Talk: Grathon Tolar

Votes for featured status

• Grathon Tolar -- self-nomination. I suppose I'm tempting fate by submitting an article covering a minor subect as this one is; but I feel it's wholly comprehensive of the subject matter. — THOR 19:52, 14 Apr 2005 (EDT)
  • Approve - The fact that it is a minor subject is irrelevant (See: Telek R'Mor). Looks good to me! --Gvsualan 14:23, 15 Apr 2005 (EDT)
  • Support - An excellent article -- Rebelstrike2005 14:51, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Supported Tyrant 15:21, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)Tyrant
  • Support. --Brad Rousse 19:28, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The Blue Alien from "In A Mirror, Darkly, Part II"

The alien they interogated in In a mirror darkly, part II. He was blue, could someone get a pic, cause I think Mr.Tolar here and him may be the same species? Just a thought. -AJHalliwell 18:30, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

I had the same thought when I was watching it. I'd like to see them side by side. Tyrant 18:33, 15 May 2005 (UTC)Tyrant'

Upon closer inspection (of the first pic of the alien i could find) Their not. Although it would have been great continuity if it was. *sigh* another alien of the week, I'll leave this talk on here in case others think that. Or, if someone wants to delete this, go ahead i guess. Tolar has a ridge going down the middle of his head, mirror alien is flat, and nose and ears are minutly different. -AJHalliwell 05:41, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I just watched this episode and he may be of the same species as the two brothers from "Who Mourns for Morn?". Any other thoughts?--NavyAO2(AW) 23:49, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Nope, different make-up. --Jörg 08:38, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I had the same thought, although their make-up is greenish the basic mould cast they're using is identical, two great episodes, also there is a bartender of this species in the voyager episode where 8472 create the replica starfleet, if only they were made the same species, continuity *sigh* *sigh* 109.156.40.61 10:29, October 30, 2010 (UTC)

Votes for removal of featured status

First attempt

Someone said that Solbor, an article of nearly identical length, one paragraph difference, is not fit because the character is not feature material. How is this featured then? It's not right to have this in the same category as Benjamin Sisko. Makon 04:54, 26 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Definitely agree. It's well written, and complete, but there is almost NO informatio about the character himself, it's all episode summary material. I'm not sure how a character in 3 scenes from one episode (albeit a great episode) even got through a FA nomination process. Logan 5 18:12, 5 Oct 2005 (UTC)

"It's not right to have this in the same category as Benjamin Sisko." The same can be said about episode summaries, but yet they are. The criteria is quite clear, and frankly, if you are going to nominate something for removal, you shouldn't be looking at length, but rather if it is well-written, comprehensive, accurate, undisputed & stable. I see no factors in this nomination that evaluate those factors -- just "length" -- which is not a limiting factor. The key is that it is well written, and has nothing to do with how many times they appeared, length or other trivial matters -- which is obviously limited by single-appearance characters -- it has to how the subject and limited imformation is handled. If the character plays a significant role in the episode, obviously a portion of the article is going to sound like the episode -- simply because the character was featured in the episode and a portion of the episode revolved around the character! Telek R'Mor, a minor character that really acted as the motivator for getting Ethan Novakovich and Grathon Tolar nominated, would seem to be an ideal example of a character with a one-time appearance that was well handled without sounding like an episode summary. If you really have doubts about why this or other "short" articles were featured, read the talk page(s) and evaluate the votes for nomination there before posting a page here for a reason that was clearly discussed in the nomination process. --Alan del Beccio 14:42, 6 Oct 2005 (UTC)

I think there is a clear difference between the Tolar-Novakovich type character and R'Mor or the main dude from "The Defector". Both of the latter characters had plenty of extra information to add about themselves, their culture, and the events around the episode. These guys could just as easily been labled "Alien guest star" or "Unamed crewman" and had just as much info as they do now. It just bears pointing out that "well-written" is a necessary but not a sufficient criteria for nomination, nor is complete. It has to be a combination of those things, plus, IMO, the additional factor of really adding to MA by expanding beyond just the action on the screen to real character development (or in the case of episodes, meta-Trek). Logan 5 14:58, 6 Oct 2005 (UTC)

I've been extremely reluctant to make my opinion heard in this forum for my (very rational) fear of being the bitchy, whiny guy who complains when people disagree with him. But I'd like to bring up the same points I was making with an administrator regarding the invalidity of removing the Featured Article status from both Grathon Tolar and Ethan Novakovich.

