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Streamlining the G1 Bionicle Story


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If you were tasked with writing a short book series based on G1 Bionicle's entire story, what parts would you leave out entirely?

 

For me, I'd leave out the Bohrok-Kal arc, for starters. It didn't need to be there, really, and required the Nuva Icon thingies that sort of were entirely forgotten as soon as the arc was over. 

 

How about y'all? 

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Ends with the 2008 story with some retcons. I'm undecided as to keep Terry's final bait and switch and have a non-happy ending, or tailor the story so that the Toa Nuva succeed in fulfilling their destiny and things working the way they intended.

 

I'd also probably cut the Bohrok-Kal arc, and if more streamlining was necessary, the portion of 2005 where the Hordika search for the Avohkii (the animations) and say that it was placed on Mata Nui the same way as the Toa Mata masks were. 

 

:kakama:

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Interesting proposition.  Let’s see, purely for purposes of streamlining:

 

-Have the Mata transform into Nuva end of 01/beginning of 02, and then fuse the Bohrok and Bohrok-Kal arcs into one story.  The Kal would of course need a purpose other than freeing the Bahrag, probably more straight-forward swarm commanders, but I’m partial so I don’t want to cut them entirely.  It would probably also be best to cut Golden Masks in this case since they would only be around for the Shadow Toa battle.

-Rahkshi arc is already pretty streamlined, could use a cleaner ending though.

-No Morbuzakh or Krahka, have the Metru immediately deal with Dume and the Vahki while searching out the Great Disks.  Probably cut the Great Disk Matoran  as well.

-Honestly we could probably cut all of 05 if we play around just a little.  Say Makuta escaped the Metru instead of being sealed, and when they go get the rest of the Matoran he tries to steal the Vahi again and something similar to Time Trap happens.

-As for 06…I don’t know, maybe skip the bit with Karzahni?  That’s all I can think of.

-Skip 07 altogether.

-Maybe have 08 involve more Toa and see Teridax’s final defeat, then reawaken Mata Nui properly.

-Could just end there, or we could have Mata Nui go on to reform Spherus Magna and go on to a plot with the MU inhabitants learning more about this new world, their creators, and their purpose.  That could be neat.
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-Skip 07 altogether.

 

Woah, uh, man, that's pretty extreme. 

Like, you know, the entire fruition of Matoro's arc and the payoff for the setup of 2006?

 

Not dissing, just interested to read how you'd distribute the main events of 07 across your versions of 06 and 08

 

:kakama:

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:kakama: Stone rocks :kakama:

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I'm totally on board with ending at the end of '08. The Bara Magna arc lost me completely; it was just too much all at once, with new characters, plotlines, and an entirely new world; I just couldn't keep up with it. I'm always going to like the idea of Bionicle drawing to a close with Makuta's final victory; though leaving the Nuva and the other Toa still alive to keep opposing him from within. Kind of leave it open-ended beyond that point, you know?

 

I'd cut all the serials, for sure. I feel like they were mostly there to show off the 'special' sets who didn't appear in the main story (Lessovik, Mazeka, etc), and as padding; you lose very little of the main story by cutting them.

 

I'd... also reduce the number of transformations most of the Toa went through too, honestly. Aside from the purpose of selling sets, I'm not sure we needed the Inika to be fully transformed when they went underwater, or the Nuva to get new armour, or Takanuva to grow to titan size (as much as that particular set was my favourite I owned from 08 xD).

 

Actually, I feel like a lot of 06-08 could be trimmed down. There seemed, to me, to be a lot of character sideplots that never really went anywhere in the novels - though I can't think of examples off the top of my head - and I think many of them weren't entirely necessary beyond the purpose of world-building. I feel like you could really just take the plots of the movies, of MNOG, and of the comics from non-movie years; pad out with some of the additional details from the novels (since to me, 06 and beyond comics often felt flat in comparison to the novel versions of events) and you'd have a pretty streamlined take on the whole thing ^^

Edited by Darth Jaller
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Come to think of it, the 06 Arc is probably the longest in terms of everything that happens. Piraka arrive at Voya Nui, Piraka befriend Matoran, matoran find out they arent Toa, Piraka enslave matoran. Toa show up, Toa lose. Toa regroup with matoran, toa lose again. Then Matoran go to Karzahni, get new masks, plan an escape, get to Voya Nui, turn into Toa, then finally hunt down the mask of life. Yeah, that could be streamlined heavily. 

