Talk:Pigeon (The Christmas Invasion)

Question

Is this a spoof page? "21st century individuals, Individual birds" and a mute background pigeon in shot, now warrants its own page? Huh. FractalDoctor ☎ 21:28, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

I agree. Something in the background that isn't even named shouldn't warrant a page. Maybe a mention on the Pigeon page, but definitely not a separate page. Shambala108 ☎ 23:38, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Mmh. I'm not sure. Or at least, I think we need to think of a more precise criterion than "something in the background that isn't named shouldn't warrant a page". For example, we often, quite rightly, have pages for members of recurring alien species who make background cameos in episodes not primarily about that species. Pages like Hath (The Magician's Apprentice). We obviously want to keep those pages.

Pigeon (The Christmas Invasion) isn't a very useful page. But it would be a good page if, instead of a pigeon, this creature had been, say, a flying stingray. Can we delete pages about members of species from the real world, but not ones about fictional creatures, without breaking T:NPOV? I mean, we can, we shouldn't be slaves to precedent in obviously silly cases. But we shouldn't create bad precedent I either. I propose that we create a note on a policy page of the different standards for unnamed background members of fictional vs. real species, and then delete this page on those grounds.

Minor as this is, changing policy is a serious affair, so I suggest leave this open for a few days in case anyone disagrees, barring which, I'll make the note and merge this page into Pigeon. Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 10:51, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

What tickled me was the idea that... if this was allowed, where do we stop? The end montage of "The Chase" has pigeons in photos of Ian and Barbara. A bee probably flies past a character in a shot at some point. An extra's dog might be half visible in a park in a 4 second scene. (etc) I agree that, had this been a Stingray ("Planet of the Dead") then it would've had a bit more weight to warrant its own page, but there had to be a line drawn before this went to rather silly extremes. Pages such as "Concrete Sidewalk (An Unearthly Child)" or "Dead Planet Tree #589" lol FractalDoctor ☎ 19:56, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

Oh yes, I agree we need to draw a line, I am just keen that we draw it in terms that do not exclude pages we do want to have. Do the ones I outlined above sound agreeable? Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 19:58, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

I'd also add that, as a sort of counter-point / example, "Pigeon (The Veil)" is a warranted valid page because that one plays a narrative purpose in its respective story. Whereas "Pigeon (TCI)" is just some random bird that flew into shot when the production team were filming. I think the above suggestions are good. FractalDoctor ☎ 19:59, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

hmmmm... if members of fictional species get pages, even if they just appear in the background, what about crowd scenes in Gallifrey stories? For example, should we have a page for each individual Time Lord extra in the courtroom scenes of Trial of a Time Lord? They're certainly members of a fictitious species. NightmareofEden ☎ 18:07, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

Oh, no, generally not — for the same reason we also already don't try to have pages about every single Cyberman in a squad, but do have Cyberman (Carnival of Monsters). An individual does have to be distinguishable, if only by being the only one of its kind on-screen in a given scene. (There are situations where we might create pages for background Time Lords, of course, for example if the credits named the actors individually and gave us clear ways of distinguishing them. But the norm is not to.) Compare Time Lord (Dimensions in Time). Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 18:12, 12 August 2022 (UTC)