Aanchir

Plus if they were to connect the two they'd need Greg F. back on their team. He is the only employee who could piece together G1 and G2. But all he did was ad some advice during the planning faze, and then ran of to keep working on Ninjago.

Technically, no, he's not the only one who could piece them together. He may have written a lot of the G1 story, but it doesn't belong to him, and if LEGO wanted to write their own connection between G1 and G2 they'd be at full liberty to do so with or without his involvement. They could even retcon elements of the G1 story to make the two generations fit together better, if they were that committed to it. It's their story.

I don't imagine that kind of thing is what a lot of people hoping for a G1–G2 connection want, though. Frankly, one advantage of the G2 story being its own independent thing would be not needing to rewrite or contradict G1 canon. But as Fishers points out, there are some elements of the G1 story, particularly the aimless story threads that emerged in the later serials, that would seriously complicate attempts at a post-hoc connection, unless they were retconned or glossed over. And as difficult as it might be, one of the things I've heard a lot of people ask for is closure to those obscure, out-of-the-way plot threads.

Y'know what I really think needs to be done? I think there needs to be more official artwork of Okoto. That's kinda what made the island of Mata Nui feel so mystic to me was all of the artwork of the diverse environments. It really established the mystery and serenity of the island. MNOI & II also kinda established that as well.

I agree artwork makes a big difference in making a world more immersive, but to be honest we have gotten quite a bit of artwork for Okoto thanks to the Facebook page, the background art from of the packaging, and the webisodes. I mean, just take a look at BS01's Okoto gallery. That's all from one year, and doesn't even include things like the "Month of (element)" and "Happy Easter" art from the Facebook page, or scans from the graphic novel — all of which gave us new glimpses into Okoto's scenery.

The main thing we don't have this generation are video games like the Mata Nui Online Game that let you experience the island firsthand. I can't pretend I don't miss that kind of immersive gameplay. The two mobile games so far are not too bad in terms of gameplay but offer hardly any kind of world-building due to their repetitive arena-style level design.

​And another thing! Why do you come to these topics, and say all the time the same thing that there is no connections, honestly, it just makes you look like a troll trying to get attention, so why do you do it? Does it make you happy knowing that you upset people? when in reality I myself have been completely calm this whole time. What kind of sick twisted world do you live in to do such a thing, on a topic you don't even like?

You don't sound calm. It's not helped by all-caps font, which can make anyone seem like they're shouting, but you're also using a lot of exclamation points, bold text, and imperative verbs (like "stop bringing it up!"). I'm not trying to discredit you or anything here, and I understand that it can be hard to stay calm when you're disagreeing with someone. I struggle with it all the time. But I just thought I'd mention that so that maybe you could step back a moment and try approaching this again more calmly, like I believe you are in fact trying to.

Lucina's posts, to me, seem fairly cool and collected, which is another reason it might help for you to step back a moment. It's very easy, in a disagreement, to feel like you're being personally attacked. There have been a number of people I've disagreed with who have gotten angry at me and accused me of having a grudge against them or targeting them personally. When really I just like contributing to discussions I have opinions on, and those opinions often happen to run counter to theirs without me even realizing it's the same person I'm disagreeing with each time. So again, I don't mean for this to sound patronizing, but I think it would help if we all took some deep breaths and realized that nobody here means anybody else any harm.

Now, as for my two cents: personally, I think you're reading too much into a lot of those "hints" you're seeing. Things like Tahu having latent fighting skills or Kopaka wondering if he was really a prophecied Toa do not at all imply a shared continuity in my mind. In fact, these are also things that applied to 2001 Bionicle in some capacity, when the Toa's memories were likewise clouded but they didn't need any kind of special training before leaping into action.

But I am with you in that wouldn't rule out the possibility of some kind of connection between G1 and G2. In fact, I'm working on a short story right now that presents a hypothetical possible connection that wouldn't involve the Toa being the same Toa or the timeline being the same timeline or even the universe being the same universe.

There are reasons I don't want the Toa to be the same Toa, chief among them being that their personalities and powers are different between both generations. If they were the same Toa then those differences would have to be explained, and I can't think of any explanations that aren't a disservice or retcon to one generation's characterization (i.e. "What do you mean he changed, Kopaka has ALWAYS been clumsy, you just never realized it!")

