Talk:Man-Thing

The Man-Thing is Transportation?

There's currently a comment stating that Steve Rogers (Cap) assigned the Man-Thing to the Thunderbolts as "transportation". The general reader leader is likely to ponder in what fashion a near-mindless much monster can act as transportation (I certainly do). Does it have a pilot's license? A rickshaw? Does it possess powers and abilities not covered in that section of its wiki?

Duplicate Page?

It seems that this page should be removed or combined because it's a duplicate of a wiki article. The original is here Swamp_Thing —Preceding unsigned comment added by Devon Vice (talk • contribs) 01:44, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Fictional character biography

It's a big, big job, and I ask for other editors to help. The FCB contains a lot of material about the writers, etc. Some of it's extraneous, but none of it belongs in this section, which should be written present-tense in-universe throughout (and as the first paragraph seems to be). Any pertinent material about the creators should be in Publication history, and any issues cited in FCB should be within footnotes, all as per WikiProject Comics guidelines. --Tenebrae 16:55, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Right, because it was assembled in emulation of Swamp Thing, so please try tackling that page, too. --Scottandrewhutchins 18:32, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Man-Thing isn't a copy of Swamp Thing. That's a discredited rumor. It'd be a pretty neat, trick, too, considering Man-Thing premiered May 1971 and Swamp Thing premiered July 1971. They were both in the pipeline at the same time. --Tenebrae 18:52, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm aware that, if anything, the second Swamp Thing is a rip-off of Man-Thing, since Wein wrote a Man-Thing story before he wrote the first Alec Holland story. What I'm referring to is the way this page is/was formatted is modeled on the way the Swamp Thing page is formatted, so you might want to work on that page's formatting, too. Looking at that page will explain a lot of the problems you are finding with this page.--Scottandrewhutchins 20:21, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

No question; the Swamp Thing page needs a lot of work as well. I like to look at entries for Batman and Spider-Man, for example, as models.

I'm working on 'em, hard as I can. Like I always say, I've only got two hands and half a brain!--Tenebrae 21:16, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Powers and Abilities

The powers and abilities section is the one stopping this article from moving into the B-class. I haven't worked on this section at all other than to add the line about the increased independence caused by the waste treatment process. Most of this appears to be taken from the Marvel Universe Handbook, possibly excessively verbatim, although it was missing the line about the waste treatment process affecting his powers, which is in the Marvel Universe handbook. In the stories it is more implicit than explicit, since it seems to have been necessary for him to voluntarily make the trip to Atlanta.--Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 21:09, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

For what it's worth, my compliments. You're doing good work and much hard work on improving this article. --Tenebrae (talk) 03:50, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. To help things along I've tagged a few statements but also I thought it might help if I dropped in a more detailed appraisal of P&A:

• Both paragraph 3 and 7 repeats similar information about his acidic secretions. Bringing the two together would cut down on space and (as paragraph #3 is more specific) it could sv on having to source some of it.

• Paragraph 7 is also poorly worded, so the above might help with that. The first sentence here in particular and the quote as a whole, could be tightened up and clarified "Unusual psychic and mystical forces react in what passes as the "brain" cells located throughout his body. These unique forces render the Man-Thing extremely sensitive to emotions."

• Similarly the last sentence isn't great and I wonder if it is needed: "In-universe, knowledge of his existence is rarely tied to the experiments of Sallis, as are speculations as to any human identity he may have had."

Overall it is rather rambling and sometimes unclear (I wonder if that is due some gymnastics in paraphrasing) and I suspect there wouldn't be a problem with keeping it trimmed back - it is usually wise with such sections as they can attract unsourced opinion and speculation.

Other than that the article could shoot for GA. (Emperor (talk) 18:51, 2 November 2008 (UTC))

Completely agree — there's good information, but the prose needs to be streamlined and the data culled to what's most significant.

I gave an example of such streamlining at User talk:Scottandrewhutchins, and will give it again here as one brief example, and then incorporate it into the article

In the case of this passage:

Reminded by Dr. Calvin that S.H.I.E.L.D. has warned them that Advanced Idea Mechanics has been operating in the area, Sallis disobeys orders by bringing a woman (later retconned to be his wife, but consistently referred to here as "Miss Brandt"), Ellen Brandt, originally from Wisconsin,[19] to his shack, sleeping with her and telling her about the project as he destroys his notes, believing that the formula now exists only in his head. Motorboating to the laboratory, where his colleague, Harrison, is to pick up the sample, Brandt accompanies him, but they find Harrison collapsed on the floor, and Brandt has prepared an ambush. Fleeing to his car with the only sample of the serum, he injects himself with it, believing that he will become a Super-Soldier (someone of peak human, although not superhuman, abilities) and survive the crash and submersion, drives through a fence and into the swamp. The serum instantly reacts violently with the fen, and, as later explained, magical forces extant in the area, transforming him into...

Here's how I would streamline and edit it for encyclopedic succinctness:

Though warned that the technological terrorist group Advanced Idea Mechanics has been operating in the area, Sallis breaches security by bringing with him his lover, Ellen Brandt (later retconned to be his wife, but referred to here as "Miss Brandt"). He destroys his notes to his formula, which he has memorized. Later, at his nearby laboratory, Sallis is ambushed and learns Brandt sold him out. Fleeing with the only sample of his serum, he injects himself with it in hopes of attaining peak-human physicality and saving himself. However, he crashes his car into the swamp where chemical and, as later explained, magical forces instantly transform him into...

