Talk:Mobutu Sese Seko

Record of Pee Review of article

Humour:	8.5	From the beginning the jokes seem well timed, and the irony is clear and funny. Each line is not too subtle, nor do you bang the reader over the head with the punchline. That being said, I laughed but never LOL. Having lived in Belgium I know about King Leopold, but I think not too many people would even some historians, so maybe pointing out that he was a monster of colonialism might help (although it could perhaps still be funny without explaining it). Mentioning the childrens hands is grotesquely funny. The sired population sentence is funny but it seems incomplete. "Constant fear of being raped and murdered" seems to stick out in the article. Your other lines are subtle and subtly ironic, while this one veers too close to the horrific truth, and, again, seems to stick out. Perhaps there is another way to say it that fits in with your style in the rest of the article. "land which will be no longer called Zaire" is extra funny it was actually a LOL moment for me, but for me. you may want to touch on that in the intro for people who dont know about the renaming. almost LOL:mobutu good will fund, very funny. The chucky cheese tokens for me was well placed, I like absurd out of nowhere stuff, but it works for me in the article. I dont get the polonium in their sushi bit. Hutu tutsi was funny and so dark i tried not to laugh. The best paragraph of the article in my opinion is the authenticité which i dont think you should change. "hated his guts" also sticks out for me from the rest of the article, not as subtle as other lines. You might not like to hear this, but I think the Boxing paragraph adds a little too much to the article. Its the most story like, not as funny as the other paragraphs and doesnt add much to the rest of the article which is really about a tyranical leader not a boxer. A final paragraph about the end of the tyrants life could make this article superb. All of this being said, I really like the humour in the article, it did make me laugh a lot and a couple borderline lols and over all its really good and at times almost briliant irony. It is funnier than most of the articles on VFH right now in my opinion.
Concept:	4.5	Sorry, I think you are mixing two concepts. Is it a story or a parody of a wikipedia article. If you stick to the wikipedia article parody, which is 80 percent of your article, then the concept will be clear and make the article much better. It doesnt mean there cant be a story but adding narrative elements makes it too hard to see what it is you are trying to do (see prose and the boxing comment). That being said, you are consistant with the irony when talking about what Mobutu plans to do, why he does it and how it really happens (always failing). That Africa is a mess and nothing will change also comes through. Perhaps thats a good way to end the ariticle, he also washes away, but still nothing changes. I dont know, but it would make a consistant concept.
Prose and formatting:	8	As the concept seems to be wikipedia article copy, it might be good not to use intros to sentences such as "and so then" or "so one day" "or something like it". It blurs the article between story and wikipedia article parody. I think the article would do well to be one or the other and since most of the article seems wikipedia article copy it might be best to stick to that. "peace came quickly to" sentence is not grammaticly sound. It needs fixing. Apart from the few narrative elements that I dont think work well in the article I do think it was VERY WELL WRITTEN.
Images:	4	Im a stickler for images, I dont know why, but I think they make or break an article. The urkle thing doesnt do it for me. Since the concept seems to be copying a history wikipedia article, it seems best to me to try to copy that as best as you can, and images of irritating urcle take away from the fact that you are talking about an arrogant vicious tyrant. Maybe putting images of someone who seems like a vicious arrogant tyrrant (exagerated as much as possible) will be more amusing. The bottom half of the images, there seem to be too much, and its cluttered. The currency image works, the free food (though maybe an ever more desolate photo would be funnier) and nelson mandela, but the palace photo in my opinion is clever but not funny. The currency is by far the best placed and captioned. You might want to think more about the captions.
Miscellaneous:	10	I add 10 to bring the overall article to 35 as I think it deserves it. I liked this article from the moment I read it, I think its clever, funny, has a concept waiting to be fully realised, makes great ironic humour out of a real tragic history and pisses on a historical tyrant in a good way which no wikipedia article could do no matter how critical they tried to write on evil characters. the article would be extra great if there was more consistancy with the tone of the article, the ironic humour, care with the images and perhaps rethinking the narrative leads at the beggining of some of the sentences.
Final Score:	35	Good luuuuuuuuuuuuck and thanks for making me laugh
Reviewer:	--ShabiDOO 02:23, March 1, 2011 (UTC)