 

I'd probably have the Piraka enslave the Matoran, then kill them when their work is done. Toa Nuva show up, get beat and then manage to escape to fight on. Jaller and friends get worried, go look for Toa Nuva, skip karzahni and wind up Toa via the red star, but their masks are their Matoran masks instead of new ones. Inika attack the Piraka stronghold, discover the Toa Nuva captured, but in no fighting shape. They free them and hand them over to some surviving matoran to care for them. Inika and Piraka go down to the mask, have their final showdowns with Vezon, and thats it. 

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-Skip 07 altogether.

 

Woah, uh, man, that's pretty extreme. 

Like, you know, the entire fruition of Matoro's arc and the payoff for the setup of 2006?

 

Not dissing, just interested to read how you'd distribute the main events of 07 across your versions of 06 and 08

 

:kakama:

 

 

If we have the Inika join the Nuva in Karda Nui (maybe with some adaptive armor of their own), Matoro can complete his arc and die in 08.

 

Barring that one plot point, 07 is 100% filler, and the Barraki are some of the most forgettable and disappointing characters in the franchise.  Extreme or not, I personally want 07 out.

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I would merge the phantoka and mistika events into one big battle and skip the part where the vehicles were discovered

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I'd leave out the serials, plain and simple. They really didn't have any sort of necessary contribution to the story, and didn't even execute the world-building aspect that well. Instead, they just created loose ends and plot holes. Getting rid of them wouldn't affect the main story at all.

 

Oh, and definitely end it at 2008.

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I'd leave out the serials, plain and simple. They really didn't have any sort of necessary contribution to the story, and didn't even execute the world-building aspect that well. Instead, they just created loose ends and plot holes. Getting rid of them wouldn't affect the main story at all.

 

Oh, and definitely end it at 2008.

The serials were some of the most enjoyable reads though. While it's true they weren't at all pertinent to the actual main story arc, I'd disagree with you and say they executed worldbuilding very well.  

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Clean up the stuff on Bara Magna- have it revolve around Mata Nui, introduce supporting characters as it goes along. No need for arena fights and "wow Bara Magna is bad" because Mata Nui can see all of that when he arrives. The whole arc would have been better if viewed from his perspective. He gets the robot, hints towards Bara Magna's past are strewn about and the series ends with a great big fanservicey battle like it actually does.

 

Also, cut out or heavily revise the post-ending web serials.

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I'd leave out the serials, plain and simple. They really didn't have any sort of necessary contribution to the story, and didn't even execute the world-building aspect that well. Instead, they just created loose ends and plot holes. Getting rid of them wouldn't affect the main story at all.

 

Oh, and definitely end it at 2008.

The serials were some of the most enjoyable reads though. While it's true they weren't at all pertinent to the actual main story arc, I'd disagree with you and say they executed worldbuilding very well. 

 

I'll agree that some serials did it better than others. Federation of Fear, the Mutran Chronicles and Dreams of Destruction all managed to tell a relatively cohesive story and expand on the universe and lore. On the other hand, any world building in serials like Dark Mirror, Brothers in Arms and Reign of Shadows was ruined by making them about alternate universes, which meant convoluted, non-sensical plot points with no contribution to the universe we cared about. Destiny War had a lot of potential for world building, but many of its plot points were left unfinished due to Greg's lack of planning, meaning that they only served to make the story more confusing and less satisfying in general, due to a lack of payoff.

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Hmm... Honestly I think I myself would have left out the Bara Magna Saga, and only until after the events of Teridax's Reign of Shadows would we get into detail about 'worlds' outside of the Matoran Universe.

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Whatever I don't mention remains more or less unchanged.

