Talk:Saru (Star Trek: Discovery)/GA1

GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Nominator: Very Polite Person (talk · contribs) 18:06, 21 September 2025 (UTC)

Reviewer: Viriditas (talk · contribs) 12:06, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

Feedback

Lead

• Lead is a pleasure to read, but is slightly too wordy when it should be brief and too brief when it should be wordy. Examples abound: four large paragraphs out of proportion to the body it represents; doesn't mention Jones is a creature actor (instead avoids those two words and says "Known for his long history of prosthetic-based performance in genre films", which is 12 additional words instead of "creature actor". This is just an example.) Your lead is just under 400 words, while the body is about 2000 words. That is out of proportion. Take the FA Kes (Star Trek) as one of many examples. The body is about 3500 words, while the lead is abut 370 words. That's almost perfect at just over 10% the length of the body and just under 10% of the entire article. You want to aim for a similar ratio here. In other words, you want the body of the article to be roughly 10 times longer than the lead. Right now, it's five times longer, and that means, as a rule of thumb, that your lead is too big. Now, I don't think you should remove anything just yet. But there is an excessive amount of wordiness that can be removed without impacting the overall meaning.

@Very Polite Person: Check out the article on the Sontaran. The lead is almost 9% of the body. Again, almost perfect. Your lead is somewhere around 17%. That's too high.

I'll trim it back. I'll be shorter on time today until later on, so bulk of it all will be this weekend or tomorrow. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 17:33, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

There's no rush. My main concern right now is the unusual paraphrasing which resembles AI output and of course, the em dashes, which I would get rid of altogether because that's what ChatGPT has made famous. FWIW, a lot of professional writers have said that they have had to modify their writing style due to this problem. Otherwise, they are often accused of using an LLM. Viriditas (talk) 21:00, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

Design and performance

• You're missing a lot of wikilinks: first season of Star Trek: Discovery; Kelpien, prosthetics acting, etc. And how the heck is there no list of Starfleet captains (based on Category:Starfleet captains) so we can link to Starfleet captains? (insert i feel like i'm taking crazy pills gif)

Yikes, file under you miss the obvious no matter how many times you stare at it. I'll get them in. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 17:33, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

I just looked at this now, for list of Starfleet captains and Category:Starfleet captains... I had no idea we had so many articles. That will be a fun one to write. Did acting captains count? If someone told Wesley shut up you have the conn? When the EMH became the ECH? — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 00:11, 3 October 2025 (UTC)

Love me some Robert Picardo. "Living Witness" is one of my faves, but there's a lot to choose from.

• Saru's costume made him approximately 6'8", a height Jones said gave him a "gazelle-like" appearance.
  • Use the {{convert}} template. We are writing for a world audience.

Got this. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 14:47, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

• While being known for his physical craft, Jones remarked that two of the more challenging acting moments as Saru came when he was called to sing, as not a natural musician, on-screen in full prosthesis during emotionally charged moments including a funeral and in the Kelpien language.
  • Rewrite, as it doesn't work.

@Viriditas: what do you think of this? — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 00:46, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

Definitely an improvement over what you had before. Viriditas (talk) 00:48, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

The original sucked. My bad. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 00:50, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

• As a central Star Trek: Discovery character, Jones during filming would sometimes need to stay in full costume, prosthesis, and with Saru's blue full-eye contact lenses in place for 15-17 hours per day.
  • It seems more accurate to call him a main character, but I suppose both could work.
  • Sentence needs to be rewritten as it doesn't work.

Got this too. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 14:47, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

Characterization

• This is contrasted to his crewmate and close friend Michael Burnham, portrayed by Sonequa Martin-Green; Julia Alexander in Polygon compares him to the "cowardly lion" versus Burnham's "risk-seeking go-getter."
  • This sentence doesn't work. It's "contrasted with" not to. Semi-colon should be a full stop.

Got this too. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 14:47, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

• A lot of unnecessary and excessive quoting that is better off as paraphrases.

