Wikipedia:Top 25 Report/August 27 to September 2, 2023

Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (August 27 to September 2, 2023)

Prepared with commentary by Igordebraga, Rajan51, Ollieisanerd, Karnataka, Ltbdl and Marinette2356.

⭠ Last week's report → Next week's report

August closes still being a good split between the United States and India, and the recently deceased holding the top spot.

Rank	Article	Class	Views	Image	Notes/about
1	Jimmy Buffett		1,649,856		If we didn't have the exclusion policy against articles with 95+% mobile views, the top article of the week would be 2023 Asia Cup, which exceeded 2 million page visits reflecting India's love for cricket. But even if the traffic might be legit we need to be consistent, and thus the top spot is the recently deceased singer responsible for among other songs "Margaritaville", which he turned into a chain of restaurants, and the life-story song quoted at #6 about Eddie Balchowsky, a Spanish Civil War veteran he once met.
2	2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup		1,107,517		In yet another tournament that's hard for the western hemisphere to follow, basketball's national teams (though with not everyone at full strength, as for every Luka Doncic present there is a Nikola Jokic who either skipped or wasn't cleared by the NBA) have gathered in the Philippines, Japan and Indonesia. The biggest upset thus far have been Olympic silver medalists France falling in the group stage.
3	Bob Barker		1,087,041		The American game show host who won 19 Emmys for presenting The Price Is Right on CBS for 35 years died on August 26, aged 99. He also hosted Truth or Consequences from 1956 to 1975.
4	Gadar 2		1,014,364		This Bollywood historical action film starring Sunny Deol continues to bring in audiences, and along with being the second biggest Indian movie of the year behind Pathaan has become the ninth highest-grossing Indian film ever. It has a shot at going up another place, but the release of #23 next week could change things.
5	Vivek Ramaswamy		976,099		An American entrepreneur of Indian descent who is trying to be the Republican candidate on next year's elections.
6	Deaths in 2023		966,254		Some of it's magic, Some of it's tragic, But I had a good life all the way...
7	Gadsden flag		954,575		The sudden interest in this historical American flag comes from a video of a middle school student being removed from class with a Gadsden flag patch on his backpack. Officials later allowed him to come back with the patch following backlash from the decision on Twitter (or X? I don't even know what to call it at this point).
8	Oppenheimer (film)		913,919		Christopher Nolan's biopic based on the life of #14 continues its explosive performance at the box office. It became the second highest-grossing R-rated film behind only a clown and then crossed $800 million at the worldwide box office. Hopefully it crosses the $1 billion mark too, but that's not a lock, yet.
9	Jailer (2023 Tamil film)		819,196		While it may have fallen behind #4 at the box office, this Kollywood thriller starring Rajinikanth is still the third highest-grossing Indian film of the year, and it will hope to keep the spot in the weeks to come.
10	Bray Wyatt		745,221		The WWF fighter also known as "The Fiend" sadly joined the list of premature professional wrestling deaths by having a heart attack at just 36.
11	George Foreman		735,406		He's all up in my George Foreman... Big George Foreman, a biopic on the legendary boxer (he famously was heavyweight champion before losing the Rumble in the Jungle to Muhammad Ali... and 20 years later got his belt back at 45, becoming the oldest boxer in history to win the title) also known for naming a grill, entered Netflix after being mostly ignored when it ran in theaters in April.
12	One Piece (2023 TV series)		634,966		After a widely successful manga and anime, Monkey D. Luffy, a pirate who cannot swim but has impressively elastic skin, earned a live-action series on Netflix.
13	The Equalizer 3		613,798		In 2014, The Equalizer was a hit for combining an old TV show with Denzel Washington beating up people as a retired intelligence agent. The Equalizer 2 followed up in 2018, and now a trilogy closer with Washington in Italy fighting the Camorra has entered theaters taking advantage of Labor Day weekend.
14	J. Robert Oppenheimer		582,221		The subject of #8.
15	ChatGPT		580,738		Well, look who's back. Let's take the chatbot's presence to note the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes partially started because greedy studios are willing to use AI to screw over writers and actors still hasn't ended.
16	Chandrayaan-3		570,772		The first spacecraft to land near the moon's south pole sent out its rover, which has detected sulfur and temperature variations on the moon. It has been put into sleep mode and its space agency ISRO hopes that it will be able to restart after the cold lunar night (which lasts two weeks!). Scientists are hoping that it detects water after that. Meanwhile, ISRO launched a spacecraft to study the sun on Saturday.
17	Starfield (video game)		564,581		A Bethesda Softworks video game set to release on September 6, 2023, which is one of the first open-world exploration games with a setting revolving around science fiction.
18	Adam Sandler		564,121		For all the awful movies Happy Madison Productions created, sometimes Adam Sandler manages to deliver something good. The latest winning contribution was the Netflix release You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah, starring his daughter Sunny (with Adam and her sister Sadie being her own on-screen family along with Idina Menzel as the mother, with Sandler's wife Jackie instead playing the mother of Sunny's best friend).
19	All In (2023)		557,843		A live reality television professional wrestling show held at the start of the week. If you know squat about what happened, the Wikipedia article has you covered, writing in excruciating detail about the fights.
20	Mitch McConnell		535,439		On August 30, this Republican senator had "frozen" during a press conference, raising questions about his physical health. A month ago, a very similar thing happened.
21	Barbie (film)		534,493		While the other half of Barbenheimer (#8) still has more views and managed to finally get a weekend making more money, the pink behemoth became the highest-grossing film for its studio, beating the magical boy who held the record for 12 years. It is particularly satisfying for the people who felt betrayed by said boy's creator, as one of the dolls is being played by a trans actress. The film also surpassed The Super Mario Bros. Movie as 2023's highest earner in the Sunday where this list was published (says something that after over a month in theaters Barbie still hasn't fallen below #2 in North America, at most spending a weekend each behind #24, Gran Turismo and #13).
22	Ahsoka (TV series)		530,641		Andor and season 3 of The Mandalorian failed to enter the report as they ran on Disney+, but once more we have Rosario Dawson under heavy make-up portraying surviving Jedi Ahsoka Tano (joined by Mary Elizabeth Winstead also covered in prosthetics as General Hera Syndulla) as her show gets new weekly chapters.
23	Jawan (film)		521,610		Unlike Hollywood movies whose trailers are released months before release, the trailer of this Bollywood action flick starring Shah Rukh Khan was released just seven days before its release next week. Nevertheless, its prospects look good and if the star's previous film is anything to go by, this one is going to dominate the box office and this list for the next few weeks, barring any unforeseen deaths that rack up views.
24	Blue Beetle (film)		509,861		Originally meant for HBO Max, the latest DC Extended Universe movie was promoted to a theatrical release, has barely recouped its $100 million budget - the studio even said part of the blame would go to Hurricane Hilary, which passed by California during the opening weekend and afflicted the Latino population who would like to see a Mexican-American superhero - and has now lost ground to Gran Turismo.
25	Deion Sanders		499,084		Finishing it off, right above the recently deceased Arleen Sorkin, is the only person to play in both NFL's Super Bowl and MLB's World Series, whose first game coaching college football's Colorado Buffaloes was a victory.

Exclusions

• 2023 Asia Cup, Asia Cup: Look, it's not my fault that most views from the South Asian countries that love cricket are mobile ones - reaching 99% in the case of the archrivals Pakistan national cricket team and India national cricket team.