Legoland Toa statues being removed?

[Lenny7092]

Hi, guys. Some guy posted in Reddit about the Legoland Toa statues being removed. I don’t want to believe because I shouldn’t think Lego would do such a thing. Here is the link: 

 

WARNING: This is put up by people who don’t work for Lego, and they may be joking around.

[masterchirox580]

There are other people on twitter saying the same thing which seems to heavily suggest that this is indeed the case. Sad but not unexpected. I believe Johnny Thunder used to feature at Legoland but I think I heard somewhere it's now gone (I'm not sure if this is true so feel free to correct me). Lego simply do not care about bionicle anymore. 

[Lunarple]

One of the Legoland employees reached out to essenger and explained why they are removing them

 

[NuparuFan8913]

Wow this all really sucks. 😔😥😢

I can kinda understand why they are removing for safety concerns, but still it feels like LEGO wants nothing to do with Bionicle anymore and it seems like the company has totally forgotten what Bionicle did for LEGO. 😔😥😢

[Nato G]

I completely understand the reasoning behind removing dilapidated, decades-old statues from a long-defunct theme... but the timing (the same day as all of the Faber/Duckbrick reveals being taken down) is unfortunate, to say the least. 

Both things happened for perfectly understandable reasons, but when two of the biggest hits this community has taken since G2's cancellation happen in the space of the same 24-hour period, it's hard not to feel like it's deliberate. 

[Chronicler06]

With how often I'm sure there have been kids climbing on things, I'm a little surprised it took over twenty years for such an issue to be acknowledged like this.

I think the more likely reason is the simple fact that they've been standing outdoors for over twenty years and the wear and tear of that age is starting to become noticeable. Does anyone know what those statues are made of? Their condition would depend on the material used and what kind of weather conditions they've been exposed to over the years.

This also leads to the hopeful possibility that someone could potentially get those statues restored and then display them somewhere else that's a bit more climate controlled.

[xccj]

Now the question is how does the fan community get ahold of these statues? 🤔

 

[JAG18]

10 hours ago, Chronicler06 said:

This also leads to the hopeful possibility that someone could potentially get those statues restored and then display them somewhere else that's a bit more climate controlled.

It belongs in my basement a museum! 

[Toa Philo]

14 hours ago, JAG18 said:

It belongs in my basement a museum! 

No, it belongs in MY basement.

[TERIDAX941]

On 10/28/2024 at 11:30 PM, Chronicler06 said:

Does anyone know what those statues are made of?

Someone on reddit to supposedly works at legoland stated that they're made of metal, were rusting and had a ton of paint chipping off of them. Definitely a safety concern. Additionally there's supposedly an auditor coming by sometime this year and they wanted to clean up the park because of that.

On 10/28/2024 at 11:30 PM, Chronicler06 said:

This also leads to the hopeful possibility that someone could potentially get those statues restored and then display them somewhere else that's a bit more climate controlled.

Tahu's head evidently got saved before being trashed and got put up in the model shop where they build the park figures and miniland attractions.

[Lenny7092]

Two things: 

1. Some of you guys are being pessimistic about Bionicle being a long-defunct theme. I mean, it is a heartless thing to say. We need to convince to keep the legacy (or better yet, bring Bionicle back somehow). Bionicle is NOT dead! I hope guys understand that, even if some of you are new to Bionicle. 

2. I hope the statues will get fixed and Lego will reconsider letting Duck Bricks show us the content that Lego was sensitive about. I mean, we have the right to see them. Good thing I remember the plot for 2009-2011, and we got the pictures and some rough draft ideas from the story arcs. 

We should reach out to Lego and somehow convince them to bring everything back. We have the right to have them.

[Lunarple]

10 hours ago, Lenny7092 said:

Some of you guys are being pessimistic about Bionicle being a long-defunct theme.

