Talk:Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction

Postapocalyptic vs post-apocalyptic
Webster's suggest spelling of postapocalyptic without the hyphen. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/postapocalyptic

Theking2 (talk) 16:54, 27 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Although Merriam Webster is seen as authoritative (in the US at least--obviously the rest of the English speaking world refers to the Oxford English Dictionary, which for academic purposes serves us all much better), this spelling is not the result of changing usage, but rather someone's hope of making a change for the sake of ease. That's not how new words or new spellings usually come to be--throughout history the dictionary follows usage, not the other way around. For that reason, I don't think there's much debate: it's post-apocalyptic, with a hyphen. Why? Because that's how everyone spells it right now. Besides which, take a look (use your search engine of choice) through those colleges and Universities offering classes on Post-Apocalyptic Fiction--at my school it is offered under the ENG-319 Studies in Genre and Form. If the college/university professors use a hyphen, you should too. Professorwilder (talk) 03:57, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "books.google.com": From Anti-Catholicism: Scheina, Robert L. Latin America's Wars: The Age of the Caudillo, 1791–1899 p. 33 (2003 Brassey's) ISBN 978-1-57488-452-4 From Rhema: The Fight of Every Believer by Terry Law ISBN 1-57794-580-8 page 45 From God in Buddhism: Gethin, Rupert. "Cosmology and meditation: from the Agganna Sutta to the Mahayana" in Williams, Paul. Buddhism, Vol. II. Routledge 2004. ISBN 0-415-33228-1 pgs 104, 126  

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 17:07, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

terraforming
"The television series Defiance (2013–2015) is set in an Earth devastated by the "Pale Wars", a war with seven alien races referred to as the "Votan", followed by the "Arkfalls", which terraforms Earth to an almost unrecognizable state. Unlike most apocalyptic works, in this one Earth is not inhospitable, and humanity is not on the verge of extinction."

maybe transforming could be better than terraforming. Terra means earth in many languages derived from Latin. Transforming earth into earth makes no sense in that context. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:2C5:C600:22D2:C514:C4B9:FB98:5903 (talk) 23:17, 24 June 2018 (UTC)

