Wikipedia:Top 25 Report/November 19 to 25, 2023

Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (November 19 to 25, 2023)

Prepared with commentary by Igordebraga, Ollieisanerd, CAWylie, Ltbdl, GeorgeBailey, Death Editor 2, Rajan51 and a helpful IP.

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

Cricket has wrapped up, and so have some elections.

Rank	Article	Views	Notes/about
1	Cricket World Cup	3,919,491	Like in 1950, a country hosted the world championship for its favorite sport, went to the decisive game in the biggest stadium in the world as massive favorites and still lost. With its sixth World Cup win, Australia, which had already won the most World Cups, has extended its lead over India and the West Indies, with two titles each. Indian cricket fans are certainly trying to overcome their defeat to Australia by checking on the next big tournament, to be hosted in the United States (where people think of the insect when they hear the word cricket) and the West Indies in June. At least, they seem to be getting some payback in T20 matches after their World Cup defeat.
2	2024 ICC Men's T20 World Cup	2,031,267
3	2023 Cricket World Cup	1,880,101
4	Victor Chang	1,619,664	Google homaged with a Doodle a Chinese-Australian doctor who was a heart surgery pioneer in what would've been his 87th birthday.
5	Jimmy Carter	1,402,796	The oldest living former US President who lost his First Lady Rosalynn Carter (see #18), a marriage that lasted nearly 80 years.
6	Napoleon	1,259,949	The war hero turned emperor who expanded France's domains during the 18th century, and many crazy people believe to be a reincarnation of. Ridley Scott just released a movie telling about Mr. Bonaparte's exploits (#10).
7	Javier Milei	1,227,917	The Libertarian winner of the 2023 Argentine general election, and a clear indicator that Argentina didn't learn from the last 4 years where neighbor Brazil was ruled by an unhinged right wing politician. After all, Milei is attracting international headlines due to his unorthodox economical views (drop the peso for the US dollar, saying he would cut relations with China - only to back out when it was clear it would not fly...) and general peculiarities (as summed up here, Milei is "an economist and former tantric sex teacher, former cover band lead singer who advocates for organ trading, denies global warming, apparently wears a wig, supports Bitcoin, preaches free love, and his main political advisor is his deceased dog, with whom he consults through an interspecies medium.").
8	Sam Altman	1,135,940	The CEO of OpenAI was dismissed for unclear reasons (speculation included breakthroughs that would make artificial intelligence even stronger), only to return to his post a few days later.
9	Dolly Parton	1,105,283	The country music legend sang during the halftime concert of the NFL on Thanksgiving Day game, dressed as a cheerleader to show off how she's in great shape for 77. Parton also released her 49th (!) studio album Rockstar, delving into rock n' roll with both covers and original tracks, helped by a star-studded guest list (just for starters, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Elton John, Sting, Sheryl Crow, Miley Cyrus, and Lizzo).
10	Napoleon (2023 film)	1,079,091	Joaquin Phoenix plays #6 in this year's second big budget R-rated biopic after Oppenheimer, but this one might not be the as good with historical accuracy, particularly since it has to fit into less than 2 hours and 40 minutes (in any case, director Ridley Scott said he has a 4 hour cut), but it has great acting and impressive production values to win over viewers. The film arm of the biggest company in the world already gave $200 million for Martin Scorsese to make Killers of the of the Flower Moon, so they also spent a lot on this one and probably don't mind a box office performance if it's acclaimed (even if Napoleon hasn't won critics as much as Scorsese's film - historians in particular took issues with all the artistic licenses, but Scott has no problem bashing them) and brings in viewers to Apple TV+.
11	UEFA Euro 2024 qualifying	1,063,120	20 of the teams that will play the Old Continent's football tournament are set, and 12 nations were split into three short playoffs to determine the last three spots. One of those 'groups' includes two countries currently afflicted by war, namely the one that is still occupied by the Russians and the other that started a truce this week.
