Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Fictional characters/Archive 1

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Sources

Does anyone know whether this is a reliable source? I don't think it is, but its got some great stuff that could be used to bolster reception.

At any rate, I've found some sources that appear to be reliable (I'm taking liberties and assuming Book Magazine is reliable): [1] [2] [3] Should help some articles, particularly literary ones. Harry Blue5 (talk) 10:22, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

There's [4] and also [5], but the very name of the latter site makes me cautious to use it until its actually examined. Harry Blue5 (talk) 11:08, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Digital Spy is a great source for a wide range of fictional characters btw. :)RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 21:06, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Herbert Garrison Requested move

Just thought I should say, I have proposed Herbert Garrison to be moved to Mr. Garrison on its here. Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:44, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Articles with no real-world content

I have started the page Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional characters/No real world content. It is only a few articles right now, as I am adding them while sifting through the fictional character categories, and that is an enormous task. But regardless, I think that it would do us good to have a list of those character articles requiring desperate attention to be encyclopedic. So far, I am only adding those character articles that have no reception or development at all, and only appearances and/or fictional biography. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 05:27, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

I think that page will wind up getting pretty enormous after a while! 108.69.80.49 (talk) 06:25, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Setting a basic style

Look, there's some really crummy character articles out there, filled with fancruft, trivia, and sometimes just useful info in a just generally messy presentation. I think we should develop some sort of basic style, y'know, similar to WikiProject Novel's CharacterArticleTemplate. (Except, of course, nothing like their one. Their one... er... sucks). This would be useful for creating some consistency and helping new users create articles that are properly designed and stuff.

Now this wouldn't be forced, articles could have other designs. But the general gist of it should be nice. Of course, a reception section is a must. Harry Blue5 (talk) 16:40, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I created Wikipedia:WikiProject Pokémon/Style/List with some help from its parent style guide. I think the main thing with all characters is:

• 1. Lead
• 2. Design and characteristics/Development
• 3. Appearances
• 4. Cultural Impact/Reception/Legacy.

These can be renamed if needed, and have subsections, but those are the main points of any character article. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 16:56, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

There are some articles that use "Fictional history" rather than appearances, or use both a "Fictional history" and a list of appearances, e.g. Revan. For character's that have only appeared in one game or one series, I find an appearances section should be replaced with a "Fictional history", assuming we're talking about stuff that moreorless has a history, rather than just plain old Excuse Plots. Harry Blue5 (talk) 17:03, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Note that that article is not a GA or FA. A characters "character", and what they do in a series is completely different. For a quality article, they should be split, although I think that for lesser articles, character information and plot info can be in one section. I am compiling a list of GA and FA articles. Once we have these, we can look through them and see what the general style of most of them are. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 17:12, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

It seems to be that for television characters, the best use would be "Role in X". Harry Blue5 (talk) 17:48, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Ok. Done compiling Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional characters/Quality content. Sure is a lot. 218 articles. We could probably get a bot to tag everything in Category:Fictional characters. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 20:19, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Gotta say, I am very surprised and impressed that some of those articles, particularly Aang, Jenny and George. I really didn't expect them to even get to B-class, really... Anyway, now that we've got the freakin' huge list of GAs and FAs, we can examine them and stuff.

There seems to be a bit of a difference in how the articles are presented depending on medium. Episodic television stuff doesn't tend to use appearances sections. Probably for the best, with that. Harry Blue5 (talk) 20:27, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I think different TV shows, for example, have different layouts for their articles. For example, WP:WHO character articles are different to WP:EASTENDERS character articles. So I don't think this project will be able to have a standard layout (though I'm sure there are many characters that don't come under any project until now). Though MOS:TV says (I think) that storylines/appearances should generally go first. –anemoneprojectors– 15:58, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

They don't have to be exactly the same, just a general idea on setting up an article. Harry Blue5 (talk) 16:47, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree. Ideally, our outline on how to form articles should focus on the need for real-world information, and stress the importance of development and reception sections. We should acknowledge the need for an appearances section of some kind, but tell writers that it may take different forms depending on the medium. We must, however, make it clear that these sections should be very limited summaries, rather than in-depth retellings of stories. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 19:47, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely! It's the "very limited summaries, rather than in-depth retellings of stories" part that most people seem to have trouble with. –anemoneprojectors– 20:02, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I see the standardization of formats and finally combating fancruft and solely character biography articles as one of the main things that this project can accomplish. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 20:38, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I'd just like to highlight Homer Simpson, a FA. It has absolutely no information on his actual past, per say, it merely shows his actual role and summarises his fictional history elements. Ideally, that's what I'd hope for most characters in long-running television shows. Or at least, ones like The Simpsons that don't have a hard defined important canon. Harry Blue5 (talk) 20:51, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Alright, I made this. Feel free to edit and comment on it. Harry Blue5 (talk) 21:14, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Rincewind and Gandalf titles

I recently tried to remove the "Rincewind's titles" section from Rincewind, and an editor reverted, saying something about his relationship with the other wizards. Personally, I do not think that titles section helps the whole "relationship with other wizards" thing because, as the article makes clear, they are pointless. At best, I think it should be reduced to a single sentence and moved somewhere, maybe in the lead or under "Character".

Oh, and I was thinking about removing the "Names and titles" section from Gandalf as well. They all seem a bit trivial (and I bit in-universe) in my opinion, and the only two I really cared about (Gandalf the Grey and Gandalf the White) are in the lead. That said, middle-earth can be a right pain to deal with. They might have some hidden purpose unknown to me or something... Harry Blue5 (talk) 21:44, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I think the names are somewhat important, but aren't these usually in the infobox? They don't really need to be in the article. If they do need to be in the article, it should be in prose format, not a list. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 22:42, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

The names and titles have their own section in Aragorn's article because it explains how Tolkien came up with it, but Gandalf's just seems to explain it...they are already in the infobox. And please don't add the movie pictures into the infobox. We keep them in the adaption section. Glimmer721 ^talk 23:57, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Bilbo Glimmer, you fool! The reason they're in the infobox is because I moved them there. I just forgot to remove the section when I did so. Harry Blue5 (talk) 10:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I noticed that right after I posted this :) Glimmer721 ^talk 23:34, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Nice idea

I think this is a really nice idea for a project! It will take a lot of work to find every fictional character article, but I will try to tag as many as I can. Not right now, though, getting sleepy. :) 108.69.80.49 (talk) 06:26, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Seconded, great idea. Making fictional character articles better (cutting plot, adding Reception etc.) has basically been one of my missions on here.~Zythe^{Talk to me!} 15:35, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, almost surprising no one ever thought about this before. I like how it concentrates on one aspect found in many projects but not all of it...as it were. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 01:00, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Project To-do list

I created a to do list. Currently it only has things that were on the WP:VG todo list. I have Abra, Kadabra, and Alakazam up for GAN right now, and Mario is currently under Peer Review. Wario has been on the bounty board for a few years. If you have anything to add, please add it. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 16:01, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Assessment Table?

