Talk:Ex Machina (comics)

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Contents 1 Pherson 2 Volume 4 3 Timeline ? 4 In/Out of universe issues 5 Series or character article? 6 Edit made as of 1st Feb 07 - Article structure

[edit] Pherson

How should Pherson, from the EM Specials, be included here? I'm going ot give it a try, and hope we'll work something strong up.ThuranX 15:51, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Nevermind. I somehow read right over him in the characters list.ThuranX 15:52, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Volume 4

I added what volume 4 will contain. I just got that off of Wildstorm's web site. Pretty sure it would be accurate since they publish it. Abrynkus 23:03, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Timeline ?

Would a timeline be better then a Synopsis for the series?--Brown Shoes22 18:34, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] In/Out of universe issues

I started to rework the article tonight to convert it to a more sourced, less 'in-universe' feel. The TImeline's probably going to be a casualty of this conversion. It's distinctly 'In-Universe', and thus conflicts with both wiki-policy onfiction oriented articles, and the WP:COMICS ideas, not that I'm a part or supporter of that group. ThuranX 00:12, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

The Comics project says to avoid chronologies in comics where continuity is fluid. However, this clearly isn't the case here. In fact, the chronology helps the reader understand the comic better, since everything else that's happened in world history has also happened here; because Hundred is in a position of influence, knowing what's going on in the world during this time helps to illuminate his character. Perhaps more importantly, we know that the series is on a fixed timeline: Hundred isn't reelected, so the story is going to end in 2006. An essential part of the story is the claustrophobic nature caused by the fact that so much story is compressed into so short a timeframe. Getting rid of the chronology would make this point much less effective. Stilgar135 03:50, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Even better. We can tie a proper summary of the series to the dates without needing a chronology. ThuranX 04:24, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

What advantage (beyond being "proper") would a summary have over the timeline? Stilgar135 04:31, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Cleaner and more text oriented, for one. Also, a Chronology shouldn't replace the entirity of summaries, because it's entirely in-universe, which is, again, frowned upon. I think that contextualizing the story with events relative to real-world events referenced in context, or which establish the story's framework will serve to help inform unfamiliar wiki-readers about how the story is told. ThuranX 04:42, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

I mostly agree with you, and I had a bunch of things that I wrote about the in-universe/out-of-universe argument, but they all seemed like passive-aggressive personal attacks, so they're gone. Suffice it to say that I agree summaries are generally better than timelines for readibility, but the out-of-universe argument really drives me up the wall. Stilgar135 04:57, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

I understand a great deal of it, but what bothers me more is the permanent present tense. it's ridiculous that a character is simultaneously created, empowered, fighting for 50 years and dying all in the same moment and time. All the same, I think that this article actually NEEDS a strong measure of the OOU exactly because of it's unique 'One-step-away' story. Unlike the DC universe, which has false cities, or Marvel, in which there have been thousands of character interactions which have buitl to create a thoroughly different world, Ex Machina is a world in which only TWO major differences exist: The alien device which gave Hundred his power, and that only the North tower fell. Nothing else changed; we've seen that the US still attacked Afghanistan and Iraq; Bush still followed his 'compassionate conservative'agenda, gay rights, marriage, and civil unions are still a red button topic in the nation... THe only difference between our world and theirs is it's Hundred not Bloomberg, and for a year, Hundred was a superhero, and a lousy one at that to judge against the standards of Superman or Batman. This close paralleling is well worth documenting carefully. an Out-of Universe perspective allows us to compare Hundred's responses to real stimuli.

Finally, thanks for keeping this civil. I'm not looking to pick a fight, but to actually improve the article, especially since I happen to be a huge fan of the story and the creative team. I just wish I could find a couple sources to properly compare Tony Harris to both Stained glass and Charles Demuth. ThuranX 05:44, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

On another in/out, I revised the themes section to reflect a more scholarly, less OR oriented ...vibe? thoughts? Suggestions? ThuranX 00:11, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Series or character article?

At the time of writing, the information in this article is a mix of series (Ex Machina) and character (Mitchell Hundred) information. I've made a start at editing the page so that it is primarily series related. Ideally, any character information kept should fit within the series structre rather than sticking out like a sore thumb, or farmed out to a separate Mitchell Hundred article if deemed neccessary. H. Carver 12:58, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Your 'start' was to remove the infobox, add another without carrying over any of the relevant info, then leave. As such, I've reverted your single edit. Try discussing the issues back here first, or making a significant sweepeing set of changes to be discussed. Throwing up an infobox where we had one, then leaving with an edit summary for others to fix your mess isn't being bold, it's causing troubles, though I can tell there was Good Faith involved. Next time, copy all the details out of the old infobox, or fully prep the new one. Don't switch it and ask others to complete your bold edit. ThuranX 15:37, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

My start was to replace an inappropriate infobox with a relevent infobox. All appropriate details were carried over - the details omitted were about the character, not the series. As I said above, the artile should be about the series, not the character, who should have a separate page if necessary.