12	Bhopal disaster	1,045,013	Netflix released The Railway Men, a miniseries about railway workers who helped evacuate people during the worst industrial disaster in history, where a leakage in an Indian pesticide plant exposed 500,000 to a highly toxic gas.
13	Jamie Lynn Spears	1,043,476	Britney's younger sister (who earlier this year revived her Nickelodeon days in Zoey 102) lasted only two weeks on Dancing with the Stars, so she decided to cross The Pond for another reality show in the UK's I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!
14	Miss Universe 2023	983,300	While many question why beauty pageants still exist (Miss Universe is even trying to appease the opposition being more inclusive, with this year's top 20 including a mother, a plus-size pageant and a trans woman), Sheynnis Palacios was crowned to give Nicaragua its first title. Given she's an opposer to the country's controversial ruler Daniel Ortega (who's been considered a dictator since he's in power since 2007, and is downright banned from visiting the United States), Ms. Palacios has also been hailed as a symbol of resistance against Ortega, who is not taking things well.
15	Deaths in 2023	930,675	I'm Always Chasing Rainbows Watching clouds drifting by My schemes are just like all my dreams Ending in the sky...
16	Dodi Fayed	930,633	The son of #21 gained notoriety when he began courting Princess Diana in July 1997 up until their deaths (memorialized here) one month later. Renewed interest in the last month of his life arose this week with the season six release of The Crown. Dodi was portrayed by Khalid Abdalla.
17	The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes	918,221	8 years after the last movie of The Hunger Games, a prequel centered on the origins of president Coriolanus Snow showed people are still interested in the post-apocalyptic country of Panem. Reviews were positive and The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes has made back its $100 million budget while being set to repeat as the highest-grossing movie of the week, beating #10 and Disney's latest cartoon Wish (as if the House of Mouse wasn't bummed enough by The Marvels underperforming, to the point it fell off this list).
18	Rosalynn Carter	901,047	First Lady of the United States from 1977 to 1981, Rosalynn helped her husband Jimmy (see #5) become governor of Georgia in 1970 and campaigned for his successful bid to become President. During his time in office, she was no ordinary First Lady; she supported his public policies and sat in on staff meetings. She also represented her husband and country as an envoy to Latin America in 1977, and she went on to advocate for women's rights and mental health. She died on November 19 at age 96.
19	ICC Men's T20 World Cup	868,558	The other major international cricket tournament has its next edition(#2) scheduled for next year.
20	Thanksgiving	815,107	The American version of this holiday was celebrated this week. And this year there was an opportunity to do so watching the slasher movie set on it, that Eli Roth first conceived as a fake trailer for 2007's Grindhouse before expanding it to a whole film.
21	Mohamed Al-Fayed	714,092	The Egyptian billionaire, whose death in August aged 94 wasn't enough to make the report, but his appearance in The Crown is, of course. Father of #16, who was in a relationship with Princess Diana when they were both killed in a car crash. He is played in The Crown by Salim Daw.
22	2023 Dutch general election	709,612	In a surprising election upset, the Party For Freedom, a right wing populist party lead by Geert Wilders has won the most seats in the Dutch Election. Don't expect him to actually become prime minister for a few months or so however.
23	Saltburn (film)	707,783	Actress turned writer-director Emerald Fennell (who related to #16, played the woman Lady Di was traded over in The Crown) won an Academy Award for Promising Young Woman, and now is back with this satirical thriller where Barry Keoghan plays a student spending time with the peculiar family of his upper-class schoolmate.
24	ChatGPT	639,755	ChatGPT has been... actually, you know what, I'm sick of this. You know what ChatGPT is. You know why it's on this list. And I'm running out of funny things to say about it. I'm never writing another entry for ChatGPT again. Good day!
25	Virat Kohli	633,036	This veteran Indian cricketer finished #3 as the highest run-scorer, despite his team losing the final. He also became the second-highest run-scorer in all World Cups, behind only his idol.