Got these too. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 23:59, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

• Second paragraph (Maloney 2018) is your most interesting one in the entire article. Instead of just citing one source on this over and over again, you could do a bit more research and see if you can find further supporting sources from other authors and build a stronger argument (discrimination against non-human officers in Starfleet). You can also consider mentioning an aspect of this in the lead.

Let me see what I can shake out for this after I get the rest. I'd thought about going deeper for it (thinking back to the occassional remark or that line from STVI--The Federation is nothing more than a homo sapiens only club. But I think I had thought about not overloading it, since Saru only dealt with it briefly on-screen. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 23:59, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

Agreed with not overloading it, but since Saru is a symbol of the achievement over this kind of thinking, it would make sense to go into it deeper. No need to do it now if you don't want to, but maybe something to think about in the future. It's one of the more fascinating aspects of DISCO, and is briefly alluded to in the earlier Voq/Ash Tyler storyline, which is admittedly silly, but the way it was played strongly reminded me of the 2004-reimagined duality of the humanoid Cylons from Battlestar Galactica. Viriditas (talk) 02:08, 9 October 2025 (UTC)

It could definitely do for another sentence or three. This source may have something solid, but it didn't cover every season: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_drive#cite_note-Meinecke_Spore_2020-7 — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 02:29, 9 October 2025 (UTC)

• "Saru is Kelpien. He thinks everything is malicious," human captain Philippa Georgiou, played by Michelle Yeoh, stated.
  • Framing is off. She was joking, but still discriminatory. The "stated" line makes it seem like it was said with a straight face.

Is this what you were thinking? You're right, it reads off. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 16:47, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

• After undergoing vahar’ai, Saru earned the nickname 'Action Saru' and is portrayed with stronger leadership and boldness in later seasons
  • Why the transition to single quotes for Action Saru?

Got this. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 14:48, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

Story and appearances

• In the Star Trek: Short Treks episode "The Brightest Star", Saru's origin story of fleeing his homeworld to join the United Federation of Planets with the help of then-lieutenant Philippa Georgiou is explored, and that his later joining Starfleet could prevent his ever returning to his pre-first contact home.
  • Rewrite, doesn't work. Read it out loud. Also the wording is torturous, like the sound of nails on a chalkboard. Keep it simple.

You're right... better? — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 15:14, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

• Saru comes from a planet where Kelpiens are a "prey species"
  • I can understand why you used quotes here, but the term is so common I don't think it is needed. Wikilink to prey.

Got this one. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 15:14, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

• By the end of Star Trek: Discovery, Jones summed up Saru's storyline with the word "satisfied," framing it a happy ending.
  • I think this can be improved a bit with a rewrite.

Got this one. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 16:36, 7 October 2025 (UTC)

Reception and analysis

• Wikilinks: Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor, Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Prosthetic Makeup

References

• @Very Polite Person: You're missing a lot of citations. Please add them. You shouldn't nominate an article without sources as that could lead to a quick fail.

@Viriditas: I think I honestly misread part of the MOS when I was tuning this before GA, because I thought plot-level things didn't need to be sourced if they could be gleaned from observing the media (similar to how film/episode plots in articles, I thought for GA/FA, aren't cited. Like, you wouldn't need to cite that Superman caught Lois and the helicopter in the 1978 film? All good, these are all easy to source. I'll have them all topped off in a day or two tops. Probably less. Sorry. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 17:29, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

It’s not entirely your fault. WP:PLOTCITE (and other guidelines) are confusing and cause a lot of problems for editors. It would be easy for me to say that you have to use sources in this instance because Saru is not a primary source like the show is, but it’s still not helpful. I think all of those guidelines need to be rewritten. Viriditas (talk) 19:50, 1 October 2025 (UTC)

This was my first real exposure (spore drive was a lot simpler for that). I dislike how that set of guidance feels nearly arbitrary somehow. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 17:33, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

If you go back to the original creation of the policies and guidelines, there were a lot of people with legal backgrounds involved who wrote these proscriptions in an intentional, flexible manner to allow for multiple interpretations. There's also the fact that many of the policies and guidelines were created by competing parties, so the wording is often a compromise. Viriditas (talk) 21:05, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

OK, tied off the last of them in the last paragraph. I thought I was going nuts because things weren't lining up. I had a typo on what season he went ambassador that was throwing me completely off, but fixed now for the proper timeline. And bonus Progentors source! — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 01:29, 8 October 2025 (UTC)

Randomized spot check

• 3a: Check.
• 3b: Check. That's a complex paraphrase, but it checks out.
• 3c: Check. Note: the source does not say anything about a "blue full-eye" contact lens, but we can both agree that is correct. However, besides you and me, someone might ask for an additional citation. You should try to find one just for those three words.

