Aanchir

I think I'm now ready to say Rey is my favorite Star Wars buildable figure yet. Now, Rey isn't flawless. Her head sculpt would be much more useful without any kind of headgear. She doesn't have coverings on the back of her legs, or a holster for her pistol (though these two things are very easy to fix). She also doesn't have a functioning blaster. Nevertheless, these are fairly minor flaws, and they are ameliorated by the fact that she is being sold at the $20 price point, the lowest price point for these figures.

Ikir is nice, although its color scheme is not as unified as Uxar's, in my opinion. It frustrates me that the bright orange crystal blades don't match either the Tr. Flu. Reddish Orange accents or the Tr. Red/Tr. Yellow flame pieces. This is a problem on both Ikir and Tahu. I know they can't be a perfect match in terms of transparency due to them being molded in soft polypropylene rather than hard polycarbonate, but they could at least match better in terms of hue. The crystal blades on Lewa/Uxar, Pohatu/Ketar, Gali, and Kopaka appear to match the sets' other colors a lot better.
 

Overall, I think Uxar pulls off the "flying creature" vibe better than Ikir, but perhaps once I have the sets I will feel differently. Ikir's extra wing and talon articulation could help swing things in its favor.

But they use the friction extender pieces anyway.

 

Using longer bone pieces would solve two problems - the short limbs and the use of the extender pieces. That piece is mostly equivalent to one pinhole length; using a 1-longer hip piece on both Gali and Lewa and getting rid of that piece would result in a better look, and Gali could use a 2-longer shin piece and get rid of those ankle pieces as well.

 

They both could use a 1-longer forearm as well.

The extender pieces are being used for friction, not length. Chances are the reason all these sets use them in the hips and ankles is so that you can keep the creatures attached to the Toa without the joints sagging from having to support the weight of two sets. It's the same reason 2004–2007 Bionicle titan sets used the old style of friction joint. There are few sets that use the friction joint strictly for length. And while it might not seem like a set needs the extra friction right when it comes out of the box, time and play can take a toll on Bionicle joints. The LEGO Group has a number of tests they do to ensure the stability of a model, including a "heat test" where they put the model in an oven to simulate a year in direct sunlight, which shows them any weak spots in a model's design.

And LEGO definitely isn't afraid of using longer beam pieces. Tahu's got 6M beams in his lower legs and 7M beams in his upper legs, which is part of what makes his upper legs look so long and lanky. Kopaka uses 6M beams for his upper and lower legs, Onua uses 6M beams for his lower legs, and Gali uses 6M beams for her upper legs. In several of these sets the lower leg beams are actually brand-new recolors for these parts, so it doesn't seem likely that the LEGO Group was trying to cut costs by using beams in these sizes.

Frankly, I think the issue with these sets isn't that the legs are too short, but that the torsos are too long. I was quite happy with the proportions of the 2015 sets, but these ones increase the length of the torsos by two modules, and on the smaller sets, also raise the shoulders up an additional module. I can sort of understand why it was done, but it still seems like a poor choice to me. I saw a comparison photo of the 2015 and 2016 Pohatu on Facebook yesterday, and the 2016 version just looks weird and stretched compared to his shorter and stockier 2015 counterpart.

 

Most of the Glatorian series . I don't really know why it just never hit me . I could never understand what was so special about them

Most of the Glatorian series . I don't really know why it just never hit me . I could never understand what was so special about them

A lot of people hate the Glatorian sets. I'm not sure what's overrated about them.

Personally I think that they're very underrated because of the fact that so many people hate them for their inika builds and flimsy plastic. 

That's another issue with terms like "overrated" or "underrated". It's based on the assumption that a lot of people really like or dislike a particular thing, when really it's easy to hear just a few people saying something and mistakenly assume it's widespread, or not hear anybody saying something and assume it's inconsequential. I've known plenty of AFOLs who have no clue how popular themes like Ninjago, Bionicle, Friends, and Minecraft are because people in their immediate circle of friends and colleagues don't like them. Sometimes, the narrative you're used to hearing doesn't actually reflect popular opinion in the community as a whole.

I find it's a lot easier to judge sets on their individual merits, and agree or disagree with people on an individual basis, than to worry about what the community as a whole thinks about particular sets.

