Talk:The Venture Bros./Archive 4

The Guild
From the article, "... The Guild of Calamitous Intent, a group that bears resemblance to the Legion of Doom."

The above sentence is misleading. The only thing the two have in common is that they are organizations with super villans. The structure of the two organizations seem to be entirely different. If anything the guild appears to be super villian bureaucracy considering it's licensing requirements and the Legion of Doom was simply a weak partnership of a sizable group of villians. I think the extremely weak comparison doesn't add anything to the article and should be removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.9.154.52 (talk) 03:46, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Why remove Underbheit?
As stated on the title above,why was Baron Underbheit removed from the "Failure" section? - R.G. 06:49, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Title
On the intro it says "The Venture Bros. (sometimes incorrectly titled The Venture Brothers)". I think the parenthasis should be taken out. Even though it's always spelt The Venture Bros., it is still pronouced as the Venture brothers. I think the Venture Bros. is simply used for shortening, and the skull logo. (also, if I did this entry wrong sorry. I'm new to editing Wikipedia)


 * Either way, it should not be in parentheses. Slof 10:16, 10 September 2006 (UTC)


 * According to IMDB, the official name is "The Venture Bros.", and that is it also known as "The Venture Brothers" as a USA alternative spelling. IMDB is tied to the industry, so I would be inclined to defer to that. --Mespinola 15:08, 30 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't think it's necessary to be slavish in following cites when the answer is obvious and non-controversial.    Bros. is obviously an abbreviation for brothers, making the proper name of the show Venture Brothers.  Now, if you have a cite from Jackson Public or Doc Hammer saying its properly Bros. then--despite the fact it was idiotic--I'd say go with it, in deference to the fact that it's their creation.  JShea44 (talk) 19:32, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Season Three
On Jackson Publiks LiveJournal, he mentioned there have been talks for season 3. I was thinking that should be added someplace(maybe in the intro, or some the future of The Venture Bros. type thing). I think it's fairly relavent, given how long it took for season 2 to be renewed (9 months). The mention of a possible speedier renew would be good for fans, and people just learning of the show to know.

There is an update on the LiveJournal as of March 08 07, saying they are starting the writing and production for Season 3. This should go on the main page at some point...

In fact, VB has been greenlighted for a fourth season as well. Which is awesome. But yeah, Doc Hammer gave the good news during a panel at some comic con or another. Blahmicho 02:19, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

DVD sections to episode list article
Should the DVD section be moved to List of The Venture Bros. episodes? -th1rt3en 02:33, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

On the topic of DVD releases, the Venture Bros. season 3 DVD box art is certainly modeled after Atari VCS game packaging, but it does not resemble the packaging of Adventure in any particular way. It has much more in common with a dozen or so other covers Atari published in the late 70s and early 80s, including Warlords, Video Chess, Video Olympics, Surround, Missile Command, Blackjack, and Casino (among others). These were created by a handful of artists working in similar styles and the cover art in question is especially reminiscent of the work Cliff Spohn, Steve Hendricks, and Rick Guidice did for Atari during this period. Xot (talk) 06:12, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Do we really need it?
The 'Next Episode' & 'Past Episode' table on the episode articles. That infomation is in the box on the top of the page.Kidcorona 09:42, 8 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I've seen it on several other episode guides. I'd say keep it, personally, but that's just me. Umbric Man 11:13 P.M. Oct 8th 2006

Perhaps I should have clarify that statement; I mean the box on the bottom of the page that has just the epsode details, not the one at the top of the page, with the epsiode screenshot, production number, and the other good stuff. Kidcorona 18:00, 9 October 2006 (UTC)


 * could we maybe spruce it up a bit? im going to try something out tonight. --Carterhawk 06:26, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
 * after a long and arduous battle with wikitable (plus my html is rusty) ive finaly finished, take a look, i think it helps out. id still rather have the images closer to the text, but i couldnt figure out how.... --Carterhawk 08:30, 19 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Nice job. -Umbric Man 8:44 A.M. 19th Oct 2006

