Wikipedia:Top 25 Report/October 13 to 19, 2024

Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (October 13 to 19, 2024)

Prepared with commentary by Igordebraga, Vestrian24Bio and Shuipzv3.

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The shocking death of a young singer tops the list and brings his old group, and in a preview of Halloween, there are many horror movies.

Rank	Article	Views	Notes/about
1	Liam Payne	7,904,304	British singer Liam Payne might've not had the greatest solo career after the end of #4 in 2016, but it sadly became a short one once he died at the age of 31 falling from a third-floor balcony in an Argentinian hotel, and it's yet to be determined whether it was an accident or a suicide. Payne was technically a one-hit wonder with "Strip That Down" and had only one studio album to his name, cheekily named LP1, and it's unclear how much of the second album he announced last year had been recorded. Many tributes emerged.
2	Cheryl (singer)	2,011,202	From 2016 to 2018, #1 dated this singer who like him was part of a group formed in a reality show, with whom he had a son. Cheryl issued a public request for consideration and dignity, fearing their child could potentially access "the abhorrent reports and media exploitation" regarding Payne's death.
3	Lyle and Erik Menendez	1,800,441
4	One Direction	1,757,832	In 2010, #1 had just had his second unsuccessful audition to The X Factor when guest judge Nicole Scherzinger suggested he and four other candidates (#11, #15, #18 and #19) get together to compete as a band. The result not only finished third in the season but spearheaded the boy band revival of the 2010s, selling millions of albums and filling up stadiums before being reduced to a quartet with the departure of #11 in 2015, followed by an indefinite hiatus in 2016 so all members could pursue solo careers.
5	Baba Siddique	1,747,594
6	Lawrence Bishnoi	1,560,755
7	Yahya Sinwar	1,239,034	The leader of Hamas was killed in a firefight with IDF soldiers on October 16.
8	Deaths in 2024	1,029,961	All these places had their moments With lovers and friends, I still can recall Some are dead, and some are living In My Life, I've loved them all
9	Terrifier 3	917,431	The third installment in the Terrifier franchise of slasher films, delving into Christmas horror as Art the Clown attacks the Yuletide shoppers, was released worldwide last week to positive reviews from critics and has grossed $35 million so far against a budget of $2 million, becoming the highest-grossing film of the franchise and one of the most profitable of thew year.
10	Rodney Alcala	859,974	In 1978, this guy won a date on television by appearing on The Dating Game, only to be rejected by the lady who found him "creepy". She dodged a bullet, as Alcala had already murdered 3 women and would kill at least five more before his arrest one year later, leading to decades waiting for capital punishment until Alcala died in prison in 2021. The story was told by Anna Kendrick in her directorial debut Woman of the Hour, with Daniel Zovatto as Alcala and Kendrick herself as the would-be date Cheryl Bradshaw, which was added to the Netflix catalogue.
11	Zayn Malik	757,687	This singer of Pakistani descent left #4 in the middle of a tour in 2015, and one year later managed the Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper the group lacked with "Pillowtalk", plus another hit with the Taylor Swift duet "I Don't Wanna Live Forever". Zayn has barely charted ever since - which coincides with the rise of another 1D member who has had a more consistent solo career (#19). Not helping was how he struck the mother of his partner Gigi Hadid, being sent to probation, anger management and a domestic violence education programme.
12	Joker: Folie à Deux	666,911	The numbers of the beast and emergency together? Seems adequate for what's shaping up to be a historical failure, which hasn't even covered its massive $200 million budget after three weeks in theaters. A big cause is general disappointment from viewers who wanted the sequel to the wildly successful Joker to live up to the subtitle meaning "madness for two" simply by pairing the Joker and Harley Quinn, only to receive a weird hybrid of courtroom drama, psychological thriller and jukebox musical.
13	The Substance	650,228	An acclaimed criticism of ageism, beauty standards and celebrity, told with a lot of stomach-churning body horror, where Demi Moore decides to give a second wind to her career by using a black-market serum to create a younger version of herself played by Margaret Qualley. The Substance premiered at the 77th Cannes Film Festival and won Best Screenplay Award, and has been rolling gradually around the world (it entered American theaters last month, but will only do so in the France of director Coralie Fargeat next month), and has already grossed over $31.4 million against a budget of $17.5 million. Its American distributor MUBI must soon add it to their streaming.
