Back from a brief trip to North Carolina (and warmth!) ... here's the news:
1) We had a one-night story meeting to discuss first half 2009 story. We got the bare bones figured out, now I have to get to work on the story bible.
2) We discussed any number of things, including beefing up BIONICLEstory.com in 2009 and possibly doing a serial or something similar that woud focus on the current universe while main story focuses on the new one next year ... I really like that idea, since there is
I was looking through a topic on 2001-2003 vs. later years, and Lewathetoa made an excellent point about the appeal of the early years being the spectacle of advanced beings on a primitive island, and how much of that was lost in 2004 when we got to Metru Nui. I felt it worth reprinting my response to him here, as it is a very interesting topic from a literary point of view:
"What made 2001 work was the incongruity of advanced technological beings living on a tropical island with no tech at a
BIONICLE Legends #6: City of the Lost is done and on its way to Scholastic!! Hope folks like it ... it's a little different than the other books I have done, in some respects, but I think it holds together and has a nice cliffhanger ending.
Tomorrow I am in NYC to meet with my editors and brief them on BIONICLE and EXO-FORCE 2007, and discuss some other issues. Then Wednesday I start EXO-FORCE Book 3, which is due in two weeks (and has to get done in less, since I leave for Denmark on the 13t
Lately, I am getting a lot of PMs from people saying they have seen the new BIONICLE movie (which, to the best of my knowledge, has only had two screenings so far, one of which was in Billund where I don't think too many of you live). A few people have admitted that they are watching pirated copies of the film.
So I am going to ask that you DO NOT send me questions based on watching illegal copies of the movie. You are putting me in a very uncomfortable position by doing so. As a colleague of
Last blog entry before heading to San Diego on Wednesday --
This weekend was my birthday, so I have been mainly staying away from the keyboard and trying to chill, since I know next weekend will be insane (Comic-Con always is). There is no tired like San Diego tired ...
Had a really great BIONICLE business team meeting on Friday, to discuss 2007 and start talking about 2008. This is very different from the story team -- it's a US-only group, consisting of the Brand Director, Brand Manager,
Hi guys,
As you can imagine, I am getting bombarded with 2008 questions now that the first sets have appeared in Anaheim. I did release a mask name and power this week, and will do more next week.
However, I'm not going to just hand out the entire first half 2008 info on December 7th, and leave us with nothing to discuss between now and next July. I am not going to embargo all info on '08, but I am going to portion it out so that it lasts. Okay?
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Just a few things today --
-- The event at the Booth-Dimock library in Coventry, CT next week is shaping up to be fun. For those of you who might want to attend, there is still time to register by phone. Just call the library at 860-742-7606.
-- Big week here. After only two weeks of searching, my wife and I bought a new house -- and it has room for all my comics and toys! Anyway, I will most likely be offline some during the first week of June as we move, but will keep you up to date on
Hey -- back from the big story meeting in Billund with various bits of news --
* I met with web producer Leah Kaae for half a day on Tuesday to discuss some future web plans. Then the whole story team met on Wednesday for about 9 hours.
* Got to see about 16 of the 2008 sets -- winter releases, one store exclusive, and some of the big sets for next year -- the big ones, I have to say, rival the Ultimate Collectors Series Star Wars sets for sheer, striking look -- plus some really nice fun
Another library event to announce -- Saturday, October 18th, 11:00 am at the Fairfield-Nichols branch of the Trumbull library in CT.
Also -- if you send me a PM, please make sure your settings are set up to get messages back. Lately, people have sent me lists of questions and when I respond, I get a message that they have chosen not to be contactable by Messenger. As a result, I waste my time answering and they can't get their answers.
Greg
There are lots of rumors flying around BZP, and the word "reboot" is being used a lot (often by people who don't know what the word means) ... so I thought I would address them here.
-- The plan for 2009 is to take the story in a new direction. That does NOT mean:
* Killing all the old characters
* Pretending all the old story never happened
* Starting over again with the Toa Mata on Mata Nui
* Telling a story that has nothing to do with anything that happened before.
It DOES mean:
Just some quick news --
-- A lot of people on here have been talking about a set they have seen with a Hydraxon mask on it and suggesting that is the 2008 BrickMaster exclusive set. It's not. No images of the BM exclusive set are on the net (I've looked), but I do have an image of it and it does not have a Hydraxon mask. The item number for this set is #20005 and we aren't even showing BMs what it looks like yet. The March issue will show what the May and July sets will look like, but the BIO
Many of you may have heard or read or even seen a video that popped up on Amazon.com and elsewhere recently that involved BIONICLE in general and summer 2008 in particular. So let me address some of the Q's you may have about it:
Q. What was it?
A. It was the first draft of what we call a "sell-in" video. That's a video we prepare to show buyers from dept. stores, Toys R Us, etc., to get them excited about BIONICLE for the year. It is not something shown to the public.
