Jump to content

graywolf89

Members
  • Posts

    54
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by graywolf89

  1. I'm hoping for a more developed story. Hopefully the netflix series will be good.
  2. Can someone put this info on the LEGO Bionicle Facebook page?
  3. There needs to be more world building, that's for sure.
  4. I think many Bionicle fans will agree that although Gen 1 Bionicle's story was pretty awesome, it had its share of flaws in both its content and the way it was delivered. Generation 2 represents a fresh new start for the line, whereupon I hope LEGO use what they've learned from some of Gen 1's precieved weaknesses to make Gen 2 have a great storyline (after they finish up that mediocre web series). I'll say what I hope LEGO will do with Gen 2's story, and then I's like to know what you guys think they should do. (I know I've kinda discussed this topic in "Will Bionicle Ever Reach Its full Story Potential," but I figured something more focused would be better for discussion). From what I personally believe, and from what I've gathered from other members on this forum, these are the completely subjective flaws of Gen 1 Bionicle: 1) The overall plot was too complex, requiring fans to read through multiple stories, presented through many forms of media (story serials, novels, graphic novels, movies, guidebooks) in order to fully understand. 2) The online story serials lacked structure, and were basically pointless side plots with no real effect on the main story. In particular Brothers In Arms had a weird ending. To me, they seemed kind of "fanfiction-y" (no offense meant to our lord and saviour Mr. Farshtey). 3) This one's kind of split between fans, but some people didn't like how Bionicle got darker with more Sci-Fi elements as the series went on. 4) Some people didn't like the sudden setting changes of the Ignition Arc 5) Some lore elements, such as romance being non-canon and the characters' 100,000 year life spans can be pretty restrictive/convoluted. 6) The Toa Nuva had poor characterization, as all 6 Toa were little more than shallow archetypes. This also applies to many of the villains. Also some fans want more female characters. Here's what I personally believe LEGO could do to make the Gen 2 story better: 1) Make the story less serialized, and more focused and concise. You shouldn't have to read online serial, comics, novels, and graphic novels to get the whole story. LEGO will probably minimize the amount of story media anyway. The story should also be pre-planned, instead of being made up as it's being written. This would allow the writers to fit a lot story into a small amount of media efficiently, without any of the excess plotlines in Greg's writing. 2) Make the story less complex, but still interesting. Gen 2 has to find the sweet spot between the immensely complex epic that was Gen 1, and the bare-bone frame that was Hero Factory. I wouldn't mind the story being slightly more light-hearted, but it has to have at least some darkness in it for it to be Bionicle in my eyes. 3) Keep the interesting parts of the story. While the lore could be less complex, fundamental elements like the matoran language and the various cultures of the matoran tribes should be kept, because they were what made Bionicle so unique. 4) Maintain a more consistent genre. Gen 2 has started out as fantasy, and for the most part it should stay that way. I wouldn't mind some Sci-Fi elements here, but nothing as drastic as the shift made in Gen 1. 5) Maintain well developed settings, and change settings less. It's no accident that people get attached to interesting places over time. It would be nice it Okoto was further developed, and if the Toa could stay on it for some time before going elsewhere. 6) Have actual character development. "Nuff said. And finally, 7) Allow romance. Also, not everyone lives 100,000 years. So, what do you guys think LEGO could do to Gen 2, to make it as good if not better than Gen 1?
  5. I'm not an adult, and Gen 2 still seems too simple to me. It just lacks the intrigue that Gen 1 had.
  6. I have no problem with Bionicle being targeted towards younger children, and I certainly don't mind the Bionicle story being less complex. That said, I would like the story to have greater depth and characterization, and greater maturity- not necessarily in terms of content, but in the way it's written. Greg Farshtey was very devoted to his work, and overall a capable writer, but I can understand when people say the G1 story was simply edgy for the sake of being edgy (but Matoro's death is one of the things I wouldn't change). I don't want the story to be too light-hearted either, but I'm okay with a few jokes here and there. I'll be hooked as long as the overall story is taken seriously, which HF failed to do. On a side note, G2's premise seems incredibly underwhelming compared to that of G1's. In G1, the Toa are trying to reawaken a spirit-god-deity (Mata Nui) who is the protector of the world. Meanwhile, Makuta is presented, at least initially, as a spirit of chaos/dark lord. In G2, Ekimu is some guy who makes masks, and Makuta is, well, another guy who makes masks. Granted, they almost certainly both have special powers, but the stakes just seem so small in comparison to G1's.