 

-Condense 01 and 02 into one single arc where the Kanohi collection is kept but the Krana collection is skipped, with the Rahi being the initial antagonists and later the Bohrok, with Mangaia consisting of a gauntlet that begins with the Toa donning the Exo-Toa suits to fight the Manas but then being overpowered by their shadow selves and the suits being destroyed. Then they fight the Bahrag Queens as per in-story and instead of falling in Energized Protodermis, they unlock the secret to becoming Toa Kaita. They fight a larger swarm of Manas and get split up into their separate selves. Makuta fight stays the same but instead of being teleported out, the floor becomes EP and they become the Toa Nuva.

 

-Remove the Bohrok-Kal, go straight into the Mask of Light arc. Add some foreshadowing that the Bahrag had a contingency somehow. Remove Takutanuva and Jaller dying (he just gets incapacitated), have the emotional climax be the Turaga's reveal that they were not the first Toa and that there is a city beneath the island.

 

-Condense the subplots of Metru Nui ala LoMN, but keep the Morbuzahk as the finale of a preparatory miniarc that follows the Metru Nui arc proper. Mix the feeling that the Toa have been on the run for a while provided by the comics with the good pace the movie had. Have a villain episode where we find out about Nidhiki's past, setting up Roodaka and Lariska. Make it so Teridax killed Dume and stole his body. Have the confrontation with Makuta end by collapsing the Coliseum on him or something instead of sealing him; change Makuta's plot from merely brainwashing the Matoran into also transporting them to Destral or somewhere to justify the Matoran being loaded onto Vahki transports beforehand so the Toa can just hijack now and skip 05. Makuta escapes the destroyed body in shadow form and slowly rebuild himself using Kraata, explaining why his only body in 01 is a Matoran's body and why he has a titan's body by the climax.

 

-De-edge Voya Nui. It can be a dangerous island where the Matoran are on edge but have less quips and such, the Piraka can remain mostly unchanged but have them act more separately. Have Jaller and co. visit. Eliminate Karzahni, the Matoran on Voya Nui are there because of experiments run by the Makuta (start setting up the idea that there are multiple Makuta. The experiments in question would probably be testing the limits of the Matoran's survival capabilities to see if they can survive in more harsh environments outside of Voya Nui. The experiment proved to be a yes, which is why Teridax put the plan on Metru Nui into action. Jaller and co. do not actually become Toa, they go and save the Toa Nuva who put up a decent fight against the Piraka but were caught off-guard by Roodaka and her Visorak. Jaller and co. are trapped by Roodaka when they arrive and are mutated into Hordika, which improves their combat capabilities but puts a lot of mental stress on them. The Matoran cope with being in new forms by relating to the Voyatorans who have lived in unfavorable conditions for a long time. They coordinate a rescue for the Toa Nuva, capitalizing on the fact that the Dark Hunters are infighting. They rescue the Toa Nuva and together sneak off to find the Mask of Life as the fighting continues. The Toa Nuva search for the Mask as the mutated Matoran and Voyatoran gather the Matoran on the island and herd them to a beach where the vessel the Toa arrived in is hidden. The Voyatoran are left in charge of the other Matoran so the mutated Matoran can go find and help the Toa Nuva. They catch up and find the Chamber of Life. The Toa Nuva are unable to gain entry but the Matoran are. An inscription reads that Toa may not descend (Order of Mata Nui foreshadowing). The Toa Nuva agree to trust them and return to Metru Nui with the Matoran. They'll return to help them back once they get the Mask of Life. They go down the stairs where they find a shadow Takanuva. The Shadow Takanuva (foreshadowing) will allow five to pass if one stays back and sacrifices himself. Matoro volunteers (double foreshadowing) but Jaller believes he's better suited for this. Matoro reluctantly agrees and leaves with the other five. Jaller and Shadow Takanuva fight ala the Sparks Liner High scene in Fate/stay night: Heaven's Feel which ends in Takanuva taking down Jaller without much difficulty. He says he'll spare Jaller but go after the others. Jaller says he's content with dying if he stays put. Shadow Takanuva retreats and disappears, revealing he's a fake. Jaller says he knew, it was pretty obvious. The Chamber of Life is underwater, submerged in Pit Mutagen. The Matoran go in and are cured of the Hordika Venom but change into a Toa-like form. The Toa Inika (they'd look somewhat like Mahri but a little more uniform and with less obvious underwater-themed features.) find the Mask of Life (which is already silver) but it's guarded by several Maxilos robots. After they beat them all, the Mask of Life communicates telepathically with Matoro and reveals that Makuta is coming. They stand guard and suddenly one of the Maxilos robots rises. They beat him together with relatively little struggle as Makuta seems strangely pleased (creepy foreshadowing). They are about to claim the Ignika when the Piraka finally arrive and fight the Toa. The Piraka are exposed to the mutagen and become nightmarish creatures that devolve mentally to resemble their new beastial appearance, though Zaktan retains his intellect because he only dipped before retreating. Zaktan rises to find Roodaka and Lariska waiting for him, who want to cut him a deal. Back in the chamber, the five Piraka slowly go down one by one. Matoro realizes that the Mask has been slowly darkening and comes to the realization that it refers to the fact that Mata Nui is dying. He rushes to grab it as it turns pitch black. Mata Nui is dead. The mutagen drains from the chamber. They take the mask back up to the surface and see the sky slowly darkening (Voya Nui is inside the GSR as there is no Mahri Nui). The Toa Nuva look upon them darkly with the Turaga. Vakama thanks them for their effort, but Matoro receives a telepathic message that only by one of them sacrificing their lives can Mata Nui come back. Matoro realizes no one else heard the message so he follows the instructions of the Mask secretly. He goes back down to the Mask chamber and discovers a secret passage that leads to a gigantic cavern. He is on a rock formation for which the dropoff seems to go on forever, ending in a strange mist. The Mask tells him to dive down and don the Mask. Matoro comes to terms with himself and does so as the Turaga follow him. Nuju steps forward, speaking normally for the first time since his days as a Toa. They share a heart-to-heart as Matoro jumps and sacrifices himself. The Turaga return to the surface with the two Toa teams and bear the news.

