Talk:Walter Bishop (Fringe)

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Education[edit]

This article fails to give information about which science Walter Bishop is educated in. I remember him being a biochemist and his work on the series mostly consists of genetics,chemistry, biology etc. but he also invented a portal machine to travel between parallel universes, which suggests he must be some kind of quantum physicist. Which is true? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.102.190.194 (talk) 12:02, 5 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]


Robert Bischop / Father? / Date problems[edit]

Currently, the article says that Walter "has a relative named Robert Bishop that died young on December 11, 1944, for reasons that have yet to be mentioned."

Robert Bishop sounds like Walter's father, who migrated to US in 1943 (all being said by Walter in S02E14 00:18). If Robert has died in 1944-12-11, as written above, his son could not have been born in 1946 (which would be at least 13 months later), unless some fringe science was in use. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.6.227.39 (talk) 22:36, 1 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

German Last Name[edit]

The German word for bishop is "Bischof", and pronounced just like in the series, so that was probably the Bishop family name in Germany (alternative spelling Bischoff exists, though). "Bishoff" as in the article seems to be wrong. 79.210.84.212 (talk) 23:08, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Moonlighting Reference[edit]

Walter Bishop is also the name of a character in the TV series Moonlighting_(TV_series) -- I assume it's a deliberate cultural reference, but I can't find a reference to justify it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.3.233.9 (talk) 21:36, 17 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

the religion edit didn't look right anymore[edit]

Here's an edited version of the info.


  • Season 1 Episode 9: Astrid says "I didn't know you were so religious". Just after Walter recites a verse from the Bible. Walter responds,"I'm not, not anymore".
  • Season 1 Episode 18: When asked "do you believe there is such a thing? The soul?" Walter responds,"There are days when I wish I did. There are days which I wish I didn't." Later says,"If indeed there is a soul, we must consider then that there is still time for redemption, were not ready to be hauled off to be judged yet, Nicholas."
  • Season 2 Ep. 11: When a Priest asks,"are you suggesting Lisa's possessed?" Walter responds,"I wasn't, but now that you mention it, I wouldn't be suprised if numerous possessions were in fact misdiagnosed cases of a phenomena we are just now discovering." Priest retorts,"I hardly think thats whats happening here." Walter argues,"Oh you hardly would because the Church doesn't approve of exorcisms anymore does it?" Priest,"No, because they are merely superstition." Walter yells,"because there are examples of casting out spirits right through the Bible, Father!" Towards the end of the episode Walter says in Latin,"Isaiah 7:9" Lisa's mom recites it. Walter responds,"Even as a scientist, sometimes I have to rely on faith."
  • Season 2 Ep 15: After Walter describes a Quantum anomaly he comments,"Oh its possible, but if so then God has a far more disturbed sense of humor then even I could have imagined."
  • Season 3 Episode 22: Walter kneels before a Cross and begs God to spare humanity from obliteration. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.199.68.204 (talk) 07:18, 4 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 19 July 2016[edit]

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. Even discounting the !vote that gave no rationale, there's no consensus for this move after more than two weeks and a relisting. Cúchullain t/c 14:16, 4 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]



– Walter Bishop, the fictional character from the television show Fringe, is the primary topic for the name Walter Bishop, getting the most views in the last 90 days (I can't add the link, for some reason it removes all of this text. Check it out for yourselve, please :o). The other two Walter Bishops, Walter Bishop Jr. and Walter Bishop Sr. are not primary topic, getting much less views than the fictional character. Besides, the other two Walter Bishop's do not go simply by "Walter Bishop", instead, they go by their name + a suffix at the end, while the fictional character does not have a suffix. Therefore, Walter Bishop the fictional character should be at "Walter Bishop" and a hatnote can solve any confusion. ✉cookiemonster✉ 𝚨755𝛀 20:31, 19 July 2016 (UTC) --Relisting. No such user (talk) 13:33, 28 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • OpposeWeak support - Fictional characters, even if more widely known, should rarely be given namespace priority over real persons. I don't think Walter Bishop the Fringe character has the significance to meet this exception. --MASEM (t) 20:55, 19 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    • Masem, Is there a policy/guideline that states that real people are given priority over fictional characters, even if the fictional character is primary topic? Also, why don't you think that Walter Bishop (the Fringe character) has the significance to meet this exception of primary topic? Like I said before, the other Walter Bishops use suffixs, which is WP:NATURAL disambiguation. So why can't the fictional character be at "Walter Bishop", which is natural. The fictional character is primary topic. Did you view the WMF lab page views of the three Walter Bishop's? Let me know. ✉cookiemonster✉ 𝚨755𝛀 21:22, 19 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
      • There's no policy for that, it just feels disrespectful to the actual persons to put a not-widely-known fictional character at the undisambiguated spot. But that said, you're right that the two living persons have additional text necessary to distinguish between each other, so I have changed my !vote for that. --MASEM (t) 22:32, 19 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        • Thank you! and I understand your position, Masem. Some may feel that it is disrespectful for a fictional character to be at the undisambiguated spot, but we have to go by policy and guidelines. I am sure you know this guideline, WP:BUTIDONTKNOWABOUTIT. The fictional character has more views than the other two real-people, so the fictional character should have the undisambiguated spot, according to Wikipedia guidelines of WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. There are several other fictional characters on Wikipedia who are primary over real-people. And like you said, the two living people named Walter Bishop are naturally disambiguated with name suffixs. Cheers my friend! ✉cookiemonster✉ 𝚨755𝛀 22:54, 19 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. I don't have a problem necessarily with fictional characters being primary. Sometimes they will be. But in this case I think the jazz musicians have greater long term significance (one of the WP:PTOPIC criteria) than the Fringe character, which counteracts the fact that the character may enjoy greater common usage in day to day conversation. In the NY Times, for example, more search results are about the jazz musician, suggesting that it has greater encyclopedic and long term significance.[1]  — Amakuru (talk) 11:34, 28 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think the jazz musicians have greater long term significance (one of the WP:PTOPIC criteria) So why is that musician not a base name? Because it is not their common name. They use a suffix, which is natural disambiguation. The fictional character is not at natural disambiguation, therefore should be at the dab page. Do you understand? :) Cheers, Ḉɱ̍ 2nd anniv. 16:40, 28 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.