Top 25 Report: Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (July 5 to 11, 2015)

Note: see the main report's edit history for full editor credit.

← Last week's report – Next week's report →

Summary: However coy they may be about it in public, Americans love to win. And when they do, they make no secret of it. Today saw two American triumphs in world sport: Serena Williams securing her sixth Wimbledon win and the Women's national team securing their third World Cup title. America has had little recent success in men's tennis, lorded over as it is by seemingly invulnerable demigods like Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. On the women's side though, Serena rules alone. As far as soccer goes, the US may not have a chance of ever dominating the male equivalent, but they rule the women's game, and are becoming increasingly vocal about it. Fully 12 slots this week were either soccer or tennis-related, and the groundswell of interest pushed the bar of entry up by 30%. Hopefully this will kickstart the one thing America is better at than any other nation in history: sales. As their ebullience translates into exposure and buzz, slowly other countries will come to treat women's football with the respect it deserves. Another surprise trend this week was the return of Indian viewers, with three slots devoted to their interests. Celebrity death also cast a shadow, with both Omar Sharif's and Amanda Peterson's passings noted.

As prepared by Serendipodous, for the week of July 5 to 11, 2015, the 25 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the report of the most viewed pages, were:

Rank	Article	Class	Views	Notes
1	Serena Williams		1,002,160	Serena's no stranger to this list, but this week sent her into the stratosphere. Not only did she win Wimbledon for the sixth time in a straight-sets duel with Garbine Muguruza, she also secured her second "Serena Slam"- winning four major titles in a row, and is on course to winning a Grand Slam (four major titles in a calendar year). If she succeeds, she will be the first woman to do so since Steffi Graf in 1988. At 33 she is also the oldest ever world women's tennis number 1; with 16 years between her first title and her latest, Williams has already surpassed other long-surviving legends in her sport, such as Graf and Martina Navratilova, and shows no signs of slowing down. To put this in perspective, the 21-year-old Muguruza was only five when Williams won her first title.
2	Abby Wambach		988,700	The openly lesbian (and married) forward for the American women's national soccer team topped this list despite only scoring one goal in seven matches during the 2015 Women's World Cup. This may be due to her declaration that this World Cup would be her last.
3	Flags of the Confederate States of America		951,148	It took the horrific act of the Charleston church shooting on June 17 to refocus the attention of South Carolina politicians and public at large to the fact that South Carolina was still flying the battle flag of the Confederate States of America near their state capitol. This flag causes a lot of controversy in the United States, though its general modern use as a symbol of racist oppression of blacks is undeniable. Will the flag of ISIS/ISIL be similarly used in the Middle East one hundred years hence? In any event, on July 10, after an emotional debate in the state legislature, the flag was finally taken down.
4	Terminator Genisys		875,698	This film marks the fourth attempt in 12 years to restart the dormant Terminator franchise without the aid of its creator, James Cameron. To date, if Metacritic and IMDb are anything to go by, the only remotely successful of these resuscitations was the hugely underrated TV series, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. One wonders if audiences are wishing they'd watched that when they had the chance, because the box office numbers for this flick are bad. Really bad. As in, "made as much in its first five days as Terminator Salvation made in its first weekend" bad. Salvation, mind you, was the black sheep of the series until now. Even after two weeks, the movie has made barely $70 million. All this is rather perplexing, since the two things that usually drive movies up this list are box office and controversy, and so far the only controversy generated by this film is from the few scattered critics who don't consider it utterly terrible. Perhaps it was the presence of Emilia Clarke (currently the second Game of Thrones star to take on the role of Sarah Connor). Or perhaps, if this ageing Terminator fan could be wistful for a moment, the critics are wrong when they say the Millennial generation has no love for this franchise. Perhaps they rushed to their tablets incensed at the terrible reviews; determined to learn who and what was responsible for vandalising the legacy of this landmark work of science fiction. Or perhaps it means nothing at all. Who am I to guess?
5	Eiji Tsuburaya		854,672	Want a quick route to temporary posthumous fame? Become the subject of an interactive Google doodle. Which is exactly what happened to the creator of Ultraman this week.
6	Baahubali (film)		810,328	At $41 million, this sprawling, two-part historical epic is the most expensive film in Indian history (no, it isn't actually Bollywood, since it was made in South India, much to Bollywood's chagrin). Starring the Telugu actor Prabhas (pictured), the first part, subtitled "The Beginning", broke box office records upon its release on July 10, earning Rs 2.15 billion ($34 million) worldwide in just 5 days.
7	Carli Lloyd		796,339	The midfielder's hat trick in the final against Japan helped clinch the USA the World Cup title, and made her a national hero in the process. Though not enough of one to top this list, apparently.
8	FIFA Women's World Cup		775,963	If America wins a tournament, you can be sure it will end up on this list. And while the old US of A hasn't exactly stormed the palisades as far as men's football is concerned, it's comfortably ensconced at the top of the women's game. Perhaps this challenge to the world will lead some of the more macho footballing nations to begin to take their female counterparts seriously.
