J46 Nui

I do like that it does not revive characters that had reached their destiny. But I feel like there were easier ways to revive Mavrah. I wanted the Red Star to be something special, but I am not sure that this is what I wanted. I sort of want to know what Greg had planned for it. Right now I am unsure about it.

As a fan of the entire story, I wouldn't say Bionicle ever went wrong, but it did make mistakes, and it hit its peak well before it ended.

I'd say Bionicle's peak was from '04 to '06. Its story was more present than ever with 5 books a year plus comics that were actually full length. It also broke out of the bad habit that '01 to '03 had of repeating the same basic story over and over again. It was actually taking risks with its storytelling and exploring new places and concepts. Plus, pretty much all the story content released those years focused on the main story. Even though there was an occasional side story, they were small and unobtrusive.

The reason why I feel the following years were in a bit of decline is that they started producing less of the main story. The comics were getting significantly shorter and there were less books released year after year. Plus, with the rise of BionicleStory.com, the side stories gained a lot more prominence and even overshadowed the main story eventually with the amount of content being released. I feel that it was a mistake to make the side stories, which are not friendly to people trying to get into Bionicle, the easiest piece of story media to access.

Even though I do enjoy the later years, I feel like I would have enjoyed them a lot more if they had released the same amount of story content that they did in earlier years. I know that Lego had good reasons to stop producing as much books and comics later on, but it doesn't mean I liked it.

With that said, Lego could have made Bionicle more accessible in those later years with one simple change: switch the content of the books with the content of the story serials. Having the easier to follow main story available for free on the web would certainly have made it more accessible. Plus, having the unimportant side stories in books and having the main story delivered in easily accessible media is basically what Lego does now with its story focused themes.

If comics are coming back, I doubt it would be like it used too. Last time I checked, they stopped carrying any sort of comics with the Lego Club Magazine, and somehow I doubt that they will start carrying them again. Considering how short, scarce, and incomplete the comics were getting '07 onwards, I would not want them to return that way anyway.

I do believe that, with the success that Ninjago has been having, the main story telling media for the relaunch will be a TV series. So I expect Bionicle comics will take a similar approach to the Ninjago ones. I predict that the new Bionicle comics will be released in collections by Papercutz and contain self-contained side stories. Greg would probably be the writer for these too.

Now there is another way that comics could return, but this is just wishful thinking on my part based on observations of other toy-lines that were relaunched. There could be a regular, monthly, retail comic book that caters to the older generation of fans. Now this may seem far-fetched, but there are good reasons why such a thing could come into existence. Long running toy franchises such as Transformers, G.I. Joe, and a ton of others have comic books, but the majority of their comics are targeted to the older generations of fans rather than the kids. It takes a much smaller audience to make a successful comic compared to other forms of media, and I am pretty sure I read somewhere that comic readers tend to be older these days. Also, another reason that I believe the free comics disappeared was that they were getting too expensive. But if the comics were sold at retail, Lego could actually make a profit from them. Plus, Lego now has a bunch of connections with the two biggest names in comic books. Lego also has a bigger presence in comic book stores these days with all the variant covers coming out and more collector-based licensed toys coming out.

So if Bionicle 2015 is a complete reboot, do you think it will still be part of the old Bionicle's multiverse? Like could a character from the classic universe could travel to the new one by use of an Olmak?

As far as sets are concerned, I have a complete collection, with the exception of the European promo sets and combiner sets that I already have the components for. They are currently fully assembled, with the exception of the playsets, but all of them are in storage boxes.

My collectable collection is far from complete. But I do have a few that I am proud of, like a ton of '04 Vahi and shadow Kraata, plus the Onu-Metru great disc. I am not very compelled to complete it, but I would like the Movie and '04 versions of the Mask of Shadows and an orange Vahi.

I already have a mostly complete collection, with the exception of the European promo sets and a full set of collectables, But before those I would try and get either Takutanuva, Ultimate Doom (Dume?), or the Kardas Dragon. The first two I want for their exclusive Masks of Shadows, and the last one because it is one of the best looking combo models and would look so good on my shelf.

Though my highest priority set I am searching for is not a Bionicle set, but the Breakout version of Furno. It is the only set I am missing from my HF collection and it is nearly impossible to find for a decent price.

Yikes... Leave for a little bit and look what the places becomes.

 

So anywho...

 

Never managed to see Age of Extinction. Although I didn't hear man good things about it at all... Definitely will try and get it on DVD though.

 

I'm loving the toyline though. I've only picked up a few Dinobots so far, but I must have more. I'm even tempted to get Drift after many recommendations. Or maybe I should hold out for the Platinum set with all of the Autobots... And I've said before I never wanted to collect the movie toys!

 

Wish it were easier to find Generations figures right now though heh.

 

Also, anyone pick up Rise of the Dark Spark? I plan on getting it soon and wanted to hear from Transformers fans what they think of it.

