Toa Halcyon

I'm late to this but I figured I'd leave my 2 cents on the topic. It isn't that kids today aren't interested - my mother works in spec-ed teaching, and frequently asks to borrow my personal collection of Bionicles to show her students and they completely adore them. The problem at this point is Lego. The company's not interested in original IPs anymore and pretty much hashes out licensed brand sets nonstop since that's a very safe corporate way to make money. Not to mention Gen2's sets were all very low quality for the price they were put on offer. People complained about parts coming off that wouldn't stick, how there was just one initial "villain" set to go with the wave of villagers and Toa that got released in the first batch of sets, stuff like that. And a lot of the story likewise felt off - the reboot all but shook off its original story roots likely to avoid another lawsuit in the event that they made it too similar to certain languages and themes (even though I personally loved the Maori-inspired storytelling of the original). By the end of that second wave of models most of the sets looked less like Bionicle and more like off-brand mockbuster-style Bionicle rip-offs. Really at this point I don't personally care if we ever actually get Bionicle back, but I do want a chance to buy some of the old models again even if there's a price hike. Lego's been re-releasing old sets again and people have been actively buying them so there's definitely an audience, but it's been disappointing that they've been purposefully avoiding the one IP that actually financially saved them as a company back when they were struggling, even though they'd make a ton of money if they did. TL:DR - Yes, kids are interested, you can blame executive meddling for our lack of Bionicle.

Hey guys, now I wasn't sure if this belonged here or if it needed to go in the Theories page, but since this is a general question about the sets versus something about the story I thought I'd risk it and ask here. We all know that Lego tried its very best to make movies of the franchise. While we can agree the second two were much, much better than the first (and DEFINITELY better than the latest one), they still weren't as good as we would have liked, especially when compared to the awesome animated commercials done by Ghost. But despite that I did give a little bit of a look at the Hero Factory show and was impressed by it. The story was not as good, but the animation was great and the voice acting was acceptable for the show's quality. Now Hero Factory has come to an end, and so has the show as far as anyone understands. So, that begs the question; will Bionicle get a similar treatment? Should it get a similar treatment? I think it goes without saying that I'm not the only one who is really curious about the current story and waiting with jaws agape to munch upon any comics or novels that show up in the future, but do you guys think we should be expecting a show to come with the sets in the future? I mean, dare I dream that the day has finally come when we Bionicle fans get some more attention in the form of a television show based on our beloved characters? Lend me your thoughts, I am genuinely curious. -Toa Halcyon

These may have all been mentioned already, but your best bet is to acquire the kid's novels (which are all relatively cheap), and then find the comics. The comics were always available on the Lego Website for free, so searching for the PDFs online shouldn't be too hard. But the best bet is to start with the Mata Nui Online Game. There should be a website that has the game available for download. It should give you a basic understanding about the first generation of Bionicle and why us old farts love it so much.

Well, more like...it's what killed it, in the end, but....I hope they don't spread out too thin really. There don't have to be lots of different places where they tell the story. We do know we're getting books at some point, though. The easiest way for the new story to avoid falling into the same trap as the original one, even spread across multiple media, is to make sure that a single medium tells the whole story and everything else either adapts that or is nonessential. I loved the 2011 Ninjago chapter books, which told stories which either simply elaborated on events from that year's main TV special (like the story of how the Ninja obtained the Nunchucks of Lightning, which happened in a montage in the show), or were side-stories that featured the characters in unrelated adventures (like a story about the ninja being tested by a rogue former student of Sensei Wu). Those kinds of stories can still be compelling if they give new insight into the characters they portray, but someone who stuck to the TV series wouldn't be missing out on any developments in the overarching plot if they gave those books a pass. Yes, I agree with this statement. It would work a lot better if Bionicle had a main storyline set in a TV show or a comic series, then have books that either expand/elaborate on what was on the original show/comics, or follow the path of a completely different character. It's why I liked the Mata Nui Online Game so much; even though it took place during the Quest for the Masks, it didn't follow the Toa, it followed a side character who ended up carving his own place into the storyline...which was amazing.

you have an addiction manAn addiction to those awesome new pictures? You're right!To a toy robot's butt, which is slightly disturbing... To be fair there are worse things to be addicted to...

