Story Too Complicated

[bonesiii]

Zippo, I noticed some inaccuracies in your two lists. Lemme rearrange the quotes to put like with like and look them over.
 

2001: The Toa are the heroes destined to master the elements and save the island of Mata Nui

Now: The Toa were trained [?] hundreds of thousands of years ago, their purpose being as a safeguard in case Mata Nui should fall into slumber. They were accidentally launched prematurely and drifted in the ocean for thousands of years [?], before landing on the island of Mata Nui

Everything in bold was pretty much known in 2001. Everything in strikeout is inaccurate. Anything with a bracketed question mark after it may be disputable. To specifics:

 

We did know they were heroes in 2001, yes, and that they had a destiny, but we knew the destiny was to awaken Mata Nui, not to master their elements or save the island. Those two things were implied to be steps along the way, but the emphasis was on awakening Mata Nui. (And they seemed more like they already were masters of their elements.) You could quibble that it wasn't directly stated that they were trained, but they did remember how to use masks and elements expertly, so it certainly seemed implied they must have retained the "muscle memory" of their training, implying they must have been trained, although I suppose we could have also assumed they were just programmed from the start knowing all that stuff, but how does that really change things?

 

We didn't know anything about how long ago that happened, but it's hard to see that as a problem, given that we did know the same people had been living on Mata Nui for a thousand years, and Mata Nui especially was that old, so vast timespans are normal to Bionicle. They were not launched prematurely; it sounds like you're getting confused with their canisters malfunctioning after launch so that they arrived late. We knew they were drifting in the ocean for a long time and Takua needed to summon them in the GBA game prequel to MNOG. Since Mata Nui was cast into slumber a thousand years ago we basically knew they must have been in the ocean that long, though this isn't necessarily the only possible interpretation we could have deduced.

 

And it wasn't thousands of years but one thousand. We knew they drifted, not sure offhand when we found out it was 1000 years, though.

 

[Addition after writing the above: We also knew they came in space-capable craft that landed, so we knew they had to be launched from somewhere. It was mainly thought they were launched from somewhere in space, not from the planet as skyhopping craft. Makuta in MNOG claimed that they came from outer space; the "void".]

 

2001: The Matoran are the inhabitants of the island

Now: The Matoran were robots [rearranging this part of quote to make clear two separate errors] simply created to help build Mata Nui [?], until a malfunction [*] caused them to become self aware [?]

First error is that it was always thought they were robots. But it's later that we found out they aren't literally robots (though Bohrok and some other things are); they're biomechanical. They were not only made to help build Mata Nui but primarily were intended as maintenance workers over the entire course of his mission (and in 2001 I would argue it was pretty clear they were originally meant to help Mata Nui in some sense, even if just as loyal citizens of the land he was supposed to rule.

 

The asterisk on the malfunction means that for a while Greg did say this was to blame, but he has since changed it to an intentional change by Velika. You're right that we didn't know in 2001 that they weren't always... "what the change brought to them", but I'm not aware that Greg has said self-awareness is what Velika gave them; he gave them full sapience. They always had partial sapience, and always had sentience (self-awareness). That last bit is a minor quibble, though, as self-awareness is often used as sci-fi-fan code for full sapience. Just sayin'.

 

I would say that this revelation is not at all surprising to a 2001er; robots becoming sapient is hardly a new concept in science fiction, and their robotic-like portrayal in 2001 would certainly open up the question. We would not have assumed that it wasn't possible, anyways. To me a much more unexpected revelation was that they were maintenance workers in a giant spaceship shaped like a controllable body. (But I don't buy the "charm" argument against this. It's a rad-cool idea and deserved a mystery-buildup-reveal in a story somewhere. I'm thrilled Bionicle got to be that story. Any charm they have remains anyways.)

 

2001: The Turaga are the village elders, who use their wisdom to help guide the Toa

Now: The Turaga were former Toa who almost failed, but sacrificed their powers to save the Matoran (But the Matoran don't remember anything from before they arrived on Mata Nui) [?]

No clear inaccuracies here, except it could be argued we basically already knew the Matoran's memories only went back so far. This is also the first I've heard anybody suggest the Turaga were Toa revelation was bad... as far as my bad memory serves anywho.
 

2001: Mata Nui was God and Makuta was the Devil, basically

Now: Mata Nui is a giant sapient robot who crash landed [*] on a giant water planet, and over time islands formed over his body as he slept. Makuta is now [*] the name of the species, and the Makuta from the 2001 story is known as Teridax.

In 2001, Mata Nui was a mysterious, powerful leader who, according to the Turaga's legends, united the Matoran who were previously scattered, and had limitations such as vulnerability to being cast into slumber. Upon his slumber, the Matoran returned to a state of some sort of chaos (this scatter/chaos part isn't really in words we were told but is implied by the visual symbolism of the stones animation from MNOG).