There is a difference between being pessimistic and realistic

[masterchirox580]

19 hours ago, Lenny7092 said:

Two things: 

1. Some of you guys are being pessimistic about Bionicle being a long-defunct theme. I mean, it is a heartless thing to say. We need to convince to keep the legacy (or better yet, bring Bionicle back somehow). Bionicle is NOT dead! I hope guys understand that, even if some of you are new to Bionicle. 

2. I hope the statues will get fixed and Lego will reconsider letting Duck Bricks show us the content that Lego was sensitive about. I mean, we have the right to see them. Good thing I remember the plot for 2009-2011, and we got the pictures and some rough draft ideas from the story arcs. 

We should reach out to Lego and somehow convince them to bring everything back. We have the right to have them.

I'm not familiar with this so called right to Bionicle. Was there ever a piece of legislation that proclaimed such a right? In fact most (by which I mean all) legislation would deny you such a right as Bionicle is considered property of the Lego group and as such you have absolutely no right to it at all as Lego has a monopoly on it. 

Actually bringing it back again is also no longer economical. The moulds are now long out of production and with a declining economy it's unlikely Lego will be willing to invest in new moulding machines any time soon. If you do see anything more based on Bionicle it will in all likelihood be brick based similar to the promotional set from last year. Of course if you're ok with brick based Bionicles designed to resemble past sets then I personally think you can reasonably expect this to happen at some point in the future (can't say when). However an actual official continuation will never happen at this point. It is possible that Greg Farshtey could unofficially wrap up the story but even that seems unlikely as he doesn't seem all that interested. 

Bionicle isn't 100% dead but it is mostly dead. References will be made here and there but that's the best you'll get. It's also questionable how much Lego would want to make brick built sets as the size of the Bionicle audience is limited compared to other IPs. Most people who know anything about Bionicle are people born at various points in the 1990s and a few years after the turn of the century. This is a very limited audience compared to Lego's current strategy of using licences with much broader appeal. This is why Lego may not make many of them and even then they will just be brick built replicas and not designed as a continuation or new sets in the true sense. So if you want an actual continuation it is not heartless to say that you're wasting your time because you will just be sorely disappointed. 

Edited November 1 by masterchirox580

[Aiden]

17 hours ago, Lenny7092 said:

Two things: 

1. Some of you guys are being pessimistic about Bionicle being a long-defunct theme. I mean, it is a heartless thing to say. We need to convince to keep the legacy (or better yet, bring Bionicle back somehow). Bionicle is NOT dead! I hope guys understand that, even if some of you are new to Bionicle. 

2. I hope the statues will get fixed and Lego will reconsider letting Duck Bricks show us the content that Lego was sensitive about. I mean, we have the right to see them. Good thing I remember the plot for 2009-2011, and we got the pictures and some rough draft ideas from the story arcs. 

We should reach out to Lego and somehow convince them to bring everything back. We have the right to have them.

I hate to break it to you, but

1) Bionicle returning as it was isn’t realistic at all since the moulds have been destroyed, our best bet as @masterchirox580 said is brick-built recreations of older sets similar to the GWP. I don’t think it’s crazy to call Bionicle dead, when they aren’t really making any sets or media for the theme. Can’t say anybody was being pessimistic though, seems like everyone was just being understanding as to the reasons these statues were unfortunately taken down.

2) We don’t have any rights to stuff that Lego doesn’t want us to see/have access to. Not to mention I could’ve SWORN it has been discussed before that Faber could only share drawings- way before he and Duck shared all of that recent stuff. While it’s neat we got to see that stuff, we definitely had no right to.

[Nato G]

18 hours ago, Lenny7092 said:

Some of you guys are being pessimistic about Bionicle being a long-defunct theme. I mean, it is a heartless thing to say.

It's not pessimistic or heartless to state a fact. 

G1 ended fourteen years ago. G2 ended eight years ago. Pretty much the entire Bionicle/CCBS catalogue of parts has been destroyed. Most of the story and design team no longer work for Lego. By every definition of the word, the theme is defunct. 

18 hours ago, Lenny7092 said:

Bionicle is NOT dead!