 

~|ET|~

I picked up the 3DS version. I am only 8 or so levels in (out of about 40), but I am having fun with it. It isn't the best game ever or anything, but it is fairly good. If you were going into it for its story, you may be disappointed. It doesn't even try to fit in story-wise during the movie-verse segments. I have heard no good things about the console versions.

I've been a Bionicle fan since the beginning, though I only joined this site in very early 2006. Even back then there were divides in this site, specifically between the people who only liked the story when it took place on Mata Nui and the people who liked all of it. Similar divides happened throughout my time here. But I stayed here because, unlike pretty much anywhere else on the internet where divides just lead to people acting mean and pointless flame wars, divides on BZP led to actual discussion and respectful conversations.

So yes, I do believe there will be divides, just like there always were. But I do not believe that will be a problem. Like pretty much everyone else said, we should still be welcoming and respectful.

After doing my own research, I'm jumping on the HYPE train. I wonder if it is going to be a reboot or a continuation. Evidence on other sites leave both as a possibility.

It would be great if this was true. I don't think I'll get hyped just yet. But the last time I completely dismissed a rumor on this site it was the one about Bionicle's cancellation.

If no one else has reported this, I have already seen them out at my local Toys R Us in South Carolina.

There really went all out on this one. A few of the shots looked like they were taken straight from the film.

Well, I guess this is good news for some people. I dislike not being able to buy these directly from Lego. It always seems that prices on constraction sets on Amazon and eBay are always crazy inflated. I think there is a good chance that will be true for these sets as well, not to mention the oversea shipping costs. At least they are out there somewhere.

I'd like some sort of construction set to go along with the tribes that have yet to receive one yet. Heck, I am still waiting on a regular Bear minifig.

Besides that, some large sets representing the legend beasts would be pretty cool.

It is sort of funny that they are not using the same type of minifigs as the toys that will be released.

The rhino set and this one would be nice additions to my collection. I do want a Lavertus figure, though I wish that they had released a figure with full ShadoWind gear, which I would definitely pick up.

I am still interested in the constraction sets and plan on picking some of them up if they actually release. I also really like the mammoth (which is my favorite set for Chima this year) set and Eris' new eagle vehicle.

I really like the episode where Laval was trying to rescue the crocodile tribe from the wolf camp. While having the characters act pretty dumb sometimes in other episodes in season 1 bothered me, they went so overboard on this one that it looped back around to being pretty funny.

I also thought that all of the episodes from when the black cloud showed up and onward were much stronger than the episodes that came before that point, though I do wish that the first arc in season 2 ended on a more epic note.

Eris was my favorite from the first season. She is followed by Razar and Worriz, who tie in a close second. I did like ShadoWind and really enjoyed his character in the new episodes.

I like Flurr and Jagz. Haven't seen Flurr's "wing" parts before, although they look like fins. I take it the blue guys are underwater?

They are from the classic Lego dragons. I don't know if they have been used since Orient Expedition though.

I really want to pick some of these up. I still have not gotten my hands on any of wave 1 though. The week that they were released all I could find was an already empty display box. I do like the aquatic theme the orange ones have. Anyone remember X-Pods? For some reason, these really remind me of the animal/fantastic creature sets from that line.

It looks like it is keeping the classic space theme, which is cool. I hope the final product will have a bit more color, though.

I am not caught up on season 2, so I am just going by the first season's tribes.

1. Ravens. I found these characters to be pretty funny.

2. Wolves. When they started acting like real villains the show picked up a lot.

3. Gorillas. I love the sets that belong to this tribe, and they really grew on me as the show went on.

While I do like characters from the rest of the tribes (Eris is probably my favorite character), I can't really say I have any strong feelings about their tribes.

It seems that I am about the only one who liked even some bits of the first season. Granted, I don't think the season overall is that good, but I did think it improved a bit after the first two episodes. I think I even started enjoying some episodes after the wolf tribe started acting like actual villains. Though the way that plot wrapped up was not that great.

I even enjoyed some of the characters. Eris was pretty good, mostly because she never acted really dumb unlike the other main characters. I actually thought that the Raven Tribe was pretty funny, unlike most of the comic relief. I even thought that the Gorilla tribe was sort of fun.

I really liked the legend beast sets, and I do plan on getting them all.

A problem that I have with Chima sets in general is that the large chest armor covers up a lot of the beautiful chest printing on all of thefigures. While taking off this armor piece is no problem with most of the minifigs, the bird tribe minifigs lose their wings as well. It would be nice for Lego to come out with a piece that allowed the wings to be attached and not cover up the the torso. While I can build a wing backpack out of existing pieces, a much more solid piece would be much better.

Has the new season started airing yet?

I am looking forward to it and I feel like it may turn out much better than the first season. The addition of an overarching goal and true antagonists should keep the story more focused, which was a problem with the first season.