Talk:Survivor: Africa/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Vocem Virtutis (talk · contribs) 20:25, 16 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Heya! I think I can lend a hand on this review! ~Vocem Virtutis

Good Article Criteria

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

It is reasonably well written.
a (prose, spelling, and grammar): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):
I definitely do see some grammar issues throughout the article that need to be improved. When I see minor issues, I'll fix them myself, but if anything larger comes up, I'll let you know!
It is factually accurate and verifiable.
a (reference section): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR): d (copyvio and plagiarism):
Definitely will get started on this part when I get a chance and get back to you.
It is broad in its coverage.
a (major aspects): b (focused):
I think a section should probably be added that breifly describes the show as a whole. Some of the episode summaries need to go a little more in-depth. I'll point out individual issues I see below.
It follows the neutral point of view policy.
Fair representation without bias:
On a quick skim of the article, this doesn't seem like a major issue. I'll keep an eye out for any problems here when I take the time to read a little more closely.
It is stable.
No edit wars, etc.:
This one doesn't seem to be an issue.
It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.
a (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
If illustrations are available, and I've got to think they are, we could definitely use some. Visually, the article is pretty bare-bones at this point.
Overall:
Pass/Fail:

First Thoughts

Looking at the article in its current state, I definitely do see some significant work that needs to be done. Fortunately, several articles on other seasons (Borneo, the Australian Outback, and Cook Islands) of the show have been classified as Good Articles, and I think that they provide a pretty good template that we can take advantage of in improving this article further. The first few places that need to be improved are the following: an Overview section should be added at the beginning of the article that gives a brief synopsis of Survivor as a show, as well as any relevant information about the location or production of the season; the episode summaries should all be reviewed and given proper attention (I see that episode five doesn't have a summary at all as of now); and, if possible, some illustrations of the contestants or maybe the filming location should be added to better the article. Again, I think that this is definitely an article that we can work through, but I do see these as major issues right off the bat, before I even get into the more minor issues.

First Draft: Issues Unresolved

Lead

The lead should be a bit more in-depth a summary. For example, Ethan ought to be specified to have won the cash prize of one million dollars in addition to the title. Furthermore, some information ought be included about the tribes the and the contestants divided into them. Again, I think looking at the other Good Articles I mentioned provides a decent template here.

I fixed a couple minor verb tense issues in the lead. If the rest the article resembles the lead, grammar work will need to be done.

I've made a bit of a change here. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:38, 1 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Overview

Currently unadded

Now added Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:38, 1 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Contestants

Overall, this part looks alright. I would add a mention of the players making up the jury from the final 11 onwards.

Some pictures in this section could really help out the article visually.

I'll have to fact check the information in the chart at a later point, but the formatting all looks good.

Future appearances subsection looks good as well.

Season summary (on hold; please see my comment below before you do any work on this)

This is also relatively solid, at least for the most part. I think that it would come off less clunky to refer to the two Kims on the season as Powers and Johnson rather than by their last initials (after going through the whole article, this is actually an issue that is not unique to the season summary.).

The first paragraph focuses heavily on the tribe dynamics of the Samburu tribe, almost without mentioning dynamics of Boran, the tribe that the final four players came from.

Again, there are some grammar issues to clean up.

I think it should be noted within the summary that Teresa was responsible for the mystery vote against Lex at the Clarence elimination. The current summary leaves the reader wondering whether or not Kelly actually was responsible for the vote.

Episodes

Maybe the section that needs the most work. Some of these episodes summaries are just too shallow. The fifth episode, arguably one of the most consequential episodes of Survivor considering the introduction of the tribe swap, has no summary whatsoever.

Several grammar issues are within this section as well.

I notice that reading through all of the summaries, the winner of the season, Ethan, is barely mentioned at all. On one hand, I understand that Ethan wasn't the most strategic player on the season or even the one who was usually in the spotlight; on the other hand, it is an issue that if I had not seen the season before, I would have absolutely no clue why Ethan would have won the game from the episode summaries alone.

I think that the summary of episode seven, though very clunky, is a decent example of the amount of information that ought to be contained within the summary. It establishes the main plots of the episode (the merge, the deal struck between Teresa and Clarence, and everybody else's refusal to work with Clarence), while still being concise, though, again, even it needs to be reworded to sound less clunky. To give an example of some of the clunkiness, "The tribes are told of the immunity challenge but do not realize they have reached the merge until they arrive, and the challenge is now on an individual level." seems like it could be simplified to something like "When the contestants arrive at the immunity challenge, they learn that they are all merging into one tribe, thus entering the individual portion of the game."