If the G1 Toa are acknowledged in G2, I'd like it to be acknowledged as what it presently seems to be: an alternate universe. And not "alternate universe" in the G1 sense where it meant that one specific thing had "gone wrong" in the timeline and changed the future. I mean "alternate universe" as in a universe where lots of things are different and it can't just be boiled down to one specific cause.

Everything about this sounds like a bad idea to me.

Launching new story without new sets? Bad idea. Bionicle is, at its core, a toy line, and I guarantee you the storyline would not have resonated nearly as much with people on its own merits without colorful toy characters to tie in with it. The sets were always the core of its profits. Also, subscription-based comics for kids as an industry are not doing well. LEGO has made numerous attempts to create paid subscription-based services for kids (LEGO Brickmaster Magazine, LEGO Master Builder Academy, LEGO Universe) and none of them have had lasting success. I see no way a subscription-based comic without any merchandise-driven element to it would somehow be any more successful than any of these examples, even if you could guarantee top-of-the-line art and storytelling. And top-tier writers and artists don't come cheap. You're basically asking LEGO to invest heavily in a project, in an industry that's performing a lot more poorly than LEGO toys are, that wouldn't do anything to promote the products that actually make them money.

Of course, you're right, if it weren't for the sets G2 would be underwhelming. The same could be said for G1. This is because the sets are an essential, inextricable part of what makes Bionicle what it is. If there hadn't been sets to promote, none of the great things we remember about the G1 story would ever have even existed. Your strategy says next to nothing about the sets, just that if the story is strong enough the sets will sell themselves no matter what their quality. But LEGO didn't become the biggest and most profitable toy company in the world by treating set design as an afterthought and relying solely on name recognition to make their products desirable.

Marketing Bionicle simply as Bionicle? Again, bad idea. Because the LEGO brand is currently stronger with all ages than the Bionicle brand has EVER been. If someone is turned away by the LEGO brand at this point, then they're too obsessed with being "grown-up" for there to be any point whatsoever in trying to market a kid-focused brand like Bionicle towards them. And changing Bionicle's target audience so that it's not kids would be setting it up for failure. Bionicle was as successful as it was in part because it was a craze kids could call their own — not in spite of that.

Starting Bionicle off with a TV show is a great concept in theory! In practice, being able to pitch a TV show to producers and networks who can do it justice means you have to convince them you're offering them something valuable. Bionicle G2, a revival of a franchise over a decade past its prime and the successor to a franchise that saw its media presence declines sharply by the time it ended, couldn't necessarily do that. A Bionicle G3 isn't guaranteed to be able to do that either, even if G2 does end on a strong note. Among other things, you'd have to be able to keep the constraction category strong in the intervening time.

You're making all these claims about how the story, as you intend to run it, would generate this kind of widespread, viral interest, would become a huge hit before you even launch the first sets, and would affect and change people on a profound level. But I don't think your game plan would achieve anything of the sort. This kind of pie-in-the-sky thinking might be a fun diversion, but you've given no examples of similar franchises that have used a strategy like this successfully. You're inviting us to imagine that LEGO should sink huge amounts of money into a story, well before they have any actual products for it to promote, just because it might become a massive craze! That's not how any successful LEGO theme has ever come about.

The book Brick by Brick, which I recommend to pretty much any LEGO fan, especially Bionicle fans, is all about how LEGO turned a failing business characterized by reckless and wasteful risk-taking in the name of "innovation" into a business that had an actual strategic framework for innovating safely and reliably, and how they did that while staying true to their brand values. Bionicle played a big role in helping them develop these strategies — its development became a blueprint for future innovations like Ninjago or Nexo Knights, and helped turn them from one of the world's least profitable toy companies into the single most profitable toy company in the world.

Now, you're advocating discarding this blueprint entirely and trying to build Bionicle back up using a strategy that flies in the face of what made it successful in the first place. You call this "saving" Bionicle, but does Bionicle even need to be saved? More importantly, if it's become such a weak brand that the strategies that made it what it was aren't enough for it anymore, is it even worth saving? In my opinion, LEGO would be better off discontinuing Bionicle forever and focusing on newer and more reliable ventures than taking huge risks on a madcap venture like this that has no grounding in reality.