I'd say Korgot is the most overrated of the current wave. I just don't get how people can ignore the chest gun. 

I don't ignore it, I think it's one of the things that makes the set cool and unique. I imagine many other people who like the set feel the same way. It's not a flawless set, though — I feel like the color scheme could use more contrast.

In general, I don't like the term "overrated". It always feels to me like a way of policing the things other people like. Obviously, different people like different things. It's fine to dislike something even if a lot of other people like it. But conversely, it's fine for a lot of other people to like something even if you dislike it. I think a lot of the faults being pointed out in this thread are valid, but if there are people who aren't bothered by those faults, then their love of those sets is still just as valid.

I do think that there are times when people should try and be more mindful of a set's faults. Sometimes people criticize newer sets for faults that were just as applicable to the sets they grew up loving. Like criticizing the width of the Toa Inika shoulders while praising the Toa Metru whose shoulders were pretty much just as wide. Or complaining about the 2015 Toa builds being too simple while praising the much simpler Toa Hagah. As long as you're aware of a set's faults, though, it's your call whether they make you like the set any less.

And it's also good to remember that sometimes the reasons you like or dislike a set are just personal preference and not things that are objectively "right" or "wrong" about it. I personally don't like how tall the 2016 Onua set is because I prefer him to be shorter and more muscular, but that doesn't make it a bad set. It just doesn't fit with how I choose to see the character. I can certainly understand why some people like him as much or more than the 2015 version.

OK-ish review, though I'm really surprised how much you found to complain about. IMO, the upper arm and lower leg construction are both beautiful and brilliant. I don't see how the kneecap ruins its "flow".

I actually think the new mask looks quite a lot like the classic Miru, arguably more so than the Mask of Jungle already did due to the eyeholes being longer and the "grin" being more pronounced. Of course, its jaw is less squared off, but that's not a feature that ever made that much sense for the youthful Lewa anyway. I think a pointier jaw suits him.

I will agree that the feet look too tall, which is a problem with all the 2016 Toa. A number of people I know are getting tired of this foot piece and want it to just go away, and while I'm not in that camp, I do agree that a friction joint just throws off its proportions. Of course, without the friction joint, his legs wouldn't really be long enough for the torso. I'm still a bit bothered by how long these Toa's torsos are... it seems to create more problems than it solves.

It's rather bizarre how the instructions have you assemble the set's lower arms. It seems like just plain common sense to rotate the lower arm beam ninety degrees so the elbow has more backwards-and-forwards motion than side-to-side motion. I know I'll be doing that when I get the set.

I do think that Lewa could use some more contrasting color, preferably some more Bright Yellow like Uxar uses. Even though he's without a doubt the most coherent-looking of the new Toa, his colors don't really "pop" the way Gali's do. Even Tahu's got some brilliant Dark Azur accents.

In spite of all these faults, Lewa is still my favorite of the new Toa designs, and looks fantastic both on his own and combined with his creature. I look forward to adding him to my collection.

 

 

Although it's dual colored, there are some trans green parts near the bottom of the mask, making me think it's entirely trans bright green with the silver painted on.

I thought all of these head pieces were dual-injected (if that's the term). Is that not the case?

Eh, maybe, I'm not 100% sure. What I find odd is that there are obvious bits of trans green at the bottom corners of the helmet, as well as around the nose section. But maybe that's how the dual injection works?

Yeah, some random variability is pretty much inevitable with any co-injected/blended parts. The masks from the Protector sets and the golden masks from the Skull Army sets were the same way.

Uxar is my favorite of the creatures from what I've seen. The wings are not as posable as Ikir's, but the overall look is more impressive, IMO. Also, the color scheme feels more organized — Ikir's crystal blade and flame elements don't really match any of the other parts of its build (except the silver hilts of the crystal blades matching its feet), but Uxar's wings are in colors that are repeated throughout the design. It's really nice that the set included some System tiles to add a little bit more detail instead of just leaving the studs of the wings exposed.