I'd argue they need to be pretty small to retain focus. WP:VG/PLOT for example says these should be 700 characters for example. I'll have a scunny through, and maybe watch the swap episode again and write something up. Give me a bit of time. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 14:06, 23 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

They definitely don't need to go super in depth, but I do think most of them could use at least a bit more meat. If you look at Season 40's episodes that give the ins and outs of every single challenge throughout the season and all that, I definitely think it comes out to way too much unnecessary information. The climax of most episodes of the show is someone getting voted out, and thus, the most necessary part of an episode summary should be the explanation of why the person who left did, how they did (or didn't) attempt to save themselves, and (assuming they did try) why their plan failed. In addition, the summary may mention important themes or plot points that come up later in the season, like Teresa's vote for Lex in the merge episode.

I used episode seven as my example, which, in hindsight, was a pretty terrible choice. When I made this comment originally, I did so thinking about quantity of information over quality of information. Quality-wise, episode seven dwells way too much on Teresa and Clarence at the challenge, while comparatively taking almost no time to explain why Clarence was voted out when his tribe had the majority over Samburu.

At the end of the day, the main point I should've made it to say that, if nothing else, at least some of the episode summaries need to be rewritten.

The part of the MOS you've linked me to seems to be in reference to episodic video games and not television, which is found here: [[1]]. Looking at the television part of the MOS, it seems as though the expectation is for the series overview to contain a section dedicated to the plot of the season in one of two ways: an episode table in which each episode's plot is summarized in no more than 200 words OR a prose plot summary of 500 words for the entire season. Looking at this, I would lean towards the former option. To do otherwise would require a series overview with an average of 33 words for each episode. The MOS guide specifically notes that an article should NOT contain an episode table summary AND a prose plot summary, which is an issue since this article contains both.

Forgive me for this; I made the mistake of using the other GA listed seasons to help me find the mistakes in this one. While that's not entirely unfair, I should have checked the MOS first. I'm still quite new to reviewing, so I hope you'll excuse the mistake; I know that I'll become better at this with time.

With all that said, how do you think is best to approach the article from here? Additionally, is there anything I've described here that I'm misunderstanding (because, again, I'm very new to this)? Assuming that I am properly understanding, my recommendation would be a full deletion of the prose section of the season summary.

Sorry, I know that's a lot of information, but I want to ensure we're on the same page. Please let me know if you have any thoughts. Many thanks! Vocem Virtutis (talk) 16:26, 23 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No drama. I actually prefer the plot summary to the episode list as survivor is a series that is much less about the individual episodes and more about how the tides turn over it. The current plot summary is less than 500, so if you are cool with it, I'll remove the info from the episode summaries. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:38, 1 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That sounds good to me. Thank you much! Vocem Virtutis (talk) 18:44, 4 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

These have now been culled Vocem Virtutis. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:03, 12 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

If Africa no longer needs episode summaries, why not eliminate the episode recaps in Survivor: Borneo, which still has a GA-status? George Ho (talk) 04:23, 26 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I mean, sure - I didn't write that article, nor is this a review of that article. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 10:46, 26 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Voting history

This one looks mostly alright to me.

Controversy

Again, this one looks alright. The one other possible controversy that comes to my mind is in regards to the "Beangate" situation between Clarence and Diane in the first episode and specifically the way in which Clarence was treated by the other members of his tribe being perceived by some viewers as having racist connotations. If there is sufficient information about that incident, particularly if it came up at all contemporary to the season, it should probably be included here.

- If there is a suitable ref, I'd do so. I had a scunny and couldn't see one. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:38, 1 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

All looks very doable. You may need to give me a little time as I've got quite a bit on at the moment. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 14:22, 19 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

That's okay with me. I've seen you around the community enough to know you're pretty active, so I'll take your word that you'll be here to check in on things once you get the chance! Vocem Virtutis (talk) 22:57, 20 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I have added an image. There are several images at Shaba National Reserve that might be appropriate since that was the reserve where this season was filmed. Bgsu98 (talk) 00:58, 26 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Good thought! Thank you much! Vocem Virtutis (talk) 06:08, 26 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I've done a couple replies. I think this pretty much boils down to whether or not we kill off the episode summaries. That would be my preferred way to deal with it - as individual episodes just give details on challenges and such, not really an overview. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:38, 1 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Was there anything else I needed to do Vocem Virtutis? Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:25, 23 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I'll be finishing the review soon enough, but I want to make sure there's future clarity on how the season/episode summaries need to be handled. Once I look through the article again, I'll get back to you. Vocem Virtutis (talk) 00:54, 7 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Second Draft: Issues Unresolved

Contestants

I wonder if the paragraph at the beginning of this section may not go better in the Overview section. It also might still be good to mention something about the jury, if we're mentioning the tribe swaps and merge.

