I've seen so many forum topics on the subject of how Bionicle (thank you, O all-knowing encyclopedia) has been going downhill. It's as if there's a secret Disillusioned Bionicle-Fans Club dedicated towards publishing at least one such topic per month, with rewards for persistent authors. Many of these topics have poor reasoning, though there was at least one recently with well-articulated points and a solid logical base. B-Rex himself takes on the subject in a news post today at BZP.
What does this all mean? Well, mostly that a lot of people care about a toy-line and have invested so much into it (both personally and monetarily) that they feel they should have a say in its future. Lego should be proud that it has created such a memorable toy-line.
But I think it also serves as yet another indication that interest in something rarely lasts long. For instance, someone who flies in an aeroplane for the first time would find it exciting, exhilarating. Someone who travels to other countries on a regular basis would not consider it any more interesting than a bus trip. Of course, this is due to the effect routine has on interest. I believe the issue with Bionicle is a little different - it comes about because of change, coupled with routine.
I remember what first attracted me to Bionicle. There I was, wandering about the Lego site debating whether to play Robohunter 2 for the umpteenth time (great game, by the way, easily one of the best on the site) or picking something new to play, and then my eye fell on MNOLG II. Deciding it would be better to play MNOG I first before going on to the sequel, I opened it up... and was immediately thrust into a foreign world. Standing on a sandy beach, some weird metal canister thing draped in seaweed standing by the shore, some blue robot-thing waving at me and babbling something about Rahi, a green crystal on top of a cliff winking in the bright sunshine... I realised it wasn't just a game. It was an adventure.
Three days later, I was finished with the game, and completely hooked. I wanted to know more about this strange world. I wanted to know more about the Matoran, the ordinary "people" of the Bionicle world, the wise old Turaga who headed each village, the powerful Toa warriors who kept the villagers safe, about the island of Mata Nui and the Great Spirit Mata Nui after which it was named. I wanted to know about the Rahi, the animals of the island, and about the evil Makuta who had influenced them to attack Matoran and cause mayhem. I hunted up the site and read voraciously, catching up on the three years of storyline which preceded the point I had first discovered Bionicle. Some stuff took me aback - like the Toa going Nuva, and ending up looking all ugly and stuff - but overall I was a fan.
Then came the first Bionicle movie. It changed many of my perceptions from the original game - for instance, Takua, the character whom you adventured as in MNOG, turned out to be an irresponsible character who liked to shirk his duty. (Hey, I was responsible when I played him! I solved all these problems and stuff!) Jaller, whom I had envisioned as a gruff-voiced general, appeared with high-pitched speech and a somewhat childish attitude. Hahli, the shy chronicler you play in MNOLG II, ends up all sassy and strong-willed and completely the opposite of shy. It was as if all the games I had played (and by the same reasoning, the adventures I "had" in that world) were retroconned in favour of this new state of things.
(I am aware this sounds unreasonable. Hear me out.)
It was disorienting, to say the least, but I got used to it. I got used to Takua suddenly becoming the Toa of Light. I got used to another island - Metru Nui - appearing, and apparently being the original home of the Matoran before they moved to Mata Nui, when Mata Nui felt more like home to me. I got used to Voya Nui and Mahri Nui appearing from nowhere again in an expanding world, and my old Matoran comrades from MNOG - Jaller, Hahli, Nuparu, Matoro, Kongu and Hewkii - becoming Toa as well.
The problem was, this wasn't the story I started with. This wasn't the story I fell in love with from the beginning. And herein lies the crux of the matter.
When I first started following Bionicle, it was because something attracted me. Duh, or I wouldn't have followed it in the first place. For me, it was the whole attraction of a wonderful new island with an appealing mythology and imaginative characters. For someone else, it may have been the attractive sets, or the exciting comics, or... something. It depends on the person.