Mmmm, smells like... fancruft
While I knew this would happen, I didn't realise it would be quite so pervasive. The homages section is now a Gargantuan mess full of all sorts of random claims. Any time now someone will be proposing splitting list of DC Comics references in Venture Bros off into its own article! This needs to be harshly trimmed back until it a) contains 100% less speculation and b) is readable by people who aren't raging fanboys. Chris Cunningham 14:31, 9 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Oh lord, thank you. When I saw 'politicians' I knew it was getting bad. Want me to trim it down and see how the changes go? We can always put others back in that we want, and anything else can go to episode-specific pages to eliminate redundancy. -Umbric Man 12:32 P.M. Oct 9th 2006


 * The nice thing about having a full edit history is that one doesn't have to feel guilty about deleting vast amounts of cruft from articles. Thanks for doing this :) Chris Cunningham 16:46, 9 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeah, the references section is very, very large. -th1rt3en 18:12, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Homages and references
Is it just me, or is this turning into a dumping ground for trivia? Honestly I think this section needs to be worked on, rather than dumping names and things they've referenced in the show, mention the FACT that they reference these things, and only mention by name the more prominant recurring reference (i.e. David Bowie, Star Wars, Scooby-Doo, etc.). What's everyone think? -th1rt3en 20:11, 16 October 2006 (UTC)


 * See the previous talk section. I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure. Chris Cunningham 22:35, 16 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Again, agreed. That was my entire original point in making the section, for the really recurring or obvious references. -Umbric Man 12:43 A.M. 17th Oct 2006

I like the idea of a seperate Homages and Cultural Allusions in The Venture Bros. article myself. If any one major section in the article gets too big, it should be summarized and exported. --Carterhawk 16:04, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

You should include a reference to The Residents, in the final episode a character holds the orb in front of his head, like the eyeball is his head and says: "Hey look, I'm in The Residents."

Yet another tidbit...the character "Colonel Horace Gentleman" is undoubtedly a reference to the bass player from "The Specials." Check it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Specials68.200.39.156 04:19, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Brock Sampson strikes me more Nick Fury Agent of SHIELD on steroids than either Doc Savage or James Bond. While Brock has Doc's sinze and coloration he doesn't have Doc's mental skills or moral compass. Nick Fury was always a kind of over-the-top hands-on kind of spy which is vwery much whay Brock is. And Fury is already a parody of James Bond. Seeing Brock as a SHIELD parody fits in with the OSI being a SHIELD parody. Also Brock's love-interest Molatov Cocktease resembled (at least in my dim memory) Steranko's vision of Fury's girlfriend, ie, favoring low-cut, skin-tight cat suits. The original Team Venture strikes me as more a parody of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, especually since it was like by Col. Gentleman. 69.222.11.226 (talk) 15:25, 27 November 2007 (UTC) Brian Brown (beb01@sprynet.com)
 * Brilliant. Someone criticises a section as becoming a dumping ground for supposition and trivia, and people come here and turn the discussion into a dumping ground for supposition and trivia.  Unless you have a reference to the show's creators stating that a character is a homage/pastiche/parody of something, you cannot add the information to the article.  Just because you "think it is" does not make it so.  For instance, Molotov Cocktease could just as easily be a parody of Marvel Comics' Black Widow, and Jonas, Sr., and the original Team Venture have much more in common with Doc Savage and his Fabulous Five than they do with the LEG, but I'm not adding it to the article just because "I think it's true". 71.200.138.188 (talk) 14:10, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Why was my addition of the Bowie references removed. The reason listed is " no references,do not guess at running jokes" while i didn't have any citations I listed the three times, with links to the episodes and a short description of the reference, that Bowie is mentioned. I think this is clearly a running joke and should be put back into the section. Also, not that its proof or anyting but the first paragraph in this discussion sections says only important references like BOWIE, should be included. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.231.201.42 (talk) 07:28, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Trivia Sections and References
It seems like a lot of what is in the triva section of each episode could be better integrated into the main plot area (those are rather long, btw). Also, all the instances of the creator's live journal postings being referenced should use the refence system, rather than just making the claim.--Carterhawk


 * I suppose that's a good enough point-though I admit I like the long eppy summaries. -Umbric Man 9:16 P.M. 18th Oct 2006

