The movie, I felt, was overall good. I found it entertaining, interesting, and I am definitely eager for the 2010 movie.
Animation:The animation was incredibly detailed, with realistic, fluid movement that gave for some nice fight scenes. You can really tell that they put some great effort into the designs, especially with close-ups on Metus, whose armor looks very scratched and discolored in some places. Really, the detail doesn't make the characters look ugly or unpleasing to the eye at all. It just makes the characters look very cool, and more importantly, realistic. It really does give one the impression that the Glatorian and Agori have lived on Bara Magna for many years without any real luxuries, which is just great.
I would have to say that my favorite character model from the film was probably Metus, since, at least to me, he seemed to have the most details. Then again, it may be that his just stand out because he's got white-colored armor. Still looks cool, though.
Also, the pins spinning in their armor gave a very nice little effect to the overall characters. Fairly useless, but cool nonetheless.
I suppose my main problem with the animation is that sometimes the fight scenes were a little bit slow. I thought that Tuma should have moved a bit faster when fighting Mata Nui near the end of the movie, although this was mostly averted in other fight scenes in the movie, at least.
Another problem I thought was that all of the Bone Hunters looked exactly like Atakus (which has prompted my brothers and I to jokingly refer to our own Atakus set as "Bone Hunter). I know that the Bone Hunters are related to the Rock Agori and that there is bound to be at least one that looked similar to Atakus, but I was really expecting them to use Fero mostly.
Also, in the beginning of the movie, when the Mata Nui robot is sitting up in Aqua Magna, the water around him looks incredibly fake and unrealistic, too, which makes it looks kind of funny at the same time. I understand that they probably didn't add much detail to it because it only appeared for that one scene, but it was still kind of odd seeing the super detail Mata Nui robot sitting around the most unrealistic-looking CGI ocean ever.
Plot:The plot itself was very character-driven and not terribly complicated, although since this
is a kids' movie this is slightly forgivable. It basically focuses Mata Nui uniting the villages (both literally and non-literally) against the forces of the Skrall and Bone Hunters as he tries to find a way back to his universe. There were some subplots, but that was the basic movie. Since I don't usually have high expectations, I wasn't very disappointed by this.
However, one thing I was disappointed about was that all of the advertizements for the movie kept saying that huge secrets would be revealed. Yet all we really learned by the end was that one, the villages when brought together all look like a giant Mata Nui robot (something we've all kind of figured since we saw the map of Bara Magna earlier this year); and two, that the Skrall shield design is actually a map (at least according to Mata Nui, anyway), which again is something at least us BZPers have already figured might be the Valley of the Maze.
Which again brings me to another point: The Valley of the Maze was not featured in the movie. Considering how much it was mentioned in the web serials this year, and the fact that the Skrall's shield seems to be a map of it, I was hoping that we would actually visit there and discover some new secret. But no, we didn't it. Of course, the story was still good, but I was expecting the Valley of the Maze to play a large role somewhere in the plot.
The movie also felt shorter, at least to me, than the past movies. But the plot itself did not need to be much longer than 71 minutes (which is the length of the movie, I think) and dragging it on longer would have made it feel a little unnatural. Although I still would have liked a longer movie, I understand that maybe the budget for the movie didn't allow it to be any longer than that.
And then there was the whole scene where the scarabax beetles combined to make the giant Malum-like monster that scared the armor off the Skrall and Bone Hunters. It pretty much came out of nowhere and looked pretty awesome. I like it.
Also, if you are not familiar with the 2009 story, don't worry. You can probably follow the movie's plot without having to read all the comics, web serials, and books and not get too lost, since they make little mention to events outside of the movie. This is good for new BIONICLE fans and maybe for older BIONICLE fans who haven't been paying much attention to the story lately, too. This is important for any continuing series that is as long as BIONICLE; making it understandable to both new and old fans and even non-fans, too.
Characters:I'd have to honestly say that my favorite parts of the movie were whenever Kiina and Berix interacted with each other, really. Before I saw the movie, I was thinking that I wouldn't like Kiina and Berix as much as the other characters (mostly because of their voices). But after watching it, I liked how they had a sort of older sister, younger brother kind of relationship (ignoring whatever the shippers may say), which was pretty good. Their relationship was really well-developed, in my opinion.
Berix was pretty funny sometimes, like when he was first discovered in the Secret Lab, but by the end of the movie I didn't really think of him as just a comic relief character, which I believe is his primary role in the movie's plot. I thought of him as his own character, which is great.
As for Kiina, I am little up and down with her. On one hand, she sometimes had moments that were a bit weird (like her happy dance when she learned that she was right about the existence of other worlds), but on the other hand, she wasn't totally not serious all the time. Like when Mata Nui asked Berix to fix Gresh (who had been serious wounded in the Skrall attack on Tajun), she seemed to be fiercely against having Berix fix Gresh, which fits in with her protectiveness for other Glatorian.
Metus, too, was fairly entertaining. He was an all right villain, I guess. He was no Teridax or Shadowed One, but definitely all right. His voice really fitted him well and made most of his lines sound interesting. I hope that he reappars in the future, maybe in a web serial, but Greg has said that there are no plans for Metus to reappear in the story again. I like to think of Metus as the main antagonist of the movie, as he played a larger role in the film than Tuma and he acted more like a main antagonist, too. Which is really awesome, once you think about it, because we've had bad guy Matoran before (Ahkmous and the Shadow Matoran), but they've never been the main villains, which is part of the reason I think Metus is a good villain, at least for BIONICLE, anyway. At first him as the traitor shocked me a little, but looking back he fits the roler almost perfectly IMO.