The most central point to my dissertation is that you are objecting to their FA status on the grounds that they don't meet with criteria which do not exist. When I originally nominated both of these articles as Featured Articles, I examined the stated criteria of being an "...especially well-written, informative, and comprehensive article that covers all available information on a subject." and I personally desided that they did, in fact, meet those criteria. Once up for nomination (see Talk:Grathon_Tolar#Votes_for_featured_status and Talk:Ethan_Novakovich#Moved_from_Nominations_for_featured_articles respectively), it was clearly stated in both nominations that the articles in question were covering "minor subjects"; in reply it was noted by an administer in support of the nomination that "The fact that it is a minor subject is irrelevant". Both of these articles were voted on by the Memory Alpha community with no objections and were made Featured Articles.

Your argument that "'well-written' is a necessary but not a sufficient criteria for nomination, nor is complete." is not bourne out by the two places the criteria are mentioned, neither of which stipulate anything additional except for what has already been stated: well-written, informative, and comprehensive. There is nothing dictating length, significance of subject matter, or "meta-Trek" as qualifiers for Featured Articles.

Succinctly, if this discourse led to a discussion where the Featured Article criteria were reevaluated and made more specific and detailing (such as, if the community wanted to change the parameters for a Featured Article and dictate that it should be a certain length in addition to being of high-quality to be featured), I would be in whole and complete support of helping with that process; and should any articles I contributed substantially to not qualify under those reevaluated rules, I would be the first to stand by their status removal. But the criteria now are the exact same as they were when those articles were initially nominated and accepted by a majority of MA contributers.

Based on the information presented above, I anticipate one of two results to occur. Either Ethan Novakovich will revert the loss of his FA removal status and Grathon Tolar will be removed from this list; or a new forum will be opened for discussion and decision-making for the purpose of defining new and more detailing/stringent criteria for the acceptance of Featured Articles, after which all current Featured Articles will have to undergo a reevaluation process to determine whether they may maintain their status under the new protocols. Either way, I greatly look forward to one or the other conclusion. — THOR ^=/\= 18:00, 25 Oct 2005 (UTC)

I still don't think that Ethan Novakovich should be a featured article, but you're right, there is no written limitation concerning extent, so I don't support it this time. We need a general discussion on this. --Memory 18:32, 25 Oct 2005 (UTC)

Well, I don't think 3 votes that these got constitute a "majority MA contributors" so I'm not sure the vetting was as rigorous as it should be. As to criteria: FA are supposed to represent the best of MA's work. And these type of articles do not, in my opinion, do that. Mainly because they cover minor characters who can be summed up without any effort beyond recapping the events of one episode or a few scenes. So I wholeheartedly agree that we should have a further discussion on this, but I disagree that these two articles meet the current criteria as I understand them. Certainly there are other articles out there that were complete, well written and informative (see Nova class), that didn't get FA status becuase they lacked something. Logan 5 19:10, 25 Oct 2005 (UTC)

So what do we do? After the Noah discussion it's definitely clarified that we don't accept removal nominations with the reason "it's a minor character" or "I don't feel groovy while reading this". So if there is something more concrete (and formally correct) than the length argument, add it now. If there are no more reactions, I'll archive it in two days. --Memory 18:38, 16 Nov 2005 (UTC)

The clearest reason I can give is that the article is lacking substantive information on the character, which to me is a primary criteria for an FA of this type; it doesn't really tell us anything about the character, just what he did. Contrast this to the article on R'Mor which gives us insight into the character, not just the actions, or the possibilities for Ghemor, Tomalak, Jarok, Moriarty and any number of other minor characters with far more potential. But I freely admit my definition of informative may be an intangible criteria except in clear cases like Novakovich, which was completely devoid of any substantive info about the character himself, may not be sufficient reason to de-list. Logan 5 19:29, 16 Nov 2005 (UTC)

• Archived --Memory 20:43, 18 Nov 2005 (UTC)

Second attempt

This article simply does not meet the requirements for FA IMO. There is only one source for the information in this article and it is too short. -- TrekFan ^Talk 23:12, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Oppose for now. Just as a note, this has been discussed before.

