converntion, just for this reason. Whatever methods other sources use, they are often caught using the wrong capitalisation. Unless the capital 'O' was a deliberate intention by the creators of the show, which has not been established, there is absolutely no reason why Wikipedia should deviate from their own conventions. The BBC made an honest mistake, and everyone else getting their information from the BBC, copied that error verbatim. Go ask the BBC or Russel T Davies if the capital 'O' was indeed intentional. — Edokter • Talk • 13:03, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Just a note, capitalisation rules are for titles...of books, songs and episodes. DonQuixote (talk) 13:22, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Fifth Opinion

The BBC website as linked above shows it as "From Out of the Rain", and BBC iPlayer spells it with a capital O, http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/b00950q2.shtml?src=ip_potpw.

It seems to me that, regardless of the conventions in WP:CAPS, the title is intended to be written as "From Out of the Rain" and therefore WP:IAR should be utilised. According to WP:IAR, If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it. And WP:CAPS is preventing the true, sourced title, from being used. Jacobshaven3 (talk) 14:14, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Please provide some proof that is actually is intended to be capitalised. ONLY THEN should the title be renamed. Otherwise, capitalisation is not part of the title, only a way to write it. As such, we follow our own convention. — Edokter • Talk • 14:25, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

So even though there is no source showing the true spelling being "From out of the Rain", we must find more proof for the spelling as "From Out of the Rain", regardless of every single BBC page showing it as such. If the BBC website or other affliated sources showed a confusion of spelling I would agree with you, but they don't. There is no differing in opinion. the BBC clearly repeatidly shows the spelling as "From Out of the Rain". What proof would be strong enough? A hand written / typed editorial from the producer regarding the spelling?

It may seem like only a way to write it, but according to all official sources, it is the proper way to write it (otherwise, at least one place would spell it differently), which means that by following the wikipedia conventions to the tee, the article is not showing the true title, and is therefore damaged by it. Jacobshaven3 (talk) 14:49, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

There's a difference between using improper grammar/capitalisation for effect vs improperly using grammar/capitalisation. Unless you can prove the former rather than the latter, the proper protocol is to correct it, which has been done here, or write it as "From [o]ut of the Rain" or "From Out of the Rain [sic]", which are rather unwieldy. DonQuixote (talk) 15:13, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Sixth opinion

Yeah, these are getting boring now, but.

There's been a myriad of sources, which people have provided, that indicate a capitalised Out. There hasn't been a single source provided that says it shouldn't. Wikipedia requires information that is sourced. I think the sourced information trumps the MOS on this one, and I don't really understand how anyone can argue to the contrary.

Also, I think Edokter's conduct here is reprehensible. You're involved in the movement dispute, and slapping a move protection on it in the form you prefer... well, apologies in advance if this looks like a breach of NPA, but that fucking stinks. If you believe you are in the right, you would be able to find uninvolved admins that support your position and petition them to lock it. Utilisation of admin powers to protect your preferred version is a flagrant breach of WP:ADMIN#Misuse of tools; I really don't want to throw this one to WP:ANI, but I really think you are out of order here. Kinitawowi (talk) 15:45, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

The protection has long since expired. And I'm sorry to disagree, but the MOS does override the sourcing for this one, as no artistic intention has been asserted. Also have a look on Google; a search will show the title in all manners of capitalisation, right and wrong. I have already told the original poster to bring it to ANI if he so wishes, so if you think it warrants a post there, go right ahead. — Edokter • Talk • 15:57, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I have to say, this could just be a common sense situation here. On the Google-search you link, I can't see anyone except WP who use the lower-case "O", and just generally, not only does an upper-case one look better, it's used by everyone including the BBC, who are actually a reliable source. So while I can see where you're coming from, Edokter - and so I don't complain about your admin actions, I see your point - I have to say, I'm with the capital-lobby :-) —TreasuryTag—t—c 22:02, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

A resolution...

There is a resolution which could satisfy both sides of the debate, if you want it.

