I mean, it wasn't the best movie, but I don't remember it being that convoluted.  Vakama was a reluctant leader in LoMN, but then he tried to overcompensate and then that just spiraled out of control once he was Hordika.  I mean, still weak characterization, but not totally unbelievable.  Also, helicopter backpacks would be epic.

All in all, for the oddness of the story, Web of Shadows had the best animation of the first three Bionicle movies.  Gotta give it that

Vakama was talking about the Visorak when he talks about how you can't betray someone you're enslaved to, not himself.

This was my favorite movie of the three back in the day.  Roodaka is one of my favorite villains from the BIONICLE story.

Yeah there are definitely some weaknesses with Vakama's conversion (and all the issues inherent with Roodaka are a whole 'nother ball of wax) but Web of Shadows is the most ambitious thing ever to come out of BIONICLE as a character piece and as a film. And I've really got to respect it for that, warts and all, just like the two movies before it. 2005 gets a lot of flak for being 'the year they didn't bring us back to the Toa Nuva like they said they would' and I think it's really too bad that that whole mentality rubs off on the movie and the whole 'Vakama turning evil' thing. Like, I get it, the actual idea of doing what they did in 2005 wasn't probably the greatest, but what happened happened and I'd like to appreciate it for what it is as much as I lament for what might have been.

I blame the terrible Bionicle movie trilogy for permanently retconning Bionicle into something far less innovative and unique than the original concept. Of course, in recent years I've possibly gone down the path of insanity, especially ever since I became convinced that Bionicle was really about a world were robots were living and organics were not alive.