dviddy

Booo A&M forever. I love the Longhorns. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. The only school from the old Big12 I dislike more than A&M (and OU, obviously) is Baylor. Here's a bit of advice from somebody who messed their collegiate career up spectacularly: your degree exists to get you a job. You're planning on going up the school ladder and getting higher-level degrees. Your undergraduate degree matters only as much as your GPA and your references for your Masters, and any state school will easily get you into a Masters program. And your Masters degree will get you into any other program you need because you got the Masters. Schools very rarely turn away revenue, which is why the degree level has proliferated so far and tanked the educational economy in America. Speaking financially, my school debt is the biggest stumbling block to anything and everything I want to do with my life. It's this giant number hanging over my head at all times, all because I was offered a full ride right out of high school at any number of state schools, waited because I wanted to go to a specific private college instead, wasn't offered the package I needed to afford it remotely, and then discovered my full-rides were negated because I took too long to decide to go to the local state school. Unless you're looking at an Ivy League school, the school that gives you your undergrad degree matters almost not at all for the purpose of employment and moving forward with your education. Don't get hung up on one school over another because of names or anything like that. Your financial future is immensely important, especially because a good degree doesn't necessarily mean a good job anymore either. Basically, if you have a free option from a "lesser school" take it and run with it. Your future career path won't care where your undergrad is from, only that you have it. Your financial future will thank you.

I mean, this was a long time ago, but my first several BBC contest wins were when I was like 15 and 16, and several of the competitors were adults with kids themselves. It was earlier in the community's history, but still.

I quibble entirely with the split between "mystical" and "epic". The earlier stories had a very mystical, legendary story feel to them, something that made the story seem larger-than-life, and that seems more to match the "epic" description I've seen elsewhere. Nothing about the latter years screams "epic" to me, it's a more closely-told story where the main characters are more defined than any others, little-to-no world-building, and personal tasks that are said to have Universe-wide repercussions, but don't seem to be written that way. A more descriptive split would definitely be the "lighthearted/mythical vs grimdark" split the story clearly possesses. Or the "fantasy to science fiction" split where the more mystical elements were all explained away as made-up-technobabble. But trying to cut it as "mystical vs epic" seems to be a purposefully leading description where you've set the topic up to purposefully go a certain direction.

We went to that LEGO store back in December, it is a tad small, but the mall was neat! I mean, it's outside!! That was cool. And while we were in there a LEGO store employee asked me if I was "the guy from the New York BIONICLE thing". Apparently there's a marketing video LEGO showed internally I was in and this guy recognized me from it. California is indeed weird! That's a normal winter in Oklahoma too, and I hope never again. My last winter back home in Tulsa it got down to -38F for a few days. Never again.

70 degrees F is hot. I grew up in Oklahoma, where summers hit 95 and then 100 and stay there. 70 is still warm. It won't get that warm consistently in Portland until June. I'll keep you informed! You're not the only BZP member at UCLA I want to see, so we've been planning a trip up there once we're settled in for sure.

We came down for her interview with LEGOLAND back in December, and went to Fashion Valley mall in San Diego during some downtime before our flight back to PDX. It was like 65 out, but folks at the mall were in boots and jackets and scarves and we were like "what even is this?"

We have been in California now for... ten days? We're currently hotel livin' it up outside of the tippy-top of North-East San Diego, halfwayish between my work and Nukaya's LEGOLAND lifestyle. It's been really weird. Like, I always knew palm trees were a thing. But you guys. They are a THING. Also no one told SoCal that it is winter? Today was 80F. Like??? Why do I even own jackets. LEGOLAND is cool though. We went the other day and I liked it. I am missing PDX something fierce, though. Also Micah. Miss you, nerd!

Proud of you!

Considering several episodes have been released in other languages, even if unintentional, it is probably a safe bet that the majority of production on this year's episodes has wrapped.

They have plenty of opportunities to expand the cast of characters; no matter how much they rerelease the Toa, I highly doubt they're going to rerelease the Protectors each year. If they follow a similar release pattern, that means at LEAST six new characters each winter wave. People are protesting adding more Toa because you only need Pinky and the Brain. There shouldn't be a Larry. But Vakama and Jaller were no Larry. That's why I think they really worked as Toa. We knew them right from the beginning, so because they were established characters for a long while beforehand, it's not like they came out of nowhere later on to complicate things. I like the Protectors as representatives of their villages, but aside from that... they're nobody to me. I'd honestly be quite surprised if anyone managed to form some personal attachment to the Protector of Fire the way they might with Vakama. That's because I don't think the protectors were made with that deep of a connection in mind. They're just there. I don't want more characters created with that mindset, though. I don't want new characters for the sake of new characters, I just... I'd like to see characters who could be on par with the Toa, rather than being relegated to standing in their shadow. Can anyone honestly tell me that they suddenly disliked Vakama or Jaller for being a Toa? Jaller? Yes. All of the Inika lost all of their prior characterization from previous media, mostly because Greg didn't seem to like the MNOG story so he tended to ignore it. But prior character growth and personalities were ignored and it was intensely frustrating. I would rather that not ever happen again. I have a strong distaste, as do many fans from the earlier years, of the Inika/Mahri group.