Of course not. This community is full of wonderful creators who make MOCs and music, stories and theories, artwork and videos, custom parts, and so much more. As long as there are fans who remember and cherish the theme, Bionicle will never be completely gone. 

If you want to keep the theme alive, be part of that. Use your talents to contribute to continuing Bionicle's legacy. 

Lego isn't going to do it for us. 

[Master Inika]

On 10/31/2024 at 10:39 PM, Lenny7092 said:

Two things: 

1. Some of you guys are being pessimistic about Bionicle being a long-defunct theme. I mean, it is a heartless thing to say. We need to convince to keep the legacy (or better yet, bring Bionicle back somehow). Bionicle is NOT dead! I hope guys understand that, even if some of you are new to Bionicle. 

2. I hope the statues will get fixed and Lego will reconsider letting Duck Bricks show us the content that Lego was sensitive about. I mean, we have the right to see them. Good thing I remember the plot for 2009-2011, and we got the pictures and some rough draft ideas from the story arcs. 

We should reach out to Lego and somehow convince them to bring everything back. We have the right to have them.

Why are you always so hostile to LEGO? What right do we have to BIONICLE prototype material?

[Lorentz]

The fact that these statues were advertisements for toys that are no longer sold is alone more than enough reason to take them down.

[Lorentz]

On 10/31/2024 at 7:39 PM, Lenny7092 said:

bring Bionicle back somehow). Bionicle is NOT dead!

Huh? Which one is it? If Bionicle needs to be brought back, then it must be dead. But like @Nato G said, youre right. Bionicle is not dead. The community is in a very good place right now with all of the fan projects, brand new custom pieces, and more. This is G3.

On 10/31/2024 at 7:39 PM, Lenny7092 said:

I hope Lego will reconsider letting Duck Bricks show us the content that Lego was sensitive about. I mean, we have the right to see them.

We should reach out to Lego and somehow convince them to bring everything back. We have the right to have them.

First, we absolutely do NOT have the right. Second, it's all over the internet. Just go look at it.

Edited November 2 by Lorentz

[Chronicler06]

On 10/30/2024 at 8:39 AM, TERIDAX941 said:

Someone on reddit to supposedly works at legoland stated that they're made of metal, were rusting and had a ton of paint chipping off of them. Definitely a safety concern. Additionally there's supposedly an auditor coming by sometime this year and they wanted to clean up the park because of that.

Tahu's head evidently got saved before being trashed and got put up in the model shop where they build the park figures and miniland attractions.

So, you're saying that the majority of those statues have already been scrapped? Such a pity...

I've watched a few shows on the History Channel that featured the discovery and/or restoration of various items and objects from several decades past, including pieces of advertisement that were never intended to last and it was only thanks to a special kind of person who had the foresight to save them at a time when most people would've thrown them out that such rarely surviving pieces of history could be preserved. I guess I was kind of hoping someone at that Legoland park might have thought to do something like that with these Toa statues, but it seems it just wasn't meant to be in this case.

[That Matoran with a Vahi]

I'm honestly amazed other Legolands kept their Bionicle statues around this long; I don't think the giant Onua who was in the Windsor park for a few years even remained until the end of Bionicle's original run - or at very most, he was long gone by 2012, which was the first time I visited since '06 - and he was the longest-lived out of the Bionicle statues from that park. Tahu, Turakh and Vakama Metru didn't stick around for more than a year each.

Then again, I don't think the Windsor ones were made of metal like these (the latter three especially weren't, as they were only for indoor use in the shop, etc.), so probably far less durable...

It is a shame that they just scrapped these rather than, I dunno, auctioning them off to fans or something; but if they were genuinely unsafe then I can understand why that wouldn't be an option.

Was this the California park that these are being removed from? Now I'm curious if there are any little pieces of Bionicle lingering in any of the other parks that have just never been taken down even all these years later. Could be fun to explore and find out!