I'll dig out something that's more obvious for that part. One nice thing about Trek nerds, we're... thorough. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 17:33, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

@Viriditas: How's this? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Saru_%28Star_Trek%3A_Discovery%29&diff=1315314533&oldid=1314731467 — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 00:32, 6 October 2025 (UTC)

• 10a: Check.
• 10b: Check.
• 10c: Check.
• 10d: Check.
• 10e: Check.
• 10f: Check.
• 10g: Check.
• 10h: Check.
• 10i: Semi-check. The original quote is "His apparent lack of ego deserves a deeper examination, not just of his character, but of the stereotypes surrounding Kelpiens." You may want to go back and rewrite it. You wrote, "Maloney notes Saru has a lesser level of ego than humans." I think Maloney missed an opportunity to expand on this point.
• 16: Check.
• 17a: Check.
• 17b: Semi-check. I think you are referring to other sources here in part, but not this one entirely.

That's Prior to their vahar'ai change, Kelpiens exhibit involuntary fear responses characteristic of prey species; after the transformation, fear dissipates and assertiveness emerges.[17] from this source.

From source for the "prey" and "prior to changing" bits:

• In the first season of Discovery, Saru’s species was described as one half of a predator-prey dichotomy that brought up many follow-up questions that were never properly addressed.

From source for the "fear dissipates":

• I was convinced that the Ba’ul would turn out to be the post-vahar’ai Kelpiens, transformed into something else, watching over the Kelpiens from above, afraid that their lack of fear makes them unable to co-exist with their former communities.
• What will happen to Saru, and the rest of the post-vahar’ai Kelpiens? What does it mean to live without fear?

From source for the "assertiveness" clause:

• Now, Saru knows that it not the truth, as he himself has survived, coming out on the other side without his threat ganglia. He is understandably angry, and wishes to keep his family, community, and species from continuing to sacrifice themselves for what he now knows to be a lie.
• Through some strong-arming from an emotionally-involved Saru, Pike agrees to let both Michael and Saru go down to the planet to find out from the Kelpiens if they have seen the Red Angel for themselves.

I worried when I was writing this if I was overdoing it by trying to avoid getting into the deep nerd-speak that so many articles like this have, and to keep it high level and "normie" accessible.

Did I overdo or over-condense the paraphrasing here? The plot/story beat stuff here was a bit of a pain to write with that goal... — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 23:23, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

• 17c: Check.
• 21a: This text reads as if it was generated by AI. All the ChatGPT words are there: "explores tensions...mirroring contemporary struggles...versus broader global or institutional allegiances." That's ChatGPT, my friend. It has a distinctive writing style.
• 21b: This text reads as if it was generated by AI. "This mirrors modern dilemmas concerning...notably in the context." That's ChatGPT-ese.
• 21c: Check.
• 21d: Check, but not a fan of this paraphrase.

That read more cleverly I think in my head than printed as a shorthand ("but wait, there's more!"). I just pulled it completely and refactored the paragraph slightly. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 22:59, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

• 21f: Semi-check, source refers to the concept of vahar'ai, but doesn't name it. Also, you refer to vahar'ai in both uppercase and lowercase throughout the article. Figure out which one to use and stick to it consistently.

Fixed, it seems to be almost always lower-case so I went with that. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 22:59, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

For the concept question (sentence 1 here), yeah, Filipová kind of oddly never actually writes "vahar'ai", but refers to it often. If I'm tracking the cite numbers right since I pulled one, that's this passage in our article: The species oppressing his people on Kaminar were historically preyed upon by the Kelpiens thousands of years prior, nearly to the point of extinction.[21]

That was from this in the PDF: In addition, Saru’s struggle ends with the revelation that the species suppressing his people have actually been the prey species before, and Saru’s people used to be the predators: the prey species, Ba’ul, have faced near extinction before and were simply attempting to keep such a situation from repeating. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 23:12, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

• 21g: Semi-check. It sounds like you are referring to another source in addition to this one.