Those who favor the capital cite BBC sources, and Starhunterfan has said that "capitalisation of 'Out' in this title is deliberate and is a reference to a specific thing within the episode".

Those who favor the lower-case cite Wikipedia policy, but Edoktor is prepared to use the capital "if the producers intended the capitalisation, and/or the story itself reflects that intention".

Edoktor is quite right that we should follow Wikipedia policy but is also quite sensible in offering to allowing the producers' intent to trump it.

However in this instance there need not be a conflict between the two.

You see 'out' is an adverb and as such deserves a capital letter in a title.

I'm a professional proofreader and I had exactly this issue two days ago, when capitalising Meat Loaf's album Bat Out of Hell. 'Out' here has its usual adverbial meaning, 'forth from, away from, or not in a place, position, state etc'. (I'm working in Australia; so my primary source is the Macquarie Dictionary. It regards 'out of' as a compound preposition when it means 'without', as in 'out of eggs' or 'out of work', but it regards 'out' explicitly as an adverb in 'out of order', 'made out of scraps' and 'to run out of coal'.)

'From out of the rain' has 'out' with this same adverbial meaning. It doesn't seem to be part of a compound preposition 'out of'; it certainly doesn't have the meaning 'without'.

It would therefore be consistent with Wikipedia policy to capitalise the title as "From Out of the Rain". This would seem to be enough to satisfy everyone who has contributed to the debate. Klippa (talk) 11:14, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

PS I'm all in favor of correcting honest mistakes by producers. Edoktor points out that "The BBC made an honest mistake, and everyone else getting their information from the BBC, copied that error verbatim." and proposes to correct it. Although in this case I think the BBC capitalised the title correctly according to convention, could we perhaps do something about their honest mistake 38 years ago with The Silurians... Klippa (talk) 11:24, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

I am suprised that as a professional proofreader, you err on the context; "out" is purely used as a preposition here, and is indeed part of a compound preposition "from out of", not an adverb. Were it used in a title like "School is Out", then it is an adverb and you would be right. But nothing is "out" in this contect, but coming "(from) out of", just like "into", and that defenitely makes it a preposition. Also note that Bat out of Hell is correctly capitalised. — Edokter • Talk • 13:04, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

I have to support Edoktor on this. Just compare "from out of" with "made out of" and "ran out of", and you'll see that there's no verb in the first. But then again, the other two are somewhat questionable -- i.e., "(made out) of" vs "made (out of)" and "(ran out) of" vs "ran (out of)". In other words, these two depend on the context: "(ran out) of eggs" vs. "ran (out of) the barn". Given this, the correct form is "[verb] (from out of)", thus making the title "From out of the Rain". DonQuixote (talk) 17:13, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Of course the context is important. And context can make clear which of several possible parts of speech a word might be. But you can't say that the absence of a verb means that there can't be an adverb. Just as you wouldn't say that the lack of a subordinate clause means 'because' isn't a conjunction in 'I love you because' or that the lack of a main clause means 'when' isn't a conjunction in 'when Harry met Sally'. We are dealing with phrases and sentences fragments rather than full sentences, as is often the case with titles.

As you note, and as in my examples in the previous paragraph, there would be a verb; it's simply not present because we are dealing with a title rather than a sentence.

The best book I have for propositions is FT Wood's English Prepositional Idioms, published by Macmillan. It has 90 pages dealing with 'The Prepositions and Their Uses' and 480 pages dealing with 'Prepositional Idioms'. The most it can say on the question is "It is difficult to draw a line of demarcation between those constructions in which 'out of' has the force of a compound and those where 'out' functions as an adverb, with 'of' as a preposition introducing an adjunct to it."

What's happening here is that we are finding it difficult to draw that line. But if we draw the line in favor of adverb+preposition then we avoid a conflict between official sources and Wikipedia policy. I'm not lining up with the little-o folk, some of whom seem to be rather uncooperative, but I am pointing out that there doesn't have to be a conflict if you don't want it.