Of course, as the story went on, things changed. For one thing, more things were explained (such as how the masks came to be scattered around the island, and how the whole Makuta problem started). I guess some people were happy that these things were explained, but others would not have been happy, because by the time these were explained they would have formed their own explanations as to how these things came about. For these people, the "official" explanation would have completely ruined their own pre-formed opinion.
It's like what I was saying earlier, about the "irresponsible" version of Takua being completely different from the perception I had of him that he was responsible, just that he liked to explore more than other Matoran. Of course I have no right to demand that my version be the correct one, but in the absence of information on Takua's character, I had formed a view which I liked, and which I didn't want to abandon in the face of the "inferior" official version. It's a result of investing in the story, and investing in the character.
For another thing, the story is deviating from the old formula. It is no longer about six heroes fighting a single enemy on a single island. The original enemy is more or less defeated; there are new enemies now, and the world keeps getting bigger island by island. It's inevitable that the elements originally enjoyed are replaced by other ones. That is why you get a lot of people giving different reasons for why they think Bionicle is going downhill, only agreeing that things are different from the original 2001/2002 storyline. People were attracted to different elements in the first part of the story, and these elements may or may not appear in the newer storylines. That's also why everyone seems to agree that the first storyline was the best - because that was where everyone started from. If they weren't interested in the first story arc, they wouldn't bother progressing to the second, and so we never hear about them.
It's sort of like how I started reading Harry Potter the wrong way around - from Chamber of Secrets - and that book is my favourite to this day. That book was the reason I read the entire series, and it held all the elements which attracted me to Harry Potter, which the other books possessed in varying degrees.
The third problem is that, since the story is planned for about twenty years or so, there is an element of repetition. We're having Toa who have to save the world, or at least the island... again. We've having evil nasties who come in gangs and can't be subdued easily... again. We're having new islands and funky Rahi and colourful weapon ammo and short-ish characters, usually Matoran, who need saving from abovementioned evil nasties... again. And once again, all this is in the ongoing quest to save Mata Nui, who at the very beginning was put to sleep by his evil brother Makuta and still hasn't been woken up yet. Because once he wakes up, it's all over.
This ties in with the fourth and last problem, which is that Lego isn't working on this storyline for our benefit. They are working on it to make money. And in order to make money, they need to make collectibles (ammo), small sets (Matoran who need saving), medium sets (Toa heroes, evil nasties), large sets (evil nasties' boss, Toa heroes' boss) and really large sets (whatever Lego can think of - usually playsets though). So every year they have to come up with some excuse for six new Toa to turn up - and mind you, these Toa cannot in any way resemble last year's six Toa. They have to come up with new enemies and new collectible thingys. And then they have to come up with a story which makes sense and binds everything together - but the element of repetition is difficult to avoid. So you end up with routine, and people getting bored of airplane flights. Because even though the in-flight movie is different, and the food is new, a flight is still a flight.
So what now? Well, I actually think Bionicle is going to do well and continue to do so because:
a) It has some loyal fans who stick to it no matter what.
b) It keeps getting new fans who accept all the previous story arcs reviled by older fans, since it is all new to them, though in the next year they will post a topic about how the new story arc is awful, an insult to the spirit of Bionicle, etc.
c) Lego actually does listen to the fans, and accommodates some of their wishes. Like putting back MNOG back online two years after it was removed from the web. That move made many existing fans happy, and Lego is still working to keep these fans happy.
Anyway, the reason I wanted to talk about this is because, well... I think analysing Bionicle and how it changed over time has explained a lot. Why I liked the original Star Wars, endured the sequels and could not abide the prequels. Why many old fans of Megatokyo mourn the days of Rodney Caston, while new fans don't understand what the fuss is about. Why the first episodes of Knight Rider are my favourites while I could not bear to watch the last one. It's all a complex mass of entitlement and expectations and that old schemer, Change.
Hey, Change? Just want you to know that I've grown past hating you. You take Bionicle where you want, and I promise I'll be here for the ride.
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