 

-The Turaga note that the path is still blocked to the Toa so there must be another route. They return to Voya Nui where a team of three Makuta attacked. Takanuva was able to hold them off but was bit by a Shadow Leech. The Toa interrogate the Makuta, who reveal that there is a team of six Makuta in Karda Nui and that more will arrive there. They explain how to get to Karda Nui (a delivery system in the surface in the shape of an island far south of Mata Nui, where the canisters shot out of. The Turaga explain that it's not as simple as going to Karda Nui; that the Bahrag are to be awakened (no sundial, no Artahka). The Toa Nuva go awaken the Bahrag and then sail south. They have an encounter with mutated Takea sharks and note not to fall in the water (foreshadowing). They finally make it to Karda Nui. Meanwhile, The Toa Inika go to Destral with Takanuva to fight the Makuta there. They find Roodaka, Lariska and Zaktan there, who team up with the Toa since they don't want the Makuta taking over. Lariska kills various Makuta as revenge for what Teridax did to Nidhiki and Krekka, then she's killed by another. Once they finish the battles and apprehend all the Makuta, Takanuva leaves to accompany the Toa. As soon as he leaves, the Dark Hunters turn on the Toa. They defeat Zaktan and Roodaka (most of the Visorak are dead at this point) and head back to Metru Nui since Dark Hunters will be attacking there according to Roodaka. When they return, they find that Metru Nui is already being defended by the Order of Mata Nui.

 

-Things in Karda Nui go fairly similar. The Toa don't have adaptive armor, they can use their mask powers (they use their Mirus to control their descent). The Makuta also don't have much aerial mobility. The actual aerial battles come later with the vehicles in the Codrex (Antroz steals one, they try to get it back). They find that the Makuta had already been fighting a mysterious Toa wielding the Mask of Life. Toa Ignika is indeed the same, though he bears golden mask and armor. Takanuva arrives. The stuff with the Klakk and the Matoran remains the same. Together they press on to the Codrex through careful climbing, gliding and swamp traversing (made easier thanks to Ignika's hoverboard) and the vehicle heist happens, which leads to aerial fights. Ignika insists that he must activate, the safer the process will be. He does so and the energy storms start slower. Krika sacrifices himself to kill Antroz and let the Toa take their vehicles. The Toa get out as the energy storms kill the Makuta left behind. The twist remains the same, Makuta hid his essence in the Mask of Life (he influenced Ignika into activating the Codrex). The Mask of Life is expelled with Mata Nui's soul. Everyone rallies together against the Rahkshi and the shadow-controlled Exo-Toa. (The remaining Makuta on the surface are assassinated by the Exo-Toa; no Miserix). No Bara Magna arc, something else happens.