Q. So how did it ge
Just some bits and pieces today --
-- The movie script is out with the folks in Denmark for a final read. I am expecting that we will pretty much have an approval by the end of the week or so. The ending is set, hopefully the beginning is too -- surprisingly, there has been more debate about how to start it than how to end it!
-- It looks like the BrickMaster BIONICLE set will be out in the fall -- we are still looking into the possibility of getting it sold in non-BM countries. It will pl
Some of you may have read that BZP member Nuhrii the Metruan made some suggestions regarding the name of the Mangai/Mangaia which I really liked and told him could be official.
Ever since, I am getting buried in PMs from other people trying to find other uses for existing names or "explain" other storyline things, in hopes of getting to say they came up with something official too.
I appreciate the enthusiasm, but I really don't have the time for this. Having to go through these suggestion
Hey guys,
Just so everyone knows, I am offline from 2-11 through 2-15 -- I have LEGO Club meetings to attend.
Other news --
2009 story team meeting and set focus groups coming up at the beginning of March.
Movie call this week -- we are still quibbling over the beginning of the picture, but everything else seems set.
BIONICLE 12, due out in March, has been approved and is on its way to the printer. BIONICLE 13, which will be out in July, has been written early and is with DC -- m
BZP has been hopping lately, which is great, because it means people are excited about the new story and looking forward to 2009.
However, it also means I have been really busy lately, with somewhere around 8000-10,000 questions in my inbox just in the last month. As some of you noticed, not all of them have been getting answered promptly (or at all), simply because of the crush of them. Since I REALLY don't want to ignore anyone's questions (that's not why I'm here), I thought I would pass
Got my copy of Papercutz GN #8 in the mail today. I must say, the art is gorgeous, especially on the first story -- really captures that creepy, claustrophobic feel I was going for. At first, I thought they might have overdone the snowstorm, as it makes things kind of hard to see at times .. then I realized that worked, because it IS hard to see in a snowstorm and that is part of what makes the baterra's sudden appearances and disappearances so effective.
Overall, a great job by Christian Zan
Recently, a BZPer posted a topic insisting I had been rude to him in my answer to his PM. He had asked a question for which I did not have what I felt was a good or complete answer, so I appended, "for what it's worth to you" to the end of the answer -- since I had no way of knowing if the little bit of info I was giving would answer his question. He somehow decided that meant I thought his question was worthless or stupid, which was not the case. (If I HAD thought that, I simply wouldn't have b
A few pieces of news --
-- Scholastic has informed me of plans to do a new, second series of BIONICLE books starting in late 2008, in addition to the regular ones they have been doing. These will be what they call Level 3 Readers and will be aimed at 5-6 year olds -- similar to what they have done for Batman and other lines. I am writing the first one, and we will see how they do and whether they want me to do the others.
While I am going to make an effort for these to be canon, they will
Sorry to beat a dead horse, but ... this morning I got a very intelligent PM from a premier member asking some questions regarding the look of the Agori and the Glatorian. I sat down, spent five minutes or so giving him his answers, sent it off ... and he is not contactable by Messenger.
PLEASE do not send me PMs if your account is not set up to receive replies. It wastes my time and yours.
As we are just about to start production on the new film, thought it would be a good time to share some script news with you guys.
As you know, I got the chance to write the story for the movie, which was very exciting and fun to do. The script itself has been written by Sean Catherine Derek, who I must say has done a fine job on the project and has been very willing to work with me to make sure it came out "BIONICLE." It's been a very smooth process, and we will most likely be working togeth
Just so everyone knows, I have the approved name list now and will be releasing the name of the stasis Toa (which people have been asking for) by end of the day on Monday.
It's looking like Book 6 will need a polish -- need to shift some Matoran roles around and the villains need to be more evil. Unlike some previous years, we are not just abandoning the high priced sets as we enter the new year -- a lot of the summer '06 characters will continue into the '07 story in some way, shape or form, which I think is good for the story and fair to the people who went out and bought the sets.
Just told the BIONICLE bosses in Denmark how this book ends -- hopefully, they
Just this and that today --
1) Work on the new movie is proceeding apace. Had another conference call between the story team and the movie folks yesterday and another one is scheduled for the movie "core team" (myself, the screenwriter, and the Tinseltown Toons VP) on Friday. Story-wise, this is the best movie we have ever set out to do.
2) Surprise hit for BIONICLE this year is Karzahni, who is a top 20 item at Toys R Us.
3) DC sent me something nice the other day -- original art board
