ToM Dracone

I like the sound of that, myself. Perhaps try it for a little and then change back if it's not to your liking, if you do end up going with it?

This isn't to say I hated 2006 and think it should be scrapped or anything like that, just so everyone's clear. I liked the year on the whole, but there are parts of it I've never thought were done well, such as how easily the Piraka defeated the Nuva, while the Inika succeeded, despite their complete lack of experience and comparative lack of power. It's just an idea that I had that I like better than the premise of 2006 (just as a matter of taste, since I like tribal stuff more than the complexity the rest of the universe had gotten in 2004-5, and would have greatly welcomed a return to that simplicity in 2006). And, as I thought it through, I realized it would explain the elements of 2006 that I actively disliked much better than the actual storyline. Kojol – An interesting comparison, and kinda. The image I had in my mind is from Pirates of the Caribbean, where Will and the other pirates are captured by the natives (not together, but still) – in an open fight, the pirates have guns and all sorts of things that would let them win easily, but wasn't an open fight. They were taken by surprise, caught in traps, put to sleep – all things that the technologically inferior natives used to defeat them because they were familiar with the land and the pirates weren't. A thing true of pretty much any guerrilla warfare, for a real-world example.

Oh, I just thought of two more things. One, and I don't see why Lego couldn't have done this anyway, the comics could have included the fall of the Nuva simply by showing them exclusively in shadows and with dramatic angles and lighting that don't show very many features of the sets. I'm thinking of stuff like a distance shot of the canisters washed up on the beach with silhouettes of the Nuva walking ashore... then a shot of the Matoran looking upward, talking to a Toa, but all you see is a darkened Nuva leg in the foreground... or something like Lewa slinking through the shadows of a forest, with Vezok or someone in the foreground shooting a Zamor at him. I mean, Lego was fine with showing the Hau Nuva in full color, and then Turaga Vakama at the end of 2007 – why not just a few glimpses of the Nuva in a page or two showing the events of Island of Doom? And two, I realized what the Zamor could be now: something with a knockout gas that the Piraka extract from some plant that grows on the island. Or, now that I think about it, the launchers could be interpreted as slingshots, and the spheres could maybe be a kind of fruit that bursts open on impact, releasing noxious gasses that put the victim to sleep. Thus, the weapons with which the Piraka take out the Nuva, and the Matoran would replicate them as they do in the real story.

So, Sméag and I and then Janus and I were talking about this the other night, and I figured I'd make a blog entry about it, because goodness knows I'm not going to get around to writing a story about this any time soon. Anyone remember back in 2005, when Greg told us that 2006 would be returning to a more "tribal" feel? And then how there was actually none of that at all in the 2006 story? I mean, sure, the Matoran lived in a village by themselves, rather than a city, but that was just about it. There was no culture to it. However! The Piraka looked distinctly tribal, especially in the early leaked photos we got of them (Reidak particularly more so in prototype, with his glowing third eye and longer tail). Their faces just looked deliciously like wild, scary, tribal masks, and then of course the spines added a lot more in the way of wildness. So I was thinking about this the other night, how tribal the Piraka could have been, and that made me think – what if the Piraka had been the native species of Voya Nui? They would have existed as a more primitive culture than the Matoran, hidden in the depths of the forests of Voya Nui or inhabiting the various mountains on it. I would see them as not stupid, but having a social system such that the lower Piraka were deeply, deeply obedient to the higher ones. These higher ones in the social system would be shamans of a sort, controlling the lesser Piraka with an elaborate system of myths and legends and cautionary tales to keep them in line. The Mask of Life, hidden in Mount Valmai but known to the Piraka, would be a deeply significant object of legend to them, something the Piraka would be willing to die to protect – it would no doubt be the center of all manner of stories, and probably be attributed the property of protecting the Piraka species from Mount Valmai's eruptions. That, then, would be why they fought so hard against the Toa Nuva when they arrived to claim the Mask of Life. And I guess that's where the Matoran come back in. The six we got would probably be the few who had actually dared to explore further inland, sneaking through the forests and finding out both the lay of the land and about the Piraka, and thus they would help the Nuva on their quest for that reason. But! The Nuva would still get defeated, of course. But not by some awkward scheme of "well the Nuva are the most powerful Toa in the universe, but we have to get rid of them anyway, so we'll just give the Piraka way too many powers and pretend they're strong enough to defeat the Nuva." Nothing like that. The Piraka would defeat the Toa Nuva simply by better knowledge of the land, by setting booby traps for them in the forests. They would separate the Nuva from each other and then capture them one by one by ambushes, sneak attacks, traps, and poison darts. And then the Inika come along as usual. And hey, even Vezon would make a bit more sense now. He'd be a lone daring Piraka who ventured into the heart of Mount Valmai to find the Mask of Life, and was rewarded by being made its guardian. Perhaps he himself would be legendary among the Piraka – either that, or everyone assumed he perished in the attempt. Gods, I'd have liked that so, so much more. ~ ToM

