Pomegranate

I'm more startled by Kopaka's accent.

Well, this is exciting I love that they're taking the time to work these into shots because there's really no reason to do it other than for those of us who'd recognize it. I'm ecstatic to see where this goes, especially since the Okoto story seems to focuses on time a lot. How does it all tie together? They've clearly got a plan again

I just wanna see what kind of cool displays they come up for this year.

 

 

-NotS

I won't be in the city until two weeks into the new year, but when I get back I'll definitely go to the big stores where they always have big displays for the new sets to take y'all some pictures

I'm expecting an Ekimu set, 'cause I feel like Lego is doing the thing where only characters available as sets will be featured prominently in the story, as evidence by both the cloney nature of the Protectors (they could've gone the MNOG route with unique looking characters) and the fact that we've yet to see anyone besides Makuta and Ekimu in the animations that we haven't seen in set form. I'm not sure when I expect them to be released, but it could be next wave and I'm pretty excited for 'em if that turns out to be the case.

Principles Regarding Achieving Canonization Through the Lego Message Boads & BZP Polling & Discussion should be renamed Principles Regarding Achieving Canonization Through Integrated Concept Examination so that you could have a perfect acronym  Easy to remember, and it describes itself! Just list LMB and BZP as the places to do that process as the first step if they're critical.

I was really close with voting Toa Iruini but I had to give it to Keetongu; not only was he our first keetorange and a really cool set (and character, although that's not the criteria) but I remember planning to and succeeding in getting Keetongu, whereas Iruini was a surprising and conveniently marvelous gift. And since he wasn't a Metru build, Keetongu gets uniqueness points. I don't think we've ever really had a set quite like Keetongu before or after.

( That reminds me, I gotta go rebuild Iruini -- I know I could've have lost all his gold armor, and all his green parts are right here on my grey-less Matau )

Keep in mind powered protodermis other than masks doesn't have to only be used for Kanoka. I think they usually use Kanoka for things other than self-use powers, and could make tools to carry for those instead.

 

But yeah, if they want to... headbang.

 

Okay... not the head in most scenarios (that might smash their mask!). But yeah. Or tap it with a finger really fast or the like.

Does that mean powered protodermis could be made into something wearable like armbands that activate with impact? Even made into powered armor with the same skill Kanohi are made? That would be so incredibly handy, and double as wearable decoration even when their power fades. Akilini and other games already cover the sport application well, but imagine if the powered protodermis was worn instead of thrown? Could Matoran unburdened by having to physically carry large disks potentially commission fresh Kanoka fashioned into armor and conventional tools/weapons that would make them as defensively and offensively capable as Toa when doing difficcult jobs ,or dealing with Rahi? Or even just going off and doing heroic stuff with a range of easily accessible albeit weak powers? That would be incredibly neat.

At least in the comics. Of course, they did do a movie-styled Dume in the comics, and the Agori look like their hands are fused into fists permanently.

 

As for how they grab things, perhaps everything in the MU is technically magnetic, since everything is protodermis. Of course, that makes Toa of Magnetism very OP.

That's a very good point, it could be part of Protodermis's many magical features, but that might mean they're all over on Bara Magna right now struggling to hold things without dropping them

What if folks simply do not like the changes being made to the canon? Is it really worth shoving things they do not like in their faces and insisting they are now the law of the land, when all of the changes could easily be fanon interpretations that nobody is forced to accept? If the beauty of this "worldbuilding" is that it's for the fans almost entirely by the fans, why are not all fans considered? It seems very selfish and inconsiderate, especially when Greg's approval could just mean that something is possible and could have happened, validating it as worldbuilding in terms of setting limits, boundaries, and guidelines for possible tales, while not setting anything in stone. The push to make something canon is not a deliberate action by Greg but merely an enablement of the desires of the outspoken few who goad him into saying yes or no to changes or additions that were never his own.