I know we have some FA and FL articles tagged by they're not on this tabel or on the search on the toolserver. Glimmer721 ^talk 00:04, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Horatio Hornblower & Richard Sharpe (fictional character)

There is a discussion about splitting Hornblower, see Talk:Horatio Hornblower. 64.229.101.119 (talk) 06:21, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Also splitting Sharpe at Talk:Richard Sharpe (fictional character) . 64.229.101.119 (talk) 06:28, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Importance rating

What is our guideline on importance?

• Top - Very big household name (Mario, Harry Potter, Luke Skywalker)
• High - Main character of popular series/Other big names (Ness (EarthBound), Bella Swan?, Iron Man)
• Mid - Lesser known popular character (Pit, Percy Jackson, etc.)
• Low - Everything else

??? See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Video_games/Assessment#Importance scale for example. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 21:59, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I think we should also rate them on the importance of what they are in--a notable work of fiction, TV show, etc., even if it's not popular now. I've been using my best judgement. Glimmer721 ^talk 02:20, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I've just been ripping off WP:ANIME, WP:VG and WP:NOVELS' importances, in all honesty. Harry Blue5 (talk) 09:01, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

What is important to them may not be important to us, and vise-versa. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 14:22, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I know, but the chances are, the more important they are to the genre they're in, the more important they'll be generally. I did mark some things differently, though. Harry Blue5 (talk) 16:46, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure that Jack Sparrow should be Top-importance. Definitely high, though, IMO. Harry Blue5 (talk) 16:49, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree. Jack Sparrow isn't quite a household name. Top importance should be for characters that even people who don't watch movies/play games/read books would know, just by word of mouth, and sheer popularity. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 17:18, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

What importance should we use for Discworld characters? I put Susan Sto Helit at low-importance, but she's more of a secondary character to Death (truth be told, I don't think Susan should even have an article). The reception's for most of the characters are pretty much non-existent, but given Discworld's vast size and popularity makes me wonder if characters like Rincewind might be mid-importance. Harry Blue5 (talk) 17:37, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I have never heard of Discworld before I met you. So I am not sure what their importance as characters are. If they are the MAIN characters, then I suppose they could be mid-class. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 17:45, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Discworld, like its author Terry Pratchett, is one of those annoying series that manage to achieve fame without being famous. It's a series of 37+ books that have all achieved critical acclaim seemingly without being reviewed and are all incredibly influential despite nobody knowing about them in order to be influenced by them. The more you find out about them, the more you'll be convinced their huge gods of the literature business, but if you haven't heard of them, will go "What?" at the mention of them that occasionally turns up every few years or so. Harry Blue5 (talk) 17:53, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, really, Importance rating is a popularity rating. Depending on how many people will come to read about it, that is its importance. We want the most popular pages to be the best articles, so they are the most important for us to focus on. Get what I mean? _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 19:23, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm gonna go with "Mid" importance for the main characters. Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:44, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I would say that it is more appropriate to put household names as "high", high-profile characters as "mid", all others as "low", and reserve the "top" designation for all-encompassing subjects like Character (arts). かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 03:24, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Problem is, how do you go about identifying "household names"? Just looking at the short examples above, Iron Man would fit on that list given the treatment the character has gotten. For a start it may be wiser to lump most articles initially at "Mid" for well known, "Low", and "Bottom" for the almost unknown characters. The ratings on articles can be refined from that point on.

And I agree, "Top" should be focusing on the articles on the broad topics.

- J Greb (talk) 03:53, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Household names are names that you just hear about, and are super popular. Like I said, ^{Top importance should be for characters that even people who don't watch movies/play games/read books would know, just by word of mouth, and sheer popularity.} I disagree with moving everything down a level. If so, "low" is going to have 95% of our articles, and that wouldn't be very good. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 04:09, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Batman, Superman and Spider-Man would be top-importance right? They're pretty iconic. Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:53, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Oh, and would anyone mind if lowered Mr. Garrison to low-importance? Harry Blue5 (talk) 20:07, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

And how about lists? Right now all the project's lists are rated either medium or low importance. Are there lists that could be high importance? How should lists be evaluated? Reach Out to the Truth 21:41, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I would say the same thing applies. Think about most of the list. If the whole list is Top importance characters(which is unlikely), then it would be Top importance. Or you could do it by how popular the series is. List of Mario characters would probably be mid/high, while List of Kingdom Hearts characters would be low/mid. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 21:48, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

New AfD

The article List of Decepticons is apparently also under the scope of this project. It has been nominated for deletion. Anybody wishing to comment can do so at the appropriate page. NotARealWord (talk) 18:02, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

character's importance.

Hey! I really enjoy the idea of this WikiProject and it seems to be doing well. But there is the importance of characters that I am not sure about sometimes and I am sure other people would debate on as well. Here's a few so far that I am not sure of and feel free for anybody else to add one on the list if they are unsure about it as well.
SpongeBob SquarePants (character): High or Top importance?
Captain America: High or Top importance?
Freddy Krueger: List as high but I think he can maybe be of top importance.
Aang: I am thinking mid but maybe low.
Green Goblin: High or mid importance?
Sauron: High or Top importance?

Jhenderson ⁷⁷⁷ 19:18, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Top, High(maybe top after the movie comes out later this year), not sure, mid, mid, high. When in doubt, put nothing, and see what the active editors of the subject place it as, but try not to do that too often. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 20:16, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Splitting

Wouldn't it be a good idea to split the project up into various task forces? Ie comics, video games, television, films, etc. As it stands, having all of these subjects discussed in one area might cause confusion, or might cause a certain kind of fictional character to be lost among the more popular fictional characters. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 20:21, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I suppose task forces for each form of media would help people know who is an expert in which field, and wouldn't contact a video games guy for comics info. Then we could also link to/create style formats for each task force. I think that actually would be good, but first we need to set up various other things. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 20:31, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Isn't there already seperate WP's for that? I like the idea of this being united.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 21:53, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

If we split up into taskforces, I'm worried that only the VG task force will survive, with all the other task forces going inactive, most likely taking the main project with it. That said, I was thinking about making a "Fictional species" task force a while ago and seeing how that would work. Harry Blue5 (talk) 22:39, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