9	Ariana Grande		706,116	A fixture on this list last year, the former Disney poplet has struggled to maintain a presence this year. Until this week, when she was filmed licking a doughnut on a display counter and then putting it back, before declaring, "I hate America". Not sure if this qualifies as a Britney Spears-level meltdown, but it's certainly lifted her profile.
10	United States women's national soccer team		701,219	The US national team has now secured the World Cup title 3 times. If they were counted among the men's records, they would have a legacy as secure as Germany or Italy. Perceptions are changing though.
11	Amanda Peterson		676,356	The onetime child star who followed the all-too-well-trodden path into drugs, violence and trouble with the law was found dead in her home this week of undisclosed causes. I remember as a child reading some publicity material for the movie Explorers and being mildly put off by the first sentence of her bio: "Amanda Peterson is a very beautiful young lady". As if that was all that mattered. Keep in mind that the same scrip had just waxed eloquent on the acting abilities of her costar River Phoenix, and that her role in the film largely amounted to letting the male castmembers ogle her through her bedroom window. She then played the object of Patrick Dempsey's desire who basically prostitutes herself to him for $1000 in Can't Buy Me Love. When you think about it, it's not really surprising that she struggled in her career, when Hollywood treated her like that.
12	Hope Solo		670,960	The notoriously tempestuous goalkeeper for the US national soccer team was declared the best goalkeeper of the tournament, but her victory was overshadowed by the continuing controversy about her assault charges last year.
13	Omar Sharif		638,419	The suave Egyptian actor who made the ladies of the 60s swoon in sweeping historical epics like Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago died this week at the age of 83. It's a bit odd to see him so low on the list, but he had stepped out of the limelight in recent years.
14	Jurassic World		628,896	In this era of duelling gargantuas, when Hollywood risks $200 million budgets on a whim and triple-digit opening weekends are a seasonal event, the financial achievements of the first Jurassic Park can seem somewhat pallid. And yet, it was for a time the most successful film ever made, and more importantly, formed the prototype for the modern blockbuster; massive, frontloaded opening weekend, brushfire earnings and supercharged ancillaries. And now, after Furious 7 and Avengers: Age of Ultron made substantial dents in the US GDP, Jurassic World has arrived to show that its aging franchise is perfectly capable of holding its own in today's hostile environment. Its $208 million opening weekend was the biggest of all time, though at just $1 million above the previous record set by Marvel's The Avengers back in 2012, it wasn't exactly a killing blow. Still, it managed to claim the highest second weekend gross of all time as well, showing that it may well be on the way to repeating the performance of its ancestor. Today, the Jurassic franchise is just one monster among many, but it has shown that it still has the right to reign.
15	Vyapam Scam	Unassessed	622,562	This cheating scandal, in which candidates for government jobs in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh paid already qualified people to either impersonate them or to allow them to copy their answers, has engulfed doctors, politicians (including a former education minister) and other individuals throughout the state and involved a surprising number of suspicious deaths. This week the gradually unfolding mess was handed over to the CBI, the Indian equivalent of the FBI.
16	Roger Federer		605,649	The man widely regarded as the best tennis player of all time lost the Wimbledon title to Novak Djokovic in a titanic 7-6, 6-7, 6-4, 6-3 showdown.
17	Deaths in 2015		506,839	The viewing figures for this article have been remarkably constant; fluctuating week to week between 450 and 550,000, apparently heedless of who actually died.
18	2015 FIFA Women's World Cup		506,839	See #2, #8, #10, #12... Actually, see most of this list.
19	Garbiñe Muguruza		487,998	In her fourth year as a professional player, the 21-year-old Spaniard made it all the way to the Wimbledon final to face eventual victor Serena Williams, having already seen her off in the 2014 French Open.
20	Alex Morgan		478,895	Only just back from injury, the US national forward had little impact on the World Cup this time round (she scored three goals, none of which were among the five scored in the final) but remains a media darling, both for her looks (she's appeared in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue) and for her children's writing.
21	Independence Day (United States)		458,124	The American celebration of its Declaration of Independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain on July 4, 1776 (although technically American independence was declared on July 2, by which time the American Revolutionary War had already been going for more than a year, and not actually attained until February 3, 1783) is arguably the biggest summer festival in the English-speaking world, with the possible exception of Christmas in Australia.
22	Jason Lee (actor)		444,170	As learned on a Reddit thread this week, the unrepentant Scientologist divorced and then cut off all contact with his wife after she read a book criticising the religion.
23	2015 CONCACAF Gold Cup		438,820	The North American equivalent of the Copa America, the UEFA European Championship or the Africa Cup of Nations got underway in the United States on July 7.
24	Venus Williams		430,478	Her sister Serena may have knocked her out of Wimbledon in the third round, but the rising tide of interest in Serena's eventual victory lifted her up as well.
25	Methaqualone		427,636	This recreational depressant, more popularly known as quaaludes, had long been seen as much a relic of the 70s as bell bottoms and sideburns, until it was revealed that Bill Cosby had admitted giving them to women, all but confirming his past rape allegations.

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 also exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (~2% or less) or almost all mobile views (~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.

Note: If you came here from the Signpost article, please take any discussion of exclusions to this article's talk page.