The Sopranos Forums

Hey, Sopranos fans! Here's a list of guidelines that should greatly improve your chances of having your submission accepted. These are meant mostly to help clarify both what is expected from submissions, and to show through examples what is and is not appropriate for each section of the guide (if you want to know the difference between Notes and Trivia, this is the place to be). It also tells you what you can expect from me in acceptance and rejection notices. You can use the following links to drop down to general guidelines that apply to all submissions, as well as those pertaining to specific sections of the episode guides:

General Guidelines
Summary Form
Cast/Crew
Quotes
Notes
Trivia
Allusions

General Guidelines Applicable to All Submissions

Do Not Copy-and-Paste/Plagiarize

I'm not an idiot; I can sniff out when something feels copied, and Google is my friend. If you copy-and-paste another website's original content or type verbatim from another source, and I catch you, your submission will be rejected. Take the time to rewrite things.

Mass Submitting

To ensure editors are not overwhelmed with work, TV.com policy forbids the practice of mass submitting. If I feel you are mass submitting, all of your submissions in my queue will be rejected. While they leave this to editors' judgments to determine when this takes place, I will generally consider submission in excess of 30 to constitute mass submitting, and would prefer to get less.

Edit Existing Notes to Add Data When Feasible

If you hear a piece of music not listed in a note or two credited people do not appear, but only one is listed in a note, do not add another note. In that case, edit the existing note to reflect the change.

Be Wary of How Accurate Syndication Cuts Are

If you just watched a show on cable/syndicated reruns and noticed a quote wasn't there or a scene related to in a trivia blurb was absent, do not submit a delete saying "I watched this and it never happened." Syndication cuts have a few minutes missing compared to the original broadcast version, so are not 100% reliable indicators of how an episode truly played out. A DVD or other recording of the episode as originally broadcast is the gold standard when considering deleting something.

Spell Properly and Use Correct Grammar

This means 'make a good faith attempt at proper English.' I'm not going to be an ogre over the occasional letter transposition, outright misspelling, or missed comma; it can happen to anyone and I will happily correct for you. But when multiple submissions have multiple errors consistently, or you make the same mistake time and time again, you will start having them bounced back to you. Please keep in mind the following:

• Character names are in the guide. There is no excuse to spell them incorrectly, and I will be an ogre about them being spelled wrong.
• Sentences should have punctuation at the end of them, and it should be the correct punctuation. Questions get a question mark, not a period.
• Unless from a British speaker, use American spellings. It's "realize," not "realise."
• Learn the difference between to/too/two, your/you're, its/it's, then/than, except/accept and similar homophones/sound-a-likes.
• Contractions like ain't/can't/won't should have apostrophes.
• Capitalize proper nouns/brand names/trademarks/media titles.
• As a general rule, numbers one through twelve get written out; 13 and higher use digits.
• Longer sentences will often have commas or such in them. I don't mind a missed comma here and there, but when you needed four of them and only used one on a consistent basis, I may start rejecting.
• Don't double space between sentences. This is an unneeded holdover from the typewriter days. BR tags should also not be added.
• Unlike many word processing programs, here two hyphens do not automatically become an em-dash ( — ). To make one, use ALT+0151 on the numeric keypad.
• If English is not your native language and these rules are too tough to follow, my apologies, but please don't submit. I don't go submitting things in broken French to French-language websites; show TV.com the same respect.

Making Correction to Entries

If you see something that needs fixing, like incorrect spelling or grammar, please feel free to correct it. Just be sure to be specific about what you're doing. Don't just say "correcting spelling" in your comment; say "correcting spelling of 'wnid' to 'wind.'" Don't just say "grammar edit"; say "2nd sentence should end with a question mark, not a period."

And speaking of comments...

User Comment

All submissions need a user comment. Do not bypass it. Do not type in "." Do not type in "asdf adsg." Do not type in "no comment." Don't say "true." Do not space a few times. Do not put in just an emoticon. Don't just paste in your submission. None of those are valid comments. Tell me what you're doing; while it need not be overly wordy,the more proof/evidence you can give me for things like a goof/allusion, the better chance you have of getting your submission accepted. Comments should be similar to:

• Adding a quote from the show.
• Adding an allusion to xxxxx I noticed.
• This is a continuity goof that deviates from a fact established in prior episode x.
• I noticed this glaring error/prop goof in the episode.
• I'm correcting the spelling of "temas" to "teams."
• Adding guest stars per TVguide.com (URL)

Speaking of URLs, the comment is also where you include...

