Top 25 Report: Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (November 2 to 8, 2014) edit
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Summary: Very much a week dominated by holidays and pop culture over current events, with new film Interstellar taking the top spot followed by holidays Day of the Dead (#2), Guy Fawkes and his Night (#4 and #5), and Halloween (#8, and its third week on the list). A foursome of television shows, all return visitors, appear to setting up residence on the chart: The Walking Dead (#11), American Horror Story: Freak Show (#14), Gotham (#16), and The Flash (#18).
As prepared by Milowent, for the week of November 2 to 8, 2014, the 25 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the report of the most viewed pages, were:
Rank Article Class Views Image Notes 1 Interstellar (film) 
1,513,535 
Up from #20 and 406,735 views last week, this science fiction film directed by Christopher Nolan was widely released on November 7. It earned $52.1 million in its opening weekend in North America, but was edged out by Disney's animated Big Hero 6 (which comes in on this list at #24). 2 Day of the Dead 
851,429 
Up from #13 and 465,760 views last week. With its joyful juxtaposition of the merry and the macabre, the Mexican Halloween is becoming ever more popular in its northern neighbour (the land that turned Halloween into a global phenomenon) no doubt aided by the increasing Latino presence there. (Last year the holiday topped out at #4). 3 Facebook
690,133 
A perennially popular article, as it is the second most popular website in the world, after Google. 4 Guy Fawkes 
677,205 
In the week of his eponymous night, which came in at #5, interest usually also spikes in the man himself. Whereupon our readers can learn that the only reason he's been vilified as a master criminal for the last 400 years is because he was the only one of his terror cell who was stupid enough to get caught. 5 Guy Fawkes Night
650,755 
Falls annually on November 5, see also #4. 6 Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare 
600,523 
This video game, primarily developed by Sledgehammer Games, was released on November 4. It has received generally positive reviews from critics. The highest charting video game since Destiny hit #4 in September. 7 Wayne Static
588,353 
48-year-old American musician Wayne Richard Wells, known as Wayne Static, was the lead vocalist for metal band Static-X as well as a solo performer. He died on November 1. This was originally reported to be caused by a drug overdose, though his family later issued a statement that his death was not drug related and happened during sleep. He is survived by his wife Tera Wray. 8 Halloween
519,940 
Down from #1 last week, Halloween completes its annual visitation to our list. 9 Deaths in 2014 
511,489 
The list of deaths in the current year is always a popular article. Deaths this week included British clarinetist Acker Bilk (November 2); American radio personality Tom Magliozzi (November 3); American ceramics inventor S. Donald Stookey (November 4); French flamenco guitarist Manitas de Plata, pictured at left (November 5); Nepali film director Alok Nembang (November 6); Telugu writer Dwivedula Visalakshi (November 7); and Mexican sports commentator Hugo Sánchez Portugal (November 8) 10 Happy New Year (2014 film)
490,472 
Third week in the top 25. A Bollywood film starring Shahrukh Khan (pictured). 11 The Walking Dead (TV series) 
489,473 
The show's fifth season premièred on October 12. 12 Google
470,866 
Always a fairly popular article. 13 Taylor Swift
466,674 
Down one slot from last week, with about 5,000 fewer views. 14 American Horror Story: Freak Show
464,392 
The fourth season of the American Horror Story series débuted on October 8, and has remained on the list for past few weeks. 15 Ebola virus disease
458,269 
Numbers are down from just over 750,000 views last week. 16 Gotham (TV series)
451,220 
This televisual reboot of the Batman franchise debuted on September 22, 2014, and is in the Top 25 for a seventh straight week. 17 United States
443,935 
Although always a fairly popular article, it appears that the 2014 elections held on November 4 propelled it into the Top 25 this week. 18 The Flash (2014 TV series)
441,561 
This spinoff from the hit series Arrow marks DC Comics' second attempt to create a TV universe, after the late and much lamented DC Animated Universe. Fifth straight week in the Top 25. 19 1989 (Taylor Swift album)
436,860 The country/pop singer Taylor Swift (#13) released her latest album on October 27. 20 Ariana Grande
432,202 
The singer returns to the Top 25 after a month-long break. 21 Stephen Hawking
419,637 
The Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, black hole theorist and latter-day science icon got a boost this week with the release of the biopic, The Theory of Everything, in the United States on November 7. 22 One World Trade Center
417,468 
The tallest skyscraper in the United States, located at the World Trade Center site in New York City, officially opened on November 3. 23 Daylight saving time
400,421 
Views of this article peaked on November 2, when the United States, Canada, and some Caribbean nations made their switch. 24 Big Hero 6 (film)
395,953 
Interstellar may be #1 on the Top 25, but this new animated Disney release won the North American box office. No doubt it falls much lower in our traffic rankings because the primary audience of the film is children. Actor Scott Adsit (pictured) voices the primary character Baymax. 25 Mitch McConnell
390,202 
After the 2014 elections held in the United States on November 4, it appears that this Republican Senator from the State of Kentucky is likely to be become the Senate Majority Leader in January 2015, replacing Harry Reid. McConnell also easily defeated the opponent for this seat, Alison Lundergan Grimes.
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Notes:
- It took 390,202 views to make the Top 25 this week. 91 entries in the raw WP:5000 broke 250,000 views, with Angelina Jolie at #91 (251,472 views). Justin Bieber (#497) was the last to break 100,000 views, Nike, Inc. (#1770) the last over 50,000, and Bing Crosby was last, #5000, with 27,755 views.
- Just missing the list are The Walking Dead (season 5) (#26), United States elections, 2014 (#27), future film Furious 7 (#28), American Horror Story (#29), List of Bollywood films of 2014 (#30), and Jayne Mansfield (#31) after Sophia Loren was interviewed about a 57-year-old photograph of the two of them.
Exclusions edit
- This list excludes the Wikipedia main page, non-article pages (such as redlinks), and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Since mobile view data became available to the Report in October 2014, we also exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (2% or less) or almost all mobile views (95% or more) because they are very likely to be automated views based on our experience and research of the issue. Please feel free to discuss any removal on the talk page if you wish.
Note: If you came here from the Signpost article, please take any discussion of exclusions to this article's talk page.