Plot Reformating
I had a thought on the drive home. Perhaps we should look at dividing the summaries into different scenes and acts, something to break up such huge chunks of text? Or: Many episodes have different subplots, it might also be possible to seperate each subplot into its own section. For example, in V.E.N. you have Dr. Venture / Brock's subplot, and the Boys' date subplot, each of which occurs simultaneously and could be organized into seperate sections in the article. My ultimate goal is finding a good way to organize and make more readable the content of these articles. --Carterhawk 06:25, 19 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Oh, if we can make that work, I'm all for it-just because they're long lord knows even I admit they can be confusing at times. I think the acts-scenes idea may work better than the sub-plot division purely with how much back-and-forth banter, scene switching, and overall connectivity they have at times, but I'm happy to switch to whatever works out for the best. -Umbric Man 8:48 A.M. 19th Oct 2006
 * Ive got a couple of hours free time today, I will try and come up with a structure for both versions. --Carterhawk 15:58, 19 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Okay, after finaly getting the Fix to work (win2k sucks!) ive got two prototypes using the latest episode as their basis. Take a look, see what you think, make changes to improve it, whatever. I personaly like the subplot division style, which should work for most episodes. Anything to help wrangle these huge chunks of text is a welcome change though. As a note, rather than numbering off each section, I tried to come up with a clever heading for each section, something that summarizes and exemplifies that section. Subplot Style and Act-Scene Style. --Carterhawk 19:19, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

You guys have the wrong idea. You shouldn't be separating them for clarity, you should be paring the summaries down. There's way too much unnecessary info in them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.253.129.43 (talk • contribs)

David Bowie
Maybe someone here knows.

Who is the bigger David Bowie fan? ...Publick or Hammer?

...and what's up with that anyway?

Xodmoe 19:36, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Mainly and namely, that Bowie is incredible.

On the DVD commentary they both mention being fans. Actually I think they said him and Depeche Mode were the only musicians referenced in VB that they liked. Blahmicho 02:24, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Myra's failure
This seems incorrect:


 * Myra Brandish's life is a spectacular failure. While once an apparently competent and heroic OSI agent, her failure to make Dr. Venture love her resulted in her being exiled from the lives of her children almost as soon as they were born, resulting in them having no memory whatsoever of their mother. Further adding to her failure at having a relationship with her mother, Dr. Venture and Brock Samson both lie to Dean and Hank about Myra being a mentally disturbed cast member on American Gladiators who stalks the Venture Family for no good reason.

It hasn't been confirmed that Myra is the boys' mother, and I don't believe her being on American Gladiators is false either, her car's license plate says "POWERKAT". Can somebody reword this? I'm having trouble wording it in a way not to delete it all together. -th1rt3en 01:24, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Unencyclopedic material
The "Themes, homages, and references" section needs to be trimmed way, way down. It currently takes up most of the article. We don't need a listing of every homage or reference that has ever appeared on the show, or of every instance where the theme of "failure", etc. is demonstrated. We need to determine which of are important to describing the show, and include only examples that are especially prominent and necessary to establishing this.--Cúchullain t/ c 19:16, 26 October 2006 (UTC)


 * It's agreed it needs trimming-regulars have been doing that for a while now. Just help delete stuff yourself, tis all there is to it. :P -Umbric Man 10:58 P.M. 28th Oct 2006

It's not just that section. The entire thing reads like a grade-school essay. The "failure" section is by far the worst. Rather than simply state the fact that some of the shows darker humor comes from the juxtaposition of failure, bureaucracy, and other disappointing/"real world" elements with a cartoon/superhero-type setting, there are a gazillion references to specific scenes that don't even support the failure claim. The fact that the characters have eyes does not mean that the show is themed around vision, and that everytime a character appears with eyes drawn in it needs to be referenced. Meh, it's an internet encyclopedia article on a late-night cartoon show...in the grand theme of schemes I guess nobody's getting hurt. But I would like to see the quality of the article approach the quality of the show. Lots of trivia (especially unconfirmed) just weighs it down, and the references to specific plot points in individual episode are unencyclopedic and hurt wikipedia. Yes I'm anonymous, and no I'm not going to edit the thing myself since I'm don't have time to check 20 times a day for fanboy-inspired reverts :) ah well. It speaks to the quality of the show that so many people care about small details, but the entire article would benefit from a massive trimming. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.151.54.61 (talk)

Wouldn't it be better to Wikify and find sources than just wholesale delete. (Wallamoose (talk) 02:21, 18 October 2008 (UTC))

Baron Ünderbheit cannot be a reference to Darth Malak
The Venture Bros. pilot episode premiered in February 2003 while Knights of the Old Republic was released November 2003. Underbheit appears in the pilot episode's opening sequence. Do not add this to the article unless you can cite it. -th1rt3en 03:24, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Spoiler
Uh, sorry, I know I should register, and this may have been mentioned before, but shoudln't there be a spoiler warning somewhere in all of this? I mean, the essay on failure gives away the Sovereign's identity! (Yes, yes, everyone knows it now, but still, for posterity's sake, you know?)