Encyclopedic style is not allowed on encyclopedia, as do any useful additions, apparently
So, here what happened: 1) I've added entry on 13_Sentinels:_Aegis_Rim under "Pandemic -> DOOM Eternal". 2) It got immediately almost completely removed with ambiguous description "rewrote 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim". 3) I've reverted as per suggestions in WP:BOLD and WP:EDITWAR, saying: "undo: due to wanton nullification of contribution on a non-trivial example". 4) Reverter added "Citation needed" sign without any further clarifications. 5) I've added links and quotes to ending scenes describing my summary and its meaning verbosely, 8-hour analysis of it, interview with the writer & creator and producer of the game, review summary making the same point and quote from famous game director that recently made similarly lauded piece about same topic which would clear any possible questions about what's the point of that addition and why it's the way it is. Mainly that these points, pertaining to apocalyptic subject specifically, are something that many people don't get outright because they are told in fractured manner and not all in one place of a single paragraph or scene. 6) It got fully reverted by other person with some kind of questionable accusations: "Reverting good faith edits. Poorly written, written in an encyclopaedic style, too much detail, written like a promotion of the subject. Need I say more (RW 16)" Now. I've naively been under impression that encyclopedias are written in encyclopaedic style and that if something is "written poorly" then you supposed to point on exact "poor" qualities and/or fix them, not destroy additions and accuse contributors for them. Not sure whose "good faith edits" were supposed to be and whose revert is "good" or "bad" supposed to be in that claim. "Too much detail" is pretty hypocritical because 1) it barely touches the subject of a massive story 2) right there below there are "War -> Metro 2033 & DOOM Eternal" entries that are just as big, even though it's not supposed to be a defining factor anyway, unlike usefulness in getting the point across. As for "like a promotion", there is this thing called "passion" and "enthusiasm", it makes people do thing that are not directly beneficial, like writing clarification articles in their spare time on subjects they care about, making things instead of destroying them, trying to be useful instead of feeding on drama of being antagonistic in violation of WP:BOLD and WP:EDITWAR. guidelines they are supposedly "safekeeping" from "evil additioners". But, apparently, here "good faith" is a den of destroyers nuking contributions and accusing contributors. It seems there were plenty reason for Why_is_Wikipedia_losing_contributors_-_Thinking_about_remedies and Content_removal articles being made, good thing I did not participate in this mess before and, likely, shouldn't bother ever again or promote others to try. Ironically, that this is kind of the reason for humanity's downfall in the discussed story. DFX (talk) 15:08, 15 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Aaaand right after that another deleter have completely removed the mention of the game about restoring humanity after its complete annihilation because it's "not really on topic for this article"… but Doom is. That just tells you all you need to know. DFX (talk) 15:49, 15 February 2021 (UTC)
 * . I was one of the editors to revert your contribution. My edit summary was justified but I missed 'un' infront of encyclopaedic - so it should have been written in an 'unencylopaedic' style. Apologies for any confusion. Yes you can be WP:BOLD but if another editor reverts your edit you should follow WP:BRD. Discussion is a key part of building an encyclopaedia. No-one is apriori 'correct' but there is a process to follow to make sure that edits in Wikipedia improve the quality of the articles and follow Wikipedia policies such as reliable sources WP:RS, verifiability WP:V, whether an article is notable or contribuitions are due weight - WP:NOTABLE, WP:DUE. Just because your contribution is reverted doesn't mean that, after discussion, some of it or even all of it shouldn't be restored. But what is restored will depend on policy and WP:CONSENSUS among editors. Maybe you should read some of the linked information especially WP:DUE and MOS:VG and then come back and discuss what you want to add and why. Oh and you have misunderstood the term 'good faith'. It merely means that your edit was done in good faith by you and you weren't attempting to vandalise or otherwise disrupt the encyclopaedia. Saying someone had made a good faith edit is a positive thing but good faith edits can still be wrong. Robynthehode (talk) 16:53, 15 February 2021 (UTC)


 * I imagine it was a typo, and they meant it was unencyclopedic. Which it was. It was rambling and kinda read like you forgot to tie it in to the subject of the article. Anyways, they have done nothing wrong - this is how the website functions - anyone is free to challenge content in good-faith. It looks like two separate editors oppose, three counting me. So now the rules say that the content is to stay out unless there is a WP:CONSENSUS on adding it back in to some capacity. Sergecross73   msg me  17:09, 15 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's how it works: all for appeasement of self-appointed porters instead of content of the articles or their relevance on their subject, I see.  . How is "It was rambling and kinda read like you forgot to tie it in to the subject of the article" an argument for anything ? You can put that statement about anything because you personally feel confused by something which has no objective bearing. I pretty clearly stated that in the topic's story humanity has died and story is happening in another place & time and that it's about recovering from that, as in "what post-apocalyptic media is all about", with links to further clarifications. Maybe you should ask yourself instead: what are you doing exactly by deleting information someone else worked on and why ? Is this how your attempt in presenting viewer of this article with relevant information looks like and to what end ? DFX (talk) 09:03, 16 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Rather than accusing other editors of having an agenda and reverting your edits without good reason it is much better to follow the colloborative nature of Wikipedia. First: Have you read the links I posted? WP:RS is important and so is MOS:VG Second: Do you have source/s that support your content's relevance to this article? You clearly believe this work should be included. Why not make the argument here, post your proposed text here and let other editors make constructive comments. It may be that consensus about inclusion goes against you (or it may not) but you aren't going to get anywhere with an accusative approach that assumes you are right and all the other editors who have commented are on a personal vendetta against you. Take a step back. Write a reworded entry and make your case here first for inclusion of your content. Robynthehode (talk) 11:15, 16 February 2021 (UTC)
 * If you waste all your time attacking people, you'll never get a consensus to add your info in any form. Either propose a differently worded version on the talk page, or drop it. Stop wasting our time with the tirades. If you're going to throw a fit every time someone alters or remove your content, this isn't going to be the website for you. Sometimes it'll be because info is objectively wrong. Other times it may be that they subjectively feel it's not well written or handled. It's how the website works. Sergecross73   msg me  19:20, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Multiple subsections in wrong place
Multiple entries in this article are listed under the wrong subsection. For example, many of the entries in 'Comics' are actually to do with war while being listed under pandemic. This is prevalent throughout the article. Fones4jenke (talk) 21:00, 3 August 2021 (UTC)