Sorry if this sounds harsh. But this strategy really doesn't make any sense to me.

Are they doing this on purpose now? This guy's English is bad, like really bad. Repetitive, short sentences with awkward pauses. It's like he was literally pulled in front of the camera while he was doing something completely different and he is beyond confused as he is reading his lines.

...Or maybe, like many LEGO designers, English isn't his first language. That would be the common-sense explanation.

It always amazes me how judgmental people can be about these videos. LEGO designers aren't hired for their ability to stand in front of a camera without looking or sounding awkward, they're hired for their design skill. And I think it's wonderful of LEGO to publish designer videos like this that let us hear about the sets directly from the designers. So what if they're sometimes a bit awkward doing it?

I agree the new Bionicle is cheap it feels more dead than ever. And the sets were good on the first year but now it's getting very repetitive. It's basically the same deal as last year. I know what people are gonna say "well the least bionicle was repetitive too" but at least the story was full and not like another Ninjago. New bionicle is Ninjago. I have no love for Bionicle 2016.

If new Bionicle were Ninjago then that would be one of the best possible things that could happen to it. Ninjago is unbelievably successful, and anything but cheap. It's got an ongoing multi-season TV series that's had over 50 episodes, and next year it's getting a theatrical film, things G1 Bionicle never got. Plus the LEGO Ninjago Facebook page has like 16 times as many likes as the LEGO Bionicle one.

Besides, how can you say the story is repetitive when the 2016 story literally hasn't started yet? The only things we know it will have in common are mask quests, and that's because those are a key part of what make it Bionicle. Ninjago sure never had any mask quests.

I think keeping it as a reboot is ideal. It could be possible to tie it to the original line in some way, but ideally not in a way that makes them share the same continuity. IMO that would just needlessly complicate things for both newer fans, who won't likely be familiar with the old continuity, and older fans, who will still be left with bunches of unanswered questions, since there's no way to tie G1 and G2 together and simultaneously tie up all of G1's loose ends.

Well, for one thing it was shortly after the start of Toy Fair. BZPower hadn't posted their Hero Factory coverage at that time, but maybe other sites had, and people were discussing that? It was also around when the first chapter of Journey's End was posted to Bionicle.com. So there's that.

But for another thing, I don't actually know how far back those records go. So this probably isn't actually the time when the most people were on BZPower. Just the time when the most people were on BZPower that the site can still remember.

 

 

people are so old

 

wasn't the average user age something like 14 back in 2009?

 

that's probably not true at all

It wouldn't surprise me if the average age here is older than it used to be. Back when a lot of us old timers joined BZPower, dedicated forums like BZP were some of the only places to come together with fellow LEGO fans. But today social media like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Flickr, and YouTube are a lot more prominent, and allow people to discuss not just LEGO, but also whatever other interests teenagers might have.

 

Also someone who was 14 in '09 would be 21 now so there's that too.

 

Yeah, of course. I'm just explaining why there aren't more young folks joining to balance out the active members who continue to get older.

I like the use of the Hero Factory canopy.

You mean Hero Factory's use of the City canopy? That canopy was introduced for City helicopters a whole year before Hero Factory used it on battle machines.

I can't remember the last time we got a LEGO limo, so it's good to see the designers giving us something new.

The most recent limo was Pop Star Limousine last year, but other than that the most recent limos were in 2010, and one of them was a spaceship. So yeah, City is probably due for a new one.

The Air Show set looks great, with our first real LEGO City hangar, and I really like the airport set. Beautiful plane and terminal. The use of specialized pieces is kind of inescapable for a plane that size that's meant to be playable. Without big parts like that it might not be sturdy enough to really "swoosh".

The firefighting sets don't really excite me, but I love the pieces used for the stud-shooting water hoses and the flames you can knock down with said hoses. The burning structures are also creative, and I quite like the new station.

The Great Vehicles sets (listed here as "general") are always fun and creative, and this year is no exception. The ferry is also a very awesome and fresh new design that achieves a very authentic look using some unconventional building techniques.

The new Volcano Exploration sets look really fun and have a great color scheme. The jackhammer functions are awesome, and the sets do a good job standing out from other heavy-duty City sets like those from the recent Demolition, Arctic, and Mining subthemes.

