Uncyclopedia:Pee Review/Don Martin
Don Martin[edit source]
Funnybony 17:13, 11 August 2009 (UTC) User:POTR/Template:PEEing
| Humour: | 4 | This really is a disappointment, and I know that I'm not unique in this opinion. First I'm going to ask that you go and read HTBFANJS and then come back here for the rest of this review. Go on, I've got a little time to kill.
You're back? That was fast. Now the most important thing here is that you read all of that and got something out of it. The first thing you should get out of it is that it's important enough to have said all that is included in HTBFANJS that someone has sat down and written it. Along with that I have about three or four books in my house at the moment that have something or another to do with writing comedic articles. I borrow them from the local library, because I'm cheap. They have about 30 or so that I've come across there that are about this topic. There's also a few hundred or so about writing in general. Now I'm not saying all of this to make myself sound any more important than I am - after all I've read the books, I haven't written them - but it's being said to make you realise that there is some importance and a certain amount of skill behind writing a good comedic article and writing a poor one. One of the first articles I wrote here, Carebears, is an example of a poor article (from my perspective), and the issues that plague this are similar to the issues that plague Don Martin, although obviously not identical. The first is the source of humour in both of these is from complete random gibberish. I started off with something completely untrue, and thought "I know, I'll throw some names into the mix that are kinda famous. Shakespeare is always a good one, and Nietzsche. And the guys who invented Superman, what were their names again?" And my thought processes skipped from place to place at random - I had no plan, no real concept, nothing to tie the whole lot in together. Now when I read Carebears, I try and read it like someone who came from the outside my head and read it for the first time. As the reader, I say to myself "This is boring. Why is this stupid guy talking about Nietzsche and Superman. I'm here to read about Carebears. Oh, how I love their Carebear stare, and their Carebear smiles, and the Carebear porn, especially the bit where she gets down and..." Ahem, enough about the reader's perspective. The main thing is that it's not a cohesive piece - it starts somewhere random and flits about with no real direction. That is the feeling I get when I read this. I love Don Martin - he has a very distinctive style and a sense of humour, and I grew up reading Mad, including those paperbacks that you referred to in your article. It is a quirky look at the universe from an almost childlike perspective, and it pokes fun at our civilisation by pointing out the inherent contradictions in it. In other words, this is an attempt at a humorous article on a humorous subject. (More on this in concept.) Now you've then decided that you'll do a bit of an ego spin in the article as well. I'm not going to say to never do that - There are a couple of articles that refer to Pau Pei, Pepé, and another pseudonym that I can't recall at the moment. However the reason that these have crept in is that I've needed fictional people to throw into my articles that were either the creators or the catalysts for the articles being written. Although Fonebone is a running gag for Don Martin, the prominence in the article makes this a bit of an ego trip. And Remember rule one. If something is coherent, and closer to the truth, it is funnier than pure nonsense. |
| Concept: | 6.5 | Okay, you've been given a boost here because I do love Don Martin, and there is an extremely good chance that a lot of people who frequent Uncyclopedia do as well. And why is that? Because Don Martins is the first introduction a lot of people have to satire. And as a result what they expect here is a good satire.