Edit: Never noticed that the images were just links...that was weird. Just like before, this is based off of a real dinosaur. Here's the wiki for more information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarbosaurus Tyrannosaurs were among the most successful groups of dinosaurs on the planet. Confirmed to have feathers, and having spread influence throughout much of the northern hemisphere, no group of dinosaurs their size could outcompete them, forcing the long-established Carnosaurs to either go extinct or follow their traditional prey south into continents like Africa and South America. Their kind had their early beginnings in the Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous as small coelurosaurs in Asia, but began to grow in size quickly, and before long they became one of the most profound dinosaurs to date. Tarbosaurus bataar is T.Rex's Mongolian cousin. Both lived roughly around the same time, and appeared so similar many thought that they were the exact same animal. Despite this, Tarbosaurus is just different from Tyrannosaurus that they are considered different species, albeit Tarbosaurus only has one species under its genus; Bataar. In terms of size, Tarbosaurus comes just under Tyrannosaurus, between 10-12 meters in length (33-39 feet), but they were still formidable enough to become the dominant predators in their region in the Gobi Desert, likely hunting the local ornithischian cuisine; the Saurolophus; which traveled to and from the desert in migrating herds. Despite how big it was, most of the Gobi was safe from these monsters due to the fact that most creatures that lived there were too small to be worth chasing, such as the local Velociraptor and their favorite food the Protoceratops. Like all Tyrannosaurs, Tarbosaurus likely had a very powerful bite; everything lay within its massive skull, a trait that made the Tyrannosaurs unique and deadly killers. Unlike Carnosaurs, whose focus was to tear big holes in their prey and make them bleed to death, Tyrannosaurs could actually crush bone, leading for some paleontologists to assume that they could have been glorified turkey vultures instead of hunters. Regardless of how they ate, it is known fact that wherever a Tyrannosaur fossil showed up in the Cretaceous rock, very few predators it size would be in the area for long, as nothing could compete with that giant eating machine. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Whoever designed the Dragon Bolt head without bothering to think of ways for it to work without the weird Brain Attack bug is on my hit list. Took forever to figure out how to set the head up, but I'm pretty proud of the way it turned out. I initially was trying to think of a cool Dinosaur that would fight my Suchomimus MoC from earlier in 1x1 combat stop motion, and wound up settling for the Tyrannosaur that was within its relative size range. It's going to be fun to set up, though a pain since I'm going to be using a blue sheet of paper and a blue shirt on a cardboard box to act as my stage, and as you can see...Tarby over here is kind of...blue...yeah. Need to rethink my setup methinks. Probably the best part about this build is that it poses really well...I'm not even kidding. Most of my old pieces are so worn out that things move really loosely, which is great for well-loved toys and action figures but rather terrible for a stop motion subject. Edit: Images linked; please don't embed images over 100 kB and 640x640 pixels in BBC. -Wind-

Well at least now I know that there will be more stuff coming out this year, good to know! Here's hoping though that Gen 2 will include some sort of game, comic series, books, and other items that's pretty much a traditional part of Bionicle. Bionicle's story is what made it so successful, so it's pretty much unspoken that the new sets NEED to have some sort of external storytelling device for us all to enjoy.

Glad that you like it. ^^ I'm gonna be honest, I'm on the fence with the whole building system. It's great for building stuff like animals, dinosaurs, and so forth, and I personally feel like there's no easier way to build a custom body. However, when it comes to certain themes like Bionicle I prefer old school a little bit more. I just like to implement new stuff and every piece that I can in my builds.

Yup, that's the general idea. I'm hoping on getting it on a jungle or a lake scene of sorts. Not sure yet.

Sorry about that Black Six, I'll remember next time. ^^ Hey thanks for the replies everyone. It's good to know what people think about this.

