Talk:Production of Watchmen (film)

Lead

Ok, the first thing that you need to do is introduce the subject. The lead jumps right into the meat of the article topic, but doesn't explain what Watchmen is. See the opening paragraph for Characters of Smallville? It begins by explaining what the show is in the first couple lines. So, I would start by explaining what the story of Watchment is. Since this page is about the task of translating the comic to the silver screen, and not soley just production info on the film, it would be important to identify that original concept (i.e. a 12 issue graphic novel). After introducing your primary subject, I would go into identifying what this article is about, and then just summarize each of the parts. Here is a quick example, that could probably be tweaked over time.

Watchmen is a twelve-issue comic book limited series created by writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons, and colorist John Higgins. The series was published by DC Comics between 1986 and 1987. The storyline focuses on the struggles of the protagonists as an investigation into the murder of a government sponsored superhero pulls them out of retirement and eventually leads them to confront a plot to stave off nuclear war by killing millions of people. The graphic novel's film rights were acquired by producer Lawrence Gordon in 1986, but the film adaptation was met with problems over the course of the next twenty-three years, until finally being adapted by Zack Snyder in 2009.

Ok, so this can be used to introduce your primary subject. I would then use subsequent paragraphs to summarize each basic point where the studio failed to get the film off the ground, what changes were made, the final success and then the litigation afterwards (along with the outcome). Work up a couple of follow up paragraphs for the lead, that summarize each section of the article, and I'll take a look and see what can be tweaked/reworded/added/deleted.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 17:05, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

GAN

this should go to wp:gan. Nergaal (talk) 22:19, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Development of Watchmen/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: María (habla conmigo) 20:16, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Hello, I'll be reviewing this article for GA-status. I'm a huge fan of the graphic novel and the film adaptation, so hopefully we can get this article to where it needs to be. :) Here is how it stands against the criteria:

1. Well-written: Yes.
2. Factually accurate and verifiable: Yes, although see below for concerns.
3. Broad in its coverage: Yes, although see below.
4. Neutral: Yes.
5. Stable: Yes.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by images: Yes.

Overall, the article is excellent; well written, well researched and well presented. I do, however, see some confusion as to what this article is supposed to be about -- as it is now, the article's title does not differentiate between the development for the original comic series and the film, and the lead does not initially make this clear, either. Because the lead is supposed to be a summary of the entire article (per WP:LEAD), the current description of the series in the first paragraph is out of place and unnecessary. I suggest making it clear not only in the title of the article itself, but also in the first sentence, that this page is about the development of the Watchmen film. Perhaps move the page to Development of Watchmen film adaptation, or something similar, and refocus the lead with a descriptive, engaging lead sentence describing the topic at hand. If a description of the source material is necessary, than it needs to also be described in the article itself, per lead guidelines.

Specific concerns

• That Watchmen is linked under "The series" in the second sentence is unfortunate and confusing for the person who may want to readily find the page for the source material; hopefully this is something that can be fixed while taking my above suggestions into consideration.
• I fixed the dashes throughout to make them consistent.[1] Make sure to check I didn't miss one. :)
• Citations referring to David Hughes' "Who Watches the Watchmen? – How The Greatest Graphic Novel of Them All Confounded Hollywood" in The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made need to be made clearer per WP:SAYWHEREYOUGOTIT. Not only does the specific edition used need to be cited, but the specific page numbers as well; you can use any number of short hand citation style, as long as it's consistent and clearly presentable. We have the 2001 edition available at my library, so it shouldn't be difficult to get a copy.
• Speaking of books, the book listed above is the only print source used in the article as of now. Have others been consulted? From a quick Worldcat search, I see Watchmen: The Art of the Film and Watchmen: The Film Companion, although there may be others. If these have been checked into and found superfluous, that's fine.
• I'm used to seeing External Links, especially in articles devoted to films; is there a reason there aren't any here? (Note: I'm not advocating their addition, I'm merely curious as to their absence.)
• Website publishers, such as WatchmenComicMovie.com and comingsoon.net, should not be italicized; magazines and periodicals, however, should.