  7. While the sets are clearly meant for people of all ages, I think the story is clearly aimed at an audience younger than Gen1's.
  8. LOL, remind me how wanting a fleshed out story suddenly equates to wanting the entire story bible? You need to have cards to play them in the first place. The fact that all of the content in the 90 second shorts can be summed up in a single sentence as "Tahu and the other Toa arrived and gathered their masks" just illustrates how shallow the story is. And how can you even think to bring up mystery and intrigue, when exposition is literally all the 90 second webisodes are! They're just piling "story" into people's faces, without bothering to add depth to it. It is necessary, because they are what you call "characters". Long term narrative, regardless of medium, still requires an effective set up. These are: a good premise, interesting characterization, and expansive world building. World building is what makes a long term narrative engaging; it's what keeps the world interesting and serves to add flavor to the basic story. Lack of world building is what kills "mystery and intrigue". In good long term stories the world building starts the beginning of a story to draw readers in, and is then paced evenly throughout it rather than being held back for the sake of "mystery". G1 never had "too much world building" as you say; it was just poorly handled due to serialization, lack of a consistent medium, lack of planning for the serials, and some poor story decisions on Greg's part. But problems like these can be easily fixed by changing the format for story info, having a consistent medium *cough* TV show *cough*, having more than one writer be in charge of the story, and just better pre-planning in general. So LEGO needs to be on the brink of bankruptcy to craft a good story? Man that's sad.
  9. 1) We actually DO know about at least the landscape of Okoto, from the regions' descriptions on the website. It would be nice to know more about flora and fauna, but on the other hand it's nice for MOCists, artists, and writers to have complete freedom to populate the island with their own creations. As for how the Protectors and villagers got there... that's not much of a problem at this stage, considering the original Bionicle took three years to even reveal that the Matoran weren't native to Mata Nui, and then took another two years just explaining how they got there. The current story, on the other hand, has been going on for two months (three if you're feeling generous). 2) It would be nice to visit the Protector villages! Maybe we'll see that in the books or other media, but given that all we've had so far are the animations, and they've used the limited time they're allotted fairly well, I don't think we should complain yet. You can compare the Bionicle comics, which didn't feature the villages themselves until the second year. The only difference is that back then we had the Mata Nui Online Game, and it's a darn shame there's nothing comparable this time around. Neither the Protectors nor the villages need names, because "Protector of Fire" and "Village of Fire" are both perfectly clear terms that refer to exclusive concepts. The Protectors' language, like the Matoran language for the most part, is English, the only difference being that it doesn't have as many non-English names sprinkled in. As for masks, we didn't know where they came from at all in the classic story until 2004, so the new story actually has a three-year lead on it. 3) While the animations haven't had much opportunity to flesh out the Toa, their basic character descriptions on the website actually have MORE detail than the original Toa bios (thanks largely to having more than one character trait apiece). The Skull Spiders' origin will likely be explored in the second half of the year (which, might I remind you, is more than four months away). So yeah. More than half the info you mentioned is non-essential, premature, or already known. The new story isn't perfect, and will almost certainly get better once there's more media to explore it, but for the most part your complaints belie a lack of perspective and patience that seems to be common to a lot of fans these days. 1) The information on the website hardly counts as anything close to a description. The basic information, like how the region of ice is cold and the region of stone is very rocky is all there, but it's so shallow and generic they might as well have put in single sentences like "this place has a volcano, it's hot" for the descriptions. In fact, the description for the region of fire is a mistake, it was probably meant for the protector of fire but no one bothered to correct it. Also, a setting should never, ever require headcanon in order to make it interesting. A good setting is one that's well-developed enough to stand on its own, at least initially. Things like MOCs and fan-fiction can come later. Lego could've easily added more detail to the map. 2) The lack of info on the protector villages makes Okoto easily the most boring Bionicle setting so far, more so than Bara Magna. And at the very least the protectors need names, simply because common sense dictates that characters in a story would have names. If the protectors can be considered nothing more than "concepts" despite their supposed importance, then so can the Toa. We might as well call Tahu the "master of fire" from now on. Would it really kill Lego to flesh them out and give them descriptions on the website, instead of having generic copy and paste "descriptions"? 3) It's one of the basics of good storytelling to give the villains a motive and a reason for appearing. Any explanation, e.g. "the Lord of Skull Spiders wishes to reawaken his master, the Makuta," would suffice over none. All of the "non-essential" info I mentioned was what made Bionicle the Bionicle we all know and love. It's because of all the "non-essential" information that G1 Bionicle wasn't horribly generic, and felt unique enough to stand on its own. I know you didn't think G1 was "exceptional," and it certainly had its flaws, but it was the epitome of Lego's storytelling and world-building. Right now G2 is little better than Island Jungle Hero factory with cooler names. And yes, you're right when you say that the G1 launch wasn't any better. But you can't compare the G2 launch with the G1 launch because Lego is a lot richer now than in 2001, and they have all the resources they need to craft a good story (*cough* partnership with Warner Bros. *cough*). In theory, fans shouldn't be expecting less or even the same quality of stuff from them-truth is we should be expecting A LOT more from Lego in regards to Bionicle's return. I'm not asking for a perfect story- I'll settle for "good" as I said earlier. And I can stand Lego not wanting to put a lot of funding or focus onto Bionicle. But what I can't stand is their lack of effort on the line. All three of the flaws I mentioned above could have been rectified earlier in the launch, for little to no cost. Most of it simply involves expanding the descriptions of the landscapes and characters on the website and adding more pictures. Why Lego doesn't bother to do that escapes me.