I'd thank you also not to accuse me of 'leaving others to fix my mess'. I made the edit during my lunch hour at work, and detailed what I had done. I had, and still have, every intention of carrying on work on the article. I did not 'ask others to complete' my edit, I merely informed you of where I had got to so *if* anyone else wanted to carry on before I got back to it, they could.

As you insist, I will provide a fully populated infobox when I re-edit the page. If you still find it insufficient, please discuss it here instead of reverting back to an inappropriate infobox. H. Carver 17:39, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, if the box were so inappropriate, it would've been attended to a long time ago. However, the current infobox is properly populated, and done well. Thank you. ThuranX 21:33, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Edit made as of 1st Feb 07 - Article structure

I've restructured the article to try and make it clearer, flow better, and read easier. In doing this I've also taken the opportunity to try and rewrite sections in the present tense as per Wikipedia guidelines on describing fictional events, and I removed some parts that I felt failed WP:V and WP:NOR. Finally, as well as editing, I added some external links, and tried to find citations for some of the things mentioned in the article.

Hopefully I've covered all the changes I've made.

The introduction

The introduction seemed too long, so I reduced it down to a single paragraph. Some of what I took out I moved to the new 'Publication History' section. I cut down the paragraph about the title, as I felt it was a little unclear in what it was trying to say. The phrase deus ex machina itself is explained on its own page, and as yet we don't know what relevence it has to the comic, so I felt the important thing here was just to point to the Greek phrase that the title came from, and say how it refers to him not being the Great Machine any more. In hindsight, I should have left in the bit about Thomas Jefferson. Though the problem is, without citing any sources, writing about the possible meanins of the title falls foul of WP:NOR. :(

Publication hisory

A new section added to give information about the history of the series. The old sections on Themes and Politics looked to fall foul of WP:NOR, so I took the verifiable infomation out of those sections and put them into this new one.

Characters

I broke this section up between Hundred and the rest of the characters so that I could expand the second on Hundred by moving the information from the old Abilities, Weapons and Equipment section in here too, as it seemed out of place before. I tried fitting the old infobox about Mitchell Hundred in here as well, but couldn't get it to look good so left it out.

As mentioned above, I rewrote the character bios slightly to try and get them into the present tense as per Wikipedia guidelines on describing fictional events.

I also removed the names of the people who Tony Harris apparently used as models for the characters, primarily because I couldn't find any citations to support the names given.

Timeline

I've left this as-is. I'm not altogether comfortable with it, to be honest, but I see it's been a hot topic already, so I don't want to risk stirring the nest too much there. :) Also any attempt to replace it with a plot synopsis would take quite a while to write, and just doing what I've done so far has taken me long enough. :)

Reprints

Changed this section heading to Bibliography and created a table to present the information in what, I hope, is a cleaner fasion.

Other notes

This section was a bit close to 'trivia', which I've seen discouraged in Wikipedia guidelines, so I moved the interesting information to where I felt it fit better, and deleted the paragraph about what else Vaughan has done, replacing that with the See Also section instead.

H. Carver 04:59, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

overall, a great rewrite. I reworked the powers/gizmos paragraph to reflect that he built his devices AFTER his accident gave him the dreams and insights.

My only other comment is to suggest that you convert all the references to formal references which accumulate at the end of the page. Otherwise, Great job. I DO feel that after the series, it might be worth it to consider a rewrite of the 'timeline' section, but for now, it's far better for illsutrating the history of the characters. ThuranX 02:41, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind comments. I've just done a minor copyedit on the powers/gizmos paragraph, hope you don't mind.

I noticed while restructring that not all the references were in the same format, but I didn't standardise them all when doing so as at the time I wasn't confident I'd be able to do it properly. I'll have to study WP:Citing sources a bit more, but once I've done that I'll have a go at standardising the references - unless someone else gets there before me. H. Carver 04:44, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

All you, man. that's not always fun for me. Thanks! ThuranX 05:01, 9 February 2007 (UTC)