Talk:Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man

Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man has been listed as one of the Media and drama good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man is part of the The X-Files (season 4) series, a good topic. This is identified as among the best series of articles produced by the Wikipedia community. If you can update or improve it, please do so.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
January 27, 2012	Good article nominee	Listed
July 14, 2013	Good topic candidate	Promoted

Current status: Good article

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name of the book[edit]

What's the name of the book CSM is reading in his bunk bed, right before he gets sent on the JFK assassination? -Meisterdieb (talk) 21:04, 17 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Fictional history of CSM?[edit]

Did Frohike find a copy of Roman a Clef with "Take a Chance: A Jack Colquitt Adventure, by Raul Bloodworth"? Was "Take a Chance" fiction or autobiography? Naaman Brown (talk) 01:15, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's never made explicitly clear, but there's a few things that are off about the episode that might lead you to assume it's not 'canon'. Off the top of my head, I'm pretty sure CSM's age/date of birth is inconsistent, plus Frohike mentions that his source is a magazine, though he doesn't name it as being the same one that serialised "Take a Chance". From what I gather, Spotnitz doesn't consider it the 'truth', but it's something that would need sources to verify either way if it were to be discussed in the article itself. GRAPPLE X 01:26, 16 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

GA Review[edit]

This review is transcluded from Talk:Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Ruby2010 (talk · contribs) 21:57, 25 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Will review this one soon. Ruby 2010/2013 21:57, 25 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

It is reasonably well written.
a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):
It is factually accurate and verifiable.
a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):
It is broad in its coverage.
a (major aspects): b (focused):
It follows the neutral point of view policy.
Fair representation without bias:
It is stable.
No edit wars, etc.:
It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.
a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
Overall:
Pass/Fail:

Comments[edit]

You mention "guest appearances" in the lead, but then only mention Owens in that sentence
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The lead could use some re-organizing (production info should be in its own paragraph (the "exploring the background of its..." sentence should probably be moved to 2nd paragraph)
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Also in lead, you mention the Cigarette Smoking Man and the Smoking Man. I assume this is the same person, so you should rearrange the relevant wikilinks and fix the names
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
William B. Davis is linked twice in lead; also second mention of him should simply be "Davis".
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
There's a sense of redundancy in the lead, in that you mention the episode explores Cigarette Smoking Man's background and history in different paragraphs; probably should be re-organized as well
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
"He convinces them to have..." Who convinces them?
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The "giving a monologue that puts a nihilistic spin on the "life is like a box of chocolates" line from Forrest Gump" line verges on original research a little, and should probably be cited.
Changed--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Break up the production's first paragraph (can probably do this starting with "Davis said of ...")
I broke it up right before "Davis was happy..."
"Davis said of James Wong's direction, "Jim Wong's direction..." Kind of redundant. Maybe change to "Davis said of the episode's directional style..." or something similar
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Did Wong win the Emmy? If not, you should say who he lost to
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:49, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The review section of the reception section says "the episode a lot", which is a little grating to read. Input the episode title again somewhere (I know it's long, so use it sparingly)
Changed--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Like in a previous review, there is a WP:LQ issue with quotation marks (hope you can spot it; please don't make me explain it again)
I believe I've fixed it. Tell me if not--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
You use two different dashes for the refs (– vs -)
I think this is better--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Use consistent date formatting (5 December 2011 vs December 5, 2011)
Done--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure how useful that screenshot is; needs further justification otherwise it should be removed
OK, I replaced it with a more poignant one and added a caption explaining its inclusion. Hope that fixes the issues--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Quite a lot of issues that indicate the article should have been looked over more before the nomination. I think this is a good sign that while admirable, you should probably slow down pumping out these X-Files articles so quickly. Just my two cents though. I'll place the review on hold for seven days while the above get addressed. As always, please respond here when you have finished or have queries. Thanks, Ruby 2010/2013 23:31, 26 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Saw this go up so I gave the article a going over. Think I've got everything bar the screenshot sorted out—I've just removed it and replaced it with a free image of Owens and Davis. Think I might comb over some of the other nominees to clear up things like dash usage and quote/date formatting since I think I've seen them come up before. Let me know if I've missed anything here. GRAPPLE X 01:08, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I believe I've (+ Grapple X) fixed all the problems with this article now.--Gen. Quon (talk) 01:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good guys. Sorry I can be a little nitpicky, but the article now looks much better :) Passing for GA. (P.S. Keep an eye on that IP; didn't think it was worth it in this case to delay the review for one dumb "Gene".) Ruby 2010/2013 03:10, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

No, no, all good! Nitpicky is good! This was one of my first GAs I nom'd awhile ago, and I realize it was a tad rough. Sorry about all of that! As for the "Gene" thing, I'll keep my eyes out. Thanks for reviewing!--Gen. Quon (talk) 03:59, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Cigarette-Smoking or Cigarette Smoking?[edit]

The 4th season DVD lists the title of this episode as Cigarette-Smoking, an adjective describing man, whereas Cigarette Smoking refers to an activity. My guess is that the version with the hyphen is correct. ---The Old Jacobite_{The '45} 03:14, 11 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Grammatically speaking, yes a hyphen would be correct; however I'm holding the season four DVD set in my hands and both the booklet and the face of the relevant disc list the title without a hyphen. GRAPPLE X 03:40, 11 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The episode list on the disc has it with a hyphen... hmmm... inconsistencies. I guess we go with whatever is most common, which would be no hyphen. I would like to see the title page of the script and see what it says. ---The Old Jacobite_{The '45} 12:26, 11 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Could be differences in the DVD regions (I'm in region 2), but mine definitely has no hyphen on the disc. However, the Andy Meisler "official guide" for the series uses a hyphen, so there's two official sources with different takes on it. Odd. GRAPPLE X 14:30, 11 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I wasn't clear. I mean the episode menu on-screen, not printed on the DVD. Does Meisler have a source, like the original script, for his version of the title? All things considered, this is a minor point, but it is, as you say, odd. ---The Old Jacobite_{The '45} 15:24, 11 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I couldn't be sure either way but given the secrecy that the series afforded its scripts (printed on red paper sometimes so they couldn't be photocopied), I doubt they'd give them out to third parties like that. GRAPPLE X 15:27, 11 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Well, that was then and this is now, as they say. Surely, it is easier to gain access to the scripts now. ---The Old Jacobite_{The '45} 15:39, 11 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]