Since I pulled prior 21d, that means prior 21g was this? This uniquely challenges the Federation's Prime Directive, as he and his sister disclose the historical lie that his species has been sacrificing themselves needlessly, believing their deaths necessary for their society's existence.[21] — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 22:59, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

That was from this in the PDF: However, the Prime Directive is also uniquely challenged in Discovery via the character of Saru, who learns that the way his people have been sacrificing themselves and dying because they believed it to be the only option is essentially a lie preventing their whole species from attaining a higher state of development. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 23:07, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

• 21h: Check.
• 21i:This text reads as if it was generated by AI. "Kaminar introduces a gender equality theme to Saru's story, with no distinctions drawn between male and female Kelpiens in terms of height, physical appearance, strength, and capabilities." "With no distinctions drawn between" sounds like ChatGPT.
• 21j:This text reads as if it was generated by AI. "underscoring an egalitarian society devoid of gender bias" sounds like ChatGPT. It loves to use the words "underscoring" and "devoid".
• 21k:This text reads as if it was generated by AI. What caught my eye was the passage "reflecting broader globalization themes, particularly the tension between" which is standard ChatGPT-speak. GPTZero gives this sentence a 100% AI rating. Feel free to go back to the source and rewrite it.

I'll go back through all these and more human vibes back in/de-coldify them. It's wild that the more I try to write in a dry, academic and formal tone here, the more these goofy meter things shout AI. I tossed some of my older copy into them, and it's like "human, clearly". Toss in the refined repeatedly versions from polishing toward GA/FA/MOS and 'proper grammar' not written in super basic language... "AI, clearly". — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 17:33, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

That's wild, I've never really messed with these scanners before. Just moving a single word around can flip it between "very AI" to "very human" or along it's other scales. I tossed an actual work of fiction I wrote into GPTZero for good measure—the original first "vomit" draft was about 25 pages, and the version I fed into it is 8.5 pages, and almost completely rewritten from the original. It thinks huge swathes of my original is AI (when I pounded it from my brain straight into the keyboard years ago) and that the refined one reports as completely AI apparently for the first paragraph, which I've rewritten from scratch a dozen times!

I even just had it test the lede from Wikipedia: if I remove all in-line cites from the text, it swears it's human. If I include the cites, it reports as AI. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 18:18, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

I understand, but you are not doing yourself any favors by mimicking ChatGPT output with your use of em dashes. Viriditas (talk) 20:57, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

Microsoft Word is actually the culprit... I'll try and cut them out. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 21:21, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

My dude. Microsoft Copilot (GPT-4) is integrated into Microsoft Word in Microsoft 365. This is why I use Libre Office. Viriditas (talk) 21:54, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

I can't run that fancy stuff on the older machines I do 90% of my WP-stuff on. 2016 on one, 2021 on another. It's the auto-complete turning -- into —. Everything you see me do is plain text "source" editing. If I could convince everyone, an option like that would exist on every modern business tool... — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 22:24, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

My apologies. I know what it's like to be on an old machine. I transitioned to new ones last year and it makes Wikipedia so much easier. It's also impossible for me to do any image workflow on an old machine at this point. Viriditas (talk) 22:30, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

My few bits of image tweaking or anything multimedia go on the "gaming" machine, same here. I'm just stubborn and tend to ride a machine (pc, laptop, car) until it up and dies. One of these I'm actually going to toss on Linux once a certain Windows version is no longer safe to have internet-facing.

So the depth of copilot/gpt on the newer Word builds is integrated to the point it's running auto-correct through instead of the older basically grammatical auditing and dictionary work? Like... it rewrites your stuff? I've just been trying to redo my own "style" into MOS lanes and proper dry, formal, well-spoken properly academic-in-the-WP-way language (that's why I went back and started revising my earlier articles). Since GPT et al are trained so heavily on that kind of writing, that now makes sense why so many people are trying to shove junk in here from LLMs. It "sounds" wiki-like. Which makes sense, since it's trained on us.