Your Source

When your source is not implied to be the episode itself (like for a quote or goof), include your source for verification. If submitting a URL, do not just give me just a home page, unless that's where the information is; give me the full URL of the page with the information. I'm not here to hunt through a website you looked at to find what you're submitting. If it's a book/magazine, tell me the name and page(s). If it's the episode credits itself, tell me that.

Also, your source should be reputable, especially for something major like adding an episode. In that case, a site with press releases (like futoncritic), a listings site (like TVguide), or an official network/show site is the way to go. An unofficial fan page for an actor or semi-(ill)legal download site is not appropriate and will result in your submission being rejected.

Formatting Media Sources and Other Special Entities

When including the name of a media source and some other special entities in a submission, it should be specially formatted. In the strictest standards, the following are correct (most taken from the bottom of this site), and I would prefer their use:

The following should be italicized:

• TV shows (Magnum, P.I.)
• Movies (Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation)
• Books (Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities)
• Music albums (Billy Joel's Storm Front)
• Cla$$ical works with unique titles (Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik)
• Plays/musicals (The Phantom of the Opera)
• Newspapers (The New York Times)
• Videogames (Halo)
• Magazines (TV Guide)
• Works of art (da Vinci's Mona Lisa or Rodin's The Thinker)
• Sea- and spacefaring vessels (U.S.S. Enterprise or R.M.S. Titanic)
• Binomial/"Latin" names (Anthrax is caused by Bacillus anthracis)

The following should be placed in quotation marks:

• TV episodes (Seinfeld's "The Serenity Now")
• Songs from the modern/album era (Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire")
• Magazine articles (TV Guide's "Cheers and Jeers")
• Short Stories (Edgar Allan Poe's "The Pit and the Pendulum")
• Poems (T.S. Eliot's "Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock")

The following get no formatting:

• Cla$$ical works with generic titles that were likely used by multiple composers (Saint-Saëns' Piano Concerto No. 5 and Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5)

Also take note that the above applies equally to fictional 'in-episode' items. (i.e. Seinfeld-universe movies like Sack Lunch and Prognosis Negative get italicized just the same as Lost in Translation.)

Links

I encourage the use of links, especially in allusions, to provide quick access to information for users of the site. Sadly, at this time only links to TV.com pages are allowed. If linking to a TV show, when you are referring to a specific episode, please take the time to link to that episode's guide here, not just the show's main summary page.

If I Accept Your Submission...

Just because I accepted a submission doesn't mean it was perfect. I may have had to fix something for you, and if so would let you know what it was so you may correct in future submissions. If you continually make the same mistakes eventually I'll start rejecting submissions I fixed and accepted in the past, and you not reading acceptance PMs is not an excuse to say "but you never told me I was making a mistake!" You should always open all PMs regarding submissions for this reason, as most other editors will also tell you if they made corrections for you.

If I Reject Your Submission...

Rejected submissions will always have the reason for rejection in the editor comments, with the exception being if two or more people edit the same thing I do make use of the 'auto-reject all other submissions' feature that generates a blank rejection. I may list corrective actions that may be taken (like asking to re-submit to a different section), or items I mention may be implied to be correctable (like telling you there are too many spelling errors), in which case you may amend your contribution and re-submit. If I give no hint your submission is acceptable or would be accepted under different circumstances, do not resubmit. I may also refer you to this document for further clarification.

Above all, if a submission is rejected, remember this:
You do not have to agree with my decision, but you do have to accept it.

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Summary Form

If You Are Adding a New Episode you need two of the following three elements: Episode Title, Episode Summary, First Aired Date. No exceptions will be made. Saying "summary will be added later" does not count as having a summary. Your source must be above reproach to add a new episode. An official press release, legitimate TV listings site like TVGuide.com, or an official network's site are examples of valid sources for new episodes. Unofficial fan sites, illegal download sites, and wikipedia are not appropriate for use to add new episodes.

The Episode Title is the title of the episode, as cited in the episode itself, or listed on a press release, copyright application, network site, or TV listings site.

The Episode Summary is a brief recounting of the major plot points, comparable to what one might find in TV Guide or on a TV listings site. As a rough guideline, one sentence per plot/sub-plot will suffice, and there should never be any spoilers of major events. A typical sitcom or action show will rarely need more than two or three sentences, and most dramas will never need more than five. And again, even if from an official show site, copy-and-paste of summaries at TV.com is not allowed.