 

I have more ideas but they're not as well defined and I'm toying using them in a story so I'll just leave it there.

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  • 4 weeks later...

01 would be the same

02 would be a bit quicker

03 would be fast and basically skip to the end, move onto the rahkshi and Takanuva

04 would just go strait to Luhkan giving them the toa stones, play out the same, then go to right to the hordika, breeze through that with very little focus on it snd not even have Vakama go evil

05 would be almost the same, minus the organic masks, hewki's look changes

06 same as 05

07 similar, Takanuva isn't infected and stays gold pohatu's look changes

08 change the way the toa Nuva look, make it fast, remove the vehicles

09 quickly go through the spheres magna story, make the glatorian wear masks and be biomechanical

10 make all the toa Nuva get new looks reminiscent of their mata looks but keep the sivler, have it play out the same way as it did.

11 expand on the story with new characters

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01 would be the same

02 would be a bit quicker

03 would be fast and basically skip to the end, move onto the rahkshi and Takanuva

04 would just go strait to Luhkan giving them the toa stones, play out the same, then go to right to the hordika, breeze through that with very little focus on it snd not even have Vakama go evil

05 would be almost the same, minus the organic masks, hewki's look changes

06 same as 05

07 similar, Takanuva isn't infected and stays gold pohatu's look changes

08 change the way the toa Nuva look, make it fast, remove the vehicles

09 quickly go through the spheres magna story, make the glatorian wear masks and be biomechanical

10 make all the toa Nuva get new looks reminiscent of their mata looks but keep the sivler, have it play out the same way as it did.

11 expand on the story with new characters

Ya got yer years a lil off

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  • 4 weeks later...

My biggest complaint with the storyline as it is is obviously the ending. I feel we were semi-robbed of a true ending. In my opinion, it's bogus from a storytelling perspective for the finale not to revolve around saving the Matoran Universe and the characters within it. "The three that must be one" and all that is a very cool idea, but wasn't built up over enough years for us to really care about it. In addition, no one cares about Gresh, or Gelu, or any of the Bara Magna characters, so a finale revolving around them and Mata Nui is dumb. Instead what I would do is build up the "three that must be one" thing a little bit better over the years and have us understand eventually that this is Mata Nui's purpose, but have it be that to fulfill that purpose, he must regain control of the robot. No Makuta/Mata Nui rock-em sock-em. Instead what we needed was a final battle with the Nuva, Mahri, Hagah, Dark Hunters, Matoran, Turaga, and all of the heroes and characters we love uniting for one insane final battle against Makuta and the forces of evil. Reign of shadows should've been the focus, or at least split 50/50 with Mata Nui's quest for his origin. He still goes to Bara Magna and Bota Magna maybe, but that is a side plot to the characters we love saving their universe. Nobody liked watching Metru Nui and all the locations we'd come to love be destroyed in favor of Spherus Magna. A lot of characters got shortchanged in the ending, in particular Takanuva. I would have Takanuva be CENTRAL to defeating Makuta, and thus have his role as a Toa of Darkness/Light and his "destiny" be revealed.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I guess it depends on why you want to streamline the story. I don't think the story needs significant streamlining, although there are a few parts that could be nixed due to their quality.

You can literally read the whole series in less time than it would take you to read Harry Potter or Game of Thrones. It's not a significantly long story and there are only a few parts that drag or are unnecessary.

 

That said:

2001-2003: I actually thought there were only three books in this era at first - Tale of the Toa, Beware the Bohrok, and Mask of Life. If you wanted to, you could stick to just these three books and never realize you'd skipped Makuta's Revenge or the great Tales of the Masks. I don't think you need to skip any of these - they're all great books (despite the disappointing Takanuva/Makuta Kohlii match), but you can totally do it. Skip MNOG II though, that sucks.

