Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2013 September 19

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September 19

Prison Break

Who are the main characters in Prison Break? Shelbywelch (talk) 01:31, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

See here. Matt Deres (talk) 01:39, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Prison Break

Who are the main charaters in the show Prison Break? Emundt6 (talk) 01:35, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Are you and the above editor known to each other, and has either of you clicked on Prison Break? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 01:40, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

If you go to the webside IMDB.com it will provide all of the information that is needed for this question. Shelbywelch (talk) 01:51, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

So, if you knew this, why did you ask the question above this one? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 04:35, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Between the two user IDs' short history, they seem a bit confused. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:23, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Waitress with a wistle?

Why is the woman in this photo using a whistle? RudolfRed (talk) 04:46, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

From [1] and, specifcially, [2] it appears that the image is a common one from Oktoberfest 2012. According to [3], [4], and a comment in [5] it appears that the whistles are used to let the crowd know the server is coming through and for them to move.Phoenixia1177 (talk) 06:01, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

And how is she carrying that many glasses? I can imagine holding four handles in each hand, but how are the remaining ones supported? -- SGBailey (talk) 09:09, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

I got my start as a bartender, if you turn all the handles towards each other (just right) you can carry mugs like that. I will say that it takes practice, is a pain in the ass, and really heavy. Honestly, it's quite impressive that she is doing that in both hands- and a crowd moving whistle is really quite justified, having to wait for people to move would make such things a nightmare, to say the least!Phoenixia1177 (talk) 09:44, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

The pic here gives you a better look at how they're held. All part of the training for a beer maiden. If you do an image search for beer maiden holding mugs you'll see some even attempt a second level on top. Matt Deres (talk) 10:58, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

A more ambitious second level: [6]. She must have strong arms. This shows six handles in a hand: [7]. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:25, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

"The most beer steins carried over 40 metres by a female is 19 achieved by Anita Schwarz in Mesenich, Germany, on 9 November 2008" [8] Alansplodge (talk) 19:17, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Hey, that's the beer that User:GregJackP ordered here, it's not to be drunk by anyone else here :(. Count Iblis (talk) 17:19, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Ich habe nichts dagegen die Aufteilung der Biere. (Since the whole beer thing started in the German language, might as well end it in German). GregJackP Boomer! 18:30, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Premiership games with no substitutions

Try as I might,I seem to be having a great deal of difficulty with this-when was the last Premiership game to be played where neither side used any substitutes? The best I've found so far is West Brom who didn't use any in their game against Swansea in the '12-'13 season,but I'm still looking for one with both teams.Any help guys?Thanks Lemon martini (talk) 12:19, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Care to tell us poor, ignorant Americans what game you refer to ? Does it involve sweeping ice with brooms or something equally as silly ? :-) StuRat (talk) 13:34, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Checking the list in Premiership, the OP might be talking about Rugby matches. Although, for all we know, it could be 43-Man Squamish. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:47, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

This discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
) If you know which sport he's talking about, you can go ahead and answer the question. If you don't know which sport he's talking about, there is really no need to point out the ambiguity. --Viennese Waltz 13:50, 19 September 2013 (UTC) Do you have any useful information for the OP, or are you just here to rag a responder... as per your usual M.O. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 13:56, 19 September 2013 (UTC) It's a pretty good MO. If no one points it out, you'll probably continue to think you're hilarious and you'll keep responding to questions like this. We should all have such an MO. Adam Bishop (talk) 01:52, 20 September 2013 (UTC) He wasn't even talking to me. And if you think it's good to snip at other editors in front of the OP, while making no attempt to provide any useful info to the OP, then you need to find something else to do for a while, like say the next ten years. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 13:32, 20 September 2013 (UTC) I was talking to you, actually. --Viennese Waltz 13:36, 20 September 2013 (UTC) So, you've got nothing to say to StuRat (silly me for assuming you had indented correctly), but you're snipping at me, when I actually provided some possibly useful info (i.e. a link), as regards what the term "Premiership" might refer to. Your comments here are worthless... as usual. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 13:43, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

As he mentions West Brom, he obviously (to a Brit) means the Premier League. Ghmyrtle (talk) 13:51, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

In the same way that the capital of the United Kingdom is the only London worth talking about, the Premier League is the only Premiership worth talking about. It needs no further disambiguation. Astronaut (talk) 15:17, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

In the same way that the national baseball league is called World Series and doesn't need disambiguating. (I have no information regarding the OP's original question - sorry.) -- SGBailey (talk) 16:24, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

In response to the OP - I've looked, but have no answer. Someone asked the same question here and they didn't get a useful answer either. Ghmyrtle (talk) 19:09, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

This site has a decent amount of statistics on substitutions although not specifically what you're looking for. Perhaps if you contact them they may be able to help. Biggs Pliff (talk) 14:26, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