Everything else looks fine; it's a very interesting article, and a good counterpart to the film's page. I'm going to put the nomination on hold for a week until my concerns have been addressed. I'm mainly concerned about the status of the lead and the article's title, although of course source quality, consistency and formatting should be addressed before I'm ready to promote. Let me know if you have any questions, María (habla conmigo) 20:16, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I moved to Development of Watchmen (film) (my original title, actually, they eventually changed) and rewrote the lead to make it more clear. Removed italics and specified the edition in the refs. I don't know what could enter external links, so that's why it doesn't exist. Anything else? igordebraga ≠ 02:01, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Good progress so far, but my concerns regarding David Hughes' book (which still requires specific page numbers) and whether other published sources such as the ones noted above may be considered as possible additional references have not been addressed. The latter isn't important, and can simply be taken into account for future purposes, but the citations pointing to Hughes must list page numbers for verifiability purposes. María (habla conmigo) 19:39, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Development of Watchmen (film) does not need to be disambiguated. Before the film, there was no article called "Development of Watchmen". Instead, a hatnote should point to Watchmen#Background and creation. Wherever this article is linked, it should already be clear that readers will be going to an article about the film's development. There is nothing we're disambiguating from here. Erik (talk | contribs) 17:11, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, Erik, maybe I didn't make myself clear; my suggestion to rename this article was so that it's clear from the onset that the title refers to the development of the film. It really has nothing to do with disambiguation, but everything to do with choosing the most recognizable article title per WP:TITLE. While the use of "(film)" may not be the best choice under the circumstances (see my suggestions above), I still feel that simply using "Development of Watchmen" is misleading and vague. Also, might context may not be so very apparent everywhere this article is linked, since many of the pages would of course refer to both the film and its source material? María (habla conmigo) 17:54, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the issue with using "(film)" is that the film is not called Development of Watchmen. :) Too bad there is no consensus for using italics in article names for these articles... I'm not sure if further clarification is needed beyond Development of Watchmen. Of the graphic novel and the film, the term "development" will always pertain to the film. That's why we have "Background and creation" at Watchmen. There is similar precedent with list articles at Category:Lists of awards by film; we don't disambiguate for films whose titles would by themselves by disambiguated. Actually, reviewing the article, "Development" is not accurate since it is more than development. The article title ought to be something like "Production of Watchmen" or "Production history of Watchmen", which are both even more film-centric. Erik (talk | contribs) 18:47, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

← I also have to add that this sub-article was inappropriately split from Watchmen (film). Reviewing the film's main article, the "Development" section (which really should be "Production" section) does not have a summary section of this sub-article. This is a serious misstep because there is no overview of the actual filmmaking involved. I hope that the splitter/creator will fix this issue, especially with the film's main article being a Good Article. Erik (talk | contribs) 18:55, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Oh, dear. Thank you, Erik, I hadn't even considered this particular issue while reviewing for GA. Seeing as how this article has already been on hold for a week, do you believe it should be failed until the remaining issues -- now including your own concerns -- have been addressed? María (habla conmigo) 19:10, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

No, I think that this particular article is fine, but the main article just needs a summary section and not just the pre-Snyder details. I'll mention the issue at Talk:Watchmen (film). Igordebraga, any chance you can fix this? Erik (talk | contribs) 19:33, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Sure, I rewrote the Development section of the main article, and even moved the page to Production of Watchmen, as you suggested. But is the sourcing problem still up? igordebraga ≠ 23:59, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes. Please add page numbers for Hughes' book. María (habla conmigo) 00:53, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Finally found a way to do it... igordebraga ≠ 03:26, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Wonderful, thanks so much; the article is much more academically sound as it is now, I hope you agree. That last issue resolved, I'm happy to promote this article to GA-status. Thanks for all your hard work, Igordebraga (and to Erik for his input, of course) -- congrats! :) María (habla conmigo) 12:39, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Suggested move (2011)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Page moved to Production of Watchmen (film). Vegaswikian (talk) 23:24, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Production of Watchmen → Production of the Watchmen film – Or somesuch. Watchmen is about the comic, so this title implies that it's about making the comic (which would be an interesting article), but the film is at Watchmen (film). Thoughts? —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 07:43, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

• Support. Current title is misleading as it implies the article is about the comic. Jenks24 (talk) 08:26, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
  • Just noting that I think Erik's suggestion of Production of Watchmen (film) is equally acceptable. Jenks24 (talk) 06:34, 6 September 2011 (UTC)
• Comment: I recommend moving to Production of Watchmen (film). With article italics, it will look like "Production of Watchmen (film)". I don't strongly feel that it needs to be moved, though -- "production" seems film-oriented to me. Erik (talk | contribs) 14:06, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
• Support moving to "Production of Watchmen (film)" since I've realized that if we have other sub-articles that could be ambiguous (e.g., "Reception of Watchmen"), it would be an inconsistent set of sub-articles to have some with the disambiguation term and some without. Seems best to make it all consistent by including the disambiguation term. Erik (talk | contribs) 14:28, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