I'm also very confused, Bones, by your insistence that kids writing fanfics and not understanding the purpose of canon are the main victims and source of discomfort, when there are plenty of grown adults who want to put a tremendous amount of work into fanfictions that rely on the contradiction or complete disregard of canon and get very adversarial over their interpretation of it. That hill you talked about is one that some never make their way over. On the other hand, once you've made it over that hill, not only should you be able to enjoy canon while making your own version, but shouldn't you also be equally willing to accept that making your own version is more than enough and doesn't need divine validation? You say you want to dissolve the right/wrong dichotomy while insisting that one side of that hill is not the right side, although it's not very easy to tell exactly what you're trying to say because of all the vaguery and drawn out thoughts that wind and meander and make it hard to follow your point and thus have an engaging and fair discussion. Your concern for the youth doesn't seem to extend to their ability to participate in this flowery debate. I don't mean to criticize your masterful grasp of the English language but it's just not that easy for everyone to decipher your responses; it should be the speaker's duty to make his point clear if he wants to be understood properly, and you seem to be correcting everyone left and right on misunderstanding what you say. Again, I don't mean to be rude, but confusing your audience and telling them what they mean to say does not elevate the validity or strength of your message. Think of the children. They wanna argue about canon too.

One last point is that you seem very attached to Tolkien's worldbuilding, but the thing about that is that he built his world through storytelling; although the Silmarillion is quite a feat, it's not just a list of facts and rules. You insist that how arbitrary and needless certain canonizations are is completely relative, but I believe that their irrelevance is basically fact since the new facts and names are neither presented to us in canon storytelling nor do they directly affect existing canon story. The canonicity of particular factors, going by your example of the Mangai and the Dragon, only serves to support what is still pure speculation. It's not worldbuilding, it's making character sheets. There is no story being told, and without a story canon is just an empty frame. Like has been said before, at least back in the day short stories and writing contests were how fanon became canon.

If it's meant to be for the good of the fandom, would it not be better that nobody is left bitter and uncomfortable over the constant nitpicky or controversial canonizations than a portion of the fandom celebrating their personal ideas being stamped with approval? And if it's not for the good of the fandom, then what's the point of it if not for personal pride?

I am neutral on the subject as it doesn't affect my life in any way, but I do think that it's arrogant and unfair to insist that rampant canonization is a good thing that everyone should appreciate or put up with.

I really didn't think Metru Nui itself was that bad or different, it was more of an urban jungle to me than techno anti-tribal. I really enjoyed both, but I think Bionicle's roots were always its best qualities and the tribal thing was pretty unique and enjoyable; after 2005 it started to feel very much like your standard generic fantasy atmosphere, but with superpowered robots.

Variety amongst characters in artwork is always nice. I've never really encountered this issue, I usually see human Bionicle characters drawn to look as dark or light as their respective armor. Kids gonna draw what kids wanna draw.gI reallyrdon't wanna8respond furtherb'cause I know 8what's  going onm and I'm not gonna8bother.

:^)

I've got an acoustic-electric Fender, and I can play exactly one song: The Ballad of Serenity, the Firefly theme

It would be nice to see new things, but no matter how many elements you can cram amongst the characters, it will have absolutely no impact on the quality of the story. I feel it's not necessary. Leaving the "other" elements to the baddies seems more than fine. There's a reason they're called "elements" and not just "powers", it's because of their relation to nature. Lewa already got the overarching theme of Jungle covering plantlife, and that doesn't really leave any basic elements of life unrepresented. Plasma, gravity, iron, sonics, and whatever else was canon in Gen 1 does not resonate nearly as well as the core elements of the Masters (that wasn't a sonics pun). Variety for the sake of variety is going the opposite way of the story team's vision for the reboot, which is to make everything more simple and focused. 

I've been doing that, I've already got my 3 Toa Metru resurrected ('cept for a few currently incognito parts) as well as a Rahkshi, a Visorak, and most recently I rebuilt Lewa Phantoka and Tanma It's a lot of fun, very nostalgic.

Yeah, another issue that I don't think was really explained is that rather than pinching Greg for answers, it's more about bringing him things to stamp with the "canon" seal of approval. It doesn't even feel like real canon, it wasn't something that would've ever been in the story except by Greg saying someone else's idea is acceptable, and it's just not the same. I don't once remember a time when someone asked a question and Greg came up with an explanation involving new characters or elements or events or new ways that things work, it's always some random fan's ideas ascending. Why would anyone be really invested and interested in that? I mean, I understand how and why, but to the rest of us it seems very unnecessary, more a "for glory" thing like was said on the previous page, and not an actual expansion of the world and story as would be respected if the actual writer presented it. It can feel like everyone is getting away with tarnishing the story and claiming it for themselves and convoluting it, ya know? 

There's only so far you can go with pushing fanon before you have to wonder what the point is.

