Top 25 Report: Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (March 29 to April 4, 2015)

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Summary: How appropriate that the theme of Easter week would be resurrection from the dead. The dominant thread this week was the release of Furious 7, a film which already looks to be one of the most profitable of the year, and stars Paul Walker in the role he was playing when he died. Not since The Crow have we had a more emphatic demonstration of the power of film to preserve the essence of the living after death. Also, the TV series The Walking Dead had its season finale this week, allowing many people to make what I am sure was a copious amount of Zombie Jesus jokes. If remembrance of the dead could be considered resurrection, then that of beloved pop star Selena on the 20th anniversary of her death this week certainly qualifies. Finally, Justin Bieber attempted to resuscitate his dying career by appearing on a celebrity roast, only to meet his nemesis in, of all people, Martha Stewart. The event occupied two slots on the list, neither of which were him.

As prepared by Serendipodous, for the week of March 29 to April 4, 2015, the 25 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the report of the most viewed pages, were:

Rank	Article	Views	Notes
1	Furious 7	1,832,224	The seventh instalment of this long-running series, whose grip on sanity has decreased as its profitability has increased, opened on April 3. In keeping with tradition, this movie is so insane it shook off the death of its lead actor midway through and kept on trucking. And, again in keeping with tradition, it has outgrossed its predecessors, taking $67 million on its first day – more than The Fast and the Furious 3 earned in its entire run.
2	WrestleMania 31	1,490,998	Our readers love their WWE, and everyone seems to be slathering over this latest event, which aired on March 29. Critically praised, the show was watched live by 76,976 fans, drew in 1.3 million online subscribers and generated $3.3 million in merchandising (all WWE records) and is expected to break records again when the pay-per-view results come in. It apparently struck a chord in the Zeitgeist, since it also generated 10 #1 Twitter trends.
3	April Fools' Day	1,398,363	The first day of April, perennial party for practical jokers and pranksters, continues to amuse the cynical and infuriate the gullible, and this year seems particularly popular, as numbers are up by over a third from last year.
4	Good Friday	1,004,089	The dark bit of Easter, this commemorates (despite its name, "celebrates" isn't really the right word) the torture and crucifixion (Passion) of Jesus Christ, as opposed to Easter Sunday which celebrates his resurrection.
5	Paul Walker	874,563	Furious 7, the last, and arguably biggest, film of Paul Walker's career, was released this week, despite his tragic death midway through production. How much of the film's current record grosses was in memoriam to a fallen star is impossible to say.
6	The Fast and the Furious	748,318	See #1
7	Easter	718,373	It's hard to remember these days, under the onslaught of bunnies, chocolate eggs and marshmallow peeps, that Easter, not Christmas, is the most sacred date of the Christian calendar. Doubtless a lot of people learned that this week, along with some fairly eye-raising information about the events it actually celebrates.
8	The Walking Dead (TV series)	659,125	The season finale of this popular TV series premièred on March 29.
9	The Walking Dead (season 5)	586,354	See above
10	Interstellar (film)	586,354	The polarising blockbuster was released on home video on March 31.
11	Selena	556,339	This week marked the 20th anniversary of the tragic murder of the Tejano singer, at just 23. Always a cult figure, her cult has grown only more passionate in the decades since.
12	Martha Stewart	540,118	The home improvement guru and onetime inmate demonstrated a little-seen aspect of her personality during a comedy roast of Justin Bieber; a rather biting, foul-mouthed aspect that proved wildly popular online.
13	Deaths in 2015	524,929	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.
14	Zayn Malik	489,235	The singer's departure from the massively popular boy band One Direction on March 25 caused the celebrity-focused parts of the internet to explode.
15	Dwayne Johnson	483,722	"The Rock" has had a busy week. Not only is he the second of four actors from Furious 7 on this list, he also appeared at WrestleMania 31 with his costar Ronda Rousey (see #20), and hosted SNL.
16	Facebook	480,126	A perennially popular article.
17	The Flash (2014 TV series)	479,210	This spinoff from the hit series Arrow marks DC Comics' second attempt to create a TV universe, after the late and much lamented DC Animated Universe.
18	Hannibal Buress	478,245	The African American stand-up comic, whose comments about Bill Cosby's longstanding rape allegations last year brought them back into the glare of the pop culture searchlight, premiered an hourlong Comedy Central show, Hannibal Buress Live from Chicago, on March 29.
19	Game of Thrones (season 5)	475,718	And it's baa-aack. Well, next week. I am not the world's greatest fan of Game of Thrones, but I swear, even if you thought it was televisual swill, after curating this list for three years solid you'd have the dadadadaDUM! dadadadaDUM! dadadadaDUM! crashing around your skull too.
20	Ronda Rousey	468,068	The UFC women's bantamweight champion showed up alongside her Furious 7 costar Dwayne Johnson at WrestleMania 31 to face off in mixed doubles against Triple H and his wife, Stephanie McMahon.
21	Eiffel Tower	465,444	The supposedly temporary construction that has remained standing for 126 years got a Google Doodle on its latest birthday, on March 31.
22	Vin Diesel	455,915	Vin Diesel, a.k.a Mark Vincent a.k.a Melkor (his D&D name, and before you say that's irrelevant, he had it fake-tattooed on his stomach while filming XXX) is the nominal star of Furious 7, though Paul Walker will doubtless be in most people's thoughts. He also recently became a father for the third time, so between that and Furious 7's grosses, he has a lot to smile about, even if he will doubtless be remembering his departed friend. By the way, his new daughter's name is Pauline, after Paul Walker.
23	Better Call Saul	455,915	The season finale of this television show spinoff of Breaking Bad (a former chart favourite on Wikipedia) starring Bob Odenkirk (pictured), debuted on AMC on April 6.
24	Pete Davidson	437,948	The SNL star appeared at the same comedy roast at which Martha Stewart (above) tore into Justin Bieber.
25	Stephen Hawking	437,079	Is it finally time to say goodbye? The former Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, black hole theorist, and latter-day science icon makes his 22nd straight appearance in the Top 25 this week, but, with his biopic and the Oscars now long behind, it seems it may be his last. It is nonetheless a remarkable testament to the esteem in which he is held throughout the English-speaking world that he managed to last so long.

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.