If Video games are going to be the dominant focus of the project, then it may be best to simply shift the focus of the project to video games entirely. And in the case of splitting up based on task forces, it is not as if the main discussion page will be unused. It merely means that the main discussion won't be flooded with one subject more so than the other. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 23:35, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I know a lot of us are here because we regularly edit articles on TV characters (mostly soap operas). –anemoneprojectors– 23:38, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Therefore, splitting would be advised, as television would certainly be a popular task force in the project. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 23:40, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think there's much point in creating separate taskforces for each medium. For most mediums we wouldn't have enough members, and heck, we've only got a few active members as it is. If we do split out, we risk repeating what happened with WikiProject Video games' characters task force. Not enough interest would risk the project, or at least certain aspects of it, dying. Maybe in the future when we've got a bunch of more members, but as it is, there's no point in creating a task force for the sake of creating a task force. Harry Blue5 (talk) 23:55, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Task forces are based on the necessity of them. If the project fails, it will be regardless of whether or not we make task forces for separate mediums. If it succeeds, it will inevitably lead to organization by medium. How would interest die? The only difference would be that people would have organized discussions where we aren't discussing Captain America and Bomberman one after another. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 00:04, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree with Harry Blue5. –anemoneprojectors– 00:09, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

I would like to know how discussion of fictional characters on this project would not be exactly the same. If not more. What is more appealing to a person writing about fictional characters in literature - a specialized place designed specifically for them to discuss literature characters, or a single talk page that is almost completely dominated by video games, film, comics, and television? If I wanted to discuss this, I would not feel comfortable discussing it with a community that is predominantly not evident as having any interest in my preferred fictional characters. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 00:14, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Here's an example of what I'm talking about: WP:NINTENDO. A task force that Nintendo fans can go to and use, feeling more comfortable mentioning them as it is a specialised place designed specifically for Nintendo stuff. Great idea in theory, and it arguably is better having its own task force than lumping it with the rest of WP:VG. In all honesty? It's not too active, as far as things go. Every medium's characters are moreorless treated exactly the same no matter what medium, the only section that tends to vary is the "Fictional history"/"Appearances"/"Role in X", the rest generally stays the same. Harry Blue5 (talk) 00:21, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

The problem with the Nintendo project had nothing similar to this. It fell into inactivity because everything about it could and was discussed in the main project, significantly more so than there. With this, people who write character articles that enjoy literature edit articles that are astronomically different from the articles that people who are writing character articles from the video game spectrum. A Nintendo game is likely relevant to the interests of many members of the Video games project, even outside of the Nintendo task force. In this, people who focus on literature characters do not necessarily care about the quality of video game character articles. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 00:25, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

If we give every medium its own task force, what the smeg do we use the main project for? Harry Blue5 (talk) 00:27, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

For discussing changes that are relevant to everyone. If there is a change to WP:NOTE, then it is something that is important for everyone to discuss together. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 00:32, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Importance

I believe that we should ditch importance of fictional characters. As it is, it's far too broad to sum up the importance. Is Homer as important as Hamlet? Is Donkey Kong as important as Darth Vader? Is Batman as important as Frodo? It's too debatable and we should just leave it alone. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 23:18, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. It leads to too many possible instances of pissing contests of editors arguing "which character is more important!"--Kung Fu Man (talk) 04:30, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree also. –anemoneprojectors– 10:33, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

I removed it. Harry Blue5 (talk) 10:44, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Article alerts

I have enabled article alerts for this WikiProject. Alerts should appear at Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional characters/Article alerts next time AAlertBot runs. This should probably be linked on the project's main page somewhere. Reach Out to the Truth 23:25, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I'll add it to the project page after the bot runs. Having a red link can be unsightly. Harry Blue5 (talk) 23:31, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

It has now run. Reach Out to the Truth 19:17, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

What is a fictional character?

First off, I'd like to say, great idea. This is probably one of the most popular aspects of Wikipedia, and while various Wikiprojects have handled fictional characters, it might just be a good idea to have everything organized in a central place. I similarly discovered WikiProject Death shortly after it was created – I had been working on articles about cemeteries, and found it frustrating that there was no good project under which to list them – and one thing I remember about that project is how quickly and well they figured out what would be the project's scope. So, I think it would be a good idea to hash that out here as well.

What is a fictional character? It's not a smartass question. One user with a particularly unique way of interpreting, well... everything, even said once that Kermit the Frog is not a fictional character, because he is really just a piece of green felt. Fictional characters appear in movies, TV shows, novels, comics, games and toys (and often enough in multiple forms of these media) which are somehow important to the plot, and these are the sorts of examples most people are likely to think of when they think about fictional characters. Obviously, this project should cover characters from classical literature, but let's face it; this is going to be a pop-culture madhouse.

So, aside from the obvious, what else should this project cover? How about:

• Groups of specific individual characters, such as Jedi or Decepticon?
• Classifications or types of characters, such as Orc or Mutant (Marvel Comics)?
• Stock character archetypes, such as Black knight or Redshirt (character)?
• Characters from myth and legend, such as Heracles or Robin Hood?
• Musical alter-egos, such as Ziggy Stardust or Gorillaz?
• Performance alter-egos, such as Tony Clifton or Dame Edna?
• Board game characters, such as Rich Uncle Pennybags or Colonel Mustard?
• Iconic advertising mascots, such as Pillsbury Doughboy or Snap, Crackle and Pop?
• Sports team mascots, such as Phillie Phanatic or Benny the Bull?

Now, you could say yes to all of the above. That will result in an even more bloated list of articles than we are likely to have already, as this project becomes a catch-all for anything made up. I think a bit more discrimination is required, and some of the above should be a No. I also think this should be limited to characters, not fictional objects or locations (unless they are somehow sentient enough to be considered a "character"). Now is the time to figure out what this Wikiproject wants to be. BOZ (talk) 03:19, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I think most of those would be yes, with the exception of the "alter egos" of real people. Groups of characters such as Jedi, and species of characters such as Orc should probably be accepted. I was wondering about religious figures, but thought that could cause some controversy calling them "fictional". _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 03:28, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I would personally say no to myths, as they transcend the "fictional character" aspect, and really spill into more religious and cultural areas. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 07:13, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I would say no to mascots (not categorised as fictional characters), no to alter-egos (though Gorillaz are categorised as fictional musicians), no to myths, but yes to the rest. I would basically base it on Category:Fictional characters. –anemoneprojectors– 09:06, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I would say either no to alter-egos (generally), no to myths (I think we could include Robin Hood and the like, though) and yes to everything else. Harry Blue5 (talk) 10:49, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I think we need to have underlining our understanding of "fictional characters" the more pedantic phrase "fictional characters in fiction". Broadly speaking, this limits the page - usefully, I'd argue -- to "groups of specific individual characters, such as Jedi or Decepticon". But it allows for us to encompass other sorts of characters, too, depending on application. Now, "Hamlet" and "Buffy Summers" would both come under the first definition no problem. The wider definition would allow the article to discuss, say "Robin Hood in popular culture" or "Cultural depictions of Elizabeth I of England" as if they were the page of a discrete character's singular portrayal. Which brings us onto another question: how do we write up those kinds of articles? There isn't a clearly-defined approach the way we have several that work for discrete characters in poems/novels/plays/films/TV shows, but there easily could be one. The sources, however, would primarily need to be academic -- and the easy part about film/TV articles is that we can easily find Digital Spy interviews to support them. The need for (loose?) style guides, basically, is what I'm getting at.~Zythe^{Talk to me!} 04:21, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

