Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Adventures of Captain Underpants


 * 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 not deleted. Part of the nomination is premature, and the discussion leans strongly towards some form of merge or rearrangement of article content, without a clear agreement on what exactly to do. However, what is clear is that the proposed solutions don't require administrator power. Please talk amongst yourselves somewhere outside AfD to figure out how to rearrange the article content. Deryck C. 10:28, 1 December 2012 (UTC)

The Adventures of Captain Underpants

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Do individual novels in the Captain Underpants series warrant their own articles. this AFD would seem to suggest they don't, but this AFD would seem to suggest that they do. This is also the Deletion review of Captain Underpants and the Perilous Plot of Professor Poopypants. Emmette Hernandez Coleman (talk) 04:21, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Selective merge. The plot summaries are overly detailed, and almost nothing is supported by references. One page covering the whole series is sufficient. There may be the occasional book that is slightly more notable than other books, because inevitably some books will get more attention than others, but personally I don't think any of the sequels, even the one that survived an AfD, are independently notable. --Colapeninsula (talk) 12:00, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 13:34, 21 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Note: I have notified the Children's Literature WikiProject of this discussion. Lady  of  Shalott  18:26, 21 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Full merge This makes my head hurt. It concerns me we have these mega AfDs and the easy thing is to delete but our job is to preserve content when possible. I suggest merge everything into a single series article to preserve, then there will be time for someone (who is knowledgeable) to work on trimming down repetitions and plot summaries. -- Green Cardamom (talk) 21:34, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Comment I invited the percipients in the other two AFD's to this one. Emmette Hernandez Coleman (talk) 01:18, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Close - I was invited to this AfD. You might want to review Canvassing. In any event, I'm here. The outcome of Articles for deletion/Captain Underpants and the Preposterous Plight of the Purple Potty People was keep. That keep outcome was on 29 September 2012. The nominator of this AfD needed to wait at least three months from 29 September 2012 -- 29 December 2012 -- before listing Captain Underpants and the Preposterous Plight of the Purple Potty People at AfD. -- Uzma Gamal (talk) 03:43, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I invited everyone who participated in the previous two AFD's to this one regardless of what their opinion was. My intention was not (from WP:CAN) to influence the outcome this AFD towards one side of a debate. Also why should we close the entire AFD because one article in this list was a faculty nomination? Emmette Hernandez Coleman (talk) 04:08, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
 * You did the right thing notifying everyone since it was so recent and AfD is notoriously in need of help. Wasn't Canvassing. -- Green Cardamom (talk) 04:51, 24 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Merge/Redirect to Captain Underpants. Seriously, are we gonna have a separate article for every single book in this nonsensical series? (Imagine if that Dav Pilkey guy were to go on to write a hundred more sequels!) This series as a whole is notable, but individually, the books are not. Take a look at the The Boxcar Children for an example. The series as a whole is notable, but the books individually do not merit their own article. Same goes for the Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Mr. Mystery, etc. This series is unlike Harry Potter, in which the individual books would merit their own page... Simply because the level of notability is not the same. Bonkers The Clown  (Nonsensical Babble) 06:53, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Comment Also be wary for all those WP:ILIKEIT votes that might appear later on... Like it did during this afd.  Bonkers The Clown  (Nonsensical Babble) 06:53, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Additionally, all these articles are just 99% WP:Siilly Captain Underpants Fantasy Land Plots with Some Silly Trivia Written by Silly Underpants Fans, failing WP:NBOOK Bonkers The Clown  (Nonsensical Babble) 10:57, 24 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Comment - My comment at Articles_for_deletion/Captain_Underpants_and_the_Preposterous_Plight_of_the_Purple_Potty_People is equally applicable here: "No question we all agree the series is notable. W hether to have articles on the separate books can be based either on individual notability (which may be debateable from book to book depending on what sources we happen to find), or whether its the best way to organize coverage of the subject.  Every time I see one of these books, though, I'll admit I can't believe the titles the author gets away with. Toilet humor is very popular in its target age group, but not so much among book reviewers and wikipedia editors."   In fact, to follow-up, just last night I completed reading Super Diaper Baby 2: The Invasion of the Potty Snatchers (part of a Captain Underpants spin-off series) to my son and found it horribly ridiculous, and all very much to his delight.  Currently that book has no separate article, but most of the necessary content is jammed into The Adventures of Super Diaper Baby, which doesn't really make much sense to me, considering that we have Template:Captain Underpants to allow easy navigation among all the books.  And indeed, just looking at this recent tome, Super Diaper Baby 2 enjoyed a separate New York Times Review, and even the Scripps service review goes deep enough to note how the book includes a horribly perverted re-imagining (they call it "hugely clever send-up") of How the Grinch Stole Christmas!.  Ultimately, I ask wikipedia editors how hard they want to fight the legion of toilet-humor-loving boys in the world?  I can write an article on best selling early 20th century novels like Sandy (novel) and it will never get as much attention as these odes to the shitter.  I can live with that.--Milowent • hasspoken  14:48, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Keep with selective Merge ... but, they should perhaps be treated much like a set of articles for a TV series currently are: where there is the main article for the series with links to each season. The season articles will often then have links to individual episodes (notability issues in this arrangement, too). That hierarchy may be what works best with this type of article "cluster." It seems to work for the hundreds of media articles, and should work here, too.  GenQuest  "Talk to Me" 21:03, 29 November 2012 (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.