  10. Thing is, G2 Bionicle is missing soooo many of the things it needs to build up to something epic. 1) We know virtually nothing about Okoto aside from the fact that it's split into six unnamed elemental regions. We don't know what the fauna is like, what the landscape is like, how the protectors got there etc.. 2) None of the unnamed protector villages have been visited, despite being mentioned on the site. We also don't know the protector's names, even though they serve the important role of being the Toa's guides. Nothing about the protector's culture and language have been revealed, or why they need Ekimu to make them masks. 3) The Toa have been largely glossed over character-wise, and the Lord of Skull Spiders kinda just...appeared. There wasn't really a set up for him, it just seemed like all of a sudden *POOF* Okoto is under attack by Skull Spiders. It's important to have this info right off the bat to have a sense of mystery to draw people in. In my opinion, Bionicle G2 still has the chance to turn into a truly awesome story, but there's no doubt its launch could've been handled better, especially in comparison to that of G1 where you at least partly knew #1 and #2. I still plan to follow the G2 story in hopes of it building up, but I can't say I expect much.
  11. Except at this point Bionicle's world is the farthest thing there is from being well-crafted. Watching the shallow, 90 second "story" videos was worrying enough, but seeing the lowered age range for the books is starting to make me believe Lego is turning this into another Hero Factory. That said, yes there's still a chance this line will be good, even if aimed at younger children. But I want a good story that takes itself seriously, not "distilled insanity" for little kids. Bionicle is about being epic, not being a joke, although a few good laughs wouldn't hurt. However, Lego needs to actually care for this to happen.
  12. I included FIM in my comparison because it's proof that despite having a dismal production value (it's freaking flash animation), a toy-based show can still be well-received and well loved if it's written by someone who genuinely cares (In other words, not what LEGO is doing to Bionicle's story at the moment). Now a Bionicle TV show would be interesting, but if the current state of the Bionicle story is any indication of what a TV show would be like, then I'm certain Lego would screw it up. I don't know why they replaced the original Bionicle story team with he team that managed Hero Factory's story. I mean seriously, Greg's no longer working on it...Christian Faber's gone, I think. I really, really hope Ryder Windham can make a compelling story for Bionicle once the books are published. Unfortunately, the new Bionicle book is going to have a lower age range than the previous books, which is very disappointing. The untitled novel has an age range of 7-10, grades 2-5. By comparison, Bionicle Chronicles had an age range of 9-12, grades 4-7.
  13. According to Wikipedia, Ryder Windham has written more than 60 Star Wars books, including comics, so I guess there's hope that the story will be good. (Why does everyone quote "full potential"? You could just say "good") Because that's what this topic was about, and to me seems like a ridiculous ideal to expect a merchandise-driven story to aspire to. That's not to say that that kind of story can't be good, but it seems a lot of people expect more than "good" from Bionicle, and it's no doubt thanks to the pretensions it established long, long ago of being an epic saga on par with Star Wars or Lord of the Rings. I think we'd get a better Bionicle by setting our sights lower, and there'd be less chance of disappointment. Fair enough. When I started this topic, my views of Bionicle's story were influenced by Hasbro's Transformers, which I saw as the epitome of a merchandise-driven story in terms of character developement, plot, and sheer scale. I understand that by it's very nature, Bionicle is unlikely to ever be as mainstream as Transformers, and by extent unlikely to have a story as large and developed. I'm not saying G1 Bionicle's story wasn't either of those, though it was less cohesive. The reason why I set my sights high for G2 is because of the circumstances surrounding its return. I though that if LEGO could create something as epic as G1 Bionicle while it was in the middle of a financial crisis, then surely wouldn't Lego, with its new found wealth make G2 even more epic? I'm sure I speak for a lot of people when I say the story content thus far is a tad bit underwhelming. But I get that Lego has to do business; that it simply isn't Lego to be mainstream or high-profile, and admittedly, G1 Bionicle is pretty hard to top as a whole. So while I certainly want a good story with effort put into it, I guess maybe I should lower my expectations. I'll settle for good, but my hopes are still high.
