Prepared with commentary by Maplestrip

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Football and Politics Do Not Mix

It initially seemed "death" was a major theme in this week's report, but neither Shannon Matthews (#9) or the guys who stole the Boeing 727-223 (#23) are confirmed to be dead and the Bowling Green massacre (#20) was not a massacre at all. What we're left with is, as always, politics and sports. The Super Bowl (#6, #11) clearly topped the report this week, with Tom Brady (#1) of the Patriots (#7) defeating the Falcons (#21) in a never-before-seen comeback. No American event can be without its politics, but neither Lady Gaga (#2) nor George H. W. Bush (#25) are controversial figures today. Meanwhile, all that's on Dutch TV seems to be ice skating, which does not appear in the top 5000 at all.

For the week of February 5 to 11, 2017, the 25 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the WP:5000 report were:

Rank	Article	Class	Views	Image	Notes
1	Tom Brady		3,748,813		Quarterback of the New England Patriots (#7), Tom Brady seems to have broken various Super Bowl records last week. Apparently, "Brady directed the biggest comeback in Super Bowl history to tie the game at the end of regulation. This resulted in the first overtime in the history of the storied game." He is now the first quarterback in NFL history to win five Super Bowls. I can understand why people are so interested in the man.
2	Lady Gaga		2,870,782		Lady Gaga headlined the Super Bowl halftime show (#24). There were no major controversies: she sang a few lines of various nationalist songs, ranging from " God Bless America" to " This Land is Your Land". Her song " Born This Way" may have been the most politically progressive song to have ever been sung at the Super Bowl, but the event was otherwise just some good old pop fun. Probably for the best.
3	Betsy DeVos		1,439,337		I was surprised to see that the United States Congress accepted DeVos as the US' new Secretary of Education. I suppose I should know better by now. Let's see how this activist-turned-politician will handle the country's school system.
4	List of Super Bowl champions		1,282,718		Patriots, broncos, seahawks, ravens, giants, and saints – I have always liked how American football teams are named. The Patriots (#7) have a very successful history with the Super Bowl, but you wouldn't be able to predict the winner of any given event from this list.
5	Donald Trump		1,227,176		Donald Trump is still controversial. His executive order that bans people from seven random countries is still under heavy fire; Trump keeps sending out Twitter messages about how the federal judge and court system are putting the entire nation in peril. Now, if he could tell us why these seven countries specifically are dangerous, he might be able to save the country.
6	Super Bowl LI		1,140,923		Some of this year's highly-watched Super Bowl commercials have been perceived as anti-Trump, or at least pro-immigration. I'm the kind of person that likes to look for politics everywhere I can in American media, and I won't let some sporting event get in-between that.
7	New England Patriots		1,098,494		The New England Patriots won said sporting event (#6). Having appeared nine times in the Super Bowl and having won five of these matches, the Patriots are possibly the most successful American football team in the country. Congratulations, Greater Boston region.
8	XXX		1,095,937		I don't know if people are looking for the ZZ Top album or the triple X syndrome. I'm sure it's not the latest Vin Diesel film XXX: Return of Xander Cage they are looking for, which is part of the XXX film series.
9	Kidnapping of Shannon Matthews		915,840		The 1998 kidnapping and abuse of nine-year old child Shannon Matthews is currently being dramatized as The Moorside. After reading this article, all I care about knowing is how Matthews is doing today, something that isn't touched upon in it at all. For the record, it seems like the girl was caught by social services and given a new identity.
10	Gisele Bündchen		794,893		This supermodel is also the wife of Tom Brady (#1).
11	Super Bowl		786,318		If you live in North America, you were probably aware that this American football match was being played last week. If you aren't, you probably only know of the Super Bowl through American sitcoms.
12	Tara Palmer-Tomkinson		774,782		This English television personality passed away on February 8, at the way too young age of 45.
13	Matt Ryan (American football)		764,180		The handsome quarterback of the Falcons played a good game during the Super Bowl, but he could never expect the enormous comeback the Patriots would make.
14	Legion (TV series)		761,720		This TV series stars Legion (#17), the son of Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men universe. The character has dissociative identity disorder (DID), and each of his many alternates control a different superpower. This trailer looks a lot better than that of Split, so I might watch some of it. I'm loving the visual style!
15	Steve Bannon		727,944		Alt-right banker Steve Bannon has become the White House Chief Strategist of Donald Trump. Doing a Google News search on his name gives me a lot of what looks like fake news, like "Steve Bannon and ISIS Get Closer To Their Common Goal: Civilizational War" and "Steve Bannon thinks an apocalyptic third world war is coming, claims historian". Steve Bannon is in the center of the " Muslim ban" situation, so that's probably the main reason why he is on this list.
16	Deaths in 2017		714,829		Relatively few major deaths last week, but there are always plenty of them to go around. Like the composer of Hotel Rwanda or the production designer of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Rest in peace.
17	Legion (Marvel Comics)		667,288		Legion was created in 1985 by writer Chris Claremont and artist Bill Sienkiewicz (pictured). The character is played by Dan Stevens in the television series (pictured #14).
18	Kristen Stewart		662,242		Twilight actress Kristen Stewart hosted Saturday Night Live on February 4, right as this week began. Apparently, Donald Trump has a bit of an obsession with her. Some of the attention this article received might be because Stewart had to explain to the United States president that she is gay. Probably an awkward situation.
19	O. J. Simpson		634,290		The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story was a highly popular television series last year. Last week, a lot of actors and actresses were signed for a spin-off series about Hurricane Katrina. I'm not sure if this is the only reason why this former American football player is garnering so much attention, especially because American Crime Story is hundreds of places lower.
20	Bowling Green massacre		627,601		As a Dutch citizen, I can comfortably say that the Bowling Green massacre never happened, but I'm worried that my American friends won't have that freedom soon. In other news, we've made some good progress in our war against Eastasia. Kellyanne Conway, the counselor who created this misstatement, pictured.
21	Atlanta Falcons		601,109		Would it be mean if I made fun of this team for losing the Super Bowl? Probably. At least I can praise them for having picked one of the coolest animals for their name.
22	Raees (film)		578,245		This Indian film by Rahul Dholakia (pictured) seems to be winning against its rival Kaabil, which was released on the same day. The film has been subject to a lot of controversy because of the nationalities of its cast and its use of religious symbolism. Reception is mixed, but the box office is always right.
23	2003 Boeing 727-223 disappearance		573,454		My first Reddit thread! Two men stepped into a large airplane, flew off with it, and have never been seen since.
24	List of Super Bowl halftime shows		565,746		Seeing as Super Bowl halftime show redirect here, it is hard to say if people are interested in the history of the event, or just want to know about this year's halftime show. Regardless, this half hour of the event has featured a huge amount of great artists, ranging from Stevie Wonder to The Black Eyed Peas. It's definitely a cultural monument all on its own.
25	George H. W. Bush		559,453		Former president George Bush, an avid Houston sports fan, flipped the coin to start off the Super Bowl. I'd say politics and sports go hand-in-hand.

• 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 exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (5–6% or less) or almost all mobile views (94–95% 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.