I don't have very much, but what I do have is:

Poisoned Hau Nuva
Ultimate Dume Kraahkan
Sparkly Avohkii (somewhere)
Silver Akaku
2 NYCC Clear Haus
A few unbroken lime joints

 

I'd actually consider that a good example of why you can't (even though I'm firmly in the camp that they did have a relationship... and it's kind of an opposite situation anyways). There are still people who genuinely don't know it is not considered canon, and every time it is brought up ever, there is somebody who has to point out that it isn't canon and doesn't matter.

 

Which was the general point I was getting at - you will always have somebody tell you you're wrong.

 

I could choose not to accept this new Toa Mangai of the Green, for example, and lament in some future topic about how we never had more than one Toa of the Green that wasn't just an off-hand mention despite being an extra element featured relatively early on compared to others added like Iron or Psionics. There will be somebody that will show up to tell me there is. And it's not like I didn't know that, but feigning ignorance doesn't get that point across and can be even counterproductive. You can't just pretend not to know and still discuss the subject.

 

~|ET|~

 

That's a very good point, 'cause it leads to things like being talked down to 'cause you were wrong about something that you didn't know got canonized sometime in the last four years of cancellation. The more you canonize bits and pieces, the less and less the general fan supposedly knows (how many people outside of BZPower even know a single thing that becomes "official" here?), and the more high and mighty those who do get to act for little good reason.

Why not a Toa tool that isn't primarily a weapon? 

And now I shall hypocritically suggest that they use a machete sorta weapon, 'cause cutting through dense foliage and a jungle theme go together well

Alternatively, a sling or something. I like the idea others have suggested of making their own weapons, and a sling is very improvised projectile friendly.

This has been going on for many, many years, basically ever since Greg started directly interacting with the fan community on a regular basis- so, more or less, for a good 10 years straight, with a little break in the middle for his family. The fans like to fill in every little gap, and at this point it's just to have something new and keep the story alive, I guess. It's really not a new trend, and it's never really been a particularly popular one with everyone. I personally don't mind, 'cause a lot of this stuff they canonize is so obscure you wouldn't know or care about it unless you actually went looking to find out about it, and I'm mostly just concerned over how poor Greg has been putting up with this for so long. He's really a blessing for the fandom, being as kind and patient as he is.

Your point comes up basically every time this happens; back in the day, at least it was fans trying to fill in the blanks and make sense of stuff the main media left out, figuring out the story and trying to guess what'll happen next and what's possible for their fanfictions and stuff, so it was never questioned nearly as much. It helped that there were a few official contests to write and design stuff to become canon when the story was kicking.

Is it really too much trouble to be fans of multiple things while on our hypothetical bonkles island?

 

 

Silver hands. Limited Skull Spider colors. Very few colored torsos/limbs. Such a waste

I wanted hands in various different colors, not more silver! The torsos, limbs, and Skull Spiders do not make me mad.

I actually don't mind the silver hands, in part because they match the silver heads. To be honest, I actually consider the Tr. Light Blue hands on Kopaka a bit stranger. I appreciate them for variety's sake, but I wonder if Silver Metallic or White might have been a better fit for the set (Silver Metallic because it would match the head, or White because it would match the feet).

If the Toa's base was more silver it might look better, yeah, but as it is now with the black, grey, and yellow all a standard part of the base build, silver hands and feets look kind of out of place; you barely even notice the head, I didn't even consider it myself.

It'd be grand to see 'em like the objects in Beauty and the Beast. A musical number, perhaps, with various Kanohi singing around a Suva for a Toa to be their guest and put them on? This really needs to be explored further.

Sorry, but BFTGM has ended. No new entries are accepted. Right now, Black Six and some admins from other sites are judging.

The entries were all submitted a good week ahead of the deadline, don't worry

These models are all very nice, they look very solid and diverse. Dragonoxx is my favorite, I love the color scheme and the CCBS build  Very menacing, very cool.

Either Mata Nui, or one of the Stars, 4 years ago. Technically, I got to open a cardboard package full of Bionicle parts recently, so, I dunno if that counts

It's really been quite a long time, I'm so excited to get to do that again

They're covering the impulse sales with general LEGO-centric things like minifig packs, as far as I can tell. Why make tiny cheap Bionicle sets (which folks would probably look over if several of those would cost the same as a big fancy regular sized Bionicle set, definitely more worth the money, quality over quantity and all that) when everyone loves minifigs?