The Prison Island is outstanding, with great landscaping and lots of creative functions. Reminds me of the Albatross Prison level from LEGO City Undercover. Definitely feels like more than just another typical police station/jail.

The Service Station set is one of the most surprising sets for me. You failed to mention its most unique characteristic — it's a 2-in-1 set! The FIRST 2-in-1 set in LEGO City! Among other things, the brushes from the street sweeper become car wash brushes. Really neat, and if we see more sets like this in the future, it could really freshen up the City theme.

The "Fun in the Park" set has some great minifigures, though with so many unique fig parts it's unsurprising that it has a steep price tag. Still, I hope it does well so we see other sets like it in the future.

Thanks for the coverage!

people are so old

 

wasn't the average user age something like 14 back in 2009?

 

that's probably not true at all

It wouldn't surprise me if the average age here is older than it used to be. Back when a lot of us old timers joined BZPower, dedicated forums like BZP were some of the only places to come together with fellow LEGO fans. But today social media like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Flickr, and YouTube are a lot more prominent, and allow people to discuss not just LEGO, but also whatever other interests teenagers might have.

 

So is this the first Lego Magazine to have a Bionicle comic in it since Bionicle returned?

Yup. And I think it very well represents the 2016 sets in the 2015 webisode style.

 

Yep, much better than the ones from this year's instruction booklets, IMO. I'm glad this style is still seeing use, and I hope we see other Bionicle comics in this style in later issues this year.

Nice to have some bios of Nadakhan's crew also, since this year's Ninjago site no longer has a characters page (which I'm still a little disappointed about).

The Elves features are great, and I was pleasantly surprised to see a bit about Elves in the Red Brick edition. Just a "how to draw a dragon wing" activity, but it's appreciated regardless.

I also learned what types of birds some of the Angry Birds characters are. I guess I could've learned that elsewhere, but I didn't, so now thanks to LEGO Club Magazine I know!

Some of the winning entries in the Chima Big Box Competition look pretty nice! Always cool to see what kids can build when they set their minds to it.

While I don't know of any BZPower members who are part of the target demographic for DUPLO or LEGO Juniors...

Here's one!

I know next to nothing about "Miles for Tomorrowland", but I really appreciate it since there has been a serious dearth of sci-fi or space-themed sets in Duplo, and these ones give us not only an exo-suit — an exo-suit — but also some spaceships, a robot ostrich, and an adorable little slime alien!

I'm not sure why Iron Man needs a car

That's the wrong question. There are plenty of reasons for Iron Man to own a car, the most obvious being "he's rich and he does what he wants".

The correct question would be "why on the box art is he driving his car around on the rooftop of Avengers Tower?" Though I guess you could answer my question the same way I answered yours.

The Juniors Ninjago sets look really cool. Probably a really wise decision, since I know some kids like Ninjago who are younger than the 7–14 age range of most of the regular sets. I also love that the snakes are back, and one of them is even a brand-new character. It's a shame said brand-new character doesn't get a name other than "Snake Villain", but in the very least you can tell he's a Venomari Serpentine based on his color scheme and four eyes. Technically both of the snakes are new minifigures — Lasha, who appears in the smaller set, has a new outfit and a new facial expression but is still recognizable as the same character. The Ninja are just mixed and matched from previous costumes but I don't mind that and I doubt too many kids will either.

It's amusing how small the vehicles in the two Ninjago sets feel just by virtue of being so much less oversized than typical Ninjago vehicles. The build for the dragon in the Lost Temple set is a little suspect, but I understand that a typical Ninjago dragon uses building techniques that are way beyond what's expected of these sets' target age range. It's nice that there's finally a double-door designed to fit the arched Juniors door frame.

It's interesting how last year's girl-oriented Juniors sets had pink boxes, and this year's have red boxes (albeit with some pink patterns). Kinda neat direction to take from a branding perspective, and I think it helps the Juniors theme feel more coherent despite how many different brands it encompasses. I really like the vet clinic. Even though it uses simple building techniques, it feels very complete visually, as opposed to, say, the Lost Temple, which feels a bit jumbled. The Ice Cream Truck set also feels pretty well-rounded, despite lacking a roof.

