Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dire Wraith


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus. But clearly, if this doesn't improve, and its renominated in 6m the article is more likely to be deleted Spartaz Humbug! 23:01, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Dire Wraith

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This fictional alien race does not seem to meet WP:NFICTION/GNG. User:2pou presented several sources at Talk:Dire_Wraith but they seem to me like press releases about minor aspect (failed attempt to trade mark the name). The article, as it stands, is pure WP:PLOT and I doubt there is much else that can be done to remedy that that doesn't bother on TRIVIA. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 19:18, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Fictional elements-related deletion discussions. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here  19:18, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Science fiction and fantasy-related deletion discussions. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here  19:18, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Comics and animation-related deletion discussions. Toughpigs (talk) 20:34, 14 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Redirect to Rom (comics), where they are covered extensively. This article fails WP:GNG and WP:PLOT, and is sourced entirely to primary sources. Any information from the failed trademark attempt can be added to the Rom article, and since it is not in the Dire Wraith article there is nothing to merge. I also note that the articles on the failed trademark attempt all come from the same source. The reviews of the book also brought but not linked to in the deprodding rationale do not contribute to notability for the character, but for the book. The article on the new series does not state anything about the Dire Wraiths that is not in-universe. Devonian Wombat (talk) 21:34, 14 February 2020 (UTC) Changing my vote to Keep per the sources found by 2pou. While most of them are either too in-universe or do not really discuss the character, there is enough, especially in the Comic Features information, about the creation of the characters and reception of them to build an article that passes GNG. Devonian Wombat (talk) 23:05, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Keep per WP:NEXIST. Oy vey...  WP:NORUSH.  Obviously the article is not in the best shape, and it should be trimmed WAY down; however, that is not cause for deletion, but improvement.  While I do recognize the argument Devonian Wombat makes, I still think there is enough specific to the Dire Wraiths separate from ROM.  Two main reasons, after the loss of ROM, Marvel still used them for X-Men and others; and they have their own series separate from ROM.  Unfortunately, not everything below from the older ages is available electronically, and requires some old-fashioned paper research, but I'll summarize. First arguement: The trade mark reporting is not at all press release material, and it is entirely secondary.  A reporter in the industry got wind of trade mark filings and decided to report on the happenings over the course of several months.  Before writing these articles, the source of information is US Patent office, not one of the publishers.  As to other sources, I had been trying to slowly accumulate them in order to improve the article, but with an AfD, there is now a 7-day timeframe, so I will unfortunately just be WP:REFBOMBING them here and ignore any elegant prose additions (for the time being). In-line content will be handled more elegantly in the article, but in this AfD I am going to show the exist, as stated above:
 * Reviews of new Dire Wraith comic (starting here since they're more easily presentable), and none of these really apply to the Rom (comics) article, though the series tries to leverage the name:
 * https://www.starburstmagazine.com/reviews/rom-dire-wraiths-1 - Starburst (magazine) review
 * http://www.multiversitycomics.com/reviews/potw-rom-dire-wraiths-1/ - another of the reviews of the first issue of the new Dire Wraith books
 * https://comicbook.com/dc/2020/01/15/new-comic-reviews-dc-marvel-image/ - another review of said issue
 * https://www.adventuresinpoortaste.com/2020/01/15/rom-dire-wraiths-1-review/ another review of said issue
 * Reviews of old comic:
 * Comics Feature magazine from New Media Publishing
 * Iss. 9 - Examines the Dire Wraiths and criticizes them. Describes an interesting tension within the race the author took time to create, but that they were "evil for evils sake" and goes on to say their motivation defintely needs more work
 * Iss. 17 - discusses that while Parker Brothers created the term Dire Wraith to promote the ROM toy, Marvel had to actually create story that went into who they were.
 * The Slings & Arrows Comic Guide offers similar criticism as Comics Feature (p. 466)
 * https://comicsalliance.com/rom-spaceknight-comics/ - This is mostly plot, but there are some nuggets of commentary on them (separate from ROM as they went on to become X-Men villians) such as "the most hideously villian ever designed".
