Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of fiction that breaks the fourth wall


 * 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 of the debate was keep (although it has been suggested that this article should be renamed to Examples of fiction that breaks the fourth wall. BD2412  T 21:24, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

List of fiction that breaks the fourth wall
I keep coming back to this one. On the plus side, it does make some attempt to discuss the encyclopaedic subject of dramatic irony; on the minus side, the list is potentially almost limitless, depending on where you put the bar; the technique is a mainstay of stage comedy (not least pantomime) and always will be, and many "straight" plays use this as a narrative device. So in the end, it is not actually particularly unusual, which I guess is why it is large and expanding, and why I consider that it is pointless, because it is potentially merely a list of al comic and a good proportion of dramatic theatre. Oh, and it includes original research. Just zis Guy, you know? [T]/[C] (W) AfD? 23:00, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete An article about breaking the fourth wall would be justified. But making a list is rather like making "list of fiction where the protagonist dies". You could go on for all eternity. --RaiderAspect 23:24, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Strong keep. This article appears to have been created to support the fourth wall article and I think it's got reader interest. It might be better served to rename the article Examples of fiction that breaks the fourth wall to avoid the list stigma. 23skidoo 05:00, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Extremely strong merge to fourth wall. Pick a handful of examples and mention them there. Any list is going to be hopelessly unmaintainable and likely to attract cruft, but it isn't an idiosyncratic non-topic like many of these lists. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:21, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete- with reservations I created this page to save fourth wall. No matter what I and a handful of other wise editors did on that page, pointless cruft examples kept creeping back in. This page was a last ditch attempt to make fourth wall encyclopedic, at the expense of a clearly pointless page here. It worked! Fourth Wall has remained largely undisturbed and I think is a good page. This list is, I admit, awful and I'd love to see it go, but for some reason Wikipedians seem to be desperate to list these somewhere. Think of this page as a holding area for useless content! Please check the history of fourth wall for a bit more background, and please, please, please, don't merge! Coyote-37 10:33, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep, this is a very useful list, and I find most of the items presented here quite interesting. &mdash; J I P  | Talk 11:30, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep sure it has issues - fix them. --TimPope 17:25, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Strong keep. Before this article was created, the fourth wall article contained this list. Despite the efforts of some editors to trim the list down, examples continued to be added to the list.  Attempting to establish some sort of minimum standard for this list didn't work, so the list was split off to its own article.  It should remain or the same problems that you see here will again become part of the main article.  Val42 18:55, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep. Useful list, items extremely verifiable, not limitless as nom postulates. Obviously lots of work has gone into this article, and it seems well-maintained. Turnstep 21:04, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Useful in a way that a few well-chosen examples in fourth wall is not? - Just zis Guy, you know? [T]/[C] (W) AfD? 00:08, 25 November 2005 (UTC)
 * I see what you're saying, and agree in principle, but my experiences of editing fourth wall tell me that there is no way to merge this without totally undermining the content of that page with a fancruft swamp. Fourth Wall currently deals with breaking in as much detail as I think is necessary. A list is not only bad prose, it invites deluge examples as seen here. I don't think Fourth Wall should contain a list of any kind. Coyote-37 10:04, 25 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Keep, makes examples available in more genres/media than if it was merged. Kappa 13:03, 25 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep, is very cool and may even provoke others to buy or rent the media to see the fourth wall being broken.
 * Keep. Useful list. Not sure how we prevent it growing endlessly. Agree with 23skidoo's rename suggestion above. -- RHaworth 03:24, 27 November 2005 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. 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.