One of the reasons I want to include Mythological peoples is there are a ton of articles about them that aren't up to standards, like Mentes, Epeius, Aretus, etc. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 14:49, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Shouldn't we leave the mythological ones to Wikipedia:WikiProject Mythology? Myths are very different to fictional characters in fiction, and anyone interested in improving them is probably more likely to join that project than this one. –anemoneprojectors– 15:11, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Portal

What would anyone think of making a portal for fictional characters? It's a pretty big topic, so I think we could run a portal for it. Plus, all the cooool projects have them. Harry Blue5 (talk) 23:16, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea as long as it is maintained. –anemoneprojectors– 15:17, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Would anyone object to me making one? Harry Blue5 (talk) 17:35, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Mass AfD

Just thought that I would point out a mass AfD that someone opened comprised entirely of Oz characters within our scope: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cayke. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 21:03, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Do company trademarks count?

So, would the characters in Category:Lists of advertising characters fall within our project? They are certainly fictional, but at the same time, they paradoxically don't really take place in a work of fiction. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 04:32, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I like to think of fictional characters as encompassing characters that are not from our world. For example, The Noid would be a fictional character in the sense that he is not real. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 05:42, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Interesting idea

A Fictional characters WikiProject seems so obvious now; I can't believe no one thought of it before. Wikipedia's coverage of fictional characters is one of its most popular aspects, which means that, if executed properly, this project will have no shortage of members. However, you guys have your work cut out for you, as I'm sure you realize. Character articles have been left largely unsupervised for, what, ten years now? The level of cruft is unbelievable, and containing it in even the slightest manner will be near-impossible. But if User:David Fuchs could obliterate "Mystcruft" by himself, with that all-encompassing Featured Topic, then I'm sure that your combined efforts will bring about change for the better. At the very least, I hope that you'll be able to improve and standardize some of this mess. JimmyBlackwing (talk) 16:21, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

From what I am finding during my continuing trudge to tag all articles in our scope and record those with nothing but plot content, the entire VG project has been quite successful in making sure that nearly all characters in their scope have at least a modest amount of development or reception, though they still have problems with lists having no real content. If one project can do it, maybe, with a little luck, we can make steps to do it site-wide. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 16:30, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I concur. Video games is the most mocked topic for being cruft, but we are actually the strictest, and have eliminated most of the cruft. It's funny. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 17:12, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

What I am finding is that comic books are by far the worst. About 90% of the ones that I have tagged thus far contain nothing but character bios, plot lines, and appearances. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 17:18, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I thought that TV shows or popular books (Harry Potter, Twilight) might be the worst, but it does make sense that comic book characters would take the prize. Superhero plotlines are so detailed and convoluted that only the most hardcore fans understand what's going on anymore. JimmyBlackwing (talk) 17:36, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I've been considering taking a whack at the Star Wars articles, which while filled with potential, are largely in a state of disuse. The characters list also makes it extremely difficult to perform merges, since it's presented in an actual list format. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 19:13, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Sadly, the current format of List of Star Wars characters is probably needed unless we make a really strict notability guide for the list. I wouldn't be opposed to making other lists such as List of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic characters, but I doubt such lists would ever be anything but cruft. Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:31, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Just make a "List of notable Star Wars characters", or "List of main characters in Star Wars". _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 02:19, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I can't tell you how disappointed to hear the bad wrap of the comic book characters because that's where I started at but I am inclined to agree with you that they do need a new kind of approach on how to be more like a Wikipedia article. I think it's time to discuss this on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (comics) per what I have heard on here. You can join along as well. Jhenderson ⁷⁷⁷ 19:49, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Darth Malak

Okay, I gathered some sources for Darth Malak here. Does anyone think it would be enough to justify giving him his own article? If not, I was also thinking of doing, I dunno, something like Characters of the Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic series, similar to Characters of Final Fantasy VII. At any rate, the current format of List of Star Wars characters makes it almost impossible to add these sources the the list. Opinions? Harry Blue5 (talk) 20:17, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

In case we do decide to go with the Characters of the Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic series route, I've created a new section of my KotOR sources that says "total sources", in order to list how many sources would be available. Harry Blue5 (talk) 20:57, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Personally, I would say that is enough reception to go ahead and make the article. Development would be great too, but reception is the most important. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 21:04, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Should I give Darth Malak his own article, or just make the "Characters of..." thing? Or perhaps make both? Harry Blue5 (talk) 21:10, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I can't seem to find any reception on the characters as a whole, I'd go with List of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic characters rather than the "Characters of..." idea. Harry Blue5 (talk) 22:05, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I think you should write the reception out as prose, then their character info such as their role in the story, and see if he would warrant a split. If not, then a list of them would be awesome. But if he is split, then the rest of the list wouldn't have much to stand on. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 02:17, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

"Darth Malak, along with Revan, was chosen as the top 5th Star Wars villain by IGN's Jesse Schedeen.[6] IGN also put Malak as their 28th best Star Wars characters[7] and 33rd best video game villain.[8] Adam Rosenburg, from UGO Networks, said the character was his 19th favourite Expanded Universe character.[9] GameSpot's readers voted him to be a better villain than M. Bison in a feature for "All-Time Greatest Game Villain", but Malak lost to Diablo.[10] GameDaily's Robert Workman listed the character as his 16th favourite evil mastermind of all time.[11]"

Enough? Harry Blue5 (talk) 07:35, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

It's decent, I suppose, but it's really only three sources. It could definitely use some expansion. Though I have gone light on my personal rule, I do like to at least have 10 unique sources if possible. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 08:09, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

If it's not enough for a whole article on Darth Malak, there's still the whole "List of characters..." thing. Harry Blue5 (talk) 10:56, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Stuff like _{IGN also put Malak as their 28th best Star Wars characters and 33rd best video game villain.} isn't really that notable by itself. You should expand it by saying why they put him on the list. What makes him special enough to be placed on a list of the best Star Wars characters? _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 13:55, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Personally, if you expand it with some comments about the character from the lists he was placed on, I would be satisfied enough to give him an individual article. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 14:05, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I would strongly suggest checking out Google Books, Google News, and the Video Game Custom Google Search. While not related to Malak so much, one book discussed in detail some deeper character motives and personalities in KOTOR. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 19:44, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I can't seem to find the book. Do you know its name? Harry Blue5 (talk) 13:35, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

[12] - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 22:36, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Harry Blue5 (talk) 12:23, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Isn't this project's name redundant?