That's because those are some beautiful photos. There are some that are really perfect, like this one and this one, where the lighting highlights every detail of the set and he's perfectly in focus. And the white background is what really completes it. With some of the others, they're either blurry or Nektann himself is too dark (a problem especially when the background is white), but there are fair amount in there that are really, really well done, and Nektann is bright enough to show off his features, but not oversaturated or looking like a different color than dark blue. And that's really great. They've made me decide that, what the heck, I'll get him anyway – probably last of the six – because it's actually possible for his set to look interesting. I hadn't seen such good photos taken of him yet. Thanks also for the multiple photos of the spine/head piece; it's nice to see that one made clearer... Also, Rahkshi. I'm very fond of Lerahk, Vorahk, and Kurahk, personally. The pearly white on Kurahk is especially eerie with his orange eyes underneath.

Quite possibly? (out of my own photos, I mean, of course.) I don't know; I'm just really really pleased with how the photos in my review of Gresh turned out. I think I just finally figured out how to light them and then how to edit them afterwards to make the colors and brightness perfect. And I'm also irrationally fond of this one: I think it's just the way his pose turned out. I was just messing around with him, but he ended up like he was looking off at someone out of the frame, his head cocked to one side, holding his one sword up like "Yeah, I can do this. Just watch me." Somehow it just captured the spunkiness of his set perfectly. Discuss. Gallery of all of them, if anyone cares for such. Oh, and fittingly, I also got star!Skrall yesterday. I was at Target and their Lego aisle was almost completely empty – all the Bionicle they had were a mass of Kiina, Gelu, and Vastus and then one little Skrall and Piraka on the shelf below them. So I bought the Skrall, and goodness I love the little guy. Definitely getting a full photo shoot when I'm back home again. ~ ToM

Actually, not so. These are Lego pieces, after all, so there's lots of structural stuff going on inside any armor piece that a Toa might use, which brings out the color very clearly. Look at, say, a transparent socket or the transparent Kaukaus. Put any of them over black and their color is very clear – often more so than it would be over another color, because of the contrast between them. But separate from the two of them distinctly, much like how Water and Ice are separate. Ice is Water in a different state; a Crystal forms from melted Stone as it cools deep under the Earth. Well, it would obviously be limited to inorganic material, and I imagine it would be a pretty concentration-intensive process. A Toa would have to actually focus her will on the object and understand its structure for her to turn it into crystal. But I like the idea of the crystal it turns into being determined by the minerals in the original (stone) object. Having taken an Earth Science class last semester is making me pay more attention to the geology of this element than I probably otherwise would. Good point. I'm leaning away from the clear Avohkii at the moment, because, one, it's a different opacity than the solid plastic of most bricks that exist in clear white, and two, it does have gold sparkles in it. We'll see. But I actually like the idea of them having just heard of it, given how famous a mask it is...