 

Makuta was similarly mysterious but was known to have brought the infection to the Rahi that made the animals attack, and was described perhaps symbolically, perhaps literally, as darkness personified (mainly by Kapura). Makuta himself basically claimed to be the Yang of destruction to the Yin of creation, a fundamental force of existence, something like the Dark Side in Star Wars (but this was not that relevant as a villain was speaking, and villains lie). He was also portrayed in both the Turaga's legends and his own lies as Mata Nui's brother, apparently meaning he was his equal. While the brother concept has been kept in later story in a loose sense, as Teridax had a special destiny to work with Mata Nui, and he also was in charge of the region of the MU of Mata Nui's brain, it was later story that revealed that he had been a subordinate who rebelled more akin to the devil.

 

The giant robot reveal was obviously new, and we didn't know that a giant robot-shaped spaceship crash-landed, but the original legend did allow for the interpretation that Mata Nui landed from space similar to the Toa, and the Toa were clearly portrayed as coming down in space pods, as robots. The stone symbolizing him was also large. So it actually isn't much of a stretch from 2001 information alone that Mata Nui could be a robot, be very large, and come down in or as a spaceship. (Probably part of why that reveal has been so universally loved; it fit so well with clues we got from the start.)

 

Just how giant it was and that there were dome-lands inside where the Matoran used to live is obviously not clear from 2001, though it's worth mentioning the constant face-island clues in marketing images were pretty obvious in 2001 too, though few of us seemed to consciously get it until Planetperson's famous theory in 2008.

 

We didn't know for sure the planet was all water except for Mata Nui, but that interpretation was pretty common. I remember the suggestion that there might be other islands feeling like a really exciting idea for a reveal. In hindsight, as planets go that really wouldn't be strange, perhaps even expected, but at the time the mystery of "are there or aren't there other lands?" was really tantalizing, and I would suggest that their sticking to the "no other lands" idea was a bold nod of recognition to that. Instead they used the domes for other lands (and then Bara/Bota Magna and alien planets, other universes, etc.).

 

You're also right that we didn't know the planet was unusually large. Not sure where you get islands (plural? O_o) forming gradually over him. One island formed instantly due to accidental triggering of the camouflage system the giant normally used when spying on alien planets. Maybe you're referring to the Kumu Islets. You also might be thinking of Knee Island and Three Finger Island which were concepts that did not make it into canon. Or maybe Voya Nui, but that didn't "form gradually" either; it was land from the Southern Continent in the MU that blasted out (somehow) to the surface ocean due to the Great Cataclysm (so some sort of weird side effect of the giant's crash), and floated.

 

2001 did suggest that Makuta was not his personal name but a title, and as such certainly opened the door for the possibility of it being the name of what he is, as in a species (even if it was a species of one). The idea for multiple members of the species I think (think) came later, but it was clearly based on this, so wasn't a dramatic change. (And again, his being a special member of a species of rebels would be more consistent with the devil, not less, especially his also being their leader, at least at that point.) The rest you're right on.

 

2001: The Toa have to stop Makuta and save the island by collecting all the masks, which will give them the powers they need to succeed
Now: [no need to quote the repeated part methinks; it would need bolded then. ] This all ends up being for naught in the end, however, because it turns out this was all part of Teridax's master plan

2001 did not really seem to present a "save the island" story; you may be getting it mixed up with 2002 in which the Bohrok actually did seem to be attacking the land itself. I assume you mean it nonliterally in the sense of getting rid of the threats to the Matoran that were on the island, but even then, as said above, the island was not the main goal; awakening Mata Nui was. I could also quibble that collecting masks was not portrayed as the only thing they might have to do, but I didn't know how to mark that.

 

The reveal that it was all part of Makuta's plan was new, and that was done in a really cool and shocking way, but the basic idea that a villain is incorporating what his enemies are doing into his plans is hardly anything new in fiction; if anything it's par for the course. Also, it's not really true that everything they did was "for naught". Had they not awakened Mata Nui, Makuta's takeover would not have been thwarted, and the lives on Spherus Magna would probably have been ended somehow or another (whether by Makuta, perhaps in fear that the GBs there might somehow detect his takeover or wonder where the giant went when it didn't reform it on schedule and send some kind of probe or other spacecraft after him that might threaten him, or by whatever instability the Reforming was meant to fix). Of course, it's true his takeover probably wouldn't have happened... but he could possibly have found a way.

 

Their actions there also did any number of other things beneficial to the Matoran and to their own experience, etc.

 

Hope this helps.