Shouldn't it just be WikiProject Characters? Jonathan Hardin' (talk) 18:37, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, a character can be many things other than a fictional one. And it matches Category:Fictional characters. –anemoneprojectors– 18:41, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Can you provide an example of what it can be? Also, the project's current definition is "Welcome to WikiProject Fictional characters on Wikipedia! We are a group dedicated to improving Wikipedia's coverage of fictional characters.", with a wikilink on fictional characters that redirects to Character (arts). Jonathan Hardin' (talk) 18:45, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)"Character" can mean different things then a "Fictional character". _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 18:49, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Renaming a WikiProject is very difficult. I did it once and I had to do all the categories, all the bot stuff, it was a real pain. But I don't think it's redundant. I think it's very clear for people who see a banner on a talk page. –anemoneprojectors– 19:09, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Can anyone guess what topic WikiProject Java covers? It's good to keep the name unambiguous and reduce potential confusion. Reach Out to the Truth 19:31, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

When I proposed and made the project, I did think about simply titling it "WikiProject Characters", but went with fictional characters because a) it ties in with Category:Fictional characters b) most articles seem to say "fictional character" rather than simply "character", for whatever reason c) Character is a disambiguation page. If Character (arts) was at simply Character, then perhaps I would've gone with simply characters d) I dunno why... but for me "WikiProject Fictional characters" has a strange ring to it. Odd that... Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:39, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

WikiProject Characters could also suggest the linguistic meaning. And, yeah, WikiProject Fictional characters does have a nice ring to it. JimmyBlackwing (talk) 00:03, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

New articles

Inspired by WP:VG's new article announcements page, I've created Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional characters/New articles. We probably won't get as much new articles as WP:VG, but it still might be useful. Harry Blue5 (talk) 22:17, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Is there any way to make a bot update this somehow? Otherwise, it would be hard to update. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 23:16, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think so, but hopefully some people will add new articles in when they make them. Harry Blue5 (talk) 07:40, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Assess

Hello, I was just wondering if I could get any help with assessing the unassessed articles; we just have to put the quality, usually represented by other tags. Glimmer721 ^talk 22:37, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I made a start, I'll come back tomorrow afternoon and help with the rest. - JuneGloom Talk 23:50, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

There I did the lot, we need to try and curb that happening again though. Took a hefty two hours to get through them. lolRAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 03:03, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

I believe more have popped up. Wonderful. Harry Blue5 (talk) 10:58, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

I would ask User talk:108.69.80.49 to do it when they're adding the template - assuming the IP won't change next time that person is on (it won't, they've posted on this page with that IP a few days ago). –anemoneprojectors– 16:04, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm working my way through the list now as I watch Glee. It's strangely calming. - JuneGloom Talk 17:02, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Empty once again. - JuneGloom Talk 18:03, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Haha! I worked from the bottom end up until I had a edit conflict on Taki (Soulcalibur) with you. :PRAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 18:05, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Hi there. I'd actually prefer not to do the assessment myself, because I think members of Wikiprojects generally have a better handle on how to assess related articles, rather than someone passing through such as myself. I was adding whatever characters I could think of from a huge list of works that I came up with off the top of my head and from looking around, to get as many of the character articles in this wikiproject as quickly as possible. However, I don't want to be a nuisance instead, so I will slow down so as not to create too much work to be done at once. I suppose once you get the bot up and running to tag the rest of the articles, you won't see me anymore. :) 108.69.80.49 (talk) 03:05, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I've noticed that the GA's listed on the qaulity page, more than half don't actually have the Fictional character template on their talk pages..RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 18:10, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

That's the next job then. - JuneGloom Talk 18:56, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Are we going to get a bot to tag all the remaining articles? It's tiresome just doing the ones from a single TV series. –anemoneprojectors– 21:57, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, it's great! I'm working on the GA articles. Speaking of Glee, what about their characters? Glimmer721 ^talk 01:39, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

It probably won't take long to add it to the GA's, they're all there in a list. A bot would be better for the remaining load. A purge link is needed on the class table on the qaulity content page too.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 01:57, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Two more GAs: Stacy Warner and James Wilson (House). 108.69.80.49 (talk) 03:10, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I added the template to those two. I purged the link, 90 GA's don't have the banner at present. Also, User talk:129.33.19.254 has added the banner to 94 more pages... and not assessed any of them! :/RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 04:57, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Cut that number down by about 40 and you'll be closer to the truth, and I'd say about 20 of those have already been assessed. There are over 200 articles in the unassessed category right now, so my contributions only account for about 15-20% of that. Mheart and Dimadick added a lot more than I did, so how come no one's complaining about them? I'm just trying to help out. 129.33.19.254 (talk) 15:12, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I just went off what the bot told me, then looked at your contribs and there was more than that. I know your trying to help, could you asses them too, it doesn't take to long when on the task. Your actually a massive help, more than you know! I mentioned Mheart's additions away from this talk page btw and someone else agreed to assess them.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 21:06, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Sorry about that. I've joined the project and have begun working on the backlog of assessments too. Cheers. mheart (talk) 20:16, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

206 GA articles in this project, but only 198 have actually been assessed or not actually had our WP banner added to their talk page. This needs sorting.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 21:28, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I believe three of the 206 GA-Class arer really A-Class, so it's more like 203 in need. Harry Blue5 (talk) 08:35, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

There are only three GA articles in the list that need the project banner now.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 23:09, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm helping out too now. We seem to be making good progress together. mheart (talk) 20:14, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

No one understood what I was saying, in the assessment table there are the same amount of FA' and A Classes... not GA's. So the list of 205 GA's on the qaulity page, only 203 have the WP banner, because it says in the table at the top of the page.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 03:09, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Sources for Film and Television

While such a project would not be exclusively for the benefit of fictional characters, it would help them a whole lot. As is, neither project has a list of reliable sources like we have. Using Princess Leia Organa as an example, I only found three references that could be considered viable, whereas all others were dead links, irrelevant to the article, primary, or user-contributed. It would be a great step up if the system used for video games was used elsewhere. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 04:05, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree. WP:VG has a wide array of sources that have been considered reliable. If other projects did that, surely, many character articles could be upgraded in quality. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 04:12, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

I think the challenge has always been finding those sources. I mean, pick a random character that you think should be obviously notable by WP:N's standards, and then look and see how many actual sources the article cites. This project now has over 7000 articles, but fewer than 300 at GA or better - that's less than 5%. I'm sure there are quite a few at B-class or C-class, or even lower, with a ton of potential, but no forward movement because either no one knows where to look for sources, or no one wants to put the time into fixing it. 108.69.80.49 (talk) 05:49, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

We should make our own taskforce of sort for people who want to gather these reliable sources. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 06:25, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

I am intrigued by this idea, but I am not sure of the feasibility on such a large scale. On the other hand, I think that we can attribute some of the video game project's success in producing well-sourced character articles to their having a search engine of reliable video game sites for easy-to-find referencing. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 06:53, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