Season Summary

Since we've decided to go with the season summary route, the summary should really be rewritten to better encompass the season as a whole. I would take the focus off of specifics such as Carl and Lindsey's quiz at tribal council or Linda's being voted off; instead, it would be simpler just to summarize that the younger players took control of Samburu but the older players were able to adjust to the tribe swap. Similarly, make sure that Boran also receives a bit of attention in the summary. The goal here should be to follow the broad narrative that CBS is attempting to tell. I don't know that the section needs a full rewrite, but it could use work.

Episodes

The section looks good to me, but judging off the discussion, this definitely has broader implications than this article.

Reception

There are several errors here, especially with quotations and punctuation. Dalton Ross' quote is a bit clunky; it would be smoother to use a paraphrase, especially because whoever quoted Ross messed with his original punctuation. Similarly, using three Santilli quotations in one sentence feels clunky. The second comma in the sentence about The Purple Rock Podcast is unnecessary, and, again, the multiple quotations make the sentences clunky (assuming citing a fan site is proper to begin with). In the last sentence of the section, a semicolon is incorrectly used to introduce a quote. Really, this whole section could use a rewrite.

Discussion

A comment about the episode summaries. I fully agree that on these Survivor articles they are far too long and tend to get lost in trying to interpret motives and intents of the scheming by players, but the actual game elements, like challenges and swaps, should still be documented as those are obvious, require no interpretation, and should remain relatively short. The season summary can document how major player actions influenced the game at a level that is too hard to delve into interpretative details. --Masem (t) 12:27, 26 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, losing the episode summaries is a real loss. Sure, some of these could use some work compared to more recent seasons. But I was under the impression that individual episode summaries were preferable to season-long recaps, although in the case of Survivor, I think both are worthwhile. Bgsu98 (talk) 15:31, 26 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- I mean, I get why you might want to include info on swaps, or major gameplay items, but things like challenges rarely have an effect on the outcome of a vote, unless a potential votee wins immunity. The actual details of the challenges are kinda irrelevant in my eyes. I think the current way of giving an overview of the season's structure is ample. Vocem VirtutisLee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 20:22, 1 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  I would disagree with the challenges, in part as they are the most objective part of any episode and part of the structure of the show. Masem (t) 20:26, 1 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  - - We are talking about challenges where the description of the task can be really long-winded. Sure, "hold your hand up for the longest", is quite easy to explain, but a multi-task challenge with a puzzle at the end would be a bit much to explain and then just say that X won. There's also usually two challenges per episode - I feel like we're getting down the fancruft avenue. In the past, these episode summaries have been incredibly wrong with all the details of the reward and immunity challenges, along with names that aren't mentioned in the episodes.
      
      I don't think it matters in terms of the season what the individual challenges are. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 21:03, 1 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
      Working from the Amazing Race articles (where our episode "summaries" there are limited to the tasks and locations), I think it is entirely possible to write the tasks for Survivor w/o getting into the weeds about the rules. What is 100% in the weeds is the strategy discussion at the individual episode level, as that really gets into interpretation of motivations. Masem (t) 00:42, 7 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
As a note, is there a reason why individual Survivor episodes couldn't be made their own individual articles? If not, that's where I feel that would be the better place for most challenge or strategy-related information.

The reason that I agree with @Lee Vilenski about the season summary being more important than individual episode summaries is because this is a case where the whole does not necessarily equal the sum of its parts. Some episodes are vital to the story of a season. Others really don't have much impact at all. Ultimately, I feel that the page for a season of any show needs to be focused on the specifics of that show as a whole, and not the individual pieces. Season summaries probably fulfill that role better than episode summaries. Vocem Virtutis (talk) 01:16, 7 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]
re: Individual episode articles - the amount of reception for a single episode is very small. While there is definitely recap coverage and some opinion in that, it is nowhere close to the standard the TV project has for standalone television episodes, much less those from reality TV. Masem (t) 01:18, 7 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]