"Post-holocaust" listed at Redirects for discussion
An editor has identified a potential problem with the redirect Post-holocaust and has thus listed it for discussion. This discussion will occur at until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. BDD (talk) 17:09, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Possible Copyright violations in this page
I just removed several lengthy bullet points for having been copied directly from Roger Ebert's review site, which, unless I'm mistaken, is very much not allowed. The entry on the Terminator is suspicious as well, but I can't currently confirm or deny. Movie reviews fall under copyrighted text, which has to be immediately removed, so do so if you notice it here. 192.77.12.11 (talk) 12:55, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Two very different topics on one page--extremely misleading and false.
Post-apocalyptic fiction and apocalyptic fiction are no more similar than, say, science fiction and fantasy. I'm sure many would argue they're both just lame sub-genres of bad fiction, but I never expected the user-driven catalogue of information on wikipedia to fail so adeptly in this way. I am not pointing fingers--to many people I imagine these two sub-genres are "close enough." However! Apocalyptic fiction is, by necessity, during the apocalypse--at this stage the speculative world is still in flames, the conflict that led to the apocalyptic event either still raging on or only just having come to its conclusion; this means a story of war, conflict, destruction and death. More importantly it means that it has occurred while civilization (as a whole, which is to say the modern world with all its technological resources and government regulated infrastructure, etc.) yet shows signs of life. These stories, unless they span both genres and include a significant duration contemporary of the actual civilization-ending event and continue the story a whole generation later into the post-apocalypse era. Having a minute of the apocalypse at the beginning of a book would not be a an apocalyptic fiction, as it only uses the apocalypse to introduce and begin a post-apocalyptic story. Very rarely are these stories of hope, at least not for the characters forced to live through it (or die trying); if there is hope it's in the shape of an ellipsis, a to-be-continued, or perhaps in a pregnant woman escaping on a life-boat or some kids narrowly avoiding the blast or sickness or whatever--my point is that while there are some overlapping themes and perhaps even some moments on the apocalyptic timeline, the genres each cover a single era: one during and one after the civilization-ending event.

In contrast, post-apocalyptic fiction takes place in a vastly different world, one without any civilizations whatsoever remaining in tact--only groups of people that form small (relatively, comparing to the past) societies, which by definition are not civilizations but rather simply groups of interdependent people, a definition that suits almost any group of people larger than a single family unit. Tribes, for example, are societies. National geographic has a very helpful page (I just found it!) on what makes a civilization. After the apocalypse, it's gone. That means stories not of war, but rather of survival, rebuilding, renewal, and with any luck, some hope--a light at the end of the tunnel. Professorwilder (talk) 03:50, 22 February 2023 (UTC)


 * Yes, I fully support this and think the article should be split into two. Apocalyptic is a very specific genre describing the moment of catastrophe, the actual moment of collapse. In post-apocalyptic the setting of the destroyed civilization is a basis, and the causes of the collapse are not necessary and not so rarely are described in a cursory manner. In some cases, a post-apocalypse fiction can even be post-dystopian fiction without an apocalypse per se. Solidest (talk) 06:29, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

This article is written like TV Tropes
Really needs to be cleaned up and summarized more concisely, the opening sections are good but there way too many examples listed after that. Like, come on, just because it has a flood in it doesn't make Zelda the Wind Waker notable apocalyptic fiction. I'm not an expert on Wikipedia but someone should add the proper templates flagging this article's flaws. 240B:250:91C0:6A00:B14B:E23A:92B5:3531 (talk) 10:00, 28 June 2024 (UTC)