[T.B.O.C]

On 10/31/2024 at 9:39 PM, Lenny7092 said:

Two things: 

1. Some of you guys are being pessimistic about Bionicle being a long-defunct theme. I mean, it is a heartless thing to say. We need to convince to keep the legacy (or better yet, bring Bionicle back somehow). Bionicle is NOT dead! I hope guys understand that, even if some of you are new to Bionicle. 

2. I hope the statues will get fixed and Lego will reconsider letting Duck Bricks show us the content that Lego was sensitive about. I mean, we have the right to see them. Good thing I remember the plot for 2009-2011, and we got the pictures and some rough draft ideas from the story arcs. 

We should reach out to Lego and somehow convince them to bring everything back. We have the right to have them.

1) BIONICLE has a legacy - and to be quite honest, it's not bothering LEGOLAND California to keep up old statues they have little reason to upkeep. BIONICLE isn't "dead" as in it's a well-regarded, well-remembered and beloved old toy franchise. It is "dead" in the sense that it is not a current part of LEGO's product portfolio, and therefore not within LEGO's plans nor desire to upkeep as branding. LEGOLAND parks are just merchandising. BIONICLE is defunct, that's not pessimism, that's reality. BIONICLE being defunct doesn't make it less special to people, or less fondly regarded. Everything has an end, it's fairly bittersweet.

Much less about bringing back BIONICLE - we really don't need that. In fact, that's sort of the idea of the legacy of BIONICLE. We've been seeing a significant resurgence of fanart, stories, etc being made and iterated on. It's genuinely better than what we'd get from LEGO. What would we want from LEGO? There is no return to original BIONICLE, nor should there be. We had an entire reboot of the franchise that showed a fair lack of interest in what LEGO would do with it (though I liked it quite a bit!). We sort of have what we need.

2) This won't happen. Again, no reason to actually do this. The twenty-something people that might shell out money to visit for a picture is not a profit motive convincing to the LEGO group. We are a biased group of people in this regard - this is a special piece of BIONICLE history to us, and more so a legal liability + easy example of their brand name seeming rundown. Genuinely, sun-faded, paint-flaking representations of toys that have been off store shelves for 21 years is kind of the exact opposite of what you want at your amusement park. We do not in fact have a right to these statues being put back up. They are also more than likely destroyed, which is sad, but nothing we can do. There isn't something we can do to prevent this.

As for the prototype content... we don't have a right, but I do wish they'd reconsider more. This is history that's wild and wonderful to have. LEGO is within legal rights to ask for it to be rescinded, and my personal feelings as an archivist aside (like drip feeding content for a YT channel being exactly how we end up in this mess), this is unlikely to change. LEGO has mentioned time and time again that they do hold onto ideas for a long time (for example, I recall the dino rider concepts written in 1999-2000 during BIONICLE's development years supposedly being used for Ninjago and Chima). This is also why we haven't seen things like the supposed Queen's Royal Starship models they've made for Star Wars that didn't make it to a finalized product. It sucks, but it's kind of how that sort of inside baseball works. We are lucky to have what we got.

I would say again for the production content - there isn't like a genuine ethical reason we can't have it, more so than the legal copyright owner's wishes - but that doesn't give us the right to it, per se. Just wish it had been made, uh, more available before LEGO realized.

On 11/3/2024 at 4:25 PM, That Matoran with a Vahi said:

 

It is a shame that they just scrapped these rather than, I dunno, auctioning them off to fans or something; but if they were genuinely unsafe then I can understand why that wouldn't be an option.

 

Was this the California park that these are being removed from? Now I'm curious if there are any little pieces of Bionicle lingering in any of the other parks that have just never been taken down even all these years later. Could be fun to explore and find out!

I'm guessing safety is a big reason - they looked pretty sun decayed in the end. I know a ton of the statues and such made for stores that stayed inside and out of the elements have survived to rest in people's collections or to forever be unsold online at high prices.

Yep, LEGOLAND California. A shame too, I had actually been thinking about going out there in the next year and getting a picture. The BIONICLE Blaster is still there, though. No one's been mentioning that!