Talk:G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero (Marvel Comics)/GA2

GA Review

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Reviewer: Astrocog (talk · contribs) 22:19, 5 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry - did not forget about this. Very busy lately, so I'll complete the review by Friday.AstroCog (talk) 03:01, 7 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No dablinks - good!
A check using the external links tool (on the top-right of this page) shows that a few links have minor issues, but one, the ugo.com Larry Hama interview, is completely dead. Maybe the Way Back Machine has an archive of that? I HIGHLY recommend getting archived versions of any webpages used as sources, which makes them easier to verify.

Rate	Attribute	Review Comment
1. Well-written:
	1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.	* The lead doesn't encompass the entire article. Make sure that for each section, you've got at least a sentence or two that summarizes that in the lead. In the "Promotion" section, there's a sentence that says, "Between the toy line, comic books, commercials and subsequent cartoon series, Hasbro had "put forward a marketing plan that was to become an industry standard, and a model for non-film properties to survive in other mediums",and became an early example of an industry practice that what would years later be described by Jenkins as a "transmedia narrative." - Even though there are citations here, you still need to say who is being quoted. Naked quotes are confusing to readers. Check the rest of the article for instances of this. When a person is introduced in the article, Archie Goodwin for example, you only need to give his full name once, and then on just use his last name. Again, check the rest of the article for instances of this.
	1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.
2. Verifiable with no original research:
	2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.	Several of the external link sources have incomplete citations. Make sure that things like author, date, publisher, etc are given. For example #44 and #46 are just links with not other info in the citations.
	2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose).
	2c. it contains no original research.	No apparent problems with OR.
3. Broad in its coverage:
	3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.	The article does a good job of describing the development and lifetime of the comics series, but doesn't give much detail about the hero characters themselves. I feel like a general reader would walk away knowing more about the villains than the heroes (to be honest, the villains in G.I. Joe are more interesting!), and the ongoing or over-arching story arcs are not described. I think a separate section on "Main plot" or "Story arc" should be part of this article for basic broadness. It doesn't have to be overly detailed or comprehensive, but a general reader will need at least that. Perhaps the first section could be divided into two smaller sections? "Development" or "Early development" is fine for the first section. I feel like the paragraphs about "Silent Interlude" belong in a "Reception" section. Speaking of reception, I don't see much in the way of straight-up reviews from comics critics. GIJ was a long-running and popular series, so I would expect there be some critique or discussion in comics magazines, journals, etc. The Comics Journal?
	3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).	I think it's enough to say at the beginning that the president's of Hasbro and Marvel had a chance encounter in which led to the development of the series. Emphasizing the fact that they met in the men's restroom and talked while peeing (seen in the article text and in the associated quote box) is a strange digression that a general reader doesn't need.
	4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.	Article is neutral.
	5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.	No apparent problems here.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
	6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.	The non-free images need to clearly say who the copyright holder is. The first one just says something like "It is believed that Marvel own the copyright." Find out definitively if that's correct. Does IDW own it now? I'm not sure.
	6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.	All images require alt-text, including the main image. I'm not sure what MOS for comics articles says about a caption for the main info box image, but it should probably have a basic caption as well.
	7. Overall assessment.	~~Decent article, but has some issues outstanding. I'll put it on hold to see if editors will make improvements.~~ I read this comic quite a bit as a kid, so it warms my heart to see a good article for it. In the future, it will be nice to have more reviews from major sources (if they exist), but that's an FAC thing. This is plenty for GA.

Editor Comments

Hey! Sorry, I haven't done anything yet, but I do plan to this weekend. Thanks, --Cerebellum (talk) 11:11, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

OK lots of stuff fixed, I'm continuing to work on the rest. Regarding your comment on the reception, I've posted a thread at an external forum here to try to find some old reviews. --Cerebellum (talk) 14:04, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Should be all done. Let me know if I missed anything. --Cerebellum (talk) 01:11, 12 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Cerebellum, great work in getting the article back to GA-status! A couple things that I still think need to be addressed are:

The intro has some redundancy. Specifically, it mentions being translated into multiple languages more than once. Also, the promotion and characterization sections are summarized sufficiently, but I'm not sure about the others.
And now that the info about issue #21 has been moved to the Reception section, the image from issue #21 now seems out of place in the Early Development section. I like the image where it is, but there should probably be a mention of issue #21 there, or the image should be removed.

Other than that, the article looks great! I'm happy to make these changes myself, but I though I should mention them here first, so that there's not too much back and forth editing. Please let me know what you think! Fortdj33 (talk) 15:14, 12 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, you are totally right. Please go ahead and make as many changes as you like. --Cerebellum (talk) 01:06, 13 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]