Talk:Casualty series 38

Requested move 27 April 2024

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) BilledMammal (talk) 02:35, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

– Following my WP:BOLD restructure of these pages and the discussion on my talk page with. I outline there the rationale behind the changes, and acknowledge that the WP:COMMONNAME of these series is their individual titles, though WP:TVSEASON requires their titling to consider consistency across the entire show. U-Mos (talk) 12:49, 27 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Casualty series 38 → In Plain Sight (Casualty)
 * Casualty series 39 → Welcome to the Warzone
 * Casualty series 40 → Driving Force (Casualty)
 * Casualty series 41 → A History of Violence (Casualty)
 * Casualty series 42 → Breaking Point (Casualty)

I'm currently rolling my eyes at them being split in the first place: They're clearly not Series 38-42, they're subdivisions of Series 37 and 38, which have been given subtitles for promotional reasons. They were organised perfectly with the subtitles included as part of the larger seasons and then someone goes and changes them. But ho-hum, I doubt anyone's going to change them back now, so yes, if you're going to give each of them their own page, those are the best titles to use. Skteosk (talk) 21:12, 27 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Also rolling my eyes at the series being split in the first place, as sources have already stated in that that the series would be shorter in their quantity of episodes for the future. Series 38 has already been confirmed to have 36 episodes (1), so why on Earth these changes have been made, especially without discussion, is beyond me. I preferred the original layout and it was more accurate too. EpisodeAdder (talk) 11:09, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It's worth considering that source. As I said on my talk page, there's no disputing that at that point in time episodes were being released as series 38, which has since changed to the shorter titled series. Accordingly, that article's discussion describes the "current series" as the larger body of 36 episodes. But notice that the BBC quotation does no such thing, pre-empting the shift that followed this year by talking of "episodes per year" rather than series lengths. 36 episodes per year, i.e. three complete series as they're now being distributed. 36 episodes since what was initially released as the start of series 38 will land in the middle of the next episode collection, at which point it will absolutely not be acceptable for Wikipedia to assert a new series has begun on the basis of a year-old source dated prior to a demonstrable and verifiable change in the categorisation of episodes from the start of 2023. There is no BBC source past or present that describes the episodes currently airing as series 38, because they are no longer being released as such, so there won't be one describing any future episodes as series 39 either. And that's without mentioning how maintaining a defunct format structure actively discourages the integration of secondary material (I wonder why there was so little concerning the Driving Force arc in either article...) U-Mos (talk) 12:21, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Even if you can justify that by the policy change, what on earth is the point of splitting Series 37, which was advertised, made and broadcast as a 43-episode season, into four different parts with a made-up justification about it being truncated to 13 episodes. The BBC might have retroactively split it all up for streaming purposes, but that's not the way it was originally made available, and none of these miniseries titles have ever been used on screen, where the show just carries on from one to the other. The BBC still seems to be referring to it as Series 38 internally for commissioning purposes, the miniseries format is solely for publicity and even there it's somewhat downplayed. Making out that the show now has three or four different series a year is a ludicrous misrepresentation of the facts, given that the "miniseries" description seems to infer that they are simply chapters of the overall series structure. And who knows if this will even stick, or if it will just be a gimmick or fad that will be phased out now the person that came up with it is moving on from the show (as the decision to drop episode titles, which had a near-identical "That's what modern shows do" justification, has been)? They did this sort of thing with The Flash, subdiving series into chapters which often ran between season breaks. Did someone come along and decide that Seasons 6-9 should be broke up into nine or more different pages covering each chapter? No, of course not, that would be absurd. If there isn't much information on every miniseries within the series (which is a common feature of soap pages, someone adding a realm of information at the start and then losing interest and leaving it for months or years without a significant update), then add it to the existing page, don't create a new one! Skteosk (talk) 13:22, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If you can provide sources for the BBC continuing to "internally" commission/produce the series in this way, go right ahead. An American network series, where seasons occur at a uniformly fixed point of the year, is not a viable comparison here to a show that (whichever perspective you take) doesn't routinely take any transmission break between series. There's no reason why a high-volume British show can't have multiple series per year; in fact, Waterloo Road is doing exactly the same in exactly the same time period (after, would you believe, initially producing what was released as three separate series as one). We follow sources, and almost all of those cited in the relevant articles are predicated on the miniseries/story arc structure, now backed up by the BBC's own distribution. If they change again, we change again. U-Mos (talk) 13:51, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The point is that it was released as one series. It's only now being retroactively referred to as separate miniseries. The change of categorisation didn't occur until the end of 2024, when they suddenly rebranded the old episodes which up until then had been listed as Series 37 Episodes 1-43 and Series 38 Episodes 1-6. Which is why the Wikipedia articles were written that way and why they should have been left that way. The fact that someone has produced a source from September 2023 confirming that the new episodes were still considered Series 38 following on from Series 37 at that point is clear evidence that claiming Series 38 began eight months earlier is nonsense. You're applying a policy that began in December 2023 to episodes made and broadcast a year earlier. The whole thing is recentism, using a numbering system established later rather than the one in use at the time. Skteosk (talk) 15:57, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If we stick to how episodes were originally released, then we'll have a six episode long series 38. It's very clear when the mini-series format began, so we should be consistent across that period.
 * Anyway, there's a possible compromise here to coincide with the proposed name changes. These named arcs can be described as miniseries/serials/story arcs/whatever within series 37/38, and we can (at least for now) cite the longer series lengths to the additional sources Raintheone provided on my talk page. The story arcs are the notable and article-worthy units, regardless of whether they're complete series or not. Then we can wait and see from the summer and beyond, as long as we remain source-led rather than habit-led. How does that sound? U-Mos (talk) 16:25, 28 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, that does sound reasonable. Whilst I'm not entirely convinced separating them into their own articles was needed, I won't mind so much so long as the series numbers are accurately reflected rather than the articles being given made-up series numbers. A closer examination of the renumbering shows that the BBC have basically reset the numbers, referring to the miniseries as 1-5 rather than 38-42 or whatever, which may be something to note going forwards. Skteosk (talk) 14:26, 29 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay, that can be done if this proposal results in the pages being moved. U-Mos (talk) 15:24, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Oppose. These names are very definitely not the common titles. Usually known by series number just like any other series. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:56, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Oppose a split into several series. I think there are enough sources to confirm which overall series each mini-series fall within. Soaper1234 - talk  12:25, 4 May 2024 (UTC)