Talk:The Last Ship (TV series)/Archive 1

OOD and TAO
The Officer of the Deck and Tactical Action Officer are watch stations assigned to qualified personnel designated in writing and rotated in accordance with the ship's watch rotation, not a singular position like CO, XO, Department Head and Division Officer. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:8801:9100:1B9:ACD7:CE62:6FF0:CC36 (talk) 15:46, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Seal Team "stationed" on a Destroyer?
That needs to be reworded, I think. The article that the sentence cites doesn't say the SEAL team is "stationed" anywhere and that's because no SEAL team is ever stationed on a ship. EVER. Now it's possible that after this viral apocalypse they would consider themselves "stationed" on it, but really, that word is very much incorrect. For this reason, I'm changing it to the word used in the article and that is simply "aboard" the ship. MagnoliaSouth (talk) 16:49, 29 June 2014 (UTC)
 * ...which is how the source lists it. Lost in translation perhaps? —  Wylie pedia  20:14, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

It should probably be referred to the same as the helicopter onboard. The helo and personnel are part of a squadron (the Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadrons on the east coast are based in Mayport FL and deploy aboard cruisers, destroyers, and frigates). The group on the destroyer is an embarked detachment. The Seals on the East Coast are based in Norfolk and deploy aboard ships as determined by higher authority. The small group from Seal Team (unknown number) is an embarked detachment. At least that is the way it used to be. I've been out for a few years. Just an observation.

Number of People on the ship.
The story starts out with 219 people on the ship. 217 military crew (Navy/Marines) 2 Scientists. 1 Naval Warfare fighter kills himself. There are 216 Crew left at end of 1st ep., plus 2 Scientists.173.15.149.105 (talk) 19:01, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

80% or half
80% Claim @ 18m and 47s into the episode. When Dr. Scott is talking to the captain, she says, "The virus was at phase 2...We are now at phase 6, Global Pandemic, 80% of the world population is infected."

Half Claim @ 21m and 11s into the episode. While watching news reports, a reporter says "With possibly half the worlds population dead or dying" I'm watching the episode and pausing and rewinding to get the words right.

Which to go by? 80% could mean 80% of whats left, since she only said "infected" "Half" seems to generalize the whole pandemics effect.173.15.149.105 (talk) 19:34, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Okay, if you combine the two, then you would probably have "over half".

OR, you can go by the Premise as it's written on TNT's website, which is "eighty percent" http://www.tntdrama.com/shows/the-last-ship.html173.15.149.105 (talk) 19:40, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
 * OR, 80% are infected, of which 50% are dead or dying, and the remaining 30% haven't yet progressed that far. 173.202.242.209 (talk) 03:22, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

The following is a direct quote from the referenced TNT page cited in the section in question: "Their mission is simple: Find a cure. Stop the virus. Save the world. When a global pandemic wipes out eighty percent of the planet's population, the crew of a lone naval destroyer must find a way to pull humanity from the brink of extinction." This, from the producers of the show, directly states that eighty percent of the population of the Earth has been "wiped out". Therefore, I posit that the remaining 20% are either infected or vulnerable to infection (healthy). 50.26.76.176 (talk) 17:53, 5 August 2014 (UTC)


 * The ultimate problem is those editors who change it without checking here first. —  Wylie pedia  01:03, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

US Navy Mountain Warfare
In the beginning of the pilot episode, when Lt. Danny Green (Travis van Winkle) is approaching the Nathan James with the dog Halsley, Command Master Chief Hugh Jeter (Charles Parnell) mentions that he has heard of the "US NAVY'S MOUNTAIN WARFARE UNIT", so that is what I think the unit that many people think are SEALS would be instead. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.158.99.100 (talk • contribs) 13:34, July 9, 2014‎ (UTC)

Need to remove the cross-reference to Operations Specialist on TAO
OS is a specific enlisted rating (job) in the USN; the Tactical Action Officer [TAO], meanwhile, is a position of authority whose [commissioned] holder is basically the seniormost watchstanding officer in combat, with the ability to authorize weapons release in defense of the ship -- essentially, the only guy besides the CO himself able to do so. While I know nothing about this series (having just seen it on TV a few minutes ago at my base's local rec center), I looked it up here to get some more details, and noticed that the character listed as TAO is a LCDR.