The WP:VG search engine is incredibly useful, I often use it for non-video game characters on occasion because sites like IGN often end up covering stuff like "Top Star Wars Characters". If other project's had them, it'd be really helpful in finding sources, and if other project's had them we could also use them. How does one set up a custom Google search engine? Harry Blue5 (talk) 12:11, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think you two are getting the point. It's not about having the search engine. First we need to establish reliable sources to make a search engine with. WP:VG/S uses sources that "are published and have editorial insight". In the video gaming industry, they may be somewhat more common then in Film, Anime, Books, Comics, etc. Finding these sources and establishing their reliability will be a huge job. One that really shouldn't be up to us, but the individual projects. I mean, sure, it is sort of useful to us, but 95% of the content on these sources will be talking about the actual media. There just happens to be some character coverage in the mix. Maybe contact the projects, and ask them to pool together some sources. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 15:06, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

We could always use WP:RS/N for a search engine, you know. It wouldn't be perfect, but just saying, that'd be real useful since it has a bunch of reliable sources. Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:42, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Does anyone know of any regular publications or websites which pass the reliable source guidelines, which regularly review and discuss these forms of media, and in particular talk (at least briefly) about the characters therein? I mean, even just a few different instances of "So and So was great in his portrayal of Character X, really bringing to life the character traits and exploring the character's history, saying he felt this way and that about it" (with a few more details of course) is enough to start building a real article from; although I can't think of an example off the top of my head, I've seen such things many times in many publications before. BOZ (talk) 03:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

I recommend using WorldCat.org as a search engine. It can look at books' titles and chapters. For example, if you search "sarah connor" terminator, you can find a couple of useful books. The search engine may work best for characters that are retrospectively iconic, though, to the point of being "obvious". Erik (talk | contribs) 18:36, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Articles for deletion

Some characters from the Sharpe series have been put up for AFD by me. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Daniel Hagman, find the other links on there. Go and offer your thoughts. I thought it was good to do some cleaning up.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 16:22, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Over 9000!

Well, not quite yet, but someone had to make the joke.  ;) I imagine it will be over 10,000 before next week starts at this rate - God, I have to wonder how many fictional character articles there are out there! BOZ (talk) 06:57, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

T-X

I am asking for help on this article on maybe finding sources and/or cleanup. If you got good sources do please free to show me. I just rescued this article from a merge because I think this character has possibiilties so please help if you feel the same way. Jhenderson ⁷⁷⁷ 14:43, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

The main discussion is being moved here. Jhenderson ⁷⁷⁷ 15:20, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Additional opinions are welcome at the discussion. It's an interesting question about when a character from one film should qualify for his or her own article, of course considering the coverage available. Erik (talk | contribs) 15:09, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Sources for fictional video game characters

User:New Age Retro Hippie/Character reception - Thought I'd share this with the project in case anyone was interested. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 07:08, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Nice work. Harry Blue5 (talk) 17:04, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Lord Starkiller image

I want to use this image for the Starkiller article (resized when used in the article, naturally), but I'm unsure whether or not it meets fair use criteria. I want to use it in order to demonstrate how Starkiller appeared in Star Wars: The Force Unleashed: Ultimate Sith Edition (and in the dark side ending of the normal edition). There's also this guy in the reception section who commented on it, so it'd probably be useful for clarifying that. If it does meet fair use, would someone mind telling me what the full rationale would be? Sorry to be a pain, but images and fair use rationales are the bane of my existence. Harry Blue5 (talk) 18:58, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

This image would also be pretty good. Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:08, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

You should only include an alternate design if it is either crucial to the understanding of the subject or has content covering its creation and conception. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 19:25, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

To clarify, ANY artwork of a character is not fair use. They have copyrights, and we aren't allowed to use them without a good reason. Usually, only 1 is used, because that is all that is needed. Although some have more, because it shows their abilities, or parodies, or for instance, Mario's 8bit and 3D styles. This is usually only done for iconic characters though. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 19:34, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

List of Star Wars characters

A discussion's been started on trimming the list of Star Wars characters, possibly by having an requirement on appearances or splitting it out into separate lists for certain franchises (e.g. a list for KotOR characters, which I've started here using these sources. Anyone's free to edit it.). The discussion's here. Harry Blue5 (talk) 22:36, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Televison episode assessments

Hey all. You've all been doing such a great job on the assessment efforts here that I wanted to direct your attention to Wikipedia:WikiProject Television/Episode coverage. Recently, an assessment table was added here too, but the vast majority of articles remain unassessed. In fact, the ones that have been assessed have all been done by me on my own. If anyone wants to pick a series they are particularly familiar with and help assess some of those articles, it'd be appreciated! — Hunter Kahn 04:02, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Final answer on advertising characters

What are people's thoughts on whether or not articles in Category:Advertising characters fall within our scope? かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 23:45, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

They're fictional and they're characters. I see no reason not to cover them. Harry Blue5 (talk) 23:58, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Category: Speakers of Klingon

Category:Speakers of Klingon has been nominated for discussion. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the Categories for discussion page. Thank you.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz  (Discussion) 13:51, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Weekly collaboration?

Do you think it is a good idea to do a weekly collaboration of some sort? Now we over 20 members it could be easy. Like chose an article at random, find sources, add more content and so on.. like the old collab of the week they used to have on Wiki.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 03:06, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I support this. Although, one problem is, we aren't doing the importance rating anymore, so we won't be able to do "Stub or Start class, Top or High importance" articles. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 03:41, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I was actually thinking about this and maybe we should do a bi-weekly collaboration instead because often-times for me, I notice a collaboration i'm interested in but by the time I have time to contribute, we're on to the next one. I support Bi-weekly. (I'm actually interested in what article we would do first) Sincerely Subzerosmokerain (talk) 03:47, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Well thats a long time. If you can't do it in a week, then contribute after we are done with it. With 6,000 stub+start class articles, we need to go through them as quick as possible. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 03:50, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Subz, we could do two a week seeings as there is loads, but that depends on who is willing. Blake, maybe it is just best to pick at random. We can still see which are the stubs, but we'll soon see if they are really important I think. If we find ones that are impossible and no refs available or books sources, we can AFD them or merge them.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 04:44, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

The problem with this system is that not all character articles have a parent article. Even with Star Wars, where would we merge the non-notable characters? To the messy list? - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 05:07, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I think having two at a time every week could work. I am not sure how we would pick an article at random though. I tried to find a way, but there isn't a way to list them all on one page. OH an idea just came to me. We could pick two random articles from Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional characters/No real world content. This would be arguably harder then what we were doing before, but it would help more. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 14:21, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

