Forum:Origins of the format for television story entries

Looking at the various styles that are being used for television story entries, including the original style (see "The Ark"), "The Tenth Planet," and my own entry for "The Invasion," I see good and bad points on each. I've tried to blend the best of all three styles into a new tentative format which is in the sandbox. Suggestions are welcome. Here are a few of my own:

"The Ark"

 * Pro:I like the inclusion of the production crew, location filming, possible and known influences/inspirations for the story, and continuity notes.


 * Con: I still do not understand why we need a separate entry for story synopses or uncredited casts. Wikipedia's entries have synopses, some quite detailed, on the same page. Uncredited cast members could simply be included with the credited cast, with "uncredited" placed in parentheses next to whatever they played. The argument, "it makes the page too long" doesn't fit, as whenever more than two sections are created within a page, the wiki engine automatically creates a page map near the top, with links to each section. If folks don't want to scroll all the way through the synopsis to say, look at the cast or crew, they simply click on the links for "Cast" or "Production crew" in the little gray box at the top of the page. And each section has its own edit link.

There also seems to be no need to have sections for broadcast dates or duration, as these are already covered in the infobox. "Discontinuity" is a better term, I think, than "Errors and Plot Holes," as this is the term usually used by fans. "Bad Guys" sounds too American and is not even necessary, as the newer Infobox template contains an entry for "The Enemy."

Finally, the navigation footer should only contain links for the television stories. As I believe Mantrid pointed out, the stories in other media are being produced at such a constant rate, and there are so many theoretical orders in which these stories could be placed, all of which have to be constantly revised everytime a new novel, short story, comic strip, or audio drama comes out, that keeping an "All Media" navigation footer updated would be a never ending task. Ideally, the footers for television story pages should only link to the next television story, the footers for Virgin novels should only link to the next Virgin novel, and so on.

"The Tenth Planet"

 * Pro:The infobox looks much better. Good opening description. The plot is nicely outlined on the same page. Readers are not constantly being redirected to other pages for story info that can be included on the same page. Nicely illustrated with stills from the story. Like the way the "References" section has been divided into categories.


 * Con:Some info is not included which I think should be, such as the production crew, more behind the scenes story notes, and location filming (okay, it was probably all done on set, but where?). I also think folks would be interested in knowing where Gerry Davis and Kit Pedlar may have gotten the ideas for the Cybermen and Mondas, hence a section for "Influences" or "Possible inspirations" might be a good idea.

"The Invasion"

 * Pro:Good expansion on Mantrid's original format. Lots of info.
 * Con:Description is really just a mini-synopsis. What season was this? What is siginificant, if anything, about this story? Synopsis is too general and would look better with ilustrative stills from the story. "References" section could be divided into categories for easier reading and site navigation.

There is a link to another page (unwritten) for statistics and ratings on repeats and non-UK broadcasts. Do we really want/need this? As "The Invasion" is incomplete and unlikely to see broadcast anytime soon, it may be no problem, but what about stories from post-1970, that are syndicated all over the world? - a nightmare to research, write, and keep updated!

I'm also rethinking the idea of having a section for "Story Arcs," as many stories don't fit into one, and those that do could simply have this noted in the description at the beginning of the page, i.e. "The Stones of Blood was the third story of Season 15. It forms part of the story arc in which the Doctor and Romana search for the six segments of the Key to Time."

Well, my thoughts on the matter so far. Please look over my rough template at the sandbox and my thoughts here and tell me what you think. --Freethinker1of1 17:27, 21 August 2006 (UTC)