Specials[]
Should this page list Thunderbirds stories from the TV21 Annuals and Extras, similar to the section on Lady Penelope (comic)? And what about comics from the Century 21/City Magazines Thunderbirds Annuals? Those aren't technically part of TV21 but it would make sense to cover them here, basically for being TV21 in all but name.
A semi-related question on the topic of annuals: do we have a hub article for the full-length short stories they often contained? If not, I think it would be useful for navigation. There aren't that many so something as simple as TV21 Short Stories could do the trick. Borisashton (talk) 04:36, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
- I'm absolutely hopeless at remembering the extra/annual stories are things that exist... so yeah, this page should absolutely have them listed. Also this page is still very stubby, when I made it I really just wanted a list of stories with all the dates and issues they were published in so I could line up reprint names. Not having a hub page for the annual stories is a good spot, although I might suggest just Short Stories so it's more in line with Comic Strip Stories (after that page gets its rewrite).
Guyus24Talk07:57, 29.10.2023
- Why not both? I envision the structure of a rewritten Comic Strip Stories to be made up of short sections summarising each comic series/iteration which then links using {{main}} to separate articles containing a deeper overview and the list of stories. Individual stories would be rarely mentioned, with those specifics reserved for the articles linked with {{main}}.
- A similar approach would work for Short Stories too, I think. That article would obviously cover the likes of The Creighton-Ward Gallery and A21 as well which I feel are worlds away from things like Flight to Destruction and deserve some separation. Borisashton (talk) 00:15, 30 October 2023 (UTC)
- Yeah you're right, I hadn't considered that. It's a bit weird, I consider the annual stories to be 'orphans' of sorts, and that they don't really belong to a series. Another thing to think about too is that the Lady Penelope text stories don't really belong to "Lady Penelope (comic)" (to the point where I sometimes consider renaming it).
- Considering these text stories 'orphaned' is a good way to look at it. For text stories like these I think it's beneficial for coverage to group them together by publication because a specific publication will often have a similar format and shared writers between stories. Another reason I'm keen for TV21 Short Stories is due to the occasional Thunderbirds articles on covers and in Dateline which do not tie-in with any particular comic. The examples which spring to mind are Tracy Wins Mars Grand Prix from issue 150 (title referencing Alan) and Grandmother Outwits Raiders (title referencing Grandma). Both are probably too short to bother with individual pages but nevertheless they document in-universe events not mentioned in anything else and should be included in a complete character biography. The grouping of miscellaneous stories from one magazine allows us to easily link to all our in-universe sources near the top of the page, without anything getting lost in lengthy Other features with TB-content sections.
- As regards the Lady Penelope text stories, we could maybe follow the same format and do LP Short Stories? It's a slightly unintuitive name but should be okay if it's explained in the lede. Renaming Lady Penelope (comic) is certainly one option but I'd strongly consider creating a separate article for the Lady Penelope sub-franchise. Aside from the comics and the short stories, we've also got the three novels which are branded as part of Lady Penelope and I believe there are a couple of audios which only mention Penelope on the cover, saying nothing about her connections to Thunderbirds. The LP series has its own spin-offs as well. What Does Does the Dog Say? (the Wiki doesn't cover it but it's still worth mentioning in an article) and Creighton Ward are not related to Thunderbirds in any meaningful way; I'd say that they form their own mini "Penelope-verse" which could potentially be discussed on this franchise page. Borisashton (talk) 00:56, 1 November 2023 (UTC)
One problem I've only just realised is splitting by publication exposes the frustrating distinction between Lady Penelope-the-comic and Lady Penelope-the-magazine, as it means stories such as Lady Penelope Encounters D.C. would be listed at TV21 Short Stories not the more natural-sounding LP Short Stories. Maybe we could link to a TV21 Penelope section from LP Short Stories to minimise confusion? I'm not sure. Borisashton (talk) 21:52, 5 November 2023 (UTC)