That's the list I had it mind that we could pick off. It's a good start point as there are more than enough articles there to keep us going. 'New Age RH', Just merge them to the messy list for the time being, that said I don't think lists without refs should be here. But we can improve lists later. I mean we can be honest, were not gonna improve everything, but we can make a start. We've done part of the easy bit, gathering everything together and rating all articles found so far. Next question, when do we start?RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 23:26, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I support bi-weekly. It would be fun! Glimmer721 ^talk 23:11, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I think this is a fantastic idea and would really help the project. We could do collaborations, see what we can develop, and in that way either figure out articles that need to go or, hopefully, come out with some quality products as a direct result of the WikiProject. Also, finding articles to fix is why I started the Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional characters/No real world content page; the thing is unfortunately already huge, and only continues to grow the more articles I sift through and tag with the project banner. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 01:42, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Shall we chose one then? See what we can do as test? We all seem like good editors who know there stuff, so this should be good. I don't know if the creators of this WP want to make a seperate page or splitt of to house this, but if you want to you can. ;)RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 02:03, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

(reset indent) I presume if we decide the article we're working on isn't notable, we just redirect it and try and find another one? Harry Blue5 (talk) 02:09, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

My question is do we begin with most popular or oldest characters? Or perhaps the oldest articles first so that we can contribute to the backlog drive? Any idea is fine with me. Sincerely Subzerosmokerain (talk) 02:25, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that would be easy. Just pressing the random button on the "No real world content" would be best. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 02:44, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Just chose any like third category, the 4th article down, doesnt matter really every article should be important enough for our help if it's under this WP. :) So yeah Blake, chose one now. We'll see how we all get on.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 04:17, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Nothing's happened yet, or did I miss something? lolRAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 02:18, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

How about Humus Sapien? I just went to the stub-class article and picked a random letter, going from there. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:10, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

A week later, nothing happened. This bodes well. Jonathan Hardin' (talk) 12:54, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I've been here the whole time. Anyway what Wizardman did was what I meant. So tomorrow why don't we all start? What you think?RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 00:28, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

It is tomorrow. Let's do this thing. Harry Blue5 (talk) 08:35, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

It must of been a bad idea after all. Nevermind.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 20:42, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I still think it's a good idea... Harry Blue5 (talk) 16:15, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I do too you know, totally one hundred percent. But we all need to agree on something, get the wheels in motion. Were a pretty undecided bunch. (See the convo below on the image which is still being debated..)RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 19:50, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Darn our indecisiveness. Darn it to heck, I say! Anyway, I think in looking for a weekly collaboration, we should try to find something either just enough to reach fairly large articles that are Start/C-class. Stub classes are usually to stubby to even be sure they're notable yet. Harry Blue5 (talk) 20:53, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Portal:Fictional characters

I know I've already mentioned this, but the discussion has been archived, and I feel like this should be revived. Anyway, Fictional characters is a broad scope, and I think that we should create a portal for them. Perhaps with a different article for each media? Harry Blue5 (talk) 10:57, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes I like portals. I kind of abandoned the portal I made, Portal:EastEnders, though I was only updating the "news" section anyway. I just forget. –anemoneprojectors– 11:36, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

From looking around at articles, we'll have a massive amount of video game characters to choose from, but from a quick check theatre, film and literature might be a bit more troublesome. Harry Blue5 (talk) 21:24, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Difficult as in what? Glimmer721 ^talk 22:11, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I mean GAs and stuff. It never bodes well to feature a bad article. Harry Blue5 (talk) 22:35, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I'd say film we can go Jack Sparrow, maybe, and then lit could be Nancy Drew. Glimmer721 ^talk 21:20, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

the eastender sportal i dint even no was there! shows how much i pay attention to..--MayhemMario (talk) 21:23, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia always ends up surprises me somehow, whether it be with portals or GAs or anything. Anyway, for video games, how about Hildegard von Krone? I picked at random from the Quality content page. It's a pretty nice article, and it isn't someone that pops up in most readers' minds. Always nice to do someone relatively obscure. Harry Blue5 (talk) 23:17, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

I don't mind Hildegard von Krone; I just thought were were going for a FA article. Anyway, from looking at the Video Games Portal, which also covers a large topic, this doesn't seem hard. I started rough draft in my sandbox. Glimmer721 ^talk 00:24, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

For television, how about Martin Keamy? Harry Blue5 (talk) 07:54, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

For featured topic, "Characters of Halo". Harry Blue5 (talk) 08:00, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Added. Glimmer721 ^talk 00:49, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I've been putting together a few pages for the portal, but I couldn't quite go past that. Glimmer721 ^talk 20:31, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Going by P:VG the intro should probably be changed from an introduction to this project to one about actual fictional characters. Harry Blue5 (talk) 16:05, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I dtried but I didn't really like the article...so I changed it to something similar to Portal:Novels. I could be expanded. Glimmer721 ^talk 14:50, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Ah well, it's good enough for now. I don't see what expanding yourself achieves, though... :P Harry Blue5 (talk) 18:59, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and created the portal. I think it might be worth adding Characters of Final Fantasy VIII to the featured video games stuff, since it's an FA and Final Fantasy is probably of a high interest to many people who'd see the portal. Harry Blue5 (talk) 22:39, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject G.I. Joe Concern

I've noticed this project because they have tagged there articles with our WP Banner and not bothered to assess the articles. More so they havent bothered to assess on their own WP scale.. which tells me it's a complete mess. Nothing is been done there, one brand has around 300 + articles. A lot are character articles, I think someone who knows how needs to propose a mass AFD and get a merge to list result. Let someone else clean it up. If no one does, they should be deleted all together. Fancruft gone mad. Can anyone do a mass AFD on the non notable characters?RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 16:27, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I notified the project. If they don't respond in a timely manner, then a mass AfD could take place to get consensus to redirect these articles. (To mass AfD something, just list one of the characters and then link the category, I guess) _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 16:58, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Ahh okay. :) It's good to get the ball rolling so to speak.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 17:45, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I believe it's time we acted. Harry Blue5 (talk) 16:33, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Again, totally agree. See what the GI Joe product have done is - created a task force which stops deletion of their stubs. They all jump up if an article is up for deletion, but do not actually work that hard on the articles anymore. When Blake adressed them, they thought it best to mention they have a consensus amongst themselves not to delete articles because of a past AFD. Another issue is the ones with some form of citations, they are all primary sources.. comics, comics websites... little news coverage, reviews, popular culture blah blah.. Which could be included... They havent even rated there own articles against there Wiki project quality scale which speaks volumes.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 19:50, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Now, I know that such actions are considered brash and unwise, but I'm half-tempted to just redirect every single character article they have in a moment of harsh deletionism and a bit of spite. I really doubt that all over 100 characters are notable enough for Wikipedia. It's reasons like this why Joepedia and the like exist, to describe things that Wikipedia quite simply can't. Harry Blue5 (talk) 20:48, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Hello everyone, I am a member of the wikiproject. For what it's worth, we've got all our articles assessed now. I for one think that WikiProject Fictional Characters is great and looking forward to working with you all in the future. Harry Blue5, I undid your redirection of two of our articles after adding some sources - I hope that's OK. Thanks, --Cerebellum (talk) 03:22, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

