Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of science fiction universes

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep‎. I see a consensus to Keep this article, especially after clean-up has been started. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 05:11, 7 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

List of science fiction universes[edit]

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Unreferenced list that might as well be called list of science fiction series. Too broad, fails NLIST, there is no corresponding category. Arguably any work of fiction, and certainly science fiction, creates its own "universe". IF kept, this probably should be renamed list of science fiction fictional universes, per fictional universe concept, but sourcing is a major issue (some universes listed here are red links, a few by a seeming non-notable authors, sigh). Note related, partially overlapping and not much better List of fictional universes in literature, List of fictional universes in animation and comics and List of fictional shared universes in film and television. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 03:33, 23 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Fictional elements, Science fiction and fantasy, and Lists. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 03:33, 23 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - There are, being generous, maybe about ten or so links here to actual full articles on fictional universes. The rest of the list is just a very arbitrary listing of various random science fictions stories and franchises. As the nom states, with the criteria currently on display in this list, it could essentially just list every single piece of science fiction as its own "universe", which is not a feasible grouping, and is redundant to the many, many other lists of science fiction we have grouped by more specific criteria. At the very least, the list should be pared down to the small number of links to genuine articles on specific science fiction univeserses, and then maybe decide from there what to do with what's left. Rorshacma (talk) 06:14, 23 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete too broad and redundant to other lists excluding the dozen universes with actual articles. AryKun (talk) 13:16, 23 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete This whole premise is WP:OR. These are literally just links to fiction or series, with the word "universe" tacked on. Redundant to List of science fiction novels and other similar lists, which are more well defined, and clearly a real verifiable concept. Shooterwalker (talk) 17:06, 23 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: Fails WP:NLIST and is a case of WP:OR. User:Let'srun 17:40, 23 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, but with a lot of pruning to keep just the notable ones (e.g. Star Wars, Star Trek, Stargate [SG1, Atlantis, Universe], Battlestar Galactica). It does satisfy NLIST, e.g. "Viewpoint: Why do fictional universes matter?" (BBC News), "10 Sci-Fi Universes Whose Technology Could Actually Happen" (Screen Rant). And if fantasy universes are discussed by The Guardian ("Top 10 fantasy fiction universes"), how can you exclude science fiction? As per Fictional universe#Universe vs. setting, it is not for single works, but rather for series (of books, not a single TV series). Clarityfiend (talk) 01:35, 24 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Category:Fictional universes exist. Some of the things listed have the word "universe" listed in their title. Is there anything here that wouldn't be listed at List of fictional universes in literature, List of fictional shared universes in film and television, and List of fictional universes in animation and comics? Just make it a link to those three articles and the article for Fictional universe. Any popular show will have books and comic books made, so not sure if there is a reason for any separate list at all. Popular books get made into films and television shows all the time. Perhaps list all fictional universes together, and have a column listing what media they have been in, and if anyone cares about the genre, have a column for it as well. Dream Focus 07:36, 24 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and trim. I believe this topic does satisfy WP:NLIST, based on the secondary sources listed and others like this or this. All other raised concerns can be dealt with by limiting the list to science fiction universes which are notable (in the Wikipedia sense) separately from their respective works of fiction, as has already been suggested by others. Then it's no longer redundant to List of science fiction novels and the like. In comparison to the other lists suggested in the nomination, this is the companion to List of fantasy worlds. So it looks at fictional universes from the point of view of genre, while the others organize them along the lines of medium. So while they may have some of the same entries, they have different functions. Daranios (talk) 10:34, 25 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Per others, although it needs cleanup to remove the universes that have not been discussed in a significant way in reliable sources. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 13:38, 25 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I've done a quick first pass at cleanup, removing the obviously non-notable entries, and entries that were clearly just linking to individual works or franchise overview pages rather than articles specifically about or having significant content about the universe they take place in. Still a lot more to go through and cleanup, but I am at least satisfied that reducing this to a clearly defined list that passes WP:LISTN is easily possible, so I am fine with Keeping this now. We can have further discussion on if we want to reorganize or merge this in to other existing fictional universe lists/articles once it is cleaned up, but that is not something that needs to be decided now. Rorshacma (talk) 16:45, 25 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 04:11, 30 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Keep per efforts of editors to improve the article. I think keeping it as a disambiguation page for articles that are explicitly talking about fictional universes is for the best, and per the recent Lists of Nintendo Characters AfD, even though the list can be seen as redundant, it still serves a navigational purpose. Pokelego999 (talk) 14:25, 4 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Keep I think this meets NLIST. In addition to some of the sources above, the concept is picked up in academic work, eg
1. The book Industrial Society and the Science Fiction Blockbuster by Mark T. Decker has SIGCOV of the concept across a few examples. [1]. Here's a review of that book [2]
2. This discussion in the context of film. (Crewe, David. 2017. CINEMA SCIENCE. Screen Education(86): 42-49, [3])
3. A published moderated discussion between several authors that compares multiple universes including Foundation, Known Space, and others including some of the panelists' own works (Bear, Greg, Gregory Benford, David Brin, and Gary Westfahl. “Building on Isaac Asimov’s Foundation: An Eaton Discussion with Joseph D. Miller as Moderator.” Science Fiction Studies 24, no. 1 (1997): 17–32. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4240573.)

—siro χ o 06:36, 30 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Comment From a WP:PAGEDECIDE perspective, this seems like a very questionable page to retain. I think Dream Focus presents a pretty strong case that the best solution would be a single table of fictional universes (limited to ones with stand-alone Wikipedia articles) with columns for medium and genre. This would presumably be at the title list of fictional universes, with all the current lists (this one, List of fictional universes in literature, List of fictional universes in animation and comics, and so on) redirecting there. TompaDompa (talk) 15:07, 30 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed, that makes sense. Some universes are not easy to clasify genre-wise, and split by genre and medium is confusing. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 07:09, 1 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Both medium and genre are a reality, so I see no problem with the existing lists. And if a fictional universe has the genre of science fantasy or something, there is no harm in including it in several lists. That said, I have no objections to a proper merge on the basis of WP:PAGEDECIDE, if the information is preserved - like it is done in the "Media" column of List of fantasy worlds with respect to the medium. A resulting list should also be sortable, so that users interested only in e.g. science fiction can easily find their segment. Daranios (talk) 10:30, 2 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I think splitting information across several pages needlessly is a problem, especially when it makes Wikipedia less useful to the reader as is the case here. And yes, sortability should go without saying. TompaDompa (talk) 16:40, 2 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This. One list > several lists. Most readers don't want to think which list to check, they just want one that has everything relevant in it. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 12:41, 3 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
As I said, I am find with merging in the other lists if that's expected to be helpful, though that question is more indirectly related to deletion. I did not expect a discussion that started with the criticsm "too broad" to end in suggestions to make the scope signficantly broader, but I guess the nomination meant a different dimension of "broad". Daranios (talk) 10:51, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.