It's only 'out of' though that might be a compound preposition. Don't confuse things by suggesting that 'from out of' forms a compound preposition. Wood's book offers a note at the end of its article on 'from': "'From' may be used before an adverb phrase of time or place which itself begins with another preposition." It gives examples including "He took a box from under the counter." and "From just after the war until the present time...". Compound prepositions are numerous, but we don't posit a new one every time we encounter a construction like this.

Incidentally, I had a look at the way different publishers capitalised Bat Out of Hell in five books that I have: Virgin, Orion and Kerrang! all have 'Bat Out of Hell'; Rolling Stone and the All Music Guide went one either way, although I can't remember which was which. (The album itself is no help as the phrase appears in full caps at every instance.) Klippa (talk) 23:22, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Would it help if I told you the title is based on this line from the show: "They came from out of the rain"? That should provide a little more context. I still cannot imagine it being an adverb here... Now, Bat out of Hell is a grey area (the bat is out), I'll admit that, but "from out of" only denotes a position; hence it is a preposition. — Edokter • Talk • 00:01, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I have to point out that you should take Wood's book with a pinch of salt. He obviously makes a mistake in saying that from precedes an adverb in "He took a box from under the counter." The adverb in this case is "from" itself, i.e. "took from", as "took under" doesn't make sense if "under" is the adverb. The simplest way to resolve this is to write the whole sentence in another form: "From out of the rain they came." This clearly indicates that "from out of" forms one preposition. "From the rain they came out", in which "out" is an adverb, only works if you omit "of". "Out of the rain they came from" is a little awkward. DonQuixote (talk) 01:55, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry. I was just trying to help. I thought we could have a resolution where both sides of the debate were right. Instead we seem to have begun a debate on a new front. Still, the grammar is interesting.

Wood doesn't say 'from' precedes an adverb; he says it precedes an adverb phrase. An adverb phrase is the same as an adverbial phrase; that is a phrase which serves the function of an adverb, answering a question that an adverb answers. In 'from under the counter' 'under the counter' answers the question 'Where?'. Wood and his examples are quite right. He says clearly "an adverb phrase...which itself begins with another preposition".

So 'from' is a preposition and the head of a prepositional phrase. In 'from the beginning' the rest of the phrase is a noun phrase, with 'beginning' as its head. This is typical, but it is not the only construction of a prepositional phrase. In 'from above' and 'from next-door' the rest of the phrase is an adverb—'above' or 'next-door'. In 'from under the table' and 'from across the street' the rest of the prepositional phrase is an adverbial phrase. It is an adverbial phrase because it answers the same question that 'above' and 'next-door' answer: 'where'; it is an adverb phrase of place, in Wood's terms. What we have in these examples is not compound prepositions, but nested prepositional phrases. (In all cases the 'from' phrase is answering the same question: Where did it come from? From the beginning. From above. From under the table. From across the street. The question wouldn't be *'where did it come from under?' or *'from across where did it come'. Or in our case *'where did it come from out of'. However, with a compound preposition the question is 'what is it made out of' or 'what is it lying in front of'.)

'From out of the rain' is a little more complex, made so, as we all recognise, by the 'out'. But it seems to me that 'from' heads a prepositional phrase ('from out of the rain'), 'out of the rain' is an adverbial phrase, 'out' is an adverb with 'of the rain' as its adjunct, and 'of the rain' is another prepositional phrase. The whole prepositional phrase headed by 'from' is an adverbial phrase modifying 'came'. (You're right: I haven't seen the episode and so I didn't know what line Starhunterfan was referring to, but I was almost certain that the verb would be 'come'.)

It therefore has the same form as 'from out of the unknown', 'from right near the end' and 'from once upon a time'.