  14. I suppose we will find out if the new Bionicle will reach its "full story potential" on August 25 of this year. According to Wikipedia, Ryder Windham has written more than 60 Star Wars books, including comics, so I guess there's hope that the story will be good. (Why does everyone quote "full potential"? You could just say "good")
  15. 2015 would be better if it had a better story
  16. Except LEGO doesn't need to have it be like the other Lego shows. They're partnered with Warner Bros. for gods sake. The guys who created shows like Justice League: Unlimited, Batman: The Animated Series, Batman Beyond etc.
  17. I honestly hope they ditch the short webisodes, which so far have provided us with nothing about the characters and given us a rather skeletal plot, for a full-blown TV series. It's not the story Bionicle needs, but it's the one it deserves.
  18. Alright, three things: 1) Does anyone here know how to contact the current story team for Bionicle? It would be cool if we could talk to them like we can with Greg. 2) Is it true that the team which handled Hero Factory's story is doing the current story for Bionicle? 3) Anyone know when the books are coming, and who's doing them?
  19. There isn't really any mystery to Okoto at all, because the story is just that sparse. So far we know that there are six elemental regions, but that's it. We haven't even visited the villages yet, even though we're about half way through the webisodes. You need to know some stuff in order to have a mystery.
  20. But I don't think they are going that direction. If the 9 1:30 animations with zip characterization are any indication, it doesn't seem that we'll be getting what we want. Agreed . I made this thread wondering if LEGO would be willing to fully develop the story.
  21. You clearly didn't pay attention. Since when did I ever say the Gen 1 story was inferior to what we have now? I did say that Gen 1 had some flaws, which Lego has the chance to rectify in Gen 2.
  22. I'm curious as to why you think G1 had flaws in these departments. By and large the majority of the characters that actually mattered had great characterization (and some characters shouldn't be fleshed out, because doing that for the sake of doing it doesn't always equate to good writing), the serials gave us some of the best stories of G1, and G1 stands out for having a very well-planned story, and it shows. Unless in this case you are referring to Greg's writing style, which in this case isn't really a negative, as he has written some absolute gems (and his supposed lack of planning is exaggerated; plenty of books have foreshadowing to events within themselves and often have consistent themes that underline the events of the plot). If, however, by the above you are referring to a select few serials which became very sloppy down the line (like Reign of Shadows), then never mind, ignore all of the above. To make things clear, I think overall G1 had a great story. But I think the Toa Nuva definitely could've received some better characterization, seeing as they had to learn the importance of working together 2-3 times. At least Tahu finally learned to not give into his own pride...9 years after his first appearance. That said, its been some time since I last read G1 story material, so maybe the Nuva are a bit more well-rounded than I thought. I don't mind them keeping the personalities the same for G2, but I'd like to see more visible character development. As for serialization, this was a common complaint from people and I understand it. If you missed some weeks of story there was a lot you had to read through to catch up. This wasn't helped by the multiple story media. There was a ton of story info I missed out on, like Mata Nui's journey into the valley of the Maze and Tarduk's meeting with the elemental lord because I didn't have the graphic novels (Was Tarduk's story in a serial?). Never mind the fact that the story serials sometimes crossed over with each other and, events happening in the serials were mentioned in the books. In short, you had to read a lot of material to get the big picture of what was going on. I'd appreciate it if G2 simply made the story more accessible in one medium, like books. As for the lack of a pre-planned story, I was referring to the endings of some of the serials like Brothers In Arms, and some loose ends which didn't get tied up until later (what happened to the team destroying the EP pool on Daxia?).
  23. I suppose a general definition of "full potential" would be a story that equals or excels the G1 story, but without G1's pitfalls (i.e. meaningless side plots, poor characterization, serialization, lack of a pre-planned plot).
×
×
  • Create New...