 

Not strictly LEGO-related, but today I took a walk to the park because the weather was nice. As I was passing by the playground, I saw a bunch of kids running around with Angry Birds plushies. Yet another reminder that this franchise has a lot more life in it than many LEGO fans are willing to give it credit for. There's a lot of Angry Birds merchandise out there, and clearly someone's buying it.

No denying that, doesn't mean that there's much interest from the AFOL community as seen here. That and that, at first blush, Angry Birds isn't really a franchise that lends itself to Lego as much as, y'know, Star Wars.

 

Seems to me it lends itself to LEGO better than a lot of people (myself included) would have expected, judging from the quality of these sets. The sets do a good job depicting the general precariousness of the structures and jury-rigged feel of the pig vehicles while still being sturdy enough in the right places to be playable.

And of course I don't expect it to appeal to AFOLs as much as it does to kids. But when it comes to LEGO, kids are generally the more important audience anyway. Especially since today's kids are tomorrow's AFOLs. I wish the many AFOLs who scoff at the theme would remember that a theme doesn't have to appeal to them to have a purpose. That's not just in reference to this theme, either — I remember a lot of AFOLs similarly scoffing at the prospects of LEGO Minecraft ever since that first passed the LEGO Cuusoo review.

If LEGO is going to retain their incredible brand strength with kids they need to stay attentive to what kids these days are enjoying — even the things that adults dismiss as fads that'll never last. Because whether kids will enjoy these things in the future doesn't diminish whether kids enjoy them in the present.

Not strictly LEGO-related, but today I took a walk to the park because the weather was nice. As I was passing by the playground, I saw a bunch of kids running around with Angry Birds plushies. Yet another reminder that this franchise has a lot more life in it than many LEGO fans are willing to give it credit for. There's a lot of Angry Birds merchandise out there, and clearly someone's buying it.

So, correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm guessing they're taking the same route for this series as with the last Hero Factory movie, by which I mean they've apparently got the production staff doing at least some of the voice acting instead of actually hiring professional voice actors. That would explain why none of the actor names were recognizeable, and it lends more evidence to my growing suspicion that the budget for this production (and the Bionicle reboot in general) is really low.

It doesn't seem like that to me at all. Even though none of the voice actors were names I recognized, I did check IMDB and their credits are generally all in voice acting (albeit, in many cases, for shows that didn't air in the United States) rather than in other areas of TV production. So I imagine they were hired specifically for voice acting, rather than as storyboarders or animators or anything like that.

It's actually the bunny's birthday, not Andrea's!

The supermarket set is fantastic, with lots of great food including fruits and veggies (watermelon!), roast turkey, and even a sushi bar! The shopping cart is a nice detail, and I love that the bulletin board has flyers for the Adventure Camp and the Amusement Park!

I don't like the Cupcake Cafe. It looks alright, but it's huge! Counting the outdoor seating area, it's wider than a modular building!

The Adventure Camp sets are the Friends sets that I love the most. Maybe it's from having been to summer camp so many times, but I love sets like this that encourage a love of the outdoors.

The Puppy Daycare set looks great, but I'm not quite convinced that recolor of Flamy the Fox from LEGO Elves is actually a dog.

I like the new riding club, both in terms of the architecture and the two new horses "Spice" and "Ninja"!

The Amusement Park series is exciting, although I'm a bit underwhelmed by the roller coaster. I do love that the space ride has Classic Space logos! The hot dog van is fantastic and packed with humor!

I was not expecting more Pop Star sets this year, but I'm impressed with the two there are. The Villa is a great place for Livi to get away from the hectic life of being a famous superstar, with a security camera to keep out the paparazzi, and some really ritzy taste in architecture, furnishing, and fixtures. A great place for Livi and Andrea to have a romantic? getaway.

I have no love for Palace Pets. They are creatures that exist purely for the sake of merchandise, and even then have no reason to exist because most of these princesses already have perfectly good pets/animal companions without having to make up weird new ones. It's a transparent Littlest Pet Shop knock-off. And the raccoon is blue. FOR SHAME.