 * I saw that, & I think I'm going to edit that to just say the Sovereign. That was just gratuitous.  - Pronoiac 02:17, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Right, action plan time
The same themes keep popping up in here.


 * 1) The homages section has to be removed. It can be placed in its own article. Even when it was only two paragraphs long it was in danger of expanding indefinitely, and it's over a page long now. Zero tolerance is the only way to prevent this.
 * 2) The failure section has to be removed. It is entirely OR from start to finish. Someone needs to start a TVCriticWiki or something.
 * 3) The extlinks section needs to be de-blogged. Community links are not appropriate for Wikipedia.

I'll work on this later. Chris Cunningham 09:53, 30 November 2006 (UTC)


 * The failure section and the Star Wars section both need to be rewritten to be de-listified, not necessarily removed. -th1rt3en 05:15, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

De-listified?


 * I agree, let's focus on rewriting not deleting.(Wallamoose (talk) 02:22, 18 October 2008 (UTC))

the x-1
Isn't the x-1 based off of the concorde http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/AirFranceConcorde.jpg

not the xb-70? Freelancepolice 03:39, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

OSI
OSI Ok, I don't know if anyone is aware of this or not: OSI is actually a United States Air Force office. OSI stands for "Office of Special Investigations." They are essentially the "FBI" of the Air Force. They primarily monitor and police service members in the Air Force and other branches of the military and can be pretty damn intrusive at times. They are also supposed to be aware of terrorist threats and things like that and maintain vigilance over happenings in the areas surrounding bases, especially over seas. If you're in the service, you'll notice these guys EVERYWHERE. You see them at concerts, bars, restaurants, and clubs to name a few places that you'll catch them watching you. It seems that their agents are always that person sitting in the corner of the bar that hasn’t gotten up for the entire night and has only been drinking water or cranberry juice whilst starring at what everyone does... They monitor phone calls and internet traffic; they're pretty nuts about stuff. I’m just throwing this out for my fellow VB fans; there is a ‘real’ OSI. Take care everyone.

Kind of unfair my friend, we only watch the people who need watching.71.61.80.119 (talk) 04:56, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

But VB'S OSI stands for Office of Secret Intelligence —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dn655603 (talk • contribs) 03:54, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

The real-world Air Force OSI probably has no connection to the show (certainly, I've never seen an AFOSI agent anywhere near as butch as Brock Samson); however, several TV shows and at least one movie reference an Office of Secret Intelligence. They were the agency that created The Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman; also, the Office of Secret Intelligence fought the aliens in the movie "The Puppet Masters". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.57.195.228 (talk) 03:26, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

TVB Wikia?
I wonder if there is interest in starting a Venture Bros. Wikia were we can go much more in depth than we can on Wikipedia. See http://24.wikia.com/ for a good example of a TV-show Wikia. Mike R 18:27, 14 May 2007 (UTC)


 * There is one. It's right here. The Venture Bros. Wiki. --Hazelfo 23:16, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Thaddeus or Thadeus ?
It seems assumed that Dr. Venture's first name is spelled "Thaddeus" [sc]. I love the VB, and I have seen on the DVD episodes, that on printed materials in the show his name is spelled with only one 'd' - ala "Thadeus" [sic].

Can some one confirm/deny this? You can first see this clearly @ about 45 seconds into the pilot (The Terrible Secret of Turtle Bay). I have transcribed the news paper article I am referring to here. --Mespinola 05:26, 30 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I have included a screen shot here (updated) for confirmation. I havent seen any other printing of Dr. Venture's name anywhere on the DVDs, so I can only conclude his name to have only one "d". --Mespinola 04:54, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Venture Bros. Wiki link in External links
There was a link to my website Venture Bros Wiki(http://venturebroswiki.com) that was recently removed from the external links. I thought the link appropriate as the VB Wiki is a place where fans could edit/create Venture Bros articles that can be more in depth than what a general purpose encyclopedia like Wikipedia is meant to be. A few days ago the link was removed with a note that it was deemed as having less content than Wikipedia. Since the VB wiki is not as popular as this site, it's to be expected that it does not have as much content. I could have easily have it be a dump of Wikipedia Venture Bros articles but instead chose a less formal approach at a wiki more in spirit with the show. Being a niche wiki, the VB Wiki is meant to focus on just that show and it takes a bit more work to get off the ground. The fact that the link did generate a fair amount of traffic shows that it was helpful to at least a few visitors. I realize that Wikipedia isn't to be used as promotion for my site, but I think a link has some validity as a similar site that users of this page in particular may be interested in.

