Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/James Bond/archive1

James Bond

NOTE: THIS PAGE FAILED ONCE BUT HAS BEEN RE-NOMINATED BY USER:HIGHFIELDS

ORIGINAL SUPPORT/OBJECTIONS:

Technically, this would be a self nomination, but I have only contributed minor corrections to the article. Thanks to the relentless work and fruitful collaboration of users User:K1Bond007 and User:23skidoo, James Bond has become what every article about a major fictional character should be: comprehensive, entertaining to read, neutral in its writing, and clearly the work of knowledgeable fans, without being too sensationalist. This article is about a popular, mainstream character, and thus is perfectly suited to become featured. Phils 11:42, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

• Support. -- ALoan (Talk) 12:57, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)
• Support. I maybe biased, as I am a great fan of Bonds movies (in particular the vintage ones)... but the article looks good, and I have learned a few things I did not know. --Zappaz 17:42, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)
• Support. Excellent article - interesting, comprehensive, balanced and fair. My only quibble, is that some books on the James Bond phenomenon as it were, should be added to the references section e.g. [1], [2] CGorman 18:15, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)
• Object. 1) The article starts off quite nicely, but then becomes a series of lists, which hardly qualifies as "excellent prose". Although some lists or tables are fine in the article, they should be used as an illustration or additinional information, not as the core of a section or article. 2) At the end there are several non-sections like "Trivia" or "Parody" (containing only two sentences). 3) The only references are lists of box office numbers. 4) The article discusses several of the movies returning features (as it should), but omits the theme songs. Not to mention the James Bond tune (a brief sample might even be fair use, I think) 5) The lead section should briefly summarize the article, which this one doesn't. Jeronimo 22:15, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)
  • I disagree about following points. 1) There is no alternative to listing novels and films. The article does this quite elegantly. Expanding on each of them would bring the article to unmanageable sizes. Omitting them would be making the article incomplete.

2) Where would you fit the info in the trivia section if not in said section?

3) My personal opinion on this point goes against the established view on references, but I guess I'll have to concede. Phils 00:02, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)

1) It's extremely hard to fit all of that onto the page. We're talking about 20+ films, 30+ novels (not even counting short stories) etc etc etc = the longest, most successful franchise in history. As it is the article is over 32KB and has been as high as something like 55K. I think for our "lists" we've done an excellent job. 2) The parody section was removed because it was huge, that's really all I can say about that. The trivia section is hard to do. This is really a general part of the franchise and the character and most of that information is covered per movie or per novel. I'd rather incorporate these into the character background. 3) Noted. Most reference information for this page comes from the films and the novels though - Regardless I'd like to see this expanded as well with such entries as what CGorman suggested. 4) True; this information however is found on their respective articles and those sections are thin as it is. I agree something should be written though - at least on the James Bond Theme, which coincidentally has it's own page. 5) I disagree. It gives the basic information of the film franchise, the novel series, the character written by Fleming and mentions other things having to do with Bond such as video games, parodies etc. Could it be written a little better? Sure, but I think it does the job adequately. Explain how it should be improved or how it is not fulfilling this adequately? Thank you for your suggestions. K1Bond007 06:08, Feb 12, 2005 (UTC)

Replies to both K1Bond007 & Phil. 1) You don't actually have to fit them in here. In many cases, the full list is not very interesting, and can be moved to a separate article. In other cases, it can be kept as an "illustration". In either case, a good prozaic part should be listed instead. Also, not all lists are necessary here. Just a the "parody" list has been moved out, others can be moved away too. It may be necessary to have all Fleming's books here, and all the official movies, but other parts could (I'll leave that up to you) be put elsewhere without harming the article (of course leaving behind some information in textual form). 2) Removing a section entirely is not a good solution. Write one or two paragraphs about AND refer to the other article. I agree that the trivia may be hard to do, but you'll agree a list is not "well written" (one of the requirements of an FA). I think some of the points can be included in the text, while f.e. the asteroid's listing in the "See also" section would be enough on that issue. The "Bond Bits" section would be much better already when you just remove the bullets; a slight reordering and rewrite would make it fluent. 5) Wikipedia:Lead section writes that a lead should "briefly summarize the article". In this case, we get information on the producers (which isn't elsewhere in the artile), while nothing is said about the character, the storyline, etc. If you balance this better, the lead section would be great. Jeronimo 08:22, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)

• Refer to peer review. After a great start, it devolves into lists. The bond bits is basically trivia that really should be incorporated into the article - somewhere. "Books" seems extremely disorganised, and I really beleive that should be split off into another article with two or three paragraphs summarising the material. "Unofficial films" is tantalising yet unsatisfying: why did Sean Connery appear in one?! The trivia section really should be killed or incorporated into the main article. - Ta bu shi da yu 03:35, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Connery's 1983 Never Say Never Again is mentioned earlier in the article as not being part of the official MGM/UA/EON Productions series - it was able to be made due to a lawsuit between Fleming and Kevin McClory over the rights to Thunderball that bloomed into MGM vs Sony up until 1999, it's mentioned in the article and the rest of the information is written at Never Say Never Again's and Thunderball's articles. K1Bond007 06:08, Feb 12, 2005 (UTC)