From six lines to four. I'll integrate this now in the hopes it might give one example of ways to streamline this long article without losing pertinent content. --Tenebrae (talk) 20:16, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

This is a fan page

This article has been hijacked by a single fanatic fan, and as a result, the Fictional character biography is no more than a fan-page essay with analysis and observations that would in no way be of interest to the general reader or to anyone but a fan. I am tagging this, and I urge other editors to trim this and make it read like an encyclopedia entry.

To the one editor making obsessive edits day after day, please try and pull back and be more objective. The average reader doesn't care about a lot of this incredibly dense detail. With all due respect, you are turning this into your fan page, and that is just not right. Please think of the average reader. --69.22.254.108 (talk) 19:45, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

It's not a fan page. The fictional character biography was a laundry list of Man-Thing opponents. That's a fan page. Go read Swamp Thing. It's structured incorrectly by Wikipedia policies, but it has good information of a similar nature. I'm sorry, but "Man-Thing encountered Thog, Man-Thing encountered Wundarr, Man-Thing encountered the Thing" is useless and trivial, not the material that I added --Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 20:18, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

We don't list every single antagonist of every single issue. Going on and on about whether Thogg was really this or Thigg was really that goes way beyond what any general reader needs to know. Wikipedia is written for the general reader, not for fans.

But the larger note is this: I've been watching the page without doing anything, and anytime anyone makes an edit that edits out something of yours, you just put it back in. Even single words. Someone removed the WP:PEACOCK word "highly" from "highly influential," and you put it back in. How do you quantify "highly," and what possible difference does it make to our knowledge of Man-Thing whether Neil Gaiman was influenced or "highly" influenced. On what possible scale of influence do you have to reach a certain number to be "highly"? When you refuse to let another editor touch even an empty, peacock word like that, you are violating WP:OWN, and I think we need to get an admin involved. You've hijacked this article for yourself. --69.22.254.108 (talk) 21:10, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I didn't intentionally put it back in. I was undoing something else. I'll take it out now. Before I got to it, much of the FCB was exactly what I said. I didn't take that stuff out, though. --Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 22:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

An anonymous user has no business putting a fansite tag on the article, especially since there is no elaboration on the talk page as to why. --Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 18:58, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Thing is that anonymous editors can add such tags and the same user who added the tags [1] started this section where they did express their concerns and answered queries on their concern. As the concerns were specfically directed at you it was probably better not to remove it yourself [2]. Given the concerns raised it might be best to ask someone to read the page through and see what they think. (Emperor (talk) 23:47, 10 November 2008 (UTC))

I removed it because their words assert a claim without providing any real support.--Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 04:54, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Agree with Emperor. With all respect for Scottandrewhutchins' knowledge and enthusiasm, the FCB section is way overwritten, assumes too much knowledge on the part of a general reader about Marvel Comics history and of what's significant, lacks perspective (if everything is given equal importance, then nothing is important), and, really, Scott shouldn't be removing tags; that does smack of WP:OWN. --Tenebrae (talk) 21:11, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

On the plus side, like Tenebrae, I have most of the "muck monsters" on my watchlist and have kept an eye on the edits and they are moving in a positive direction and all the articles have been greatly improved. This doesn't mean it is perfect but, as with nearly all cases, it is good to have other editors go over edits and knock the corners off them. It is all part of the process - the important thing is it is moving forward. (Emperor (talk) 01:14, 15 November 2008 (UTC))

Yep. And I really am serious in my applause of Scottandrewhutchins' knowledgeable dedication. It's just a matter of whether other editors will be able to nip and tuck without creating ill feelings. I will say he was perfectly fine when I did just that to a sample paragraph. Maybe it's just a matter of shaping is all.

But in a while. It's late and we're tired and just taking a little Wiki-stroll before bed. -- Tenebrae (talk) 03:07, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

I removed the tag because the only evidence that is being made are vague generalities. Like I said, before I got to this, it was essentially laundry list of other Marvel characters that Man-Thing had enountered. I'm also trying not to be too OR or essayist by creating threads about all the messianic references in Gerber, which are rather startling, and seem to inform DeMatteis's run. --Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 04:20, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Naw, it's cool — you've added much major, important information, corrected inaccuracies, and fleshed it all out. We just need to pull back on some of the overdetail and shape it with perspective. But I have great admiration for what you've done. Now it's just a matter of editing and trimming, as happens regularly with professional writers. --Tenebrae (talk) 05:11, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Templates

Does this really need Spider-Man and Dark Avengers templates? He's not listed on either one, and is not a major supporting character to either. --Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 17:27, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

No they both should go - if an article isn't actually on the navbox then there needs to be a damn good argument made for including them on a page and it almost feels like these have been dished out to a page that mentions them. I'll remove them both. (Emperor (talk) 02:38, 5 May 2010 (UTC))

Time to tackle this article

As noted by the deletion of Fictional history of Green Goblin and other recent decisions, WikiProject Comics follows Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction), which does not allow "fictography" and under which fictional-character articles must be written with a real world perspective. This article's FCB, like those of the deleted articles, grossly violates these guidelines and WikiProject Comics consensus. This article requires a group effort to radically trim, to add third-party WP:RS sourcing, and to be brought to encyclopedic standards. I myself and working on another big project, but will return to this article shortly and hope that other editors will help. --Tenebrae (talk) 08:15, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

This article's FC has been tagged since 2008, and it has been in vio of consensus since 2011, as noted above. Time to edit. --Tenebrae (talk) 23:12, 14 February 2013 (UTC)