Uncyclopedia:Pee Review/Bear In The Big Blue House

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Bear in the Big Blue House

Ilovecheeseandsausage 20:38, March 17, 2011 (UTC)

This shall be reviewed. Soonish. Yes. I shall do it. 1234 ~ 00:46, 18 March 2011

Prose and formatting:	3	Article article article article article... er... right. Review. Yes. Looking at this, the first thing that struck me about this was the layout and the formatting and whatnot, so I guess I'll just talk about that first. The entire thing seemed to me like a whole lot of white space with many short paragraphs and lines with only a single sentence to them - basically as though the entire thing was a great deal of lists. Looks like you've already gotten a mindful about how terribly bad lists are from Flamingo and Jack, and they're pretty much spot on about that, so I'll try not to repeat too much. But your lists of episodes are a prime example of excessive listiness - its a giant block of one-liners... or four giant blocks, if you want to get technical. There's little reason why a reader wouldn't just skip over those - indeed, I was inclined to, except I'm supposed to be reviewing this, so I should read it first, right? But then I sort of skimmed over them, anyhow. It's choppy and it looks bad and reading more fluently paragraphed narrative and description is much more pleasant, and since you are outlining what happens, why not turn it into paragraphs? I don't really see why you need to separate it by episodes at all, really, as even if you're trying to play off the contrast between what actually happened in an episode and what you're saying happened most folks, if they've even watched it, probably won't remember what happened in what number. But if you keep bits similar enough to what did happen, they will still recognise them amidst the overview, and it will also be much more readable in general. The residents, however, the list of characters - that's more sensible to have as a list - so long as you flesh out each one more. Don't just list them with a couple of cursory sentences, but talk about them, establish their importance and what they do for the show and what they are like and fit them to your main idea, perhaps mixing how they really are with how you are making them out to be... or are you already? It's hard to tell because it's so short. As for the rest of it, you need to establish your ideas from the start, introduce the subject itself - the children's television show - as well as your main idea, your angle, your what-have-you, in the introduction and work with them to the end. A full introduction can be several paragraphs, depending on the piece - however much it takes to set it up, and you need to do that here. Same with the rest of it - as long as it needs to be. From the introduction, though, each part should build upon or flow from the main notion and and from the previous part, and all of it should be there for a reason. Funnies, jokes, notions, build-up to those, background that will help readers get why those are funny... and this is, after all, an encyclopedia, so of course there would be background. Use full sentences and transitions and make the prose flow as well as the ideas. The better the overall flow, the better the read, and the easier to make jokes as you go, most likely. I did try to make it a little prettier, though. Added some markup, fixed your images (need to use thumb for the captions to show), turned the lists into subsections and removed a bit of whitespace by bulletting them - this should give you some idea of what you can do and what can help formatting, but there are plenty of other things you can do to the text. You also need to add links throughout the body of the article itself - can use them to emphasise your jokes, help explain what you mean, or simply link relevant words and things, either will work, but articles need links.