It's not okay really. Three online refs for one of those articles. Non reliable websites and primary sources - sources aimed at the subject matter in this case. Look for news coverage, popular culture websites deemed as reliable, any critical analysis and so forth. It's just suggesting they are not notable.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 03:28, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Rather than engage in "a moment of harsh deletionism and a bit of spite" (is that any proper way of engaging fellow editors?), it might be a bit better, and far more diplomatic, to engage the editors of the wikiproject to share why you feel the way they do, and find out why they feel the way they do. Discussion may lead to more collaboration than you expect! :) BOZ (talk) 03:29, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

They said they would start improving things, three and a half weeks later they still did not. They have now assessed the articles, which is more encouraging. We are trying to clean up fictional character articles. They have been long a forgotten corner - only some subjects receiving all the focused editing and active taskforces. GI seemed worse of with the hefty number of stub articles that have fallen off the radar.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 03:56, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Since there are roughly 200 articles on characters, deciding which ones aren't notable (and thus should be deleted) is going to be a very tedious process, especially since hardly any of them demonstrate their notability. In this case, I think it'd be best if we try and decide which ones are notable instead. The rest, presuming they don't indicate their notability, can then be redirected without too much complaint. Harry Blue5 (talk) 08:04, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

This is one of the reasons why I have been highlighting the G.I. Joe Stub class articles. Now that all the articles have been assessed, it's clear that we have a lot of character articles that need to either be expanded, or merged into another article. And unfortunately, most of them are limited to information from the character's file card, and don't have much farther to go. I think that any article assessed at C-class or higher deserves to stay, and probably most of the Start class articles also. In the meantime, I will do my best to highlight the articles in WikiProject G.I. Joe that need attention. Fortdj33 (talk) 15:36, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

I've redirected Topside (G.I. Joe) to List of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero characters. Honestly, after we clean up all the characters, I'm really not sure G.I. Joe should have its own WikiProject. Maybe a task force, but I'm not sure it can work as a full-blown WikiProject. Harry Blue5 (talk) 19:27, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Well, Category:G.I. Joe characters has 215 characters in it(50 of which might be lucky to stay), and the whole project has 317 articles. So that will leave them with around 150 articles. Whether they want to keep the project going with that many articles is up to them. We can't just go around closing projects. _Blake ^{(Talk·Edits)} 19:42, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

I don't think they should shut it down, they can produce better things together.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 19:48, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

If it's not very active it can always be changed to a task force instead. Jhenderson ⁷⁷⁷ 22:14, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Whether you think that G.I. Joe should have its own WikiProject or not, there is a discussion parallel to this one at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject G.I. Joe#Fictional characters discussion. And as pointed out above, now that all the articles have been assessed, members of WikiProject G.I. Joe (such as Cerebellum and myself) have started merging related articles, rather than just redirecting everything to List of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero characters. I understand there is a difference between the quality of an article and the notability of a character, but I would ask that we leave the stubs for the time being, until a consensus is reached about which character articles are notable. Fortdj33 (talk) 01:06, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

It should not be made into a task force or otherwise deleted; it covers a variety of articles, and a variety of subjects. It would be no more appropriate to make it into a toys task force than it would be to make the Pokémon project a video game taskforce. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 01:09, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Well when you reach a consensus on stubs, which such a talk should be active now, you will be required to add the sources or merge them.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 01:36, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Slightly off topic, but what's the difference between and Task Force and a WikiProject? -- Jake fuersturm (talk) 02:24, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

A task force is a portion of a larger project; for example, the Nintendo task force is a task force within the Video game project. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 02:37, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Whether or not they are a task force or a WikiProject should be left up to them as their business in my opinion. I honestly don't care how G.I. Joe articles are handled, so long as we clean up this whole situation where nearly no article shows real-world notability and most probably can't. かんぱい！ Scapler (talk) 12:41, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

What we need to do is ensure Yojoe, a mere fansite dressed up as something else, is not used for a source. Which it is. Also some articles they are trying to keep are referenced soley by it. However at the noticeboard for notability, it was deemed UNreliable therefore cannot be used to "save" a stub. They say they can't find sources for some, well I looked and turned a few up for one character I chose at random. So that makes me wonder if they know what a reliable source is if they are leaving periodicals mentioning a character out.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 13:27, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Really, care to share? -- Jake fuersturm (talk) 14:20, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

I think that we should stop discussing the characters here. The discussion's been started on their project, and it's best to keep discussion centralised. Harry Blue5 (talk) 18:38, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm still waiting for @raintheone's big reveal -- Jake fuersturm (talk) 19:03, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

I have my own solution. I think I will join the project and see with what I can do to help. Raintheone you can discuss with me what problems you have with the project and the related articles of that project. I will be happy to help out. Jhenderson ⁷⁷⁷ 19:11, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

You do realize there is the same (or worse) problem in Wikipedia:WikiProject Transformers. In fact if there is any reason to be concerned with the G.I. Joe related articles it's because of what's been going with the Transformers related articles. So I sort of understand your concern seeing the history of what's been going in other Projects. Jhenderson ⁷⁷⁷ 19:36, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Sorry I got confused if you wanted me to answer via twitter or not. Anyway, a character called topside, last night I typed it into the google news archive and there was 2 newpaper sources. This character called Ripcord caught my eye, it's totally written from in-universe perspective, it uses unreliable Yojoe, the film section is unsourced which baffles me. There are mulitple sources for this character's film section alone.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 20:10, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

[That's very pithy, twitter indeed - I use, and have seen the "@" convention used on more than one website (including Wikipedia), not just twitter - just because it's not common here doesn't make it wrong, but I guess that's just another example of veteran Wikipedians' condescension to the newbies, no wonder editors are leaving - but I digress]. Anyways, re: Topside here's the google news archive search results [[13]] - so let's come to a deal, shall we - if you're willing to spot me the $1,995/year for the paid membership to the Salt Lake Tribune's online archive (or if you're cheap, then just the $2.95 for the single article access), then I'm happy to use the article you found as a source, although I doubt other Wikipedia users will find that terribly useful unless you buy them all memberships as well. As for the second article, that one was written in 1944, before G.I. Joe was a sparkle in some Hasbro toy designer's eye. I could go on, but I hope you get the idea. -- Jake fuersturm (talk) 20:55, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Jake stop being ratty with me, I'm giving time up to help. The newspaper source i meant, The website ones are with the paywall. You can use those refs to if someone had the supcription, then everyone else has AGF. Surely you we can work together right? I'm not a veteran wikipedian just because I've been here for a while, I dislike when they quote MOS and do that to me, so don't worry. :)RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 21:09, 23 March 2011 (UTC)