By definition, an officer (i.e. Lieutenant Commander, LCDR) does not have a rating (job); thus, the cross-link to OS is utterly incorrect. And no, they don't "basically do the same job", no more than the helmsman (which can be even something like a 'lowly' BMSN or similar) is "basically the same" as the CO; since after all, the CO decides where the ship goes and the helmsman (by driving the ship) is technically also deciding where the ship goes, right? Nope. Hence, OS != TAO. TAO's job is also technically gonna involve FC and GM aspects, at the least, maybe QMs, CTs (if the ship has any sort of EWar going on), etc. Why aren't these rates linked to? Random Sailor Guy 72.198.187.238 (talk) 04:02, 23 May 2015 (UTC)

Amy Granderson
Just an observation. The Defense Policy Board is a Federal Advisory Committee and works for the Secretary of Defense, not the President. It is NOT a part of the White House. The Board is a group of former senior military and civilian government officials maybe sprinkled with some senior think tank types; BUT they are not government employees, they are consultants. All the officers on the USS Nathan James and many of the enlisted know about the Presidential line of succession -- VP, Speaker of the House, Senate President Pro-Tem, Secretary of State, Defense (etc…. down the line of Cabinet positions). Every, EVERY, State Representative in Congress would have to be dead (because any group of them, even 3, would continue to elect a new Speaker of the House until they were all gone, the same with the Senate). Acting Secretaries moving up might not have the same authority as the Secretary because they have not been vetted by Congress (because they are supposedly all dead, otherwise one of them would be President). But even it not, they would have been in a more official position to assume a position of authority within the U.S. government, than the glorified consultant that is Amy Granderson. CAPT Chandler, the XO, the CMC, etc would have known this. She was a poser, assuming a position of authority she had no official grounds to do so. And her daughter would have known this too. Just an observation.

Cast info
I know that WP has no prohibition against spoilers, and I'm fine with plot descriptions that reveal the end. People can just avoid reading those if they want to. However, a quick look at the cast section gave me the fate of every character. Since I haven't seen the last episode yet, this was disconcerting. In general I think the characters should be described in a way that introduces them, but not detailing their entire arc and even death. That can be left to the plot sections. 202.81.249.66 (talk) 15:01, 17 September 2015 (UTC)

Synthesis
"The Last Ship first season received mostly favorable reception from television critics." We do not have a reliable source that says this. We have a reliable source that says that of the critics watched by Metacritic (which is a subset of "critics"), Metacritic weighted their individual scores and came up with a score of 60. We do not know how many of the reviews were "positive". We do not know how positive the individual reviews were. We also do not have any information on critics that Metacritic does not watch (though the wording uses an unqualified "critics"). Finally, what are the objective breakpoints between "generally favorable", "mostly favorable", "favorable", etc.?

We do, however, have a reliable source which states that, "As of October 2015 the season received a Metacritic rating of "generally favorable", based on a score of 60 out of 100 based on 22 critic reviews." It is not 60 "generally favorable" reviews out of 100. It is not 60% of 22 reviews were generally favorable. Metacritic looked at 22 reviews. Some were out of five stars, others were letter grades, still others were thumbs up or down or had no single "score". They assigned a numerical value to those reviews and weighted some critics more than others, both based on their own criteria. From this, they come up with a score out of 100. We do not know if all of the critics gave it a score similar to 60/100 or if the scores were polarized (some 100s, some zeros). As a result, summarizing the summary is wildly inappropriate. In Wikipedia's terms, "mostly favorable reception" is either unsourced, POV or synthesis. Take your pick. "Metacritic, and a 7.1 out of 10 user score based on 175 user submitted ratings."WP:FILM states we do not use site user ratings because they are a self-selected subset of the self-selected group that both says they saw the film and uses the site. Take the film Saving Christmas.* Depending on the site, the film will receive a score of somewhere between 0% and 100%. A Christian magazine interviewed people walking out of one of the few public screenings and came up with a score of A+ (the screenings were largely to evangelical church groups). Rotten Tomatoes viewers' score started out fairly high as well, then was quickly buried under an avalanche of negatives. In the end, the score in the best of cases is biased in ways we can't figure out. In other cases, it's biased in fairly obvious ways. In any case, we don't use it. "The Last Ship Season 2 wasn't as widely reviewed as the first season," - I see no source for this claim. "...but the reviews it did receive were moderately better." - So, you compared every review the second season received against the same reviewers' reviews of the first season and... No, you didn't and we couldn't use it if you did. TL:DR version: Stick to things explicitly stated by the sources, not broad interpretations of various sources. - Sum mer PhD v2.0 13:11, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Please take it.
 * Please take it.