Concept:	4	The question is, what is your main idea, here? Why is this funny? What are you doing to twist the expectations of the reader, and to entertain said reader throughout the piece? I mean, making it out as a more crude, controversial and dark show than it really is could be a start, but how much of this is just made up stuff attempting to shock the reader and how much is satirising the thing itself? Problem is, I really wouldn't know, as I'm not familiar with the thing; all I really know is from this, the wikipedia article, and a brief search (nice graphics these things have these days), but however the case is, simply shocking the reader or saying untruths tend not to be that funny without basis in the actual thing. If the characters already show traits of whatever (say, instead of dropping in masturbating and random violence, mention the things they indeed do that could be considered delusional, like talking to the moon), use that. It could then build into the more unpleasant whatnots. The delusions give way to psychosis as Bear becomes more and more unstable before finally killing half the cast in a psychotic break, which ultimately leads to his suicide, for instance. Seriously, 'smoking pot and having sex' and all that is all very well and fine, but it's just not funny, nor does it make sense. If you want to warp an apparently innocent show into an exhibition of the darker side of humanity, I'm not saying it can't work, but there needs to be a reason within the bounds of the article that fits with the show itself, and it needs to make sense. The show is to teach children things, yes? So why not say that, as does the Wikipedia article, and also explain how it is teaching and desensitising children the perils and unpleasantness of real life, or some such, something about why all the unpleasantnes, and go into the mixed reviews and reactions this would have. Parents wouldn't appreciate such a thing on the air, so you might as well work that into it; make fun of them, and of the corporations, and the reviews. Use the silliness inherent in the system to your advantage.
Humour:	4	It has moments as it is, but if you work with your concept more and make the thing as a whole more readable, that should make it all a lot funnier. The main issues really aren't with the specifics here, though.
Images:	6	Ah, with captions, the images aren't that bad. Basic images from the thing itself, but seem to fit the parts of the article they are with and the captions themselves are rather good, in fact. Matter of fact, but they make their jokes, though the last one could probably use a little more funny to it. You already state he commits suicide, so... why is the image itself funny? Spacing could use a little work, though. Quite a bit of space after the first; if you keep them more even, it tends to look better. In this case, perhaps add a couple, and you can put some of them to the left to keep the article from getting lob-sided. And surely there must be a higher-quality logo image floating around somewhere. I was surprised to find Wikipedia was also using a rather artefacted jpeg (it's speckly where it oughtn't be, and stuff), but it just doesn't look that good like that, you know? Not that it's a terrible issue or anything, mind.
Miscellaneous:	4	Number. Notion. Feeling. Impression? Words.
Final Score:	21	If you work with this, it should definitely become something. Don't mind the numbers so much, but I like to think the comments are worth heeding, so please... heed them. But seriously, I do hope this helps, best of luck to you, and don't hesitate to drop by and ask if you have any questions or whatnot.
Reviewer:	1234 ~ 07:42, 18 March 2011