 

2004-2005: This can entirely be skipped by just reading the fourth book, Legends of Metru Nui. But you'd miss out on a lot of good stories, most notably Time Trap.

 

2004-2005 is something of a bug bear to me. On the one hand, it has heaps of great "side stories" for the Toa Metru. On the other hand, so many "side stories" slow the action down. The Darkness Below is entirely unnecessary, as all it does is expand a little bit on the lore of the Archives and introduce Krahka. I don't want to see these stories disappear, but if you're in a rush you can skip most of them.

 

That said, the first two books of 2004 are way too slow. Tales of the Toa introduces us to six heroes who are all doing pretty much the same thing, but by skipping between points of view it doesn't double up on content. We see Tahu break out of his canister, then Lewa explore Mata Nui, then Onua find Onu-Koro and meet a matoran, and so on and so forth. Each chapter focuses on a different character but they all move the narrative forward while developing each character. Mystery of Metru Nui sees every single Toa track down and rescue a Matoran, and Trial By Fire sees a pair of Toa collect two disks. You read a chapter, and then you read six chapters that tell essentially the same story, and it goes on forever and you get bored.

Also, Web of Shadows sucks. Vakama turns evil but it's only because he's been turned into a Hordika, thus robbing any impact him betraying his friends could have.

 

Nokama and Matau are boring and flat characters. It's like Farshtey said "I need a green one and a blue one. I'll make a creepy guy and a boring girl". Gali and Lewa weren't exactly the most unique characters ever written, but they had charm and personality that Nokama and Matau lack. Infuriatingly, over nine books Nokama never even tells Matau to stop being a creep, which would give both characters something resembling character development and personality, as well as teaching young readers that that isn't on. I mean, kids are reading this! Young boys get the message that acting like Matau isn't completely gross and young girls get the message they should just put up with boys being sleezy.

 

The biggest sin 2004 commits is spending so much time in the first three books on a repetitive narrative while completely ignoring the hints the Vahki animations gave us of a Matoran rebellion. The Vahki are some of the coolest ideas for villain-mooks the series ever had, and they never get used to their potential as these overbearing law enforcers in the actual narrative. Being introduced to a rebel cell of Matoran who are convinced that Dume has changed and become too ruthless would offer a great storyline, an excuse to not drag out the same plot six times, and some foreshadowing, as well as actually using the Vahki to their full, threatening potential rather than an inconvenience to the Toa Metru.

 

I digress. I really love the Metru storyline but there's a lot of missed potential there.

I don't think there's any point in cutting anything from 2006-2007. 2006 has some great pacing, and the journey from Matoran through Kazahni, and then to becoming Toa, is just wonderful. While you could, in theory, cut the first book down, I don't see any narrative benefit in doing so. 2007 has some weaker themes, and the first book is a bit slow while it focuses on 6 Barraki, 5 of which have the same personality. That said, the introduction to Mehri Nui and it's Matoran inhabitants is not worth skipping. 2007 also has some of the stronger serials, being more integral to it's storyline.

You could totally cut 2008 down by a book. I don't see why you would - 2008 is the finale of the Mata Nui arc, and it's so much fun that you'd be depriving yourself, but it is mostly one big long fight between Toa Nuva and Makuta. However, it does start to introduce some questionable serials. Dark Mirror and The Kingdom introduce two great alternate universes only to drop them as soon as the reader starts getting attached to them. Destiny War has too many players and skips location too much to be anything short of confusing. Federation of Fear serves to bring back some fan favorite characters, but isn't exactly necessary. The Mutran Chronicles, at least, give us some great backstory on the Brotherhood of Makuta, and Dwellers in Darkness returns to focus on some of our favorite Toa and lead into the finale. The worst part is trying to keep all of these serials straight. They all lead into each other in different ways, skipping one means being confused about plot elements later on, and they're too short to comfortably jump between them. Brothers in Arms remains one of my favorites, focusing on a completely unimportant character and not being relevant to anything, meaning that a reader can go back and read it at will. If you want to streamline it, I'd read the Mutran Chronicles, the books, and Dwellers in Darkness. Unfortunately readers would get confused about Takanuva's new flight ability, but a minor rewrite to Swamp of Secrets can fix that.

