TakuaTheChronicler

"Times are dark, and evil rules..."

20 years ago, six canisters washed ashore the island of Mata Nui, changing the lives of many fans around the world.

In the time before time, from the unreleased Cybots to the Slizers/Throwbots and then to Roboriders, these Technic themes would be the foundation in which Bionicle was built upon and improved vastly. Unleashed into the world, Bionicle continues to inspires the lives of many people to this day and promotes nothing but creativity and positivity.

Main:

In-case you haven't checked them out, BZPower just presented two special messages to the Bionicle community, two messages from Christian Faber and Greg Farshtey.

Christian Faber's Message:

https://youtu.be/lVgYQdyokic

"See you on a golden beach somewhere and keep MOCing and being creative".

Greg Farshtey's Message:

https://youtu.be/6dhR0Az4j3g

"As long as somebody is thinking about it, as long as somebody loves it, it's never actually gone".

20 years of a toyline that changed my life forever and continues to inspire me to this day, from its creative storytelling to its visuals, concepts, and messages. Thank you Bionicle, everybody that worked on it, and to this amazing community that keeps the heart beating.

20 Years of Bionicle

Unity. Duty. Destiny.

(Both images created by Christian Faber via Faber Files)

Hey everybody, how's it goin'?

I was on my YouTube homepage yesterday, and I noticed that Zach Kaplan (which recently came back from a hiatus), shared a video involving Christian Faber himself!

https://youtu.be/ocAEyNPLta8

This was the first time I have ever seen him speak, and it was very inspirational to hear his words of creativity, his struggles, and how he arose from those struggles. He even talks about how he turned his weakness into Bionicle concepts, which blew my mind away. I have always read his Faber Files to look at stuff behind the scenes, but this adds a whole new layer. Seeing one of my favorite Bionicle creators giving a lecture on creativity and moving forward has uplifted me, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I have.

I thought it would be interesting to share this with the community here. Bionicle aside, this video is very inspirational and made me appreciate Mr.Faber even more so.

Here's to the fans and/or the creatives, keep on going and never give up on your dreams.

Cheers!

@Humble_Matoran Awesome find! Thank you so much I didn't know Eljay made a video about this too.

Thank you both very much!

Hello there all, this is the first forum topic I start. I've read everything, so I hope I'm doing this right.

Background:

Anyhow, I just unearthed my shoe box, containing memories of a Biological Chronicle. My shoebox includes two MOCs of mine that I mish-mashed many years of parts together, and the last three Bionicle sets that I did not disassemble for MOCing during its sunset years of '09-'10.

As expected with the 11 years that passed, there was dust but also some unknown residue on the Mahri/Phantoka visors and the feet of my remaining sets and parts. I still haven't unearthed the giant box of parts in my upper closet, which may contain even more residue and other unknown oddities that latched themselves onto the parts during its storage (It is also worth noting that during the storage of these Toa, some parts have loosened considerably while some like Mata Nui's legs have become extremely stiff).

As expected with some of the white pieces, they have yellowed over time, for example, Pridak's salvaged arms and Mahri Matoro's legs on my MOC. It reminds me of some of the SNES's that stood the test of time and they have become yellow over the years. I realize that this is inevitable with the plastic.

The fire that is my passion for Bionicle has never died out as the years passed and it was only recently that I dived into the community. As I matured, it was then that I realized the importance of properly caring for the sets and pieces.

[TL;DR] My question-starter:

I'm curious about how those in the community have properly cleaned and restored their sets/parts, what did you use? What was your fail safe and what are some things to avoid? How did you do so that didn't damage the parts and sets? How does one tackle the yellowing of certain parts when restoring sets? (amazingly Pridak's spikes and his arms are still snow-white! incredible haha)

I'm excited to see the responses to this, as this is my first time starting something.

Many thanks! Take care.

Example of my yellowing situation vvvv

@JSLBrowning Oh wow, I literally discovered the Wall of History last month and I enjoyed seeing everything preserved on there, it is a pleasure meeting you on here. I have to thank you for creating such a site and for your dedication and effort, seriously, it means the world to us fans.