Bfa, these are nice designs. Simple, short, and sweet. I'll have to look into them, though unfortunately I'm not sure if i'll be using much in the way of some of the non-joint pieces like the Bohrok arms or the traditional Matoran feet, just because I don't want to have to make custom pieces to simulate movement of the joints...that would be a pain. It's also part of why I mentioned the use of some of the modern parts, as the current arm pieces work perfectly for what I'm looking for, and I can just spraypaint them in the event that I need the correct colored parts. But I will definitely keep this body style in mind in the event that I am not satisfied with other pieces. Yeah, I wasn't quite sure what you meant when you said their arms had to bend (whether you mean elbows or just the shoulders). I'd designed it years before CCBS existed, so it's a little dated. It should be easy enough to update and adapt it, though. Here's one way it could be done. It gives you elbows AND shruggable shoulders! Anyway, good luck with the work you're doing. Gonna be honest, that design actually looks really good. I might end up tackling that, it looks easy to build 'and' fits with the size range I was looking for. Thanks!

These are all great ideas, thanks guys! Bfa, these are nice designs. Simple, short, and sweet. I'll have to look into them, though unfortunately I'm not sure if i'll be using much in the way of some of the non-joint pieces like the Bohrok arms or the traditional Matoran feet, just because I don't want to have to make custom pieces to simulate movement of the joints...that would be a pain. It's also part of why I mentioned the use of some of the modern parts, as the current arm pieces work perfectly for what I'm looking for, and I can just spraypaint them in the event that I need the correct colored parts. But I will definitely keep this body style in mind in the event that I am not satisfied with other pieces.

One thing that I noticed about the new generation of Bionicle is that there's a certain "lack" of sets. Not necessarily in the number of sets; as with each passing generation, Bionicle gets a release of at least six Matoran and their equivalent Toa counterparts. The first group had the Mcdonalds "Tohunga" promotionals with Jaller, Hewkii, Macku, Kongu, Matoro, and Onepu, the Toa Metru had Tehutti, Akhmou, Nuhrii, Vhisola, Ehrye, Orkham, and so on. So that's kind of expected that the Protectors (which I believe to be essentially the title for village elders, such as the Turaga were for the Matoran) are the Matoran to G2's Toa. However, all we have for the bad guys are the small Skull Spiders and their master, the Lord of Skull Spiders. Now, granted, I think I'm not the only one who's noticed Lego downsizing a lot of its products lately. We kind of saw that with the lower quality casts of the Piraka/Inika series pieces (parts broke easier and wore down a lot faster than their previous models. I know, I kept track), and then later sets got more expensive, with Glatorian costing at least 15 bucks versus the Toa Metru that cost around 8-9 (this is a ROUGH estimate, as 2004 was a long time ago). I don't really want to get into why I think that, because that has nothing to do with the discussion I am posing, but I do feel that if Lego's really attempting a good reboot with the second generation of Bionicle that everyone's hyping about, there's no way that what they've released is all we're getting...at least this year. I'm thinking personally that they may end up approaching it the way they did with Hero Factory. Based on some of the information on Brickipedia, 2011 saw several releases by Hero Factory over the course of the year, including two different redesigns of the same heroes; Furno 2.0 with the funky head design released in January, and then his better 3.0 design that was released in July. This not only fixed some of the 'mistakes' brought about by the 2.0 models (those heads...good lord those heads...you'd think Lego learned their lesson with the Inika head pieces), but it also introduced more sets that made them a lot of money a lot quicker than their traditional releases with a generation every year with Bionicle (though at the expense that previous sets were off the shelves faster). It is also pretty traditional that Bionicle includes the really big sets since the big Technic era back in 2001, with the inclusion of the Rahi; the Tarakava, Manas, and Nui Rama being some of the more well known sets of that era. The Lord of the Skull Spiders is, frankly, not much of a Titan; it is in a similar size range as most of the Toa, and it's piece range is only slightly bigger. For a first gen villain, it's kind of a killjoy in the sense that there's not much standing in the Toa's way, especially if they face him as a group. But...he'd be a nice introduction that hints at something greater, especially if there's books, comics, and a web-based series of animations to go with him. It'd be nice to find out that they released these sets now only for there to be more to be released in the future. So, what do you guys think? Do you think that they're going to approach the second generation the way they did with Hero Factory, releasing more sets in increments rather than all at once? I'm all ears.