• Response I agree--they should be renamed pending the end of this discussion. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:33, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

• Comment: If this is moved, where should the resulting redirect at Production of Watchmen point? If to Production of Watchmen (film), then the disambiguator seems unnecessary to me. After all, we don't have an article for the production of any of the other works titled Watchmen. Even if it's not clear from the title which work the article is about, we usually don't add disambiguators in article titles unless there's an actual naming conflict. Jafeluv (talk) 08:45, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Requested move (2012)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved as requested and per WP:PRECISION. When title qualifiers are needed, we have consistent ones to use, but we don't apply them where the unqualified title is sufficient just for consistency. If fuller description is needed in the title to match its WP:COMMONNAME, it should be "Film production of Watchmen" or "Production of the film Watchmen" or something, but I don't think the common name is different.-- JHunterJ (talk) 13:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

---

Production of Watchmen (film) → Production of Watchmen – This article was moved to the current title (with the "(film)" disambiguator) in a previous discussion. I am suggesting that this article be moved back to the original title for two reasons. Firstly, Wikipedia's guidelines regarding the decision to disambiguate state that article titles should only be provided with disambiguators when "there is more than one existing Wikipedia article to which that word or phrase might be expected to lead" (italics mine). There are no other existing Wikipedia articles that could be referred to by the title "Production of Watchmen," therefore the guidelines are against disambiguation. Secondly, the current title (with the disambiguator) is more misleading than the original title, because it suggests that there is a film called Production of Watchmen. The disambiguator does not apply to the entire title, and it does not serve the purpose of disambiguating. The original title should be restored. Neelix (talk) 21:56, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose this is about Watchmen (film), and not the comic or any other type of Watchmen, and is a subsidiary article, so should match the main article's naming. Further, this is a descriptive title, so should match the main article, since it is not a set term referring specifically to the subject. 70.24.247.54 (talk) 03:54, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

That is not how disambiguators work. I agree that the subsidiary article should match the main article's naming, but the disambiguator is not part of that naming; disambiguators are separate entities that do not get transferred to subsidiary articles. Neelix (talk) 12:02, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

That's just bureaucratic and unhelpful practice. If articles don't match the main article, confusion reigns supreme. Since the comic book article covers the production of the comic book, then "Production of Watchmen" should redirect to the comic book article, as it covers that concept as well. If a separate article on the production of the comic book were written, would it need to sit at Production of Watchmen (comic) and some discussion about primary use of "production of Watchmen" need to be instituted to see which production article were primary? And the motion comic was also made, so could also have a production article... 70.24.247.54 (talk) 07:06, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

The reason that neither of those possible topics have articles is that they aren't sufficiently notable. The graphic novel is notable, but the production of the graphic novel as a topic unto itself is not; there isn't even a production section on the Watchmen article, because, for graphic novels, "production" simply means the physical manufacturing of the books. As far as I am aware, the word "production" has no standard meaning in the context of a motion comic. "Production" is primarily a filmmaking term, so the production of the film is the primary topic. Far from being less confusing, it is more confusing to include the disambiguator in the title for the reasons I outline in the nomination. Neelix (talk) 21:02, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

• Support. WP:PRECISION, though not a perfect fit with descriptive titles, appears relevant by analogy. The title of the main article is most distinctly Watchmen, with a disambiguator add-on, which is not just bureaucratic but fundamental to what a parenthetical disambiguator is. It is a parenthetical after all. As for confusion, no one will see the main title and then decide to search for "production of..." I cannot think of a route to finding this article where the lack of the parenthetical would cause confusion. If you could actual map out a concrete scenario where the non-matching would present a barrier, that would go a long way.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:40, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

• Support While appreciating the point about titling consistency, this seems an unfortunate case of the clashing of modifiers describing subordinate concepts. Production of Watchmen has the benefit of being consistent with established practice, as described in WP:PRECISION, as well as obviating the potential confusion with a Production of Watchmen work. Not a perfect solution, true, and some may need to click through the title link to see the article in order to clarify status, but that could happen with either title, and since most readers (as opposed to editors) will probably be accessing the page through piped links from contexts implying the film version (e.g. the "Film development" link in the Watchmen template), the likelihood of readers being confused by the absence of a parenthetical (film) is probably low. ENeville (talk) 02:55, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

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