As said on the nomination page, length is not relevant to its status as a FA. Also, there is only one source because the character was only in the one episode. --31dot 23:42, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Oppose; as brought up by User:31dot, this has been discussed previously and I have the same input as before. Allow me to paraphrase:

The [...] central point to my dissertation is that you are objecting to their FA status on the grounds that they don't meet with criteria which do not exist. When I originally nominated both of these articles as Featured Articles, I examined the stated criteria of being an "...especially well-written, informative, and comprehensive article that covers all available information on a subject." and I personally [decided] that they did, in fact, meet those criteria. Once up for nomination (see #Votes_for_featured_status and Talk:Ethan_Novakovich#Moved_from_Nominations_for_featured_articles respectively), it was clearly stated in both nominations that the articles in question were covering "minor subjects"; in reply it was noted by an administer in support of the nomination that "The fact that it is a minor subject is irrelevant". Both of these articles were voted on by the Memory Alpha community with no objections and were made Featured Articles.

[...] There is nothing dictating [a required article] length, significance of subject matter, or "meta-Trek" as qualifiers for Featured Articles.

Succinctly, if this discourse led to a discussion where the Featured Article criteria were reevaluated and made more specific and detailing (such as, if the community wanted to change the parameters for a Featured Article and dictate that it should be a certain length in addition to being of high-quality to be featured), I would be in whole and complete support of helping with that process; and should any articles I contributed substantially to not qualify under those reevaluated rules, I would be the first to stand by their status removal. But the criteria now are the exact same as they were when those articles were initially nominated and accepted by a majority of MA contributers.

Based on the information presented above, I anticipate one of two results to occur. Either Ethan Novakovich will revert the loss of his FA removal status and Grathon Tolar will be removed from this list; or a new forum will be opened for discussion and decision-making for the purpose of defining new and more detailing/stringent criteria for the acceptance of Featured Articles, after which all current Featured Articles will have to undergo a reevaluation process to determine whether they may maintain their status under the new protocols. Either way, I greatly look forward to one or the other conclusion. — THOR ^=/\= 18:00, 25 Oct 2005 (UTC)

My expectations were apparently presumptuous, and some of the particulars of my points may not be wholly applicable here as I was previously discussing two articles, but I think you're making the same argument for defrocking as there was previously. If I sound too "bitch and moany", I apologize, I don't exactly have my head int he game today, but still wanted to provide input. Please take no offense or belligerentness from my comments here! — THOR ^=/\= 17:04, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Comment - I just think it's appropriate to note that the simple fact that FA removal has already been discussed once should not mean it can't be discussed again - and obviously, some important things have changed since this first discussion. On the one hand, three years have passed since then, which means that an article that was "especially well-written" in comparison to the other articles we had then doesn't necessarily have to be "especially well-written" in comparison to what we have now. On the other hand, as has been pointed out, at least the criterion of needing a minimum number of votes has been added since then. With that background, I think it is a little too fast to just say "been there, done that", point at an old discussion and declare this a worthy FA for the next eternity or two...

That said, I'm not going to vote at the moment, as the OP was very vague about what exactly makes this "not-FA-worthy" (and I don't have the time to check in in detail right now). Could we perhaps get a more detailed criticism of the article, please? -- Cid Highwind 17:51, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Comment- I was only pointing out that it had been discussed before so others could look at it- I wasn't saying that was a reason in my thinking of opposing removal.--31dot 18:16, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I apologise for being vague in my nomination. I was a bit rushed at the time. :) Anyway, I believe this article to be unworthy of FA status simply because there are a lot better FAs out there and this does not compare to them IMO. Look at Ayala and Luther Sloan as examples. I know it's not very fair to say that articles with just one/two reference(s) shouldn't be FAs but it is what it is - FAs require in-depth detail and must stand out from other articles and if there are not many references, there isn't going to be much detail. Maybe we should have "good articles" like on Wikipedia? I do not believe it is detailed enough to make it stand out from other articles of the same type. Plus, three years on, we have much more detailed articles. Maybe it did once deserve to be an FA, but I believe this discussion should be revisited. -- TrekFan ^Talk 17:16, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

• Archived; kept as is, lapse in discussion, lack of sufficient support. --Alan 18:15, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Elaboration on implied death

After reading the entry and then watching the episode, I felt that the entry did not fully reflect the show's strong implication that Tolar was killed by Garak. I'd probably edit that last paragraph like so: "After Senator Vreenak rejected the recording as a fake and left to return to Romulus, Grathon Tolar was not seen again. When interrogated by Sisko as to whether he had murdered Tolar, Garak only said to think of Tolar as a casualty of war, implying that Tolar had indeed been murdered and disposed of." This may focus too much on people other than Tolar, but it is important to Tolar's role in the episode. Just wanted to mention it before editing since this is a featured article. --Jerodast 10:26, March 19, 2010 (UTC)