And in sharp contrast to Metus, we got Tuma, who I thought was pretty . . . generic and one-dimensional, really. His voice was all right, but in general he felt lacking. I know his fight against Mata Nui was probably just to show that Mata Nui was putting into practice whatever Ackar had taught him, but I expected that Tuma, leader of the Skrall, would have been taken down a little bit harder than that. I mean, if Greg hadn't expanded upon Tuma in the
Empire of the Skrall web serial, I probably would have written him off as a generic evil villain wanting to rule the world for no reason other than he could.
Ackar was cool, too. Despite the fact that Raanu kept saying he was out of his prime, he seemed to fight extremely well, particularly when he, Kiina, and Mata Nui fought the Bone Hunters and Skopio in Sandray Canyon. He seems, however, to have gotten some of his confidence back by the end of the movie, when Mata Nui made him leader of the new united village.
Gresh was all right. He really is the kind of young, eager hero type. Not that that's a bad thing, but he didn't seem to have much of a personality outside of that. Maybe it's just me. Personally I wouldn't mind seeing him return as a main character next year, actually.
And then there's Mata Nui, the main protagonist of the entire movie. He's very noble and wise and Michael Dorn's voice definitely fits him very well, as it gives the impression of a wise, powerful and brave ruler, which IMO makes a sharp contrast between him and Metus, who is far from what I would call noble. Mata Nui got some really awesome moments in the movie, like when he brought down those rocks on the Bone Hunters and Skopio in Sandray Canyon.
Character development-wise, I'd say Mata Nui changed subtly, from what I can tell. He seems to have realized that he needs to be less arrogent in regards to his people, as he told Tuma "Arrogance can topple giants! Trust me, I know." To me, that implies that Mata Nui realized that he ought to have paid more attention to his own universe, as his own ignorance (and, perhaps, arrogance) lead to his downfall, which may be why Mata Nui decided not to immediately abandon the Agori and Glatorian to the Skrall. May just be my opinion, but that's what I've got what from it.
Click, well, I'm not sure what to think about him. He's a cute little bug thing and I admit I didn't find him nearly as annoying as I thought he was going to be. Click didn't have much character out of the cute little kid appeal animal companion, which is a role he fulfilled well. Sometimes he was funny, sometimes annoying. I don't have much of an opinion on him.
Overall, I wouldn't mind seeing Mata Nui, Gresh, Ackar, Kiina, and Berix back in the spotlight next year, although from what I've heard, Kiina barely appears in 2010, which is a shame, as she was really starting to grow on me. I would also like to see Metus back in at least a web serial, but if he doesn't I won't make a big deal about it.
Really, the best part of this movie was the characters IMO, particularly Kiina and Berix. Occasionally they may have said a few "kiddy" lines, but this is a kids' movie, so what do you expect?
(Note: I did not do the rest of the characters, such as Tarix or Vastus, because they were not as major as these ones. Same applies for the Voice Acting section below).
Voice Acting:My favorite voice from the movie was probably Metus'. David Leisure just did him so well IMO. He sounded very much like a smug, tricky businessman, which worked well with his character.
Michael Dorn also did a superb job with Mata Nui, making him sound very much like a wise, powerful ruler as I mentioned above. He's Michael Dorn, what were you expecting? Of course he's awesome
!
James Arnold Taylor, Berix's voice actor, was I admit a little annoying at first, but I began to genuinely like the voice as the movie went on and as Berix developed as a character. His voice fit him well IMO.
Marla Sokoloff was overall a good voice acrtress for Kiina, though sometimes she was a bit annoying (like when Kiina said "Whoohoo!" at the beginning of the movie and a few other instances afterwards). But like Berix, her voice became less annoying as the movie progressed, until I had no real qualms with it.
Jim Cummings was awesome as usual. Ackar's voice was very good. He sounded older than the other characters, which fits him, as Ackar is the oldest living Glatorian, I think.
Fred Tatasciore's voice was the only one that I didn't like much. In my opinion, it didn't really fit Tuma all that much. He sounded much more like a bizarre snake-thing than a powerful warlord IMO and sometimes he sounded a bit too narmy* at times ("The Mighty Tuma" pretty much sums it up IMO).
Overall, though, I liked the voices for this movie. I thought that they picked some good voice actors for the characters, most of which fit them quite well, like David Leisure as Metus.
*"Narm" is a term on the Internet used to describe something that is supposed to be dramatic or serious, but instead comes out silly because of the bizarre situation, the character saying it, or the writer not being a very good writer.Final Opinion:Pros:-Animation was amazing and awesome
-Kiina and Berix's interactions were entertaining and offered some real character development for the two of them
-David Leisure, full-stop
-Metus was a great villain and great fun to watch
-Most fight scenes were pretty nicely done
-Spinning pins on their armor was just awesome
-Michael Dorn as Mata Nui
-Character development for the main characters was pretty good
-Lot's of action and fighting
-New fans and non-fans should be able to follow it without getting too confused
Cons:-Tuma. Just . . . Tuma
-The Bone Hunters using Atakus' model. What . . .?
-Fakest-looking CGI water I've ever seen
-Possibly a little too short
-Sometimes Kiina and Berix's voices were annoying
-Slightly underwhelming ending
Overall, I have to say that
The Legend Reborn was well-worth the money I spent and I don't regret buying it one bit. The characters were entertaining, the animation amazing, and the voice actors all did (mostly) good jobs, and all of this combining together made it one great movie IMO. Certainly it's not the best movie ever created (it being just a kids' movie and all), but I think it was definitely the best BIONICLE movie released so far and not a bad kids' movie, either.
The pros outweigh the cons, IMO, and I definitely recommend it to any BIONICLE fan. Heck, even if you're not a BIONICLE fan you may like it.
-TNTOS-
9