I just happened to notice the other day that, with the exception of Vorox, the only 2009 sets I have are the heroes of the movie: Interestingly, these (plus Vorox) are the sets from last year that come with the most recolored pieces. Which is a self-proclaimed trend in my taste, but it's interesting to see that Lego apparently feels similarly, by making these ones front-and-center in The Legend Reborn. Hmm. Still looking to get Strakk and Metus. I'll check in on my Target later this week and see if they still have any; if not, I'll prolly just order them from Shop @Home, since they're on sale... But then, I also want to get little!Skrall over break, and there are other things I need to spend money on too, so we'll see how that all works out. ~ ToM

It's a new decade. 2010 begins the decade of 201_s, or else 1990 was part of the '80s, but not part of the '90s. And that just wouldn't make sense.

Indeed, but I'm willing to forgive design reuse if we get incredible colors out of it. Whereas Gelu has practically nothing new in him at all, and though the snowflake shoulders do look cool, you have to admit Ackar has similar piece usage – shoulder adornments made of a piece released in the winter. Aho – dude, Tahu's sword looks epic backlit. I can't wait to get him now. And you're right, there is a very MNOLG-ish feel to the solid orange one... Hadn't thought of that at all, but it's true. Also, I remembered something else I don't like about him. Metru chest plates already exist in bright red. So why on earth does he have silver?

Iwha? D'aww, you know that I love you too. But what might I ask brought on this sudden profession?

My Ackar arrived yesterday afternoon, I built him this morning, and I have to say he is the prettiest set I have set eyes upon in a long time. Seriously. Not only is he BRIGHT RED and ORANGE, but his color layering is, for once in a Bionicle set, truly perfect. I mean, seriously. I love how bright and fiery he is. If I hadn't been quite so tired when I was building him (right after I woke up), I would probably have squeed when his pieces rolled out of the canister. And even so, I was still grinning giddily. Words cannot quite describe how happy I am to finally, finally have another set in bright red and orange. It's been way, way too long. I think what just completed it for me was when I was writing at our dining room table and just happened to have both Ackar and Kongu next to me. The sight of those two incredibly vibrant sets together, perfectly lit because they were right next to a sliding glass door and so had tons of natural light streaming in, was just incredible. And! Right then I also noticed something else, because Ackar's sword was backlit: I had not at all known this about the firesword before, and previously hadn't really liked it as the mass of translucent orange Ackar has (I was fine with it on Tahu). But the fact that Lego molded it so that you actually see different tiers of flame when there's light shining through the sword makes it beautiful. Of course, design-wise he's incredibly boring, but I really cannot bring myself to complain about that, since he looks so utterly fantastic with his colors. Bright red Inika body, bright red Vahki legs, orange Inika feet, and all the rest are rather incredible. My reimagination of his set for my version of 2009 gives him shoulder armor molded like flames (among other changes), and I think that might be a nice way to add a bit more interest design-wise. Even the grey hands don't bother me that much, which surprised me. I think they look better in real life than in the CGI pictures, and they also make nice complements to his grey neck piece. Just a subtle little thing to complement the brightness. I'll take photos of him sometime. Looking into getting some large black paper to use... since he wouldn't look as good set against white. ~ ToM

If I may be so bold, and since DV sort of alluded to it already, I'm rather fond of my White Makuta. I do think it's perhaps the best thing I've ever built. And I agree that Commander Stropes and Shockwave are both pretty awesome. Primus, too, has a large number of epic things. I quite like his MOC of you, Six, actually.

I think most people count decades by the digit in the tens place. Otherwise, by your system, 1990 would be part of the '80s but not part of the '90s, and that just doesn't make sense.