I just wanted to have a discussion about the merits of it's inclusion instead of getting into an edit war by adding it back in, especially since I am the webmaster of the site linked to. I appreciate any feedback and thanks for taking the time to consider my view. --Nais 01:18, 5 September 2007 (UTC)


 * The purpose of external links is to provide access to relevant material which can't be included in the article for reasons of excess detail, copyright etc, while taking into account Wikipedia's policies on reliable sources and holding a neutral point of view, and so on. Wikipedia is not a links directory for just about anything that could conceivably be of interest to someone who reads a particular article, particularly when they provide nothing which the related articles don't already contain.  Additionally, the guidelines on external links tell us to avoid linking to open wikis "except those with a substantial history of stability and a substantial number of editors", and to avoid including links "mainly intended to promote a website".


 * In summary: your website may well be worth including at some future point. But not for now. --Mark H Wilkinson (t, c) 07:50, 5 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Not to drudge up old topics, but I'm a bit unclear on why the TV-IV wiki link is more relevant. -Nais (talk) 17:00, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Category:The Venture Bros.
Can you explain to me why Category:The Venture Bros. was deleted? —Markles 11:47, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The official debate can be found here - not sure I personally understand the point the nominator was making. MarkSutton 12:19, 5 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I actually read the debate, too, and I posted my query above on the nominator's talk page. There might have been a good reason, but (like you) I didn't understand the nominator's rationale.  I'm (we're) waiting to hear back here.—Markles 13:09, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Per extensive consensus and precedent across probably a hundred similar debates by now, categories named after TV shows are not warranted unless the content related to the TV show is extensive and not easily interlinked and elsewhere categorized. Sub-categories for episodes and characters by themselves don't warrant a category, and this particular category had content that was itself improperly categorized. Articles for people who are associated with the show (voice actors, writers and the like) should not be categorized under the show's name per WP:OC. Otto4711 13:38, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Subcategories
There are categories: Category:The Venture Bros. characters, Category:The Venture Bros. episodes but no category above these.—Markles 13:11, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Hawk and Dove
Hank and Dean seem to be based upon the comic book characters Hawk and Dove. One being blonde and the other being brownish reddish haired. The personalities seem to be reversed as well with Dean being the more timid and Hank being more extroverted. Hawk and Doves real names were Hank and Don Hall. The similarities go on and I believe this is an intentional nod. For more information on the characters in question: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawk_and_Dove#Hank_and_Don_Hall —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.104.226.174 (talk) 16:30, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Seems doubtful or just a coincidence. Hank and Dean seem more likely to be based on Johnny Quest or the Hardy Boys (perhaps a mash of the two). Unless you can find a reliable source stating this connection, it's just speculation/original research. Dp76764 (talk) 18:14, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
 * That's weird. If it's true i'm sure the creators have said something about it. If they did, obviously include away.12.206.60.107 (talk) 06:12, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Brock's Influences
The page lists Doc Savage and Doc Samson as part Brock's influences, which don't really seem to fit. He's really just Race Bannon on crack. ~ Dancemotron (talk) 18:02, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Scooby Doo
There's a more direct reference to Scooby Doo besides what Hank wears... they parodied the Scooby Gang as a bunch of homocidal drug-dealing drug-addled anarchists in I think a pair of episodes. 70.51.8.152 (talk) 07:39, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Molotov Cocktease and Aeon Flux?
This page seems to be inaccurate on this point because Mol clearly more resembles Elektra in the flashback sequence in 'Assassinanny 911' and Dr Girlfriend shows her stuff (not just fighting but her hairstyle as well) in resembling Aeon Flux in 'I know why the caged bird kills' —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sandsock (talk • contribs) 11:19, 25 May 2008 (UTC)