How would the Bionicle movies look like as theatrical?

[Lenny7092]

Hi, guys. We know that we have four direct-to-video movies for Bionicle. When I heard about the Mask of Light coming, I thought it would be a theatrical movie, like Transformers, but I realized it’s just a direct-to-video, but I like the movie, anyway. So, my question is this: If the Bionicle movies would be theatrical instead of direct-to-video, as you go into the movie theater and see the movies on the big screen and wait for them to come out in DVD after 3-5 months, what do you think they would look like? 
 

Well, the direct-to-video movies are around 75 minutes long. Usually, theatrical movies are like at least 90 minutes, like the DreamWorks Animation movies. I would imagine the Bionicle movies to be at least 90 minutes long as well, maybe 100. If that’s the case, the stories in the movies would be longer and have more content. It goes like this: 

1. Mask of Light - Vakama would talk about talk the Toa Mata’s adventures on Mata Nui, fighting against infected Rahi, Makuta, Bohrok, turning into the Toa Nuva, and fighting the Bohrok-Kal. The stuff from the comics in 2003 about the Toa Nuva’s fight with the Rahkshi, like the Rahkshi Kaita, would be added. The Toa Nuva would form Toa Kaita to fight the Rahkshi, whether the Rahkshi form Kaita or not. Plus, after Takanuva defeated Teridax, Vakama would bring the Matoran to Metru Nui and then decided to tell the seven about the Toa Metru. 
2. Legends of Metru Nui - Vakama would talk to the Toa Nuva about the Toa Metru’s adventures. Plus, the Metru Nui Disk Matoran, including Ahkmou, and the fights with the Morbuzakh and the shape-shifting Rahi would be added in between the Toa Metru forming and the Toa presenting themselves in the Coliseum. We might get an explanation on why the Toa Metru never used their elemental powers. Maybe they would also form their own Toa Kaita for people’s convenience. I heard that there are some deleted content, like the Lohrak, so they would be added, too. Also, the Toa would fight against the elite types of Vahki. 
3. Web of Shadows - the Toa Hordika’s adventures involving collecting stuff to make the Airships would be added. Plus, the fight with the Zivon would be epic. Plus, stuff from the comics. Maybe Roodaka would hire the Shadowed One, Sentrakh, and Voporak to go after the Toa Hordika. Plus, the Toa Hordika would fight against the Visorak’s allies. Rahaga would think about themselves as the Toa Hagah. 
4. The Legend Reborn - I would imagine Mata Nui talking about all of the storylines before the events of the 2009 storyline. Meanwhile, the adventures of Gresh and his friends before Mata Nui’s arrival to Bara Magna would be added. Like, you know, the stuff from the comics. Also, the practice match between Crotesius and the Kaxium V3 duo from a comic book and Gelu’s and Stronius’ involvement would be added. Also, Malum, all of the vehicle set characters and their vehicles and Spikit, Fero, Atakus, Zesk, and Tarduk, and Branar would be involved. If the Vorox that attacked Mata Nui in the beginning is one of Malum’s Vorox, Malum would get so mad that he will hunt for Mata Nui. Both would fight, but Mata Nui would be victorious (maybe with friends, too). Also, we would see Ackar actually training Mata Nui on how to fight, as the story from that book called Challenge of Mata Nui would be added. The same would go with the book called Desert of Danger where Mata Nui is fighting a Sand Bat. 
 

You see, the direct-to-video movies are missing some stuff because of their running times. Probably because of the budget. That’s kind of lazy. The theatrical movies would also make characters look more diverse and more accurate to the sets. I mean, the Matoran would have more varied masks (so Takua, Jaller, and Hahli would look like that they are the only ones who wear their kinds of masks. Lol), Agori with their looks (in each tribe, they all look like clones. Lol), the Skopio wouldn’t look like Telluris with his vehicle (that was lazy). Maybe the character development would slightly be better, and the graphics would be more involved, like Moana. Plus, the voice actors in the direct-to-video movies would be replaced with ones from The Lego Movie Cinematic Universe. That’s how I would envision it.

[Xboxtravis]

Okay lets blue sky and say they got theatrical movies (and the budget for them) back in 2003-2005 when the movies were first coming out. The era was mostly marked by the rise of Pixar and Dreamworks doing CGI films, while Disney was still trying to put out hand drawn animation. So I imagine if they went the CGI route (like they did in the actual films) it would look very similar to the films we got but with much higher texture quality and lighting effects due to being able to purchase and render better animation. For a contemporary film example, look at Finding Nemo as the cutting edge of what was possible at the time:

Honestly though... while CGI was all the rage in the early 2000's I think Bionicle actually would have served very well in hand drawn 2D. MNOG as a Flash game already had that 2D style, so its easy to imagine that polished up and increased in fluidity to produce something more like Disney's Atlantis the Lost Empire or Treasure Planet, Dreamworks's Road to ElDorado or Sinbad, or maybe even a Don Bluth or Japanese film style. A lot of films from that era were dabbling in sci-fi and fantasy genre blending themes, so oddly enough Bionicle would have actually fit in thematically (the early 2000's actually had an obsession with science fiction and fantasy, the Star Wars Prequels, Lord of the Rings, Halo, Firefly, Stargate, Disney stuff like Atlantis, Lilo and Stich and Treasure Planet or Bluth's Titan AE... I think we often overlook how easily Bionicle fit into the general popular genres of the time). Even though they were hand drawn, many used CGI to supplement backdrops and effects scenes to give them a scope that previous 2D films lacked prior to them. Sadly many of those films were box office bombs, but they have gone on to become cult classics so make of that what you will.

I mean come on... tell me that a location like Metru Nui wouldn't have looked stunning in a style like that.

Ultimately though reality tells why the finished Bionicle movies looked as they did... animation especially quality stuff takes years to complete. Direct to video releases with their lower quality take less time, and with Bionicle on a yearly release schedule Lego needed Creative Capers to churn out a film annually during the 2003-2005 trilogy. I think all things considered, they did a good job; but there are a lot of weird editing, animation quirks, bad lighting and low poly textures in those films that really show how rushed they were. I think the art style of the Creative Capers films are brilliant, but they really were hamstrung by the budget and deadlines to rush the film out in a year. I honestly don't think Legend Reborn or the Journey to One Netflix series did much to improve that, its just that the technology was more advanced in 2009 and then 2016 to make a show cheaply while making it look nicer by default (i.e. render time was less intensive and cheaper since computers have improved a lot since 2003). To their credit, the fact that the Bionicle trilogy managed to help propel the career of animation writers such as Henry Gilroy who would go onto write for Star Wars The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels, is kind of amazing.