Eek...with moving house,I forgot all about this. Yes,I did mean football(soccer if you will)-I should have made that clear-in England it's taken as a given that Premiership=football,so I never thought to specify.Oops. Still no answers I'm afraid.I've tried Guardian Knowledge and ask the gaffer with no joy.Might have to be a search-for-other-ask-us-sporting-questions sites and see what they come up with Lemon martini (talk) 23:26, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Soap Operas

Can TV shows like Game of Thrones or Sherlock be termed as soap operas? What about sitcoms like The Big Bang Theory? Are sitcoms a subset of soaps? 202.153.41.162 (talk) 14:08, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

On your first question, not really. A soap has no defined endpoint – in theory, it could go on forever. Also, it tends towards depictions of the everyday and mundane (at least in its British incarnation). A sitcom is a different animal from a soap. A sitcom has a fixed number of episodes/series and is meant to be funny. Soaps are humorous in part but they are meant to be dramatic as well. --Viennese Waltz 14:21, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Also sitcoms are usually (at least in the UK) single-episode stories, whereas episodes of soaps follow on from each other in one interminable narrative. See our articles on sitcom and soap opera; they are quite distinct.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 15:55, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

More specifically, Sherlock is a procedural crime drama while Game of Thrones is a fantasy. --Jayron32 16:10, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

I agree with the above, that sitcoms are very distinct from soaps, and Sherlock is pretty squarely a police procedural.

But as for GoT, it seems to me that it satisfies our definition of soap opera, to wit: "[a] serial drama, on television or radio, that features multiple related story lines dealing with the lives of multiple characters." GoT is surely a serial drama with multiple related story lines and and characters, right? SemanticMantis (talk) 16:35, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

I'd say it has aspects of a soap opera, but I wouldn't call that the primary genre. Soap operas are more than format; that is the serial nature of them, soap operas also are defined by the setting and style and themes; GoT certainly has multiple story lines and is serial in nature, but it's setting, theme, and tone is not that of a soap opera. We can draw threads of commonality between any show and dozens of different genres, but if you want to know the core of the genre, look for the typical shows. GoT doesn't have much in common with Days of our Lives or Melrose Place or General Hospital or Knotts Landing or shows like that. --Jayron32 17:31, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

• I don't watch Sherlock or Game of Thrones, but of course crime or science fiction dramas can be like soap operas if they have multiple story arcs. The original Star Trek was completely episodic. But the recent Battlestar Galactica and Farscape had both romance and long story arcs in addition to strongly episodic elements. Crime stories can have a serial, rather than episodic nature, for which see Forbrydelsen as an example. μηδείς (talk) 17:37, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

For another crime example, see The Bill, which we describe as a procedural, but report as having won various soap awards. AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 14:16, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

It started off with no soap-like aspects at all. It used to make a point of not portraying its characters' private lives. Then the quest for ratings started, it started being broadcast three times a week rather than two and it started delving into their private lives. That's when I stopped watching it. --Viennese Waltz 14:19, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

It's kind of reductive to refer to the long story arc of the reimagined BSG as being like a soap opera. Soaps have open-ended story lines intended to allow the show to continue indefinitely. BSG was a novel, or perhaps an epic, plotted out in advance. It was actually the second show of this kind ever done for television — the first was Babylon 5, which is some of the best science fiction ever filmed. --Trovatore (talk) 19:42, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Yes, agreed, I have been thinking about qualifying the same point, indefinite openeded/long serial, but didn't bother. I have to say Ivanovna and J'Kar are two of my favorite scifi characters. μηδείς (talk) 20:53, 20 September 2013 (UTC)

Soap operas, a.k.a. "daytime dramas", are kind of like the "minor leagues" of writing and acting. That is, they've served as a training ground for many actors and writers. Many nighttime shows have elements of soap operas, i.e. all the emotional and personal stuff. Shows such as Dallas and Dynasty were referred to as "nighttime soaps". But as noted earlier, one distinct difference is that daytime soaps have no definable endpoint (other than cancellation). Another is that the typical nighttime show, even with story arcs, are mostly self-contained episodes. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:01, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you see as a "definable endpoint" for the nighttime soaps. Like almost all serials, they can go on indefinitely if desired. There are a very few exceptions with multi-year story arcs plotted out in advance — Babylon 5, the reimagined BSG. There are also a few borderline ones that have a pre-announced plot element that they have to reach sometime, and where it would be silly to continue after that, but where that element can be delayed as long as desired (here I'm thinking of Prison Break and, on the lighter side, How I Met Your Mother). --Trovatore (talk) 17:48, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

A key element of soaps is the focus on personal issues as opposed to whatever external situations are going on. To me, an obvious example is Law and Order: Criminal Intent, which was originally primarily about the case they were working on, with occasional reference to personal matters. Once USA Network got hold of it, they changed the show to emphasize the personal stuff much more. They became a soap opera, a change that "jumped the shark", and the show was soon cancelled. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:24, 25 September 2013 (UTC)