I'm not a big fan of the Disney Princess theme in general, since it tends to be somewhat simplistic and seems to ignore the real spirit of the movies in favor of a sanitized portrayal of "the magical life of a princess". But the set with Belle and the Beast is alright, and I love all the Beast's charming little servants! It's been years since I've seen the movie but I can remember a lot of them by name. The real standout sets in the Disney Princess theme are always the Frozen sets, particularly Arendelle Castle Celebration. Beautiful architecture, creative building techniques, and charming party decor.

Overall, none of these sets are really on my wish list so far. But we'll see if that changes as the year goes on.

 

Disney has dethroned LEGO as the world's most powerful brand, according to this year's rankings by brand strategy and valuation consultancy Brand Finance. A lot of this is chalked up to the surging popularity of Star Wars media and merchandise in the wake of the movie Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

Except that Lego made the Force awakens sets, so not sure how this works. The companies practically have a collaborative relationship at this point.

 

A collaborative relationship doesn't mean the brands are equally powerful. And while LEGO Star Wars brand could be considered a part of both brands, Star Wars as a whole is not.

 

It does sound like a rather peculiar choice for a school's colors, though.

The contents of this set are from Season 6, which isn't available yet on Netflix or DVD and hasn't even aired in the United States, so even if you had been following the show you'd be forgiven for not really being familiar with this set's context.

I've actually watched all of seasons 1-5. I even reviewed seasons 1-3 on this very website, so... Sorry. 

 

But I'm always behind the ball on new Ninjago seasons - they always seem to come out faster than I think they should. Since I don't watch TV at all, I have no reference point about when to start hunting for videos except for BZPower comments.

 

As for the school colors... I have no idea. It wasn't my decision. I guess all of the good color combos were taken.

 

Ah, alright, so you are caught up. I agree it can be frustrating to try and keep track of when new episodes air. Cartoon Network often doesn't promote the new episodes really far ahead of time.

Currently, season 6 hasn't aired in the United States, but it's aired in some other countries. I choose to wait until they air in the United States to watch them, even though that means navigating a minefield of spoilers on social media sometimes.

Rest assured that when I get word on when Season 6 will air here in the U.S. I'll be reporting it to BZPower news right away!

I do wonder how netflix are gonna handle the series they're making. I wonder if they're gonna take cues from the earlier direct-to-DVD films. I also wonder if netflix are picking up the series to appeal to people's nostalgia. I mean they got Peewee Herman and full house so I wonder if they're gonna try and pull off a nostalgia thing with bionicle.

Some of Netflix's original series are definitely designed to capitalize on nostalgia. Others, including some of their kids' series like Dinotrux, are much more recent properties that don't have nearly the same amount of nostalgic appeal. I have a feeling Bionicle falls somewhere in between. I have no doubt they looked at the viewership numbers of the previous Bionicle movies when deciding whether to carry the series, but it seems from the recent trailer like it is going to be doing its own thing rather than banking on people's nostalgia for and recognition of the original movies.

But brown on orange...ugh. I understand that some people really like that color scheme - one of my high schools used it for its colors, but I always found it ugly.

Orange and brown is basically a monochromatic color scheme much like Visorak Boggarak's, since brown is effectively just a shade of orange. I think it suits these sets just fine by making them look sort of rusty but still visually striking. It does sound like a rather peculiar choice for a school's colors, though.

You should watch some LEGO Ninjago at some point! If you end up getting Netflix to watch The Journey to One, the two-part LEGO Ninjago TV pilot and the first three seasons are all available on Netflix as well. I imagine seasons four and five will be added sometime this year. It's a pretty affordable option compared to buying the DVDs.

The contents of this set are from Season 6, which isn't available yet on Netflix or DVD and hasn't even aired in the United States, so even if you had been following the show you'd be forgiven for not really being familiar with this set's context.

I picked the Mask of Water (Gali) and Unity Mask of Jungle (Lewa). The Masks of Creation and Control are awesome too, but I feel like the Toa masks excel at conveying the personalities of the characters who wear them. And those two happen to be my favorite Toa masks from this year and last. Also worn by my favorite Toa from this year and last, but I'm not sure entirely whether I like the Toa more because of their masks or like the masks more because of their wearers. Probably a little bit of both.