Yeah, I based this after the actual dinosaur. If I had to pick any of the spinosaurids, Suchomimus and Baryonyx are my two favorites, as they are much more completely built than what we currently have of Spinosaurus. It's going really slow, my camera battery charger went missing and I had to order in a new one. To give you kind of a gist about what my camera is, it's essentially a nice, HD camera that's small and portable and perfect for photographs, but the battery is the equivalent of two AAs. Not exactly the best feature on a camera, but perfect for indoor use and for stop motion...until your charger goes missing after you do a bit of incomplete spring cleaning. Now that I have the battery charged, all I need is to get some new material for a green screen, since my current blue setup won't fly with blue pieces (hinting at the future).

EDIT: Toa Bumblebee mentioned that this needed more pictures. I apologize that there weren't, but my camera needed its battery charged and I had lost the charger some time ago. Finally managed to get it working again, so more pictures as needed. And yes, this is based on the actual dinosaur by the way. Here's the wiki for more info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suchomimus Suchomimus is one of the popular groups of dinosaurs known as Spinosaurs, which include the infamous Spinosaurus aegyptiacus as one of its members. It is also one of the most complete specimens, with most of its skeletal structure pieced together via many specimens which includes its ribs, hips, most of the skull, and the massive thumb claws from which the family is so famous for using. Adult members are estimated to grow an average of 11 meters (36 feet) in length when fully grown, making them massive theropods and one of the largest in the group with only Spinosaurus being bigger. Suchomimus lived in Early Cretaceous Africa and may have been one of the largest predators in its ecosystem. Suchomimus, like other Spinosaurs, was believed to be a specialist and a fish hunter, much like crocodiles and bears. It would have used its long, crocodile-like snout to snatch prey from the water's edge; the teeth perfectly designed to grab slippery fish due to their straight and conical shape like modern crocodiles. However, these jaws weren't very good at tearing prey apart, and unlike crocodiles it couldn't twist itself into a death roll in order to tear flesh. Instead, it is believed they used their signature claws; of which the thumb is shaped like a massive, killing scythe that can tear through flesh; in order to cut apart their catch enough to eat it. Bears use similar behavior today when catching fish, using their claws to help tear their catch apart. Suchomimus retains much of its almost Baryonyx-like traits, which means that while some evidence of a sail is starting to show they don't yet have the classic spine that makes Spinosaurus such a huge predator. Still, its spine is covered in large dorsal growths that gave its back a very pronounced bump, indicating that whatever Spinosaurus needed its gigantic sail for started with dinosaurs like Suchomimus, though we still don't know what that reason could be. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So I made this not too long ago, was hoping that I could do some stop motion with it sometime in the near future. When I saw the CHI Cragger set with that massive set of jaws I couldn't NOT get it for myself, and I've been messing with the parts since. That tail and that nice crocodile-like skull work perfectly for some kind of dinosaur, so I thought why not build something like a spinosaur? The trouble of building anything Spinosaur related out of bionicle pieces has little to do with their spines on their backs or their mouths, which are actually really easy. The problem always lies in that special little adaptation they've got on their thumbs; they have these massive claws that they use to tear through flesh, theorized to be the way that they actually tear apart food, since their mouths were built for grabbing fish and other slippery prey instead of tearing it piece by piece. Cool, right? Not when you're building a decent-sized MOC with limited parts...yeah. I ended up managing to kind of cheat and build a custom finger using pieces from another set, but it took a while to get it to work the way I wanted. Can't wait to start making stop motion stuff with him, he's going to be a lot of fun to work with. Of course, it wouldn't be a fun dinosaur movie without an opponent, would it? Hmm...I wonder who he'll be facing? We will have to see...