Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Steve Andropoulos and Betsy Stewart


 * 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 defaulting to Keep and w/o prejudice to a future renomination. Ad Orientem (talk) 01:38, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Steve Andropoulos and Betsy Stewart

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

Effectively unreferenced fictional bio, fails GNG/NFICTION. No consensus on a prior AfD 10 years ago, but that was the usual 'nominated 20 articles' type of a mess. The one reference is possibly relevant to the particular EPISODE, no the fictional character. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 17:15, 17 January 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  17:15, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Television-related deletion discussions. -- Toughpigs (talk) 17:40, 17 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Keep: The actress who played Betsy Stewart at the time was Meg Ryan, and this was her first big television role. Per WP:NEXIST, there are lots of existing sources:
 * To Be Continued... Soap Operas Around the World is an academic analysis of soap operas, and it has a full chapter on Betsy as a character, and Ryan's performance.
 * Soap Opera Super Couples: The Great Romances of Daytime Drama has behind-the-scenes coverage of Ryan's exit from the show, with specific commentary on how it affected the audience perception of the couple.
 * Television: Critical Methods and Applications analyzes a moment of Ryan's performance as Betsy as an example of how audiences understand television images.
 * Also mentioned in Politics in Familiar Contexts: Projecting Politics Through Popular Media, Writing for the Soaps, and Worlds Without End: The Art and History of the Soap Opera.
 * All of these are easily accessible on Google Books. Are you doing a BEFORE check? -- Toughpigs (talk) 17:51, 17 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Redirect to a parent article on the ground that this article has been failing WP:NOTPLOT for 13(!) years now. Any real-world material on this couple can be added to the show's article or its the character list; no reason for this article to exist for a mere plot rehash. – sgeureka t•c 16:24, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment: Wouldn't the sources provided by be better for a possible Betsy Stewart article since they seem to be primarily about the Betsy Stewart character and Meg Ryan's performance as opposed to the couple featured in this article? Aoba47 (talk) 01:51, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Aoba47: If this was a proposal to rename the page by someone who was interested in rewriting it, then I would definitely support that. At the moment, the option that's being discussed is to delete the page. Redirecting to the character list would be inappropriate, that list page has no actual article content. -- Toughpigs (talk) 21:10, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the response, and I completely understand. That would be a completely different conversation that should take place outside of an AfD, but it was just something that I thought about while reading your post. Either way, thank you for the sources above, and I never knew Meg Ryan was in a soap opera so I learned something new today. Aoba47 (talk) 21:27, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, thanks for asking! :) -- Toughpigs (talk) 21:59, 21 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Redirect - While I guess it's not impossible to have an article on a fictional relationship, the main articles of the series should be completely up to snuff before such hyperfocused splits are created. TTN (talk) 17:34, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The concept of a supercouple is very important in analysis of soap opera narratives. See Luke and Laura for the most famous example. Also Soap Opera Supercouples: The Great Romances of Daytime Drama, Soap Opera Confidential: Writers and Soap Insiders on Why We'll Tune in Tomorrow as the World Turns Restlessly by the Guiding Light of Our Lives, Worlds Without End: The Art and History of the Soap Opera, the chapter "The Siren Call of the Super Couple: Soap Operas' Destructive Slide Toward Closure" in Staying Tuned: Contemporary Soap Opera Criticism, Serial Monogamy: Soap Opera, Lifespan, and the Gendered Politics of Fantasy and Screen Couple Chemistry: The Power of 2. -- Toughpigs (talk) 18:00, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
 * But nobody is proposing the article about the concept of soupercouple for deletion.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 13:40, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * TTN is suggesting that the idea of a notable fictional relationship is inherently bizzare, a "hyperfocused" article that "I guess it's not impossible" to consider. This suggests an unfamiliarity with the subject of soap opera narrative. In long-running soap operas, a "supercouple" relationship has its own identity that is discussed as a unit by both fans and academic sources.-- Toughpigs (talk) 18:31, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I very well understand the concept, but the idea that Wikipedia should catalogue information in such a way is strange. The characters in these cases are ultimately separate entities that can be brought together and torn apart by the storyline, so they are not inherently connected. Rather than documenting characters, it's simply documenting a specific strand of the story. There should be no particular reason to display information in such a way unless the two articles for the main characters are in such a state that even discussing the relationship brings about size concerns. TTN (talk) 20:28, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Neither of those articles exist. Are you proposing to create them? -- Toughpigs (talk) 20:35, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm not particularly sure any of the three topics currently meet the notability threshold, so redirecting and starting fresh would be the most sensible option. TTN (talk) 20:45, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm repeating myself from above, but I'll point once again to the book To Be Continued... Soap Operas Around the World, an academic analysis of soap operas, which has a full chapter on Betsy as a character, and Ryan's performance. If a chapter in an academic secondary source doesn't meet the notability threshold, then I don't know what would. -- Toughpigs (talk) 20:49, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus. Relisting comment: We have redirects and keep proposed. Is anyone else interested in weighing in? Thanks everyone for contributing and assuming good faith!

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Missvain (talk) 16:00, 24 January 2020 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Bobherry  Talk   Edits  04:43, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Keep per the sources found by Toughpigs. Aoba47 (talk) 19:20, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Redirct the main body of the article is un-sourced and goes against guidelines because of it violating WP:NOTPLOT anyway. Articles shouldn't be an almost exact re-telling of something. They are meant to be summaries. So, there's no reason the information can't be merged or redirected into the articles about the characters or the specific soap in a more summarized manor. Looking through the list of super-couple's, a good portion of them don't have an article specifically on their relationship and the fact of being a super-couple alone does not guarantee an article on its own. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:07, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
 * WP:ARTN says that notability isn't determined by the current state of the article. The article can be improved with the many academic/criticism sources listed above. -- Toughpigs (talk) 07:38, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, of course not. I didn't say anything about notability though did I? I do wonder though why your so against the article being merged. --Adamant1 (talk) 09:00, 4 February 2020 (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.