 * This post is a good example of "much ado about nothing". It is completely customary to restate a Megacritic or Rotten Tomatoes rating in free style, precisely the way it was done in this case. Nothing wrong, no synthesis, just translation of sources into normal language. I stress again, this is done over the board. Debresser (talk) 22:19, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
 * You may find it "customary" to use Metacritic as arbiter of critical consensus, but it is not.
 * You have restored that reception from critics was "mostly favorable". Are you saying there were more favorable reviews than negative reviews or that there was more favorable content in reviews than negative content? Metacritic says neither of these.
 * Ignoring the fact that Metacritic's 60/100 does not in any way mean there was a 60/40 split of anything, where did "mostly" come from? Why not "generally favorable" or "mixed to favorable"? would 59/100 be something different? 58? 55? 51? Where is the break point on this completely arbitrary system?
 * Let's suppose for a moment that 60/100 is clearly, unarguably, objectively "mostly favorable", such that anyone with no specialized knowledge would know it in an instant. What, then, does the wording add? Nothing. It is redundant.
 * If, OTOH, it is a clarification that we are offering to readers who might interpret this differently, how do you know your interpretation is correct? You can't.
 * With no specialized knowledge of Metacritic's black box system or addition of a second source to say something neither source says, we cannot summarize their summary any further than they have summarized it. Metacritic says what Metacritic says: a normalized score of 60/100 for a rating of "generally favorable".
 * If you add something to that, you need a source for it. If the something you are adding is not adding anything, why do it? - Sum mer PhD v2.0 02:15, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
 * If, OTOH, it is a clarification that we are offering to readers who might interpret this differently, how do you know your interpretation is correct? You can't.
 * With no specialized knowledge of Metacritic's black box system or addition of a second source to say something neither source says, we cannot summarize their summary any further than they have summarized it. Metacritic says what Metacritic says: a normalized score of 60/100 for a rating of "generally favorable".
 * If you add something to that, you need a source for it. If the something you are adding is not adding anything, why do it? - Sum mer PhD v2.0 02:15, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
 * With no specialized knowledge of Metacritic's black box system or addition of a second source to say something neither source says, we cannot summarize their summary any further than they have summarized it. Metacritic says what Metacritic says: a normalized score of 60/100 for a rating of "generally favorable".
 * If you add something to that, you need a source for it. If the something you are adding is not adding anything, why do it? - Sum mer PhD v2.0 02:15, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
 * If you add something to that, you need a source for it. If the something you are adding is not adding anything, why do it? - Sum mer PhD v2.0 02:15, 6 May 2016 (UTC)


 * I don't "find" it customary, I see it is customary, on the tens of film articles I read on Wikipedia regularly. Debresser (talk) 15:27, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
 * OK, so point-by-point it is. Easy one first: Per Manual_of_Style/Film, the user submitted ratings have to go. Agreed? - Sum mer PhD v2.0 16:05, 6 May 2016 (UTC)