14	Ratan Tata	629,242
15	Niall Horan	591,936	The one Irish member of #4 has mostly retreated to his home country, with only one worldwide hit, "Slow Hands", source of an all-time bad lyric in "Like sweat dripping down our dirty laundry". #1 was in Buenos Aires both to solve visa problems in the American embassy and watch Niall perform at the Movistar Arena.
16	Vettaiyan	591,617	Fourth Super star film to be produced by Lyca Productions after 2.0, Darbar and Lal Salaam; and yet all four of them didn't do good in the Box Office. Despite featuring fame actors with renowned directors and huge budget, the production house's last few ventures (Ponniyin Selvan: II, Chandramukhi 2, Lal Salaam , Indian 2 etc.) have been disastrous at the box office. As the latest entry on this list, this film was made on a budget of ₹300 crore (US$36 million) and was coined as "A new film with the same old concept" by netizens. Even scandalous, the production house has been posting on social media claiming that the film has grossed over ₹300 crores within 7 days, and yet according to reliable news sources the film has only made ₹207 crore (US$25 million) after 10 days.
17	Sean Combs	576,488
18	Louis Tomlinson	550,165	The two remaining members of #4. Louis Tomlinson only charted well with his first two singles (and his Wikipedia article was targeted by some pageview shenanigans for two years) but received positive reviews for his sophomore album. Harry Styles can be considered the group's Justin Timberlake, with three successful albums, including one that got the Grammy Award for Album of the Year, and lots of hits like "Sign of the Times", "Watermelon Sugar", "Adore You" and "As It Was".
19	Harry Styles	547,296
20	Thomas Tuchel	543,572
21	Smile 2	542,733	After Smile became a surprise hit in 2022, a sequel was greenlit. This time the entity who haunts a person with smiling hallucinations before driving them to suicide targets a singer played by Naomi Scott (who surprisingly has been in no films since Aladdin and Charlie's Angels 5 years ago). Reviews were positive, but given how unnerved this here writer was watching the first, he took the example of this article and decided to just read the Wikipedia plot summary rather than be frightened in theaters.
22	Elon Musk	534,277	The multi-billionaire continues to make news with his support of #25's opponent. Aside from appearing alongside Donald Trump at a rally last week, it was reported he has given nearly US$75 million to a pro-Trump political group he helped found. This week, he also announced that he will give away $1 million every day to a random voter who signs a petition circulated by his group, prompting questions whether he is violating a federal law prohibiting payments for voting or registering to vote.
23	Terrifier	516,852	In 2016, Damien Leone made a full length feature out of Art the Clown, an evil clown he first featured in two short films, using his low budget (ranging from either $35,000 to $55,000) to mostly create grotesque effects of murder and mutilation. Its success in a limited theatrical run led to the 2022 sequel Terrifier 2, which managed to get box office in the millions, and ultimately the movie at #9 in this list, which downright ends on a sequel hook.
24	Agatha All Along (miniseries)	505,364	We already had a DC entry (#12), here's a Marvel one in the MCU's current Disney+ show, that released its 6th episode last Wednesday with only 3 episodes remaining till the finale. The previous episode revealed one of the main characters was actually one fans were eagerly waiting (a cosplay of him is seen to the left), as this character would play a major role in the speculated upcoming storyline The Children's Crusade which is expected to be tied-in to the upcoming Vision Quest series, which would also introduce the MCU's version of the Young Avengers. And guess who is the big bad of this storyline... I'll give you a clue: it's the same one that will face the Avengers — Doctor Doom. But it also raised a lot of questions such as how Billy Maximoff vanished as a 10-year-old in WandaVision but managed to show up alive as a Goth teen three years later. This week's episode didn't just answer those questions but also simplified Wiccan's origin story, which is a multiple time retconned mess in the comics.
25	Kamala Harris	497,648