 * Toys
 * ToyFare magazine #15 (1998) reported on the Dire Wraith toy that was created but never released to the public
 * https://ew.com/news/transformers-gi-joe-mask-hasbro-toys-first-look/ - Entertainment Weekly included a couple slides (admittedly brief) on a new toy from Hasbro
 * Regards, 2pou (talk) 22:08, 14 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Keep per WP:NEXIST. Besides the many sources provided above, there's also this article from Bleeding Cool: "Marvel Comics Abandons Trademark Challenge Against Hasbro Over “Dire Wraiths”" (2017), which contains scans from some of the legal documents. They're clearly talking about the Dire Wraiths as separate from Marvel's Rom comic -- in fact, that's what the conflict is all about. It's true that the current article is almost entirely in-universe plot summary, but WP:ARTN says that the way an article is currently written does not affect the notability of the subject. The notability is established by the existence (WP:NEXIST) of independent, reliable sources discussing the subject directly and in detail. Folks who are concerned about the current state of the article should make edits and improve it. I'll add some of these sources as a "Further reading" section so that people who want to improve the article have some good places to start. -- Toughpigs (talk) 22:48, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Keep or merge to Rom (comics) per above comments since there are WP:RS to retain, per WP:PRESERVE and WP:ATD. BOZ (talk) 22:57, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Keep per 2pou and Toughpigs. — Hunter Kahn 13:33, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Delete and redirect to Rom (comics). WP:NEXIST seems to be the new favorite buzzword, but that does not mean that just because any old thing mentions the topic, it's immediately notable. Notability for the race is WP:NOTINHERITED from the comic in which they appear, nor from the series as a whole.ZXCVBNM (TALK) 20:36, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm not following... The refs above were specifically described in a way that decouples Dire Wraith from the both the comic and series and describes commentary directly made about Dire Wraiths beyond any old mention.  This isn't as if its an AfD about "Analyzer (ROM)" where an article says "ROM uses an analyzer", therefore "Analyzer (ROM)" must stay!  Or are you suggesting that the notability of a new comic series is not inherited from the original?  To be clear, the new series has nothing to do with ROM other than utilizing the name for brand recognition.  This seems like saying Fast and Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw is not notable just because Fast and Furious is notable.  No, it's not, and I don't see any arguements made to that effect.  It's a separate work that receives seprate notable reviews.  This also seems to suggest that a fictional race or character should not have an article if there is a series associated with it, which I fully disagree with.  This leads to articles like Cable (comics) & Cable (comic book) or Excalibur (comic book) & Excalibur (comics) being separated, when that is totally unnecessary for something that can be covered within a single article, and can only contribute to confusion to the an average searcher, in my opinion.  Again, I'm not sure I'm addressing what you were specifically arguing, but I took my best shot in addressing the interpretations that I could imagine... and as stated, the article needed trimming, and it looks like Devovian Wombat did a very nice trim already to something that is more expandable with the real-world material presented above.  -2pou (talk) 18:21, 20 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Redirect - I don't know why people are so gung-ho about using bottom of the barrel trivial mentions as sourcing. There's truly nothing substantial in any of the presented sources. This is D&D all over again, many kept articles that won't actually be substantially improved only to be nominated again down the line. TTN (talk) 16:56, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment. I have reviewed the sources presented above and the best I can say is that we can SOFTDELETE this by redirecting to Rom comic book series. Nothing suggests this merits a stand-alone article as all the mentions are generally in the context of the Rom comics review, outside of the relatively trivial trademark issue that can very well be discussed there as well.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 11:05, 19 February 2020 (UTC)
 * A fair comment, and I suppose this comes down to a matter of opinion, but I would disagree that the trademark information is trivial, and having that in a ROM article would seem to bury the lede, but as always, I defer to consensus... And there's definitely nothing more real-world for fiction than who owns rights.  Then again, I am facinated by trademark ownership, itellectual property, and licensing in general.   *Thinking to self* What was the deal between George Lucas and Disney, and was there nothing there about his story treatments?  How does a license for Robert E. Howard properties like Conan not include Kull, and how did that get broken out in the first place?  How does Marvel get around Universal's license to the Hulk film distribution rights. (There should be a category for these!  I'll have to look into that!   Also, not everything else presented above is directly related to ROM; only the "old comic" section can truly be attributed to ROM (and one might be able to make an argument about the new toy).  The "new comic" material relates to ROM only in name to leverage the franchise branding, a-la Solo: A Star Wars Story, and Han Solo would have material from said film. -2pou (talk) 18:21, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, buidh</b><b style="color: White">e</b> 22:48, 22 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Delete and/or redirect to Rom (comics). Taking a pragmatic approach, tis article has existed for 16 years(!) and is in such a poor state that either people don't want to fix it, or it's unfixable. Rom (comics) already summarizes this race over many, many paragraphs that nothing would be lost by WP:TNTing it. – sgeureka t•c 08:49, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Just a note that I personally didn't even know of this articles existence until it was PRODed. Only then did I bother looking for whether it was something fixable or not.  Bringing attention to things is a side benefit to PROD/AfD (Yay!...yay?); however, I'm not encouraged to attempt to start any real fixing pending this discussion's result. -2pou (talk) 19:57, 28 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Keep and improve per above, the references certainly allow for it. Merging to Rom is probably not the prefered solution as they have a history in Marvel comics in general now. Artw (talk) 02:11, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Keep. The sources provided show it meets the criteria for WP:GNG. AFD is not cleanup. If you don't like the article in its current state, roll up your sleeves and start working on it.4meter4 (talk) 21:43, 1 March 2020 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. <b style="color:red">Please do not modify it.</b> Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.