 

2009 does the opposite. It's serials (and comics) are the best introduction to Bara Magna, and Tarduk remains the strongest character introduced in 2009. 2009 isn't as bad as some people think it is, but a new world with all-new characters is jarring and very off-putting, especially when we lose our mighty heroes with power over elements and magical masks. It's such an abrupt change in setting that would be forgivable if it lasted another two years. However, most fans were introduced to Bara Magna with Raid on Vulcanus, which has about 5 unlikable "heroes" with the personality of a tub of grey studs. The Legend Reborn, as a novel, is better, because Mata Nui is at least a more interesting character than most Glatorian were, but frankly it's not until we return to the Matoran Universe in the serials that the series really gets good again. Introducing the Matoran Universe inhabitants to Spherus Magna is much more exciting, and the hinted developments on Spherus Magna were great. Riddle of the Great Beings is the best story of the era, and a viewer could probably get away with only reading that, the comics, and The Legend Reborn (and Reign of Shadows, of course).

Stories I wrote

 

Parts of a Whole Series: An Alternate Ending

Part 1: Fight for Freedom                        Wisps of Memory

Part 2: Army of One (In Progress)


Short Stories:
The Great Takara          
Tale of the Toa Stones          Masks

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  • 4 weeks later...

[...] 6 Barraki, 5 of which have the same personality.

Out of curiosity, which Barraki is the one you consider to have a different personality?

"You are an absolute in these uncertain times. Your past is forgotten, and your
future is an empty book. You must find your own destiny, my brave adventurer.
"
-- Turaga Nokama

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  • 3 weeks later...

I'd agree most of the serials can be left out with the exception of the Dwellers in Darkness. it explains at leat the last line of obstacles Teridax needed to pass through before he could take over the inner brain of the giant universe robot and the Toa Hagah were going after the trail underneath Metru Nui in a last attempt to delay or stop Teridax.

  1. I'd agree dropping the Kal in favor of more than 6 Rahkshi
     
  2. The 2004 Morbuzahk and Maze of Shadows arc would be dropped
     
  3. 2005 intead of the hunt it is simply revealed that Sidorak was keeping the avohkii in his throneroom on behalf of the Brotherhood of Makuta's after it was stolen. Vakama never betrays his friends but he has become doubtful of being recognized as a hero because of the hordika forms
     
  4. 2006 the Karzahni trip is skipped in favor of 6 emergency toa capsules are hidden beneath Metru Nui....2007 isn't skipped but the battles and events are shorter.
     
  5. 2008 ends with toa winning. mata nui regains control Mata Nui finally remembering the mission he was meant to do and the events of his glatorian adventure is removed. instead the Spherus Magna is repaired and he settles down as a a fellow Toa for his people. (bara magnans are revealed not as a separate species and the system was a result of no proper leading government)

 

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Has nobody joked about just ending it at the end of MoL? I'm sure most people would agree that the first arc is pretty well encapsulated, heh..

After giving it a little bit of thought, why not do away with the flashback years entirely? If you really wanted you could have makuta return while the toa are away/captured at voya nui and use the vahki to capture the matoran anyway, and have the nuva rescue them upon returning while the inika do their 06 stuff, but really, you can just skip onward to 06 without losing too much. If we're streamlining, then the 04 bit of makuta + mata nui backstory can be tied to the reveal at the end of 08 anyhow. Drop the serials, drop the blogs, drop the adventures and legends novels. Embellish on the comics. 07 could be shortened to being a final bit of the 06 story, so matoro still gets his moment and we can have the whole 'makuta's still around but not trying to fudge things up' plot point setup for the twist. Cut out the mutation bit, i think just having a misfiring ignika and nocturn + maybe a couple of the barraki + makuta maxilos is enough. Maybe have irnakk follow them down too or something? And then leading into 08, have axonn bring the nuva to karda nui, and their adaptive armor can be from his now-still-mysterious organization. 08 would largely play the same i think, though to cut out takanuva's dimensional voyage and the klakk deus ex machina, have takanuva reflect on his time merged with teridax and come up with a way to restore light himself? Maybe have him perfecting this as the reason he shows up late? I'd keep the ending twist/reveal the same, though. I'd definitely want to rework bara magna out of this, but i'm not yet sure how i'd do that...

