Talk:List of Gunsmoke (TV series) episodes

Renaming of episode number columns

Hi all. The current columns "Series #" and "Season #" are open to misinterpretation (especially by casual visitors). I've recently renamed the same columns at List of The Big Bang Theory episodes to be "Overall episode #" and "Season episode #" respectively. There is a place to discuss this at: Template_talk:Episode_list#Episode_number_column_headings. Depending on the outcome there, I'm happy to apply the same changes for this page.  HWV258.  03:44, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

... but listed at the top of the Episodes section is:

• Series # refers to that episode's number within the overall series.
• Season # refers to the order in which the episode aired within that particular season.

Doesn't that seem clear enough? Jimknut (talk) 00:28, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Noted, but a couple of points:

• The note is not repeated at the start of each of the 20 tables following (any of which can be the result of a direct link from another page).
• Changing the column heading removes the need for any sort of note (surely a good thing?).

Wow—20 seasons! That must be close to a record?

 HWV258.  00:49, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

More Information

Wish more information could be added to the individual listings. We can glean nothing about individual episodes beyond title, director, and writer from this site. Although, of course, 20 seasons is a lot of episodes! MightyArchangel (talk) 21:30, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

gross errors

Some of the plot descriptions grossly misrepresent the story (eg, "The Hidecutters"). I've fixed a few, but some are so screwed up I really don't have the time. WilliamSommerwerck (talk) 16:31, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

Episode named Tara

Who is the actress who portrayed Tara? 2601:280:4E00:6E00:758E:5190:CD76:7D3D (talk) 21:00, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

Tara Hutson was portrayed by Michele Carey, and I will update Season 17 with its Complete "Guest Cast" as I get done watching each episode (just finishing season 16 this evening). Hope that helps, GreyElfGT (talk) 06:12, 7 August 2022 (UTC)

Article Too Long

@Wizardman: has added the "Very long" template, and I agree... and it's only going to get longer unless someone splits it into individual articles for each season.

For my part, since Season 12, I have increased length by adding "Guest Cast" under each episode (to match what prior editors had already done under Seasons 1 to 4...a work that was not yet finished), ensuring that they link to the Actor articles (where available, see "Episode named Tara" above), and correcting and/or expanding the Plots under "ShortSummary" that were either slightly or totally inaccurate (see "gross error" and "More Information" above).

Proposal: Using the "The Flash" list of episodes article as an example, this Gunsmoke List article should be changed to use templates to include individual articles for each season. For Example:

Season 16 (1970–71)

{main| Gunsmoke (season 16)}

{:Gunsmoke (season 16)}

I would like that the Plot is still a "ShortSummary" which does not have any (or too many) spoilers... just the basics, and plus any of the notes that people have already made herein.

My goal at present isn't about splitting the articles & creating the new ones myself, but to continue on with correcting Plot ShortSummary & adding Guest Cast for the remaining seasons. After I complete the last season, I plan to go back and verify seasons 1-12... which is a LOT of Work, but it's worth it, so I'll commit to that part, at least. If someone else can tackle creating articles for each season, copying what we already have here, and then using the Templates to embed those Season articles back to this List article, I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks in Advance for helping to improve the page(s). Updated: GreyElfGT (talk) 23:22, 27 August 2022 (UTC)

I'm the editor that started the improvements in seasons 1-4 by adding guest cast and hopefully interesting notes. If you look at the edit's history, I began this tedious process in January 2022 and in February another editor began to rewrite my edits by copying word for word IMDb material, which is a copyright infringement. I had an administer erase most of his edits and restore previous material, but they could only go back so far. There is still a few of his edits outstanding and I'm working forward as I watch each episode to correct them. I'm current to season 10 and will finish guest cast and go back to review plot lines and add notes. I do like some of your edits such as the addition of character names in guest cast and have gone back to incorporate in the earlier seasons. I agree with you that some plot lines are totally inaccurate and should be short (one or two sentences) and not give away the story and be based on the title of the episode. I hope to work with you and others to make this article more interesting. Demoon57 (talk) 06:34, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

