Talk:Out of This World Adventures/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Protonk (talk · contribs) 16:20, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Overall not too much to add about what's already in the article. I did find a number of sources which I feel can be included so some of my content suggestions are derived from them. We can talk about whether or not their addition makes sense and what changes would need to be made to the article if we include them. I'll take another pass later on for copyediting, but I didn't see any problems on a first run.

Sorry about the delay responding to this review; it's been pretty busy both on-wiki and off. I've made a start at some changes and will add more this evening; I'm going to mention The Girl with the Hungry Eyes in a note, rather than the main text. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:20, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Don't worry about it. In the meantime I knocked two GANs off that had been at the front of the queue for a while: the Kilgour–Matas report and the Met Gala. Sniping your magazine articles is a pleasure. :) Protonk (talk) 13:45, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

style/layout/images

• Image checks out.
• Everything looks well linked.

content

• "Clements suggested to Joseph Meyers..." Both this and the following sentence are structured as "Person -> someone else, identifying clause, something about an idea". Maybe mix these up a bit?

  Done, slightly at least, as part of other changes. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:52, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

• "Out of This World Adventures was one of the magazines Wollheim produced..." I think this can be simplified. We can just say Wollheim produced the three, list them (OoTWA last), then note the start date for OoTWA. Also were the three all started July, 1950? I know I've suggested mixing up sentence structure above, but it reads better w/ these two structured similarly and the suggestion bit structured differently.

  Not sure quite what you're after here, but I did some reworking, partly because of the added material; let me know if it looks OK now. Re the dates: per [1] and [2] the romance magazine was dated July 1950, and the western was December 1950. However, I don't think philsp.com is a reliable source for Wikipedia purposes, though in practice it is extremely reliable. I hemmed and hawed about this for a while, but I finally realized it was worth adding because it changes the sequence of the narrative slightly, with the western being launched at the same time as the romance magazine. Looking at the dates, I now wonder if the line about "Meyers told Wollheim to try three magazines in the new format" is actually just the researchers making an assumption. It seems equally likely to me that Meyers told Wollheim to try it with two magazines, and the romance pulp failed, but the sf one did OK, so Meyers decided it would be worth another issue, but substituted a western for the romance pulp. That's all speculation, of course. Anyway, done. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:52, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

  I thought about it some more and decided to just cut the "three magazines" line -- it's not really necessary, and given the timeline it is an odd way to describe the sequence of events. Without it the reader can make up their own mind about how the decisions were likely to have been taken. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:21, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

• There's some discussion in sources about "The Girl with the Hungry Eyes" (I guess the first sf anthology?) whenever I see people talk about Wollheim and the start of this magazine. Would it be worthwhile to modify that intro paragraph on the publication history to mention it?

  Yes; done. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:52, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

• I think one of the sources I found straight up calls it an interplanetary mag.

  I suspect this is Bousfield, who I treat with a little more caution than Ashley or some of the others; she was clearly given the dregs of the magazines to write about for the Tymn/Ashley book, and she focuses on describing the stories in detail, which is sometimes interesting but not very useful for publishing context. Overall, I don't think this is worth adding -- it's not a very specific genre. If she'd said it focused on planetary romance, which is fairly well-defined, that would be worth noting. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:52, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

• Is it worth a short digression on the transitional comic format? It seems like OoTWA was neither fish nor foul and this also impacted success/reception.

  I don't think we have enough to say much about it -- Bousfield really ought to comment on this, but doesn't, and Ashley barely mentions it. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:52, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

  See below; I changed my mind and decided to add something based on this. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:21, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

sources

• Building New Worlds, 1946-1959: The Carnell Era, Volume One by John Boston and Damein Broderick (2013) ISBN 1434447200
  • p.91 talks about a Bertram Chandler story that ran in the December issue and calls it "the worst story I have ever encountered from this writer" (screencap, isfdb)

    I have this in a box somewhere; I've used it as a source for factual statements, but I'm not crazy about using it for opinions. Broderick is an sf and science writer, so he doesn't have status as a critic or historian; and he's not a sufficiently well-known sf writer to make him worth quoting because of his fame. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:09, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

• Partners in Wonder: Women and the Birth of Science Fiction, 1926-1965 by Eric Leif Davin ISBN 0739112678
  • p 174 talks a bit about Wollheim's idea for the comic format (screencap). Take what Wollheim says with a grain of salt, as I've read elsewhere that it was basically a knock-off of Planet Stories.
    • That passage also mentions his collaboration with futurian John Michel, leading to Michel's doing the cover story for each issue. Protonk (talk) 14:51, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

      Yes, a nice detail. Added. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:09, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

  • On another page there's a bit about Wollheim and Klass (Tenn), but it's probably more useful for an article on him or on Avon than it is for OoTWA, so I didn't screencap it.
• Transformations: The Story of the Science Fiction Magazines from 1950 to 1970 by Michael Ashley ISBN 0853237794
  • pp. 4-5 has some color on the magazine getting started. I think you may have some of this from Ashley's other work, but it's worth a look (screencap)

    I missed this; the fact that the comic section was in fact taken directly from an existing comic is definitely worth adding, and I didn't have another source for that. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:09, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

• The Business of Science Fiction: Two Insiders Discuss Writing and Publishing by Mike Resnick and Barry N. Malzberg ISBN 0786456809
  • p. 175 discusses OoTWA very briefly with Resnick calling it a "bad idea". I don't think there's much there, but the idea that the pulp was trying to catch the comic market but couldn't (because comics existed) meshes w/ what I've read of Ashley's thoughts. (screencap)

    This convinced me that it was worth adding at least a part-sentence on this, and I went back and used the Ashley quote you found above. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:21, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! Protonk (talk) 16:20, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Done, I think. Thanks, as always; I think this is the most productive review you've done yet -- the article is a lot better now. I feel a bit embarrassed I didn't catch some of this stuff myself. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:21, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

@Mike Christie: Passed it. Happy to help. How close are you to getting the whole topic to it's likely highest rating? Protonk (talk) 03:10, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

There are a few still to go. See User:Mike_Christie/Sandbox for my tracking list; Astounding Stories and Weird Tales will take quite a bit of work, but I've made a start on Astounding, at least. The other titles are probably split fifty-fifty between ones that will be long enough for FA, and ones that will have to settle for GA. I'll probably leave The Thrill Book, The Witch's Tales, and Ghost Stories for last, as I have fewer sources on those. FAs take a month or two to go through, assuming they pass, and I have at least six or seven that will have to be FA on that list, so that means it'll be next summer at the earliest before the whole topic is done. But it's more than halfway there. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:18, 17 October 2014 (UTC)