Talk:The Othersiders

Fan's?

"Cast This article may be written from a fan's point of view, rather than a neutral point of view. Please clean it up to conform to a higher standard of quality, and to make it neutral in tone."

The Outsiders has fans?!?! a show on CN REAL has fans?!?! WikiChicken81112 (talk) 22:34, 25 June 2010 (UTC)WikiChicken81112

Live-action vs. reality

@ 72.134.55.3 (talk) / 70.182.139.238 (talk):
Per Reality television, "Reality television is a genre of television programming that presents purportedly unscripted dramatic or humorous situations, documents actual events, and usually features ordinary people instead of professional actors." The Othersiders fits into this category as it is supposedly unscripted, features "ordinary" kids, and documents what they experience. And yes, the show is live-action, but I've never seen that used as a genre. I'd support it being left in the "format" field of the infobox, but it shouldn't replace reality as a genre. See also: Ghost Hunters (which is listed as both paranormal and reality) and Reality_television#Supernatural. By the way, if you have a source that says the show is scripted, it would definitely be something worth adding to the article. Thanks, nhjm449 (talk) 08:20, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

While normally I would agree, the show was originally being marketed as a scripted live-action paranormal television show. You can even check all the original publications on the show, and even the Wikipedia history (which includes edits made by Cartoon Network staff saying scripted and live-action. The role of lead investigator is done by Riley Litman, an aspiring actor out of Oak Park High School, who has been taking acting lessons and performing arts classes throughout high-school [1]. I included a reference to his schools newsletter from back in November of 2008. Based on the premise of the original marketing calling it scripted, i don't see how this can be declared supposedly unscripted. I will agree to have live-action removed from the genre, but reality should be removed as well. As far as a comparison to Ghost Hunters, I believe the comparison is a bit far fetched. Ghost Hunters has always been promoted and marketed as reality, and never marketed as scripted. I have added references before to credible links about the show being scripted, one of which included a link to tvguide.com mentioning upcoming shows, 3 months before The Othersiders aired. On the article, it said it was an upcoming scripted live-action paranormal investigation show featuring teens. Since, the article has expired and is no longer on the site, but i will have to look and try to see if there is a cached version of the article available online. But in the mean time, since original marketing and promotion of this show declared it scripted and live action (which includes the aforementioned edits to this article by Cartoon Network staff declaring it scripted), i do believe that reality should be removed from the genre as well. 70.182.139.238 (talk) 16:48, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

While it is extremely likely that the series is scripted (not unlike other reality series), the show is very much intended for the audience to believe it is real. In addition, an official press release for the show states it as reality [2], as do other sources [3][4][5][6][7][8]. The official website even states (at the bottom) that the show is part of CN Real, "home to your favorite Cartoon Network reality TV shows." nhjm449 (talk) 22:53, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Of course a lot of other reality shows aren't really reality, and rely on heavy scripting... but that is still a bit different of a case. I also do understand there are many sources citing this show as reality as of recent. But where that usually comes from, is one popular source will refer to it as reality, and others will follow suit without doing much other research. But as said, all of the original press releases, information, marketing, and general talk of the show was declaring it a fictional and scripted live-action television show. As with the show being intended for the audience to think it is real, a lot of shows and movies are that way, but are not fiction. 2 examples of movies that are intended in such ways are "Diary of the Dead" and "Quarantine"... even more similar would be "The Blair Witch Project". Sure, everyone knows that these films are fiction, but they are intended for the audience to believe they are real, which does not make them reality type films. Iamonyx (talk) 21:36, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

But we're talking about reality television, not reality film. The motion pictures you mention would be categorized as pseudo-documentaries. What happens in those movies is not advertized as being real documentation of actual events. The events are real only within the world of the movie. What happens in The Othersiders, however, is being promoted as being real within the real world. The show is designed so that the audience believes that these are real kids going out to investigate haunted places and that the events they experience aren't fake/scripted. The movies that you mention are not intended for the audience to believe that they are truly real documentation of actual events. (See also: "based on true events") nhjm449 (talk) 00:22, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Equipment and Terms

I feel that the sections of Equipment and Terms is unnecessary things like base camp and going dark are really terms that don't need explaining, and the others are fairly commonly known or can be easily researched. And why does under tools does it list a vacuum and a flashlight and what car they use, things like that are pointless to list, because yes they used a vacuum to test one thing on one episode but i would hardly call that a tool, and a flashlight and car are not notible enought to really list. I think the list should be changed to be a bit more like the ghost hunter's list and should be more compacted we don't need multiple entrys for camera if it just points to night vision camera. Im not doing the changes as of yet because I want other people's opinions, and i have not watched the show so i can't really redo the equipment section to well other then a bit of compacting. --Whitefang94 (talk) 17:59, 18 January 2010 (UTC)