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  • 4 weeks later...

It's too hard for me to cut it down to just a few books and still keep it good, but I'd cut out a lot of the "Vahki chase the Toa Metru" and "Toa Metru try to escape the prison cell" scenes and spend less time on the Toa Metru discovering how to use their powers. Shorten the battles of 2007 and 2009. The Bohrok-Kal could be reduced to a mention in a prologue/epilogue of one of the books, and the 2002 storyline could probably be shortened a little. 2005 could have the Toa Hordika's travels with their respective Rahaga (as portrayed in the comics) cut out. Cut Time Trap (regrettably) and just mention that Vakama recovered the Vahi. Completely cut Legacy of Evil (also regrettably) as it doesn't take place during the current story. As for the 2009 story, focus almost entirely on Mata Nui.

Edited by Cheesy Mac n Cheese

My friend went to Po-Wahi and all I got was this lousy rock.

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I would avoid the whole 'Makuta and Mata-Nui aren't really related' retcon.

It would probably be a good idea to merge the Bohrok-Kal into the Bohrok Arc proper. Maybe the Krana-Kal could have been the macguffin the Toa needed to collect and the Bohrok-Kal would have been swarm generals.

The Darkness Below was sort of crammed into 2004 in a way that didn't really flow well with the rest of the story, so maybe the Krahka could be introduced during the Toa's quest for the great disks.

As much as I love the Inika/Mahri arc, 2007 feels a bit shoehorned in as well. The Ignika's reason for diving down into The Pit was pretty flimsy. Maybe that could be reworked so the Inika acquire the Ignika at the end of 06 and the second part of the story could be about them journeying down to Karda Nui.

The Mistika transformation also feels a bit unnecessary. The Nuva could all just be the Phantoka. I agree with everyone on this list that 08 could have wrapped up the story. With a bit of retooling and a final showdown with Terry.

Bara Magna had plenty of standalone potential. It could have been used as a sequel or a spinoff after the main story concluded.

 

That's just a few ideas.

Edited by Darkmatter Inika

"If every porkchop were perfect, we wouldn't have hotdogs."

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04: Skip Morbuzakah and straight to Vahki and Dark Hunters

They couldn't go straight to them as they weren't sets until the second half of that year. The first half's sets were the Toa Metru and Matoran, so the Morbuzahk was there as a filler villain for the Toa to face before the 'real' villains arrived with their sets.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I don't know about the story but I'd definitely want to streamline a bunch of things within the world itself, especially with species.

 

First off matoran, toa, and turaga are all the same species. Toa are just powered up matoran with all the appropriate powers and such, and turaga are matoran with some toa power.

 

Next, a Titan species. There are many marginally different species in the MU created for individual characters. The presence of these species contributes little to nothing to the canon except to artificially inflate the world. For the story to make sense there needs to be a set amount of players involved, which also helps make the addition of new players meaningful. So I would group all those characters into a single Titan species that spread out across the MU and consists of independent states and titan cultures, but biologically they would all be the same (mutations and artificial changes/additions are on an individual basis).

 

Skakdi, Vortixx, Makuta, Visorak, etc. are all distinct species and remain as-is (though ideally they'd have more of a prescence in the story).

 

I still don't know how I feel about the whole Av matoran become Bohrok but that detail never really becomes relevant anyway so changing it wouldn't streamline anything either. We'll leave that one in limbo.

 

And finally agori are just matoran. I always hated the name "agori" and think that the differences between them and matoran are so miniscule and unimportant that the distinction is unnecessary story-wise. Besides, it's cooler if Mata-Nui found ancient matoran on an alien planet with their own distinct culture than just some biologically unrelated species.

 

 

 

Story wise there's a lot that could've been fixed and streamlined to work better but if I'm at the point where I get to write the next reincarnation of Bionicle then I'd just try a new story rather than a retelling. There are just too many deeply rooted problems in G1 that trying to fix them all would result in something completely different and unrecognizable, which would ultimately be a good thing imo but technically a poor retelling.

Edited by Banana Gunz
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