All of our discussion has been about traditional grammar of course, as the capitalising rules rely on the concepts of traditional parts of speech. And adverbs are always the first up against the wall when a revolution threatens to overturn the tradition. This is because the adverb is really a very heterogeneous 'part of speech'. www.orbilat.com/General_References/Linguistic_Terms.html defines the adverb as "a word belonging to one of the major form classes in any of numerous languages, typically serving as a modifier of a verb, an adjective, another adverb, a preposition, a phrase, a clause, or a sentence, expressing some relation of manner or quality, place, time, degree, number, cause, opposition, affirmation, or denial, and in English also serving to connect and to express comment on clause content".

Perhaps when the traditional concept of the adverb finally does collapse this question will be much easier. (One possibility offered by modern grammarians, invoking Occam's razor, is that those adverbs which have the same form as prepositions would be regarded as prepositions even in their adverbial uses. This would remove our problem. 05:06, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Now that you mention it, if you read preposition and postposition, instead of considering whether "out" is a preposition or an adverb, we can consider "out" as a preposition that is an adverb (or an adjective or whatever). In other words, preposition is the superclass while adverb is the subclass. With that, we can treat "out" as a preposition (which is also an adverb) in "From out of the Rain". DonQuixote (talk) 08:04, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

We can't really. A word can't be classified as two parts of speech at the same time. The noun-verb-adjective-adverb-pronoun-preposition-conjunction(-interjection-article) classification comprises mutually exclusive categories. 'Out' is both a preposition and an adverb (and a noun and a verb and an adjective), but in any construction it can be only one. (Although there could be different interpretations in some cases, as there are here.) If 'out' is a preposition in our title it can't be an adverb. However, a phrase beginning with a preposition can be an adverbial, or in other words an adverbial phrase.

The preposition article doesn't suggest that a word can be two parts of speech at once.

The advice Edokter received when he sought confirmation on the talk page that 'out' is a preposition wasn't much help. The respondent pointed to the example "Come out from {under the bed}". However in that example 'out' is very clearly an adverb, modifying 'come'. The point of their example is that a preposition, 'from', can take a prepositional phrase, 'under the bed', as its complement. Klippa (talk) 10:26, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

To quote:

Adpositions can be organized into subclasses according to various criteria. These can be based on directly observable properties (such as the adposition's form or its position in the sentence) or on less visible properties (such as the adposition's meaning or function in the context at hand)...

Classification by complement

Although noun phrases are the most typical complements, adpositions can in fact combine with a variety of syntactic categories, much like verbs...

• adverb or adverb phrases: I worked there until recently

(emphasis mine)

Of course, whether to accept this at face value is another matter entirely. DonQuixote (talk) 15:16, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes. That's a classification of prepositional phrases, according to the class of the element (the complement) which completes the phrase. The preposition remains a preposition. Klippa (talk) 21:23, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

An interesting discussion but I think we're losing sight of the question. Surely the correct capitalisation is as it appears within the broadcast programme itself. This may or may not agree with the WP guidelines but at the end of the day they are only someone's arbitrary opinion anyway. If a television programme is to be considered a piece of art then the spelling, capitalisation, even the typeface (if you want to take it to that extreme) of the title as it appears within the programme itself is the correct one, even if it seems to the purist to be grammatically incorrect. For someone to presume to be "correcting an honest mistake" is arrogance in the extreme. There can be nothing more authoritative or more reliable a source than the original work itself. Similarly, the WP entry for the series should be called "TORCHWOOD" and not "Torchwood". 83.104.249.240 (talk) 14:48, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Gwen?

I've only seen the preview trailer for this, but Gwen did not appear in it and so I assume the episode takes place during her honeymoon. If she does not appear, this is surely noteworthy. U-Mos (talk) 19:23, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Uhm, it already aired on BBC3, and Gwen was defenitely in it. Oops, i was think of "Something Borrowed". Come to think of it... I can't recall seeing her either. — Edokter • Talk • 19:29, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Gwen, Ianto and Owen went to the Electro together, so she's in it. DonQuixote (talk) 19:40, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