Mata Nui is the best of the three in every way: he has a solid build, nearly perfect color distribution, and a ton of both new and recolored pieces. And he just looks bloody awesome on top of that. I don't know who would be a second. Kiina has 16 new pieces out of 43 total, whereas Stronius has only 10 out of 55 – Kiina is much stronger as far as new parts goes, but Stronius has more total, though you get much less new stuff for the price. However, I think Stronius's aesthetic is a bit better than Kiina's. I have her in person now and she's more than a bit awkward and gangly; Stronius is the complete opposite, being short and bulky and (though I don't have him) looking awfully good that way. In my case, the awesomeness of some of Kiina's recolors (namely the light blue feet and Vahki leg) outweighed her awkwardness, and since I care an awful lot about those, she just put Stronius to shame in their respect. So agree on the Rahkshi. The only possible reasoning for the new rubbery mess I can see is that the cost of one new mold must be cheaper than the cost of one new mold and one recolor. But that's not worth it to me, since a separate yellow Rahkshi head would both be much much cooler by itself and also greatly liberate posing. Though I do imagine the neck would look a lot less awkward than on Skrall, since the Rahkshi at least has something covering up its back and that extra ball joint up there... Still think Skrall is unbearably adorable, but I do need to actually acquire him first. Also, I like the title of this entry.

The simplest way to describe it is that it's like Scrabble without a board.

It was a pretty good Christmas, all around. Fewer presents (partly because my parents and I didn't get each other anything), but we got to spend more time with our relatives, since timing just worked out better all around this year. Which was nice, because past years' Christmas Eve festivities have sometimes wound up kinda rushed, and, fondly, they weren't this time. I ended up with, among other things: • Kiina • Ackar (ordered online, so I don't have him yet) • star!Gresh • a lovely SCIENCE T-shirt, which fits me to perfection and is my favorite present • a set of Bananagrams • the soundtracks to Queer As Folk (season 1), A Chorus Line (new cast recording), and Halo and Halo 2 • $250 in cash And a couple other articles of clothing. So fewer things that I actively wanted, but I can't complain, because the money is something that will be put to very good use next semester on textbooks and train tickets. Expect a full review of Gresh soon. And I'm also planning to go out and find star!Skrall and maybe one of the little Atlantis sets soonish, along with a new pair of pants and a new hoodie. The latter two less mandatorily than the first one. I'll post an entry about my thoughts on the Ben 10 sets soonish, too. But this subject seemed slightly more urgent. ~ ToM

From what certain folks have said (like DV and Nikira, who work in these places), stores have probably gotten them and sold out already. I'd wait for a little, and then they'll probably show up again. Or the internet, yeah.

Oh yes, of course. How silly of me to forget about events that haven't happened yet (but will).

Have I ever thanked you for taking such lovely clear photos of the mysterious parts of sets that everyone wonders about but so few people actually photograph? If not, thank you <3 And those upper limb pieces make me even sadder now.

Oh, there are axle holes underneath? That boosts them at least somewhat, in my mind. (since the Viking horn-sized holes are indeed scarcely versatile connection points, as I did indeed notice them.) And I'm betting it's the Ben 10 label too. Maybe if I were a fan of the show and recognized these guys in the Lego aisle I'd be all over them too. But ... as I don't know the first thing about Ben 10 ... I can't even begin to relate.

Oh. Then DEAR GODS -WHY- I agree new limb pieces are welcome, but they're so ... plain, and then the upper limb pieces being -one piece- is just a horrific disappointment. And then almost every piece in there is so horrifically big and specialized and the majority of them not at all modular. Throw in that this is, what, 16 pieces for $16? and it becomes even more ghastly. And I realize this is exactly what the AFOLs said to Bionicle back in 2001, but gods, Bionicle seems like pure, good-old-fashioned Technic, with axle and pin holes all over the place, compared to this. Even the Avotoran, whose molds were the most specialized Bionicle's ever gotten (aside from blasters, but those were one/two/three molds per group of six), were positively riddled with Technic connection points. *hides*

DV, your photos make almost anything look wonderful, but I'm sorry, this looks just as bad and boring as ever. ;_; Stop buying them; you'll make Lego think people want these abominations!