3	Prose and formatting Appearance, flow, overall presentation...
	Article article article article article... er... right. Review. Yes. Looking at this, the first thing that struck me about this was the layout and the formatting and whatnot, so I guess I'll just talk about that first. The entire thing seemed to me like a whole lot of white space with many short paragraphs and lines with only a single sentence to them - basically as though the entire thing was a great deal of lists. Looks like you've already gotten a mindful about how terribly bad lists are from Flamingo and Jack, and they're pretty much spot on about that, so I'll try not to repeat too much. But your lists of episodes are a prime example of excessive listiness - its a giant block of one-liners... or four giant blocks, if you want to get technical. There's little reason why a reader wouldn't just skip over those - indeed, I was inclined to, except I'm supposed to be reviewing this, so I should read it first, right? But then I sort of skimmed over them, anyhow. It's choppy and it looks bad and reading more fluently paragraphed narrative and description is much more pleasant, and since you are outlining what happens, why not turn it into paragraphs? I don't really see why you need to separate it by episodes at all, really, as even if you're trying to play off the contrast between what actually happened in an episode and what you're saying happened most folks, if they've even watched it, probably won't remember what happened in what number. But if you keep bits similar enough to what did happen, they will still recognise them amidst the overview, and it will also be much more readable in general. The residents, however, the list of characters - that's more sensible to have as a list - so long as you flesh out each one more. Don't just list them with a couple of cursory sentences, but talk about them, establish their importance and what they do for the show and what they are like and fit them to your main idea, perhaps mixing how they really are with how you are making them out to be... or are you already? It's hard to tell because it's so short. As for the rest of it, you need to establish your ideas from the start, introduce the subject itself - the children's television show - as well as your main idea, your angle, your what-have-you, in the introduction and work with them to the end. A full introduction can be several paragraphs, depending on the piece - however much it takes to set it up, and you need to do that here. Same with the rest of it - as long as it needs to be. From the introduction, though, each part should build upon or flow from the main notion and and from the previous part, and all of it should be there for a reason. Funnies, jokes, notions, build-up to those, background that will help readers get why those are funny... and this is, after all, an encyclopedia, so of course there would be background. Use full sentences and transitions and make the prose flow as well as the ideas. The better the overall flow, the better the read, and the easier to make jokes as you go, most likely. I did try to make it a little prettier, though. Added some markup, fixed your images (need to use thumb for the captions to show), turned the lists into subsections and removed a bit of whitespace by bulletting them - this should give you some idea of what you can do and what can help formatting, but there are plenty of other things you can do to the text. You also need to add links throughout the body of the article itself - can use them to emphasise your jokes, help explain what you mean, or simply link relevant words and things, either will work, but articles need links.
4	Concept The idea, the angle, the grand funny of the article...
	The question is, what is your main idea, here? Why is this funny? What are you doing to twist the expectations of the reader, and to entertain said reader throughout the piece? I mean, making it out as a more crude, controversial and dark show than it really is could be a start, but how much of this is just made up stuff attempting to shock the reader and how much is satirising the thing itself? Problem is, I really wouldn't know, as I'm not familiar with the thing; all I really know is from this, the wikipedia article, and a brief search (nice graphics these things have these days), but however the case is, simply shocking the reader or saying untruths tend not to be that funny without basis in the actual thing. If the characters already show traits of whatever (say, instead of dropping in masturbating and random violence, mention the things they indeed do that could be considered delusional, like talking to the moon), use that. It could then build into the more unpleasant whatnots. The delusions give way to psychosis as Bear becomes more and more unstable before finally killing half the cast in a psychotic break, which ultimately leads to his suicide, for instance. Seriously, 'smoking pot and having sex' and all that is all very well and fine, but it's just not funny, nor does it make sense. If you want to warp an apparently innocent show into an exhibition of the darker side of humanity, I'm not saying it can't work, but there needs to be a reason within the bounds of the article that fits with the show itself, and it needs to make sense. The show is to teach children things, yes? So why not say that, as does the Wikipedia article, and also explain how it is teaching and desensitising children the perils and unpleasantness of real life, or some such, something about why all the unpleasantnes, and go into the mixed reviews and reactions this would have. Parents wouldn't appreciate such a thing on the air, so you might as well work that into it; make fun of them, and of the corporations, and the reviews. Use the silliness inherent in the system to your advantage.
4	Humour The implementation, how funny the article comes out...
	It has moments as it is, but if you work with your concept more and make the thing as a whole more readable, that should make it all a lot funnier. The main issues really aren't with the specifics here, though.
6	Images The graphics themselves, as well as their humour and relevance...
	Ah, with captions, the images aren't that bad. Basic images from the thing itself, but seem to fit the parts of the article they are with and the captions themselves are rather good, in fact. Matter of fact, but they make their jokes, though the last one could probably use a little more funny to it. You already state he commits suicide, so... why is the image itself funny? Spacing could use a little work, though. Quite a bit of space after the first; if you keep them more even, it tends to look better. In this case, perhaps add a couple, and you can put some of them to the left to keep the article from getting lob-sided. And surely there must be a higher-quality logo image floating around somewhere. I was surprised to find Wikipedia was also using a rather artefacted jpeg (it's speckly where it oughtn't be, and stuff), but it just doesn't look that good like that, you know? Not that it's a terrible issue or anything, mind.
4	Miscellaneous Anything else... or not...
	Number. Notion. Feeling. Impression? Words.
21	Final score 1234 ~ 07:42, 18 March 2011
	If you work with this, it should definitely become something. Don't mind the numbers so much, but I like to think the comments are worth heeding, so please... heed them. But seriously, I do hope this helps, best of luck to you, and don't hesitate to drop by and ask if you have any questions or whatnot.