The Episode Recap is a detailed recounting of the episode's events. Great detail is expected, with some quotes and every scene made mention of. Spoilers are acceptable for mention in the episode recap. I don't care if you write it in the present or past tense as long as you stay consistent within the recap. For an example of what a recap should be similar too, check out this recap for one of Gislef's shows, House, or look at a Sopranos recap on HBO.com. If you think you can submit two paltry paragraphs and I'll accept it as a recap, think again.

The Season Number is the season the episode aired.

The Episode Type helps define between typical episodes and certain special episodes. 99+% are "Regular" episodes. Do not automatically assign "Pilot" to the first episode unless it is the actual pilot, which often never gets aired. "TV Movie" is commonly used for reunion shows after a series has concluded its run.

Episode Number (Season)/(Lifetime) is the order of the episodes in terms of their originally aired sequence, not production order. If there were 22 episodes in season one, and you're adding episode 7 to season two, the Episode Number (Season) is 7 and the Episode Number (Lifetime) is 29.

First Aired Date is when the episode aired first on its originating network. ex. Some U.S. shows air a day early in Canada, but still should get its U.S. air premiere in this field.

Did this Episode Air is a checkbox to be used if an episode never aired, such as by being cancelled before completing its run of produced episodes, or if you are adding a new episode but have only title and summary from the 'Golden Two of Three Rule' required for new episode acceptance.

The Production Code is a code identifying an episode inside its production company, and often show when episodes were produced out of broadcast order, either by intent or network discretion. They are occasionally listed on the last page of end credits, and often listed on copyright applications at copyright.gov. Do not simply try to add a production code of "403" because the episode is the third in season four. While that may actually be correct, you must have a very good source for me to accept as new, or accept an edit to, a production code.

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Cast/Crew

The cast section should include only those that actually appear in the episode, not simply everybody credited in the episode, though in general that is one and the same. If someone does not appear, do not add them to the cast and feel free to delete them if they are listed at present (also adding/amending an accompanying "does not appear" Note as well.) When adding cast, take care to use the correct guide when two or more people have the same name. As far as sources, many editors are leery of imdb.com. My policy for there is I will accept adds from the site so long as a character name is ascribed to the actor. I will not accept deletes based on not being listed at imdb.

Occasionally, an actor will have been in a bit part once, then become a bona fide recurring character later in the series' run, with that bit part tossed into the recurring section by the system. In cases like this, feel free to submit a role type correction, switching the rogue recurring credit to a guest star credit, as made possible by the summer 2007 system upgrade.

Most importantly: cast submissions/edits must be done in one submission. If you have five guests to add/edit, add/edit them all at once. Do not attempt to make five separate submissions. I accept that you may make a mistake and accidentally leave someone off once in a blue moon; feel free to just submit the person you missed in a new submission. It happens. As long as it doesn't become a suspicious habit, we'll be fine.

The crew section can have anybody listed in an episode's production credits that has the title listed here. Please use care to assign credits to the correct person when crew/actors share a name and havelook-a-like entries in the TV.com database.

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Quotes

There's not much to say here. Simply follow the guidelines set out by TV.com. This means boldfacing the character names that precede the dialogue, placing a non-bolded colon, a single space, and then having dialogue, not putting it in quotation marks. If a character quotes something/somebody, or mentions a media source that should typically be placed in quotation marks, then those parts of the dialogue can go in quotation marks. Any parenthetical action descriptors get italicized, as well as special emphasis/irony on the part of the speaker. Here are some examples:

Person A: Dialogue.
Person B: (action) Dialogue.
Person C: Dialogue.
Person A: Dialogue, "quotes Person C," dialogue.

Christine: Here's your porn.
Matthew: It's not porn; it's a men's fitness magazine.
Christine: Oh, sorry—your gay porn.

Use some common sense judgment and only submit the better. more memorable/funnier/more dramatic quotes; the goal is quality, not quantity. The quote section is not meant to be a cataloguing of every minor chortle, time the laugh track went off, or barely dramatic moment. When you submit a handful of the better quotes, you stand a better chance of getting them all accepted. When you start submitting double digits of quotes, I'll likely reject some as simply not cutting it, quality wise, in effort to not detract from the ones I've accepted. If there's already 15 quotes for a sitcom, I'm likely to not accept any more; let's face it--by the time a sitcom's guide has a dozen quotes, you're scraping the bottom of the barrel, quality-wise.