That's Great!! And thanks again... I did notice, late in the game, and just after spot-checking a few ep's, that the ShortSummary seemed to have been copied verbatim from IMDb, which... Yeah! Definitely needs to be Rewritten... which I'm thankful that I've been rewriting, correcting, and/or expanding them myself in my own words after watching each ep, while also including the Principle actors/characters within the summary. I'm also including rest of the full cast, in the order in which as they appear in the DVD end-credits, even the regulars like Glenn Strange and other "townies" because one then can count exactly how many ep's each actor appeared in, instead of taking the word of IMDb or other Non-RS sources. Anyway... glad you are helping... this is one of my Fav' Shows of All Time, so...it's worth it to get it right. If you don't have access to the DVDs, I did notice that Archive.org has all the shows, as low-res vid's recorded from TV... so it may be a resource to verify Plot & End Cred's. GreyElfGT (talk) 11:40, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

Thank you, I have the DVD set. A Christmas present last year, which started the edits in Wiki. After watching episodes, I would review Wiki article and was surprised how little info was given on each installment of this iconic series. I realized that this was a massive undertaking and would take a couple of years, so I glad and appreciative for all your help. If you would like to bounce ideas or remain consistent in edits just add @yahoo.com to my username to contact me. Demoon57 (talk) 19:56, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

• As noted, I added the very long tag last year, and apparently the response was to make the article even longer and add in more trivial content. Quite frankly I'm tempted to revert to the version that had FL status in 2010 because this article as it stands is garbage. Explain how the little bit I did cut benefits the article because I could easily find way, way more to cut. I intend on continuing to improve the article regardless of what a single-purpose account wants. Wizardman 00:23, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

  While @GreyElfGT: and @Demoon57: have obviously put a lot of work and effort into this, the unfortunate bottom line is that they've applied a lot of extra WP:FANCRUFT that does not conform to our MOS:TV television style guide and other consensus regarding television episode list articles. So while your efforts are duly noted, unfortunately, it's nothing personal but we've got to get things more in line with our established standards (most importantly, we are not running a fansite here - if you want trivia, put up your own fansite or blog). I have started to work on splitting the article according to MOS:TVSPLIT, which will solve the length problem. Season articles should cover elements of the season, and then the episode list will transclude from the season article, leaving off the episode summary (by using the "sublist" specification of {{Episode list}}. I have started with Gunsmoke (season 1) as an example. I'll continue on the rest as I am able. (Note in the Gunsmoke (season 1) article history how I progressed to save the guest cast and other "note" (i.e. fancruft) in the history for the article so that it will be easier to refer back to per season should any of that be needed later.) ButlerBlog (talk) 13:23, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

  @Wizardman: In addition to what I've noted above, I'm putting off major overhaul of the fancruft in the episode summary params of season articles. That's so I can get through all of the seasons to transclude in this main list article to resolve the length issue as the episode summaries are not included in the transcluded result since when using sublist. After I get a season article for each so that the list is only the main info sans episode summaries, I'll go back through the season articles to clean up the fancruft. ButlerBlog (talk) 16:58, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

  Related note: WP:DUPLINKS in the tables will be addressed along with the above... ButlerBlog (talk) 17:36, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

  Still a work in progress, but at this point, I have created a season article for all 20 seasons and replaced the episode table in the list article with one transcluded from each season article (sans episode summaries). That should help reduce the article length a lot. ButlerBlog (talk) 18:38, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

  I also took out the home media releases - that's not really MOS:TV for an episode list article - it's more fancrufty. ButlerBlog (talk) 20:09, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

  Very nice! It now looks similar to the way the list originally was when it promoted to Featured List. Jimknutt (talk) 20:23, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

  Thanks - definitely more in line now with what it should be, style-wise. ButlerBlog (talk) 21:32, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

I removed the {{very long}} tag as I believe the length issue is now resolved. As Jimknutt noted, it is back to a state similar to where it was when received FL status, and the changes implemented utilize the {{Episode table}} that is now standard MOS. I also removed all of the home media info as none of that has anything to do with the list of episodes (which is what this list article is). Now I'll be working on those individual seasons, trimming cruft and cleaning those up. For anyone coming along here that may not be familiar with MOS:TV and Template:Episode list, the |ShortSummary= is ONLY for episode summaries. It is long-standing consensus that this is NOT to be used for trivia, and especially NOT for bios of cast/guest cast. That is considered unencyclopedic and just because you see it on some other episode list article doesn't mean it's OK - it just means no one has gotten around to cleaning up the mess yet. ButlerBlog (talk) 14:27, 12 September 2023 (UTC)