Also, yes, breaking was one of my biggest fears in terms of the sets, especially the ones later down the line in the sunset years, and there can be only so many replacements on Bricklink and elsewhere before the prices skyrocket.

This new molding process method is interesting and I hope it catches on soon if the hobbyist perfects the craft. I have hope for the future.

A lot of lore stuff up there, I'm still amazed present day will still talking about this.

Not sure how to start off, but here goes.

2004:

The Vahki as a concept I enjoy, that Orwellian theme. "Trust in Turaga Dume." Man, I ate that stuff up with the animations and the tagline; "Surrender or Run". The flash animations and the tagline made the Vahki scary to me.

2005:

2005/2006 was very underrated. I know Greg's not a fan of 2005 but I think the sets do the job. Got that mutated wonky aspect from the Hordika, one huge arm one small one, feeling like the transformation is not yet complete. Got the job done, no complaints from me. Lore-wise, growing up with Metru in 2004-2005, that was like.. the Prequel Trilogy for me in Bionicle as it was for Star Wars I guess you could say. Anakin had his evil moment, Vakama also, showed nobody was perfect, some character development, all that jazz.

2006:

2006 has a special place in my heart (even though I love 2007 with an undying passion with my fav. Villains). I think the organic masks were a nice change of from the usual and added some charm and uniqueness to the Toa.I love 'em. Yeah, they didn't have the typical faces from before but it was remedied with the "bright light" story explanation after lol.

I really appreciate when anybody tries something new, even when they dip their toes in. I'd rather have somebody do that instead of them being a safe one-trick pony. A new breed of Toa, something's gotta change, and they weren't formally trained as Toa, or formally transformed the usual route. They were transformed under unusual circumstances and I think their appearances  reflect that. Something familiar yet something different. Also, the light-up swords were rad. Pew pew, electric-hybrid-elemental powers.

Marketing was loved or hated, I loved it and still look fondly back at it, tells the era it was from but also it stands out. Seeing those monstrous Piraka silhouettes in the commercial, jeez dude, those things TOWERED over the Bohrok, the Visorak, and those monsters were bulky in comparison to the Vahki. Told us that these villains were a new more menacing threat. They were cunning, internally fighting amongst one another, not some mindless robot enforcers or wild spiders. These dudes towered over the Toa Nuva and gave me a sense that a new generation of heroes was needed to handle this if the original heroes I grew up with couldn't handle them. Though nothing will triumph the might and complexity of the original bigger Rahi sets and the Bohrok Queens, those things were huge!

2007:

Speaking of 2007... Oh my goodness, the main man, my boi, Mahri Hewkii, I think he gets way too much hate. I'll defend that set for as long as I live. I think he's pretty rad. The arm attached to him kinda reminds me of Mega Man and tells me that they weren't afraid to experiment with the design and play it safe, but also, hey, sometimes you don't get lucky with the Mask Of Life changing things whenever somebody touches the thing lol. (But hey, the remedied this in the Journey's End pictures when they gave him two hands hahaha)

2010:

I honestly don't hate STARS line. I see it as a final "Hurrah". I'm glad we were able to get some closure instead of an incomplete chronicle. Even though some things were wonky like the marketing of Nektann.

Other things:

Po-Matoran/Toa color overhaul: I don't mind the color shift, actually. Tis 'aight. Inika Hewkii rocked that (no pun intended) color scheme the best with his chain.
 

Uhm.. I think that's all for now. Man I've been holding these thoughts in my noodle for years lol. Nice to see I can share them with you all. Glad to be a part of this. Cheers!

Thanks for telling us the deadline date! This is almost surreal to me that they managed to get Bob Thompson after all this time which is incredible. I'm super excited to ask/listen to Christian Faber's and Bob's responses especially.

It's amazing seeing this gem from way back in the day. I can't believe someone was close to cracking it, I can't imagine the pressure Greg was facing. Also, been enjoying reading these answers/replies with Greg.