 * As to your point that Meta critic is not an "arbiter of critical consensus" per Review aggregators. That can be easily mended by removing from the paragraph the words "from television critics" and leave just "received mostly favorable reception".
 * In am not a regular visitor to these websites, so I don't know if 60/100 means "mostly favorable" or "generally favorable" (I hope the difference between these two similar but distinct phrases is clear to all). I suppose, however, that the editors who add these remarks do know, what the meaning of a certain score is. That is precisely what we need these rephrases for. You made my point for me even better than I did.
 * I see some contradiction between Review aggregators, which claims Rotten Tomatoes is considered a reliable source, and Manual_of_Style/Film, which claims voter responses on Rotten Tomatoes are not. I suppose the difference is the 'voter submitted' part. I am not here for a general discussion of the subject, but rather regarding a very specific edit. I do hope you will spare me condescending lectures of a general nature. Debresser (talk) 19:51, 7 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Removing "from television critics" and leaving "received mostly favorable reception" makes the specific claim with a source that does not support it into a vague claim. The simple factual statement is that Metacritic gave it a rating of "generally favorable".
 * Your belief that "the editors who add these remarks do know, what the meaning of a certain score is" may or may not be founded. Perhaps they have specialized knowledge re Metacritic? I am saying that whomever added that is simply adding their interpretation of "a rating of 'generally favorable'". There is nothing whatsoever to support the belief that some unknown Wikipedia editor's interpretation is superior to what the text simply states. In general, we've solved disputes about the interpretation of text by quoting the source. Here, the source is already quoted. The "mostly favorable reception" adds some random person's opinion. The source does not say the show received mostly favorable reception from television critics or anyone else. It says Metacritic's score was 60/100 for a rating of "generally favorable".
 * The site users' ratings is part of the same section. As a rule, Wikipedia does not include this information. If you have no objection, I believe it should be removed, per MOS:FILM.
 * Your edit also restores the unsourced claims that the second season wasn't as widely reviewed as the first season, and that the reviews were moderately better. - Sum mer PhD v2.0 00:09, 8 May 2016 (UTC)
 * I would be fine with a change to "Metacritic gave it a rating of generally favorable", which I understand is what you would consider acceptable as well. Feel free to make that change.
 * Regarding the general question and issue, should editors rephrase ratings in their own words, I think that is an issue larger than the both of us. I have seen this on many, even most, I'd say even almost all, film articles, but your objections are valid. Perhaps we should draw up a post for WT:FILM about this? Debresser (talk) 07:38, 8 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Rephrasing or restating in your own words (rather than simply quoting) is an unavoidable, essential and desired task of encyclopedic writing. However whether a specific restating/rephrasing is appropriate and true enough to the original can only be decided based on the individual case, not something policy can fix for you.--Kmhkmh (talk) 10:10, 8 May 2016 (UTC)
 * As far as films are concerned for better or worse the recommendations and guidelines assembled for the film domain do not always match what various contributors commonly consider as appropriate or sufficient. This mismatch might be due to the overlap of content contributing editors and policy writing editors in the film domain being too small.--Kmhkmh (talk) 10:10, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:List of The Last Ship episodes
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:List of The Last Ship episodes. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 02:48, 4 June 2016 (UTC)

Copyedits
I swung by and did some copyedits to the characters section. I don't know enough about the show to gauge for accuracy, but in general there was some awkward repetition and even sentence fragments. Also, regarding ranks: they should be capitalized when used as part of a character's name; when being described in general, they are lowercase. For example, "Captain John Smith", "John Smith is a captain", "Commander Smith will be promoted to captain tomorrow". That may or may not be consistent with how the real-world or make-believe Navy work, but that style is consistent with Wikipedia's manual of style re. capitalization.--EEMIV (talk) 13:40, 15 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Another thing about ranks: just like in e.g. Star Trek, it looks like a bunch of these characters get promoted throughout the series. I deleted a couple of these parenthetical notes because they seem to be incidental to the character's role. It is a bigger deal for the CO and XO to be promoted to significantly different tasks, and to mention the change in rank. But if a seaman character gets a promotion but plays basically the same role, the rank-change note is just awkward. Additionally, avoid using phrases like "formerly" and "currently" for in-universe character details like rank: if I watch the first season, the CO is (present tense) a commander. Wikipedia's guidelines for writing about elements of fiction has more. --EEMIV (talk) 13:49, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Timing depends on which episode is aired and not as historical facts
When giving positions and jobs, the episode or season should be referred, otherwise who has not seen the following episodes can get confused. Example: Chandler was captain for two entire Seasons, so referring him as commander in chief at description start is confusing. --Robertiki (talk) 14:59, 19 June 2016 (UTC)

Off-topic chat
Season 4 and beyond

Will there be a Season 4, how many Seasons are planned.

The Main Article page is only for confirmed information, so I've made this section for any rumors or assumptions you may have on how long this show will be on air? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.161.1.70 (talk) 14:39, 12 September 2016 (UTC)
 * This article talk page is for discussing improvements to the article, not for general discussion of the article's topic. - Sum mer PhD v2.0 23:23, 12 September 2016 (UTC)