Also, don't make the quote too long. We're not supposed to be having entire scenes posted. A good quote should be concise; and is usually no more than four or five lines long. Eliminate uneeded set-up—if you've written out seven lines of dialogue, but the punchline would still work with only the last four, get rid of the first three. As a rule, I will never accept anything 15+ lines long, and frankly, anything over 10 will be carefully scrutinized (as well as entries with less lines if individual lines of dialogue are exceedingly long) and likely rejected or edited down. People aren't coming to TV.com to read massive text blurbs or have to scroll to see quotes.

Do not copy-and-paste all the quotes from another site that contains quotes. If a site has ten quotes for an episode, and you take two or three to submit, that's fine. But don't go taking seven of their quotes and submitting them.

Profanity should be as originally aired. Profanities on HBO fare like The Sopranos should be left as is, and censored submissions will be rejected. Conversely, profanity that is bleeped out at original broadcast should be represented with asterisks, and when known, the number of asterisks should equal that of the letters bleeped/silenced out. In that case, uncensored submissions will be rejected.

If the quote (or part of the quote) you want to submit is also an allusion, only submit it to the allusion section. Submitting it to quotes as well just creates duplicate data in the guides.

Finally, remember that not everything that works when viewed on screen works in written form. That's okay. Not everything needs to be here, especially if the italicized description(s) that makes something work is too long or it relies too heavily on an earlier scene to make much sense as a stand-alone quote. Anything submitted with a description roughly as long or longer as the actual dialogue will not be accepted.

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Notes

Notes are for blurbs that do not deal with a specific on-screen event, such as behind-the-scenes goings on, production tidbits, or other noteworthy—but not in-episode—events of interest. Or mostly simply, if it doesn't qualify as trivia, it's likely a note.

The following are examples of valid notes:

• Music from the episode, whether soundtrack or heard/performed by the actual characters.
• Credited stars who do not appear in the episode (Though credited, Jerry Stiller does not appear in this episode).
• A guest/recurring actor getting elevated to star status, or vice versa.
• Character's first/last appearances if there is additional production-related data. (Due to budget-related reasons, this is Nikki Cox's last appearance on Las Vegas. or Due to the off-season death of Will Geer, this is the last episode to feature Grandpa Walton.)
• An actor taking over a role from another actor (Austin Astrup takes over the role of Major Palmer from Desmond Roberts).
• Other projects one or more show stars and one or more guest stars appeared in together. Ex. using 30 Rock (Maria Thayer can also be seen with Jack McBrayer in the 2008 movie, Forgetting Sarah Marshall.)
• Information about deleted scenes that have, or would have had, specific plot value to the episode or overall series. Notes on things like one-off jokes cut for time are not needed.
• Episode-specific award nominations and victories (Georgia Jeffries was nominated for an Emmy in the Outstanding Writing in a Drama Series category for her work on this episode).
• Alternate episode titles. (This episode was originally titled "A 'Like Me' Story", but was changed before broadcast.)
• Foreign-language titles.
• International episode premiere dates, which must be accompanied by a link to a network website schedule and/or press release. Canadian dates are generally the day of United States broadcast or the day before/after, so do not submit unless there is a gap larger than that.
• Something that caused a major delay in filming (Due to return in January, the second half of season six of The Sopranos was delayed due to James Gandolfini's scooter accident).
• Something that caused a delay in airing, either the day (Originally scheduled for the 7th, news coverage of random disaster x pushed it to the 14th) or the time (This episode was delayed for 20 minutes in the Eastern and Central time zones due to a brief presidential address).
• "Double-Dipping" (Though she appeared three seasons ago, Gloria Stiller re-appears, but playing an unrelated character).
• Behind-the-scenes shake-ups (Upset over scheduling issues, the director stormed off the set and had to be placated into returning to work.)
• Major location filming sites. (The wedding scene was filmed at Leonard's La Dolce Vita in Great Neck, NY)
• Nepotism (Guest star Angelo Pagan is the husband of series star Leah Remini)
• Syndication cuts that cause an actor to completely disappear from the episode.
• Episode dedications.
• Disclaimers beyond typical violence/viewer discretion warnings or those of the Law & Order 'this episode isn't based on real events, by which we mean it actually is' variety.