I think that having the same characters over and over again would get kind of stale eventually. Sometimes changing up the Toa can be really good. Take the Metru for example. We were all used to the over-confident Tahu and the friendly Pohatu, however we were given a rather self-conscious Vakama and a really uncaring Onewa. The result was arguably one of the most dysfunctional Toa teams, but it was very heartwarming to finally see them learn to cooperate. These changes in personality can give the story some new dimensions. You are assuming I am a fan of the other Toa teams we saw in G1- I am not. They fractured the storytelling, and though the Metru design was my favourite Toa set design, the sets from the Metru era are too drab and dark, precursors to the almost parodying Inika and Mahri grim dark stories we got later. This shift pushed the OG Toa to the background and really fractured the story. No thank you.

I don't want another Toa team in the reboot, maybe not ever. It would depend on whether or not there was a real closure to our toas' story, but if not, no influx of other random heroes please. Though I mean they have already set it up for a new version of our Toa in the winter, assuming they free Ekimu and whatnot. What a perfect way for him to express gratitude by forging new armour and masks for them...

>implying the phantoka/mistika weren't ugly >implying greentext also, sorry, jess, but the nuva were hideous! the 08 toa at least looked good Where values for good = not good.

But what about the vahi?!?!?!? It's in the videos I saw it on youtube it's real.

I mean, a few months early is nice, right? I, for one, am super glad this piece will see a somewhat wide release. It's an amazing part and it will be nice for everyone to have! I bet DeeVee is steaming right now.:rolling eyes emoticon goes here: You know I am just one of like ten people in the community with them, right?

BERNARD

LEGO never puts all the minifig characters from a license in one set. Gotta make minifig collectors buy at least two sets, one of which will be pricier.

It is my favourite of all six Protectors. Followed, surprisingly to me, by the PoW. I am not a huge fan if the PoJ, the PoE, and actively dislike the PoF.

I still can't believe we're getting Miles Morales and an Iron Spider costume in the same year. In the same wave!

I seriously doubt that has anything to do with it. There's a clear and obvious reason why many of the set names are just actual English descriptions—because a made-up fantasy name doesn't convey nearly as much information. I don't know if Bionicle fans just don't realize it, but Bionicle's use of invented terminology for almost everything was often a source of ridicule. Lots of people, including both adults and children, had trouble understanding the difference between "Keelerak" or "Oohnorak", or why it was important. This extended even to fans—many former fans I've met as an adult, when asked what their favorite set was, will say "the red one", or something similar, because for someone who wasn't closely following the story, a made-up fantasy name with little basis in real language is not something worth memorizing or keeping track of. And in the original Bionicle, EVERY set was named like that. A year's worth of sets would have maybe 15 or more uniquely named characters, and for a story that cycled through characters every year that added up to a LOT of information to keep track of. Unless you were animating at that level at the age of 8, I don't think you're one to talk. Animation isn't easy even with Flash or similar animation tools. Add in the elaborately painted backdrops, storyboarding, character design, and so forth, and you end up with something that probably took more time, effort, and manpower than even the CGI adverts of previous years. The animations look like ###### and having the same voice actor for all characters is beyond annoying. LEGO has the means to give each of them distinct voices so they all don't sound the same and yet they hire one guy to do them all. This in itself isn't bad, but the voice actor uses terrible accents for some characters and different pitches for others. It's flimsy and lazy. Same with the animation. I don't care how long it takes. Bad animation is bad. CGI would have been so much better, but LEGO had to be cheap. Let's make the Toa look like our new 'awesome' Mixels. It's okay to be wrong. That said, they did not hire one guy to do all the voices, they hired one guy to narrate, which while similar, is not the same thing. That's very common in more mythological style stories, bit to mention the way 99% of all audio books are done.

Officially published media isn't a leak, and perhaps the mask on the back of that pamphlet is actually a summer set's mask and not the Mask of Ultimate Power?

Miles Morales and an Iron Spider minifig? Everything I've ever dreamed has come true! London Toy Fair doesn't allow photography.

Going to echo the comments about feeling like the size outweighed style, again. I'm not surprised by the results, but I don't remotely agree with them. I would have picked the snake guy, personally. But whatevs, I'm not in charge of the contest, the six panelists were in charge of the semi-finalists and TLG chose the winner. They get to do what they want. Congrats Roa.

Except that, unlike you, he knows when to cut and run, because he knows when he's up against insurmountable odds with no training, memories, or awareness of his own talents. He also knows that a magical totem is just beyond the arch and if he gets it, maybe he'll be able to change his circumstances. The whole point here is that you want him to fight and win because you think he COULD, but the story is telling us emphatically that he CAN'T (yet).

Or further than "what would Kopaka do- do the opposite to spite him".