The episode doesn't follow the "Gwen Williams is in her honeymoon" timeline. She appears like in any other episode. Even, Gwen participates in the final confrontation, which happened at the Electro, with both Owen & Toshiko. 2008ana (talk) 10:42, 16 March 2008 (UTC)2008ana

OK, that's cleared that up then. It does seem odd she was completely left out of the preview trailer though. U-Mos (talk) 13:52, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

How far was Captain Jack involved

The film shows him with the other members of the sinister cast. He says he was with a different outfit, but he has to say something to explain it. Should there be more of a reference? --GwydionM (talk) 18:01, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

• Jack was sent via torchwood as a freelance agent to investigate as a act "the man the cannot die" as torchwood knows jack cannot die {Ucebaggie (talk) 18:16, 24 September 2008 (UTC)}.

Continuity error: 35mm film in a 16mm projector?

The film shown in the Electro cinema is printed on 35mm stock - you see it clearly on the Steenbeck and when it's being loaded into the projector. However, back in the Hub the projector that Toshiko operates is obviously a 16mm model. Noticing elements (the Ghostmaker and Pearl) missing from the film, Ianto expresses doubt that it is the same film as he watched in the cinema. Jack assures him that it is but how can it be when it won't physically fit? 83.104.249.240 (talk) 15:06, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

alien tech? 84.13.30.238 (talk) 17:01, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Title

As soon as I looked at the article, I clicked "move" as the title appeared wrong, before I noticed all the to-ing and fro-ing. The article location should be "From Out of the Rain" - "Out of the Rain" is the place/concept/plane/dimension/whatever the evil traveling show people were from, hence the nonstandard capitalisation of "Out"; they didn't come out of the rain, or come out of "The Rain", they came from "Out of the Rain". Hence, "From Out of the Rain". "Out of the Rain" is the place where the things originally existed, and "from out of" isn't a preposition in this context - out is used as an adverb, and ought to be capitalised. Am I making sense? Neıl ☎ 19:58, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

You did read the entire discussion above, didn't you? Anyway, I'm not going to fight this anymore. — Edokter • Talk • 20:08, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

I did indeed read the above discussion - you kept insisting "out" was being used as a part of a complex preposition (as in "from out of"), when in fact using a lowercase "out" would be (almost) like writing "I watched a scene from out of Africa". Neıl ☎ 00:04, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, that analogy is wrong. Out of Africa is a single entity -- a film, so using that example in this argument is dubious. It's like saying we should capitalise "A" because of the example "I watched a scene from a Midsummer Night's Dream" -- although it's proper in "From A Midsummer Night's Dream" when it's referring to the play itself, it's improper in "From a Midsummer Night's Dream" when the subject is a dream dreamt one midsummer night. It's better to use some other argument, like something that disambiguates "[from out of the rain]" as a single entity vs "out of the rain" as a single entity. DonQuixote (talk) 01:10, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Crypes people... I was hoping to lay this to rest. Let's not start another move-war. I agree with Don that te anology is wrong, but you did manage to convinve me, somewhat, that Out of the Rain can be viewed as a adverb. Now can we please have some consensus? — Edokter • Talk • 11:46, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Frozen victims in the Lido

I do believe that the people seen in the lido, disappearing when the flask is opened are in fact ghosts from the already hospitalised victims instead of other unknown victims. They would have been conjured by the Ghostmaker to serve as the Night Travellers' audience. Moreover it does not appear consistent that some victims should just die and stay where they are when other disappear into fine air. Does anybody thinks the same ? 86.201.204.251 (talk) 20:59, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree. There seems to be no evidence to support that bit in the article in the episode, so I have removed it 143.238.218.245 (talk) 20:42, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Similarity to Moving Pictures (novel), Discworld?

Is it just me or is the storyline rather close to that novel? Both have creatures coming from celluloid, capturing people to watch them eternally. The destruction in both cases involved the weaknesses of celluloid. - Is there a common source to both, or did TW copy the motif of the book?--Cyberman TM (talk) 11:38, 16 August 2009 (UTC)