Talk:Belgian comics/GA1

GA Review

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Will start reviewing shortly. Cheers, Ricardiana (talk) 22:59, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Criterion 1: well-written

Unfortunately, I see many problems here. All sections have many problematic sentences. The lead, to take just one section, is filled with errors:

• "Belgian comics are a distinct subgroup in the comics history, and played a major role in the development of European comics,[1] alongside with France with who they share a large common history." --Should be "with whom", but in any case this sentence is clogged with clauses. Also, you seem to be hedging here: are the comics part of the larger Franco-Belgian tradition, or not? If there is controversy regarding this point in your source material, then it should be included in the article and mentioned briefly in the lead.
• "While the comics in the two major language groups and regions of Belgium (Flanders with the Dutch language and Wallonia with French) have each clearly distinct characteristics, they are constantly influencing one another, and meeting each other in Brussels and in the bilingual publication tradition the major editors have" -- another overly-long sentence. "Have each clearly distinct" should be "each have." Also, I'm not clear on what "meeting each other in Brussels" means.

There are a number of other problem sentences throughout the article; for example: "Meanwhile, many artists who would later become famous debuted on a small scale in the Walloon newspapers: Peyo, Greg, Albert Uderzo, René Goscinny, ..." which does not even finish but just breaks off.

I suggest asking for a peer review or for someone to copy-edit the article before nominating it again.

Criterion 2: factually accurate and verifiable

Big problem here: You haven't included full bibliographic information for your sources. I can see that you cite, for example, "De Laet, Zevende Kunst Voorbij, p. 14" in note 7, but when was Zevende Kunst Voorbij written, and what is the full name of the author, and the name of the publisher, and ISBN or OCLC number? You should start a "Bibliography" or "References" section and include this info. See Emily Dickinson for an example of what this would look like.

Criterion 3: broad in its coverage, and Criterion 4: neutral

The article really side-steps a major issue that's been debated on the talk page, which is: why are Belgian comics being treated separately when most scholarship treats them as part of the Franco-Belgian tradition? I understand that there may indeed be cogent reasons why the Belgian tradition is different, but those reasons are irrelevant unless they are in your source materials. Otherwise you are doing original research, which is not allowed. The one source you have that seems to argue this is a link that no longer works. Even if, however, you add sources that agree that Belgian comics are their own distinct tradition, you still need to mention and take into account the many sources that say the opposite. On that note, I really commend the article's use of sources in languages other than English. However, there are some good sources in English that you do not use. I turned up quite a few by typing "Belgian comics" into Google Books. Many of them are quite recent, too - one is from just last year. --I'm not saying that you have to use every source under the sun, but the article's heavy reliance on a few sources whose information is not fully given and the non-addressal of a controversial point on which you differ from most current scholarship are all big problems.

Criterion 5: stable

OK here.

Criterion 6: illustrated, if possible, by images

OK here.

Verdict

I think that the article is a fail at this point, but I am going to put it on hold for a week to give you a chance to address these concerns, especially since you've had to wait so long for a review. Ricardiana (talk) 23:24, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

It's been a week, and the only change that's been made is that the references have been given in full. All changes to the writing were done by me, and I didn't even begin to cover what needs to be done. The larger issues were untouched. The article fails, I'm afraid. Ricardiana (talk) 23:58, 8 May 2009 (UTC)