For the Matoran ability, I'm thinking along the lines of what DV said; they innately know how and where to strike a crystal so it breaks the way they want it to (instead of shattering into a million pieces). Though that's not to say that a certain unusual hardness in their armor and a degree of night vision wouldn't be present as well, the latter just from living underground all the time... As for the Toa's power, they'd be able to conjure crystal out of thin air, and an expert Toa could make really complex and detailed objects with just a thought (I can't help but think of Dumbledore and his crystal goblets); then they could make crystal bend and warp without shattering; and I imagine that a Toa of Crystal's armor would itself be diamond-hard just by nature. And, of course, they'd use the ability to create crystal to make swords and stuff or hurl crystal daggers at an opponent and create blasts of crystal shards... and as BD said, from refraction it would make sense if they could do something with that ability of crystal. Maybe to conceal themselves or confuse opponents? This idea just occured to me too – what if they could change solid objects into crystal? Maybe limited to stone objects, perhaps... The idea of doing something with lasers is one I'm less fond of, just because I think lasers and Bionicle should never mix. Lasers are pretty much the standard for sci-fi weaponry, and once you bring them into a story it gets thrown into the science fiction camp, rather than walking the line between that and fantasy as Bionicle does. (Did. Should. Sigh.) MOCs, definitely. Story if an idea strikes me... Who said anything about being able to change color? A Matoran's armor looking different colors from different angles and her being able to physically change her color are two completely different things. And is it so bad if they are a bit similar, even excluding that? The idea of an isolated village with few Matoran outside it is a given if the element is rare, and it's not like the Crystal Matoran in the outside world are in hiding like the Avo-Matoran are. A fabulous thought, dear, but there's technically supposed to be only one of those...

Since this came up in the comments of last entry, I figured I would just make an entry about it to discuss it in full... So. Crystal. I've seen the idea for it as an element come up in quite a few places, and if it were up to me (and apparently to quite a few others), I'd have canonized Crystal as an element rather than Psionics. If we're sticking with Lego's ridiculous one-gender-per-tribe scheme, it would be female. Because goodness knows Bionicle needs more female elements. The idea occurred to me yesterday that, perhaps, Crystal would be a rather rare element. I have this image of there being one single village of Crystal Matoran, led by a Turaga of Crystal, and then out in the rest of the universe Crystal Matoran would be few and far between. And then I had thought this village would be located deep under the mountains somewhere, very far removed from all the other villages or cities, and the Matoran would probably have made their home in some vast cavern filled with giant crystals that very few outsiders had ever seen... Which led me to decide on their color scheme. Originally, I had thought Matoran and Toa of Crystal would be, say, ice blue or clear aquamarine or just transparent white over white bodies, but I've had a better idea now, based on the fact that they live deep underground: Their masks and armor and feet and hands and such would be transparent versions of every color, and their bodies underneath would be black. For example, clear colors where Ackar has orange, and black where he has red. So it would essentially be a rainbow element, with no one fixed primary color (though whatever primary color a Matoran or Toa had would be transparent). And, maybe, there would be really rare Matoran of Crystal whose bodies actually have every color of the rainbow in their crystal parts, so they would change color depending on the light and angle they're seen from... Thus, I guess, they would also have all different colors of eyes. And the Matoran themselves would be masterful with all kinds of crystal, lightstones and heatstones and carving natural crystal and glass and obsidian and all things of that sort... Though the village itself wouldn't trade with anyone, being so isolated, but Matoran of Crystal out in the universe would probably set up stands selling crystal carvings and whatnot. I really do wish it could be both genders canonically, though. Maybe then certain colors of Matoran would correspond to either gender... but maybe not. In any story I actually write with this, there will be both genders, that's for sure. Wow. I guess that's the element all figured out for my purposes, now. What do you guys think, or what have you come up with for your own stuff? ~ ToM