So going back to Uncyclopedia as satire, if you've created an expectation of people that you are going to write an article in a satricial publication (Uncyc) about a satirical individual (Don Martin), what tone do you th9nk they expect you to take? So what you've done if you've picked the perfect character for a satirical article. So how can you do this? A good (not perfect) example is Brian of Nazareth, which is an article in a satirical publication of a satirical subject. A better example given the topic is looking at MAD in the Don Martin years and having a look at their Movie parodies, or looking at their parodies of artists. When they parodied artists they took the classic artworks and reproduced them in a very MAD way. So the artwork of Don Martin here should look like... and the "photos" of him and of his contemporaries should look like? (Okay, some of this paragraph relates more to "Image", but I think you can see where I'm headed.) Now the other thing is MAD was initially designed predominantly as a parody of MADISON AVENUE and the entire advertising system at the time. They were up[set at the fact that the advertisers tried to cash in on everything. Now MAD has become a vehicle for the same advertising agencies that they used to parody. What would they do with the remains of Don Martin's work? In fact, what would they do with the remains of Don Martin? So what is the major issue with your topic - Let me put it this way, I would not try and write an article about Don Martin until I had about 30 FAs under my belt. Why? Because you'll create a huge expectation from your reader base, and it will be near impossible for you to keep everyone satisfied. |
| Prose and formatting: | 4 | Okay, I have limited time to write as my partner is coming home and she's forbidden me to use the computer, so in summary about your layout is Lead-in quotes (bad), short section, long contents (okay, if justified by length of article), LARGE image (too big), short section, short section, short sections with large left hand justified image (now becoming really annoying), a section that is more than a paragraph in length (hallelujah - maybe he'll start to write some decent length prose now), a list of children (lists! we don't need no stinking lists. But it's short, he might be able to get a way with it once.), an unadorned long list of monosyllables (pain!), short section, shorter section, shorter section, another list, YET ANOTHER LIST, ANOTHER FREAKING LIST, (okay, I'm over listing the lists now), and a disambiguation banner on a non-disambiguation page.
I've avoided going through the spelling and the grammar, just because I don't really enjoy consistently criticising you. Besides, how do you correct the spelling of SLOOPLE! The writing style. Read back over what I was saying about the writing style and the humour. There is nothing that says that this is Encyclopaedic, or even MAD style writing. Once you've worked out where you want to go with your concept, you'll have to adapt the writing to match this style. Is this a 50s/60s era advertising campaign? Is this an 80s satirical magazine? |
| Images: | 4 | Again, go back to concept. I like the Don Martin Images, but what the hell is the reference doing to India in a poorly photoshopped image? And the picture of "Alfred E Neuman as Don Martin" - I can't see how this is adding to the humour of the article |
| Miscellaneous: | 1 | If I see this go on VFH as it is I'm going to be really annoyed. Ignoring the two nominations that shouldn't have gone on there from Kryptonite already, the one for iBauer, the suspect voting on both of these, along with the extremely strong similarities between yourself and Rsbj66, and an IP address that looks like it's the same ISP but after different DHCP lookups, (and there was another identity that I came across that was somewhat suspect one as well, but I can't recall what it is at the moment). I get the feeling that this is put onto review just to get something featured. Let me be blunt.
If you put below average articles up for PEE review, then they will be ripped to shreds. If you put below average articles up for VFH, they will be voted against. I put a lot of effort and time into these, and doing them for some vain attempt at getting an article to be featured, not for getting it to be an enjoyable read, really annoys me. Okay, having gotten past that little bit of unpleasantness, there is some merit to what you have done. It is not completely unenjoyable, but the problems with it well outweigh the pluses that it has. You need to take this back to the drawing board. I'm not putting it forward for VFD at the moment, but this barely has enough strength at the moment to justify it's continued existence. Take this off the main space and put it in your user space, and rewrite it. |
| Final Score: | 19.5 |  What, me worry? |
| Reviewer: | Pup | |
Don Martin[edit source]
Thanks for all the advice and taking so much time to explain. We all love Don Martin and that's just about impossible to make fun of when itself was making fun of everything. And although Don was so funny, still, his own life was very unfunny and even tragic. So there really are no facts of interest outside of the absurd in doing Don's page. I don't know how to put this on my page, but after rereading your directions I'll rewrite it, and put the new version back on Pee to make it better. Don's not my property so do feel free to edit the page and rewrite as you described above. If you have no time then I'll try it again.
BTW: I have an old acct I lost and later retrieved rsbj66, plus this new acct. Usually I log in. My wife also uses this computer but she has no acct as it's not important to her. It's not really of any importance to me nor my life either. I'm not getting paid, nor appreciated, but that's what's so "un" about it. So be sure I have nothing to gain in any of this other than making you guys and girls smile. A lot (most) what little I know is just by reading other articles, which vary from dead-worshipful serious (Obama) to outlandish nonsense. So I'll read that section as you suggested first. Thanks again for the help. If I didn't get "pee'd" then no progress would take place. Yaosir!!!--Funnybony 16:18, 12 August 2009 (UTC) BTW: Here I am onWiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Shaw_Brown