The Mask of Water is not as similar to Gali's G1 masks as some other 2015 masks like the Mask of Stone, Mask of Ice, and Mask of Earth. But in my opinion, in the places where it doesn't reflect them, it surpasses them — and other masks worn by previous Toa of Water, for that matter. It feels feminine without feeling more like a face than a mask, and despite being streamlined it has an intensity to its shape that keeps it from looking placid. Sadly, the Unity Mask of Water is not as good in my opinion. Aesthetically, it looks very nice, but functionally, the eye holes don't line up very well with the eyes, which makes a Toa wearing this mask less photogenic.

I liked the Mask of Jungle as well, both in terms of some of the things it maintained from Lewa's classic masks (like the dome-shaped forehead and the air vents on the cheeks that form a sort of grin) as well as some of the things that it changed (like the way the eye holes of the classic Kanohi Miru were so far from the face that they hardly lined up from any angles except a direct front view). The Unity Mask of Jungle stays true to this 2015 design but makes it even more intense, and in some respects (like the forehead shape and the narrower eye holes) more Miru-like. Its pointed jawline suits Lewa's youthful spirit, and its faster-looking angles and curves suit a character who lives for the thrill of adventure and leaps headlong into action. Plus it has some of the brilliant design traits that it shares with the other Unity Masks of Power, like the use of Nuva Symbols on the brow and elemental crystal motifs along the top edge — which are IMO a much more elegant way of signifying an upgrade than the squishy-looking curves of the 2002 Kanohi Nuva.

Aquasharks was a good theme, didn't it use a lot of big moulded pieces?

I really liked the Aquazone theme, the sets from that theme are fantastic

Yeah, Aquazone was one of my childhood favorite themes. But it did use a lot of large molded pieces, which is part of why some of the sets don't hold up quite so well in hindsight. At the time I loved all the big cockpit and window pieces, but it's been years since I've felt inspired to use any of them in MOCs.

Anyways thanks for the feedback, it is always much appreciated!

No problem! I'm glad I'm not the only one here who's really interested in Ninjago!

...Does anyone know if TRU would have a problem with an adult attending without a child? I really want those pieces.

I have been to these building events without any problem in the past, and so have other adults in some of the Facebook groups I'm in. Policies and how they're enforced might vary from store to store (in some cases I hear adults have to wait until all the children in line have a chance to build, which is probably a good policy for stores to have), but from what I've heard there tend to be more than enough sets for everyone who arrives on time.

Good review! When this set was revealed, I couldn't help but be reminded of the Aquasharkshttp:// theme which I loved growing up. However, the design language of this set is a lot less cartoony, the bombing function makes it more impressive on a technical level, and 221 pieces for $20 USD is a much better value than its closest Aquasharks counterpart, 6155 Deep Sea Predator (which had just 103 pieces for $22 USD, and one fewer figure as well).

The pirate motifs that decorate all the sky pirate vehicles, such as flintlock pistols, barrels, cutlasses, bones, treasure chests, and anchors add a lot of humor while also helping to tie them together with a ramshackle aesthetic and a sort of steampunk color scheme. All things considered, though, the sky pirate vehicles might be more accurately described as dieselpunk, especially ones like this one that use jet engines instead of balloons or propellors. The shark tooth stickers on the underside of the cockpit really drive home the "shark" concept.

Lloyd's jetpack is neat, though it's kind of funny that the flames are bigger than the entirety of the jetpack! It's not a major motivation for me to get this set, though, unlike the Sky Shark itself, and it's kind of a shame that him having the jetpack in this set means that he doesn't have the new shoulder armor that came out this wave. Strangely, the Skybound version of Lloyd doesn't have it in either of his other appearances this year, either! This is, however, the only Skybound set that includes Lloyd with his full mask/headwrap.

The biggest disadvantage I see to this set is that it has no really exclusive minifigures, and even the "trapped Kai" element in the sword can also be obtained in The Green NRG Dragon this summer. But I think it still stands out as a great set on the merits of the vehicle itself. I haven't firmly decided whether to get this set myself. It might depend on what kinds of sales or deals I see, since it's not as high on my wish list as Jay's Elemental Dragon or Tiger Widow Island. Still, it does more for me than the similarly-priced Ninja Bike Chase.

Thanks so much for the review!