User:Squeamish Ossifrage/Fictional character lists

Wikipedia contains numerous articles on subjects related to fiction, including fictional worlds and the elements therein. These elements often include lists of fictional characters from films, television shows, novels, or comic books. When and where to present such lists, and what characters to include in them, are complicated topics that reflect tensions between several policies and guidelines. These questions are complementary, and should be addressed simultaneously to create a well-written article or improve an existing one.

When dealing with fictional character lists, it is helpful to have an understanding of the general guidelines about writing about fiction, article size (especially splitting lists and creating subarticles), and stand-alone lists. Like those guidelines, this page page is not a content policy, but following the basic notions laid out in here is generally considered good practice.

When to include

Consensus has generally favored cast and character lists for films and television shows, in part because these fictional works possess a real-world connection: the characters are performed (or voiced, in the case of animation) by real-world actors. Even then, Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, and cast lists are not generally expected to include literally all characters appearing in the work. The style guideline for film articles provides guidance for addressing film casts; a similar guideline addresses coverage for the cast of television shows. These can serve as basic guidance for any list of cast and characters where real-world actors are involved in the roles (such as radio serials, stage productions, or video games with credited voice acting).

In other works, the characters are purely fictional. This includes printed fiction, such as novels and comic books, but also works such as video games (where there is no voice acting or credited performers). In many cases, character lists for these individual works are not necessary and are discouraged. The characters in works of fiction are effectively elements of the plot. As stated in the style guide for novels, "a finely crafted plot summary is used to introduce the characters to the reader."

Where to include

The first, best place for a character list is in the article of the work in which those characters appear. The various style guidelines universally encourage character lists, when desirable, to be included in the larger context of the work. This is not always practical due to article size or other concerns; as with many Wikipedia guidelines, exceptions exist. The most common such reason is a list of characters that is too long – even when following guidelines about which characters and how much detail to include – to fit within the article on the parent work, either because of overall article size, the general aesthetics of the article, or other concerns. There is rarely a clear set of conditions to indicate when a list of characters should be split from the article discussing the work as a whole.

It is more likely that a spinout list will be considered appropriate for long-running series or franchises than for individual works. Plot summaries for franchise articles are, by necessity, less detailed than for their constituent works; it may not be possible to adequately introduce the characters necessary to give the reader context without giving the plot undue weight. This is especially the case for comic books, where the fictional worlds created by the major comic publishers include characters who recur from time to time, and in various titles and series, over the span of decades. However, not every series of television shows, books, or comics warrants a stand-alone character list; nor does it necessarily preclude a stand-alone character list for a single, specific book, film, or video game. Additionally, keep in mind that not all franchises are amenable to a shared character list. For example, the individual games in the Final Fantasy media franchise are largely stand-alone installments with unique settings, plots, and main characters. It would probably not be appropriate to incorporate characters from all of them into a single list.

Occasionally, a list of fictional characters, taken as a set, has received sufficient coverage in reliable, independent sources to be notable separately from the work itself, but this is relatively rare. Examples might include the list of Simpsons guest stars or the list of Batman family enemies.

Editorial discretion and evaluation of the article or articles in question will always be necessary for determining when to spin out character lists.

What to include

It is easy for character lists to develop in ways contrary to Wikipedia's guidelines.

A stand-alone character list should not include more characters than would be included in the articles about the work itself (or, for series or franchises, in the individual articles about the constituent parts of the franchise). Lists may be tabular in form when that would be useful, such as a table for the characters of a long-running television show that indicates which seasons the character appeared in as well as the actor or actors who portrayed that character. But they may also be prose that provides brief context for each character's role in the work; in this case, it is vitally important to limit the amount of plot summary conveyed in this manner. The prose for a character in such a list should never be more detailed than would be expected from the aspects of the plot summary involving that character in the article about the work itself. On the other hand, bare cast or character lists, presented merely as a bullet-point list, should not typically be split off into stand-alone list articles; they can be formatted into two or even three columns in order to be appropriately included in the main article for the work.

No style manual directly addresses the format of these lists. Where practical, tabular lists should be sortable. Lists that address characters in prose can be organized alphabetically, chronologically, or by the importance of their roles (main / recurring / guest characters, for example), as best suits the topic.

Sourcing

Cast and character lists that are included as part of a broader article about a work of fiction are often sourced to primary sources (that is, the work itself and its credits, where appropriate). Plot summaries are often permitted without an explicit source with the understanding that the film, novel, or other fictional work is the implicit source. One point of view is that spinout lists, split from their parent article for length or presentation, should be thought of as "part" of the original article; a cast list or plot element would not require a secondary source to be included there, so why is there a different standard when article length is a concern? On the other hand, once material is moved to a separate article with its own title, many editors believe that primary and implied sourcing is no longer sufficient.

The list selection criteria permits lists where "most or all of the listed items do not warrant independent articles" and "every entry in the list fails the notability criteria", but cautions that such lists should be retained within their parent article when possible. Consensus on this topic has gradually been shifting away from allowing stand-alone lists with exclusively primary sourcing, especially for lists of fictional characters that are not depicted by real-world actors. Quite a few such lists have been rejected after deletion dicussions. It isn't necessary to have secondary sources for every character in the list, or even – necessarily – for stand-alone character lists to meet the sourcing standard necessary to demonstrate notability. But a character list where there are no reliable secondary sources at all is increasingly prone to deletion.

In any case, when a conscious effort has been made to separate a character list from its parent article, the article's talk page should clearly indicate this decision. Templates, such as {{SubArticle}}, can serve this purpose.

Other fictional elements

There are lots of other fictional things that can be assembled into lists.

However, lists of fictional places and objects of various sorts are typically viewed with a more critical eye than lists of characters. Where these fictional elements have not received specific attention from independent, reliable sources, it is generally best to discuss them in the context of the plot summary – if at all. Where there has been independent coverage of non-character fictional elements, best practice is to present them in a more coherent article that can address the whole of such topics. For example, Middle-Earth, for Tolkein's fictional setting; Mythology of Lost and Mythology of The X-Files, for those shows' respective storyline elements; and so forth.