I thought for a while they could be useful as a search proxy/agent ("Go find me stuff in x language from newspapers about...") because a business model I'd been testing professionally (mostly science related/training focus) was actually bad-ass at finding what you asked. Give it a bunch of guidance, hit enter, get coffee, come back to basically exactly what you wanted, x number of URLs, studies, etc. to read through. It rarely gets it wrong. Consumer GPT... I'd be lucky if 50% weren't the wrong DOIs let alone the wrong answers or just made up.

Trying them side by side was funny. "Get me studies about this kind of topic, 1970s-1990s, this language, exclude from such and such sources". Say, a chemistry topic. The work one is 95% accurate, and gets what you want to start going through. If it saves me an hour of digging, that's great. I can get right into reading. The general GPT one is half bullshit and a bonus real study from like 1960 about retail aspirin instead of industrial chemical matters or something and not in the language I requested. Still not ready for prime time. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 22:46, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

• 26: Check.
• 27: Check.
• 32: Check.

External links

• The recommended syntax is {{Memory Alpha|Saru}}.

Got it, I didn't realize that was a template. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 23:50, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

Side questions

@Viriditas: I thought I'd seen articles go back and forth on putting names of episodes into italics (whereas series/franchise names generally much more seem to be italicized). What's the right MOS/guideline for that? I italicized series/franchise names but left episode names plain. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 23:53, 2 October 2025 (UTC)

Episodes always go in quotations. The name of the show goes in italics. Viriditas (talk) 00:04, 3 October 2025 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Titles of works, WP:MINORWORK. The exception is listed as "Television and radio programs, specials, shows, series and serials", or longer works in general, not short episodes. Viriditas (talk) 00:06, 3 October 2025 (UTC)

@Viriditas: I think that's the last of the ref stuff. I'm going to start into the upper section next today and tomorrow. — Very Polite Person (talk/contribs) 00:35, 6 October 2025 (UTC)

Review

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it well written?

   A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:

   Copyedits. Please review.

   B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:

   Issues have been addressed.

2. Is it verifiable with no original research, as shown by a source spot-check?

   A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:

   Looks good.

   B. Reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose):

   Issues have been addressed.

   C. It contains no original research:

   D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:

   Earwig report is clean. GPTZero reports the text is 97% human.

   Looks good.

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:

   B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):

4. Is it neutral?

   It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:

   Not seeing any negative info, although this might be an unusual case of there not being any. When DISCO was first released, older fans reacted in the predictable way, just as they did with DS9 and VOY, with many on Reddit initially claiming "I will never watch Trek again", which was the same, tired-old-man-with-an-onion-belt-yells-at-cloud reaction we saw from fans when Janeway, the first woman captain to lead a series, appeared. To this day there are fans who say they refuse to watch VOY, so the hard headed stubborness (and sexism) of the fandom is well known. So is there criticism of Saru like there was of older characters? I'm not aware of any.

5. Is it stable?

   It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:

   Stable.

6. Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?

   A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content:

   Both images are non-free and used appropriately, however, I believe File:Saru, Star Trek Discovery – signature walk gait from hoof boot design.gif should be modified to indicate that it is used primarily for critical commentary. IIRC, the critical commentary originated on the season 3 DVD featurette (it is likely online at this point) that discussed his gait with experts and production staff, and this image was used as part of that critical commentary. It then made its way to more independent sources who discussed it in secondary sources.

   B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:

   You're still using periods in the captions where they aren't needed.

   Fixed.

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

   Some issues to work on listed above in feedback section. Nominator has already begun working on them.

   Made some copyedits; please review and adjust accordingly. Thanks for writing this article. Looking forward to your changes and expansion and taking this to FAC. You're halfway there. I would guess you would only need to tighten up the prose and add maybe add 1000 words or so just to cover all of the bases. You will also need to revamp the sources and try to improve them. Overall, you probably wouldn't have to add more than an additional five paragraphs. Good luck, I think you can make it.

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.