The following are not valid notes:

• Opinion statements (This is considered the greatest cliffhanger episode ever.)
• Other projects one or more episode guest stars appeared in together, absent any show main stars.
• 'Conversation' rebuttals of existing blurbs. If a blurb is in error or unclear, edit or delete the existing blurb. Do not submit your own take on the situation as a new item.
• "JaneDoe is credited as Janey Doe" statements. If an actor is credited under a variant of their name, that variant goes in the Alias section of the Biography in the person's page here. If it's already there, do nothing. If it's not there, submit it to the actor biography (if there's no editor) or (if there is an editor) PM them with the new alias.
• Nielsen ratings/viewership figures, as we are not allowed to accept/post them. Holdovers from before this was site policy may be submitted for deletion.
• This is the season/series premiere/finale notes. Being the first or last episode in a season provides this information without an additional note.
• Character's first/last appearances absent any production-related information. (This is the first appearance of Leonardo DiCaprio as Luke Brower). When new characters appear, they'll be listed in the cast section; when they leave, they'll stop being listed. Adding a note stating they now appear is just duplicate data, though the circumstances in which thener characterappears should be included in a recap.
• Actor's other roles (Guest Lola Glaudini is best known for being on Criminal Minds). Roles can be found by clicking the actor's name in the cast section, plus that statement also violates the 'no-opinion' clause.
• Who does commentary on DVDs. It's accepted that many, if not all, episodes on DVD sets will have available commentary. Who specifically does it simply isn't that major an issue.

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Trivia

Trivia should always relate to a specific event on-screen, viewable when the episode airs, but not simply a plot event—those go in recaps. It can be a goof or an important item we learn about a character that can reasonably be implied to be long-lasting/permanent.

When writing your blurb up, do not add any bold-faced heading; just write it as a paragraph. I won't reject if you do add one, but I'll strip it out in the mod queue, so to save both of us time, please don't. Your source is generally implied to be the episode itself, though for continuity goofs, you should supply the episode that established the continuity that has been ignored/broken.

The following are some examples of valid trivia:

• A prop/environmental goof, such as misspelled signage that can reasonably be assumed should be correct, shadows that wildly change between shots, or drinking glasses whose contents deplete and refill between camera angles.
• A geographical goof such as characters going to a restaurant with no locations remotely near them (Michael Scott takes Jim to lunch at Hooters, though the nearest one to Scranton is 60 miles away) or something in the background that gives away the filming location is not where the setting is claimed to be (Street signs from exterior shots are those of the Los Angeles area, not New York City).
• A chronological goof, such as a flashback to 1984 where a song plays on the radio that didn't get released until 1986, or inspection stickers on a car being from the present instead of the past.
• A visible/audible in-joke, such as a plaque littered with the names of show production staff or a department store page naming the director's mother.
• Visible production crew/equipment. (When Doug opens the kitchen door, you can briefly see the reflection of a cameraman).
• Breaking away from established continuity, such as a character eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, when two seasons ago they mentioned being allergic to peanuts.
• Major plot holes (While the show's main plot deals with Deacon and Kelly's care arrangements for Major while on an upcoming vacation, there's no mention of their other son, Kirby).
• A presumed expert giving incorrect facts (The exterminator promises to kill the queen of the termite colony, but termites aren't colonial and don't have queens.)
• Translation of a foreign language spoken when it is not otherwise translated during the broadcast.
• Learning a major character's phone number, license plate, ring tone, college, et al. (We learn Charlie got his Master's Degree from Clemson.) Basically something important and reasonably inferrable to be either long-lasting into the future/static through the show's run or a permanent, irrevocable part of the character's past.

The following do not constitute valid trivia:

• Opinion statements
• Explaining a joke
• 'Things that happened'/plot points. Descriptions/definitions of things that happened can go in a comprehensive recap.
• 'Conversation' rebuttals of existing blurbs. If a blurb is in error or unclear, edit the existing blurb. Do not submit your own take on the situation as a new item.
• The license place of a guest character's car.
• Continuity that later gets broken, such as a character being identified as allergic to peanuts, then two seasons later eating peanut butter and jelly sandwich. An episode that sets continuity that later gets broken does not have a goof, only the episode that breaks from it.
• Prop manipulations so common as to be standard in Hollywood, such as dummying up a soda can to change the name or the removal of a car's rear-view mirror for scenes inside a car.
• A layperson giving incorrect facts about an expert subject (Carrie says she wants the termites and their queen killed before returning to their house, but termites don't have queens). She's not an exterminator, so her not knowing this is understandable, and therefore not a goof.
• Trivial Pursuit"-type questions. (What kind of soda did Doug drink at dinner? Answer: Coke)
• What kind of soda someone drank. (Doug drinks Coke at dinner.)
• A show properly following its own continuity/alluding to itself/'callbacks'. This is simply the show doing what it should, and hence is not noteworthy.

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