Uncyclopedia:Pee Review/Pre-Presidential Accomplishments of Barack Obama
Pre-Presidential Accomplishments of Barack Obama[edit source]
Guildensternenstein 00:08, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
| Concept: | 5 | There is some good base material in the article, but it is overwhelmed by excessive attackiness. Basically, it comes across as biased/ranty and not funny. Your best bet would be to change the perspective to the "friend of the subject matter accidentally attacks the subject matter." At times, you (sorta) approach this, like in the "PhD. in Empty Rhetoric" section. But, you often lapse back into hyperbolic ranting.
As a rule, you should try to start out with a deadpan entry, then go more outlandish from their. As a rule, innuendo doesn't work after vulgarity and underhanded attacks don't work after ranting attacking (or using the verbal sledgehammer). In other words, tame sections can't follow wilde sections. The strike out thing isn't working. You really over-use it in the first paragraph. Also, the strike out doesn't "tone it down" any. It might be funny if you use it alot less. Especially try to avoid overuse early in the article. Finally, replacing single words might work better than whole sentences. Try to avoid internal quotes. In fact, I personally advocate avoiding quotes altogether under most instances. Internal quotes often mess up the flow of the article, even if they are funny. Also, header quotes tend to start your article off "too strongly" i.e. to outlandish, vulgary, attacky, or whatever. Quote sections tend to accumulate stupid items and filibustering. On a related note, try to avoid lists when you can. Lists tend to accumulate stupid items, or just get too long. Also, lists don't flow as well as text that is in paragraphs. As a rule, if you can change a list into text, without losing humor, do it. Also, I am detecting a hint of "name dropping" in the article. It is not overwhelming now, but that tendency can ruin an article. Try to avoid bringing in celebrities when they are unneeded, and try to keep the total number of celebrities mentioned as low as possible. As a final note, whenever you write anything, try to aim at maximizing the humor and quality of the whole article, not just the current section. Don't shoehorn in jokes when it will damage "article flow" or ruin the tone. |
| Prose and Formatting: | 6 | I don't see any major errors, and the spelling and grammar are fine. But, your article has too many lists. Also, I'm getting the feeling that your article is short for some reason. Probably because the lists make it look like it's filibustering on length (i.e. its trying to make itself look longer than it really is.)
Also, you don't have any sub-section headers, also called level 3 headers. This article might not need them, but if it gets longer, you will probably need to use them. If you use only section headers, and not sub-section headers, your article will be overwhelmed by headers. |
| Images: | 6 | Overall, I think the images are a bit "bombastic". Or, they are too "attacky". I would keep the one (the one of Barack Obama). The 2nd and 3rd one go along with the text as it stands, but you'll probably need to change the text. The fourth one (the tumble weed) is rather cliche, and I would suggest getting rid of it. |
| Humour: | 3.7 | You have some funny sections, but it is overwhelmed by the excessive outlandishness. Basically, what I said in the concept section. The score is the average of the section scores.
Score by Section: Intro: 3.0 Here, you really get off on the wrong foot. Much of your first paragraph has humor potential. But, your first sentence sets the tone as an attacky "hit piece". I would focus and reworking, and probably redoing the intro first. Mastering Houdini Economics: 3.5 Here, the article gets better at the second paragraph. But, "Houdini Economics" is very close to "Voodoo Economics": what Bush the Elder called Reagan's supply side economics in the 1980 Republican primary. Now, a comparison between Reagan's uncontrolled deficit spending and Obama's deficit spending might be funny. However, you don't make the comparison, and I don't think you could with the current tone/perspective. PhD. in Empty Rhetoric: 5 The first part of this section, and the last part of the previous section is probably the best part of your article. You moved from an attacky tone to a more sarcastic, satirical tone. However, this section goes downhill at the list. And in the last paragraph, you lapse back into the overuse of the the strike out function. Black African-American Belt in Smiling: 4 This is better than average on tone (at least in parts). However, it does have the feeling of filibustering. I.e. your typing just to fill up the page. I'd probably consider removing this section. Becoming Supreme Overlord of the Mainstream Media: 3.5 The underlying idea has some potential, but the execution is bad. For one, that quote is too long and rambling. Also, you don't have much material beside the quote. I would suggest you use a more toned down title, like "Darling of the Mainstream Media" or, maybe a condescending one, like "Pet Negro of the Mainstream Media". I would suggest you mention how Obama got that position. Rest of article: 3 the tumble weed thing is cliche, and section header "Legitimate, Tangible Political Accomplishments" wouldn't fit in this article if you changed the tone. I'd suggest trying to integrate the items in the trivia section into the main article. Trivia sections are lists, and suffer from the risk of rambling. However, you might want to keep a trivia section for a list of one-liners. |
| Improvability Score: | 5.5 | Your main task will be the try to change the tone of the article while maintaining the jokes. Basically, rewriting what you have. Unless you have ideas floating arround in your head, I'd suggest working on what is there and pruning a bit, before adding new material.
This is going to require going over the article, and probably changing every sentence. Fixing it probably won't require alot of comic skill, but it will require alot or re-writing. The "improbability" score measures how close you are to having a good article. The relatively low score reflects that (relatively) large amount of work this article will need. |
| Final Score: | 26.2 | try to work on the tone |
| Reviewer: | --Mnbvcxz 06:02, 26 January 2009 (UTC) | |