Wikipedia:Top 25 Report/December 4 to 10, 2022

The Top 25 Report

This page contains material that is kept because it is considered humorous.
Such material is not meant to be taken seriously.

Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (December 4 to 10, 2022)

Prepared with commentary by Igordebraga

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

The World Cup continues, in a week that made this here writer sing one more time, baby break my heart in the middle, heart in the middle...

Rank	Article	Views	Notes/about
1	2022 FIFA World Cup	4,565,186	Football fans continue delighting themselves with the tournament in Qatar. Following two rounds of the knockout tournament, the finalists are two out of France, Argentina, Croatia and Morocco.
2	Kirstie Alley	3,968,686	This actress died at 71 of cancer, finishing a career that included Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Cheers, Look Who's Talking, Veronica's Closet, and most recently, The Masked Singer.
3	FIFA World Cup	2,726,859	Back to the pitch, which had the luck of not being postponed or emptied by COVID like the Olympics for its 22nd edition at #1.
4	Viktor Bout	2,287,352	A Russian weapons dealer arrested in 2008 and serving time in an American prison since 2012, until he was involved in a quite lopsided prisoner exchange with #10 - one side's crimes are "conspiring to kill Americans, acquiring and export anti-aircraft missiles, providing material support to a terrorist organization", the other "picking the wrong cartridges for her vape".
5	Jenna Ortega	2,280,539	A former child actress (yes, she was part of Disney at some point) who in a year establishing her as a scream queen is playing the quintessential goth Wednesday Addams in #8.
6	Kylian Mbappé	1,649,558	Two footballers in different times of their careers: a 23-year-old Frenchman who in #1 is seeking his second title in two appearances, having just won the quarterfinal over England and being the tournament's current top scorer; and a 37-year-old Portuguese who finished off a five Cup run by losing the quarterfinal to Morocco, and in a demonstrative of not being the same powerhouse, started both elimination games in the bench.
7	Cristiano Ronaldo	1,599,406
8	Wednesday (TV series)	1,585,156	Tim Burton had already revived a spooky family in Dark Shadows, and now he went for the biggest one in the Addams Family in this Netflix show.
9	Paul Whelan (security director)	1,468,456	Joe Biden tried to exchange #4 for two Americans made prisoners by the Russians, Marine Paul Whelan, arrested in 2018 accused of espionage, and basketballer Brittney Griner, arrested in February (just one week before Russia's worst act of the year) for carrying vaporizer cartridges with hash oil from medicinal cannabis, which is illegal in Russia. The Kremlin refused to release Whelan, and thus only Griner was freed in the prisoner exchange on December 8.
10	Brittney Griner	1,422,254
11	Lionel Messi	1,292,206	Unlike his rival #7, this Argentinian won his quarterfinal against the Netherlands, and by playing the semifinal and whatever comes next (either a final or a third place match) Messi is a shoo-in to break Lothar Matthäus' record of 25 World Cup games.
12	2018 FIFA World Cup	1,235,766	Before being banned from #1 for something worse than arresting #9 and #10, Russia hosted the previous edition of #3. If #11 and #20 don't do anything, there is a chance the next final is contested by the same two teams that entered Luzhniki Stadium four years ago.
13	List of FIFA World Cup finals	1,171,170
14	Morocco	1,110,045	In 711, the forces of this country crossed the Mediterranean and took over the Iberian peninsula, which they proceeded to dominate for seven centuries. Well, now they did it again in #1, beating in succession Spain in the round of 16 and Portugal in the quarterfinals! Next is the country that occupied Morocco in the early 20th century, #6's France.
15	Neymar	1,095,162	In #1, in spite of losing two games to an ankle injury, this teammate of both #6 and #11 in Paris St. Germain became the Brazilian with the most international goals, beating none other than #18, and was about to be "exonerated" for questionable decisions scoring a qualifying goal in the quarterfinals... until an equalizer in the final minutes followed by a penalty shootout that he didn't take part in ruined everything.
16	2026 FIFA World Cup	1,019,764	The next World Cup, bloated from 32 to 48 countries and having three hosts. One of them, Canada, lost all games in #1, and their debut in '86 was also three defeats, so they're hoping to finally get a World Cup point in their third appearance.
17	Deaths in 2022	986,315	And we were never holding back or worried that Time would come to an end...
18	Pelé	954,365	No matter what fans of #7 and #11 say, he's still the greatest footballer ever. Pelé's still in the hospital after a health scare, but who knows if he'll live enough to see his Brazil attempt to win their sixth title at #16?
19	Gonçalo Ramos	812,368	The guy who sent #7 to the bench, a Benfica striker who scored a hat trick against Switzerland in the round of 16, but was then then neutralized by...
20	Morocco national football team	741,257	#14's football squad was already the fourth African quarterfinalist at #3 (after Cameroon, Senegal, and Ghana), and managed to become the continent's first semifinalist. France stands in the way to a historic final.
21	The White Lotus	725,906	The second season of this HBO anthology set in a resort chain (last season was in Hawaii, this one in Sicily) released its penultimate episode, while having rising audience numbers every week.
22	Brazil national football team	718,240	The biggest winner of #3. Yet it hasn't beaten a European in the knockout stages since the 2002 final. And if losing to the overhyped Belgium in #12 wasn't bad enough, now they fell to Croatia, stupidly conceding a tie in the final minutes of extra time before displaying some incompetence in the penalty shootouts (why not send #15 to kick the first, or anticipate him from fifth to fourth when elimination is on the line?!). Tite can't leave this team soon enough, even if there's no idea on who will coach the team next!
23	Yassine Bounou	685,935	#20's success, to quote another Bono, it's All Because of You, goalkeeper! After all, he was only scored on once so far, an own goal, and saved two penalty kicks against Spain.
24	Parker Stevenson	681,186	An actor who was #2's first husband.
25	FIFA World Cup top goalscorers	669,051	In the 2014 FIFA World Cup (which would be #26), Miroslav Klose topped this list by scoring his 16th goal. All fans of #22 would rather not discuss the circumstances it happened.

Exclusions

This list excludes the Wikipedia main page, non-article pages (such as redlinks), and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Since mobile view data became available to the Report in October 2014, we exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (5–6% or less) or almost all mobile views (94–95% or more) because they are very likely to be automated views based on our experience and research of the issue. Please feel free to discuss any removal on the talk page if you wish.