It's kind of surprising that the legs and stinger are Dark Stone Grey, since that's a new color for that talon element, and Silver Metallic (as used in last year's Lewa, Skull Scorpio, and Captain Phasma) would have fit the color scheme just as well. It doesn't hurt the color scheme, it just seems like an unusual choice for a recolor. The recolored 4M beams, on the other hand, are VERY appealing both in terms of their MOCing value and the look they give the set.

I love Uxar's Bright Yellow accents, and wish the 2016 Lewa had more of them besides just cross axles. The contrast with the green is not quite as striking as Tahu's Dark Azur or Gali's Bright Orange, but it still makes the color scheme a little less mundane and monochrome. It also echoes the Flame Yellowish Orange parts of last year's Lewa and the Protector of Jungle.

Thanks for the review! I look forward to your Lewa review!

By "don't reproduce" I meant "can't reproduce". Should've worded it like that from the start.

 

Are you claiming that there are certain roles or traits that are inherently tied to one gender or another?

No, just that society often assigns particular roles to particular genders, and expects particular traits from them. For the most part, gender is a social construct, not a biological one. And different societies will associate different things with different genders. In one society, it might be considered strange for women to hold certain jobs, wear certain clothes, or act a certain way that is considered normal for women in another society.

Even if you phrase it as "can't reproduce" things fall apart rather quickly. Post-menopausal women cannot reproduce, does that mean they don't have gender? What about a dog who has been spayed or neutered? What about people who are sterile their whole lives for other reasons? Can they never consider themselves men or women? Needless to say, gender is a wholly separate beast from reproduction.

Prior to the 1950s, it was even rare to use the word "gender" in reference to things other than language (i.e. how pronouns have genders, and lots of common nouns have genders in languages like Latin). The word urbs (Latin for "city") is a feminine noun, but that doesn't mean a city has female reproductive organs. Just that the society that coined that word chose to assign the feminine gender to it, thereby associating it with the abstract notion of womanhood. And that's the thing about gender — it IS abstract, not about what reproductive capabilities you do or don't have.

 

 

 

Hmm, so many great places...

 

I'm going to go with Ga-Koro. Pleasant beaches, tropical atmosphere, and all the fiiiiiiine ladies.

Were the "ladies" notessentially genderless robots, you could have persuaded me.

 

I think the phrase you meant is "sexless" since though they lack physical characteristics, matoran /do/ have a notable sense of gender, but i digress.

 

Since they don't reproduce and their genders are never referred to in-story except for pronouns, which might have been done for the ease of the reader, I'd say that's debatable.

I have never reproduced, and people rarely refer to my gender except for pronouns. Does that mean I'm genderless?

The fact that you're even bringing up reproduction suggests to me that you completely missed Rahkshi Lalonde's point. Reproduction is tied to a person's sex, not their gender. Sex=physical, biological differences between male and female organisms. Gender=characteristics of masculinity or femininity as they apply to one's sense of identity, roles, and social structures.

You can definitely have too many bright colors in my book. That's part of why I think the 2001 Tahu's colors look so much better than the 2010 (Stars) version's — the 2010 version didn't have any black to help tone down the other colors.

I will agree that the orange on Gali looks super-sweet, though I didn't think of it as replacing the gunmetal (Titanium Metallic). To me it feels more like the Transparent Blue replaced the 2015 version's Titanium Metallic and the Bright Orange replaced the 2015 version's Bright Yellow.

Well, as far as 2015 is concerned, the ideal location for playsets would be the City of the Mask Makers. You could have a big set with the Great Forge (featuring Skull Grinder and Skull Basher) and smaller sets focusing on Skull Scorpio's graveyard, Skull Slicer's arena, and the Skull Warriors' city gate. The individual temples/shrines where the Toa got their golden masks could also make for fun settings. The Temple of Time looks nice, but there hasn't been much conflict there so far, which might limit its play potential a bit.

Really, one of the saddest things about not having G2 Bionicle playsets is that there are all these beautifully designed locations that we might never get to see depicted physically.

I see they're going the "absurd amounts of Kryptonite" route of getting around the whole "Superman is superhuman, and Batman is emphatically not" thing.

 

I mean, that still doesn't change the fact that Superman could just pick up a sizeable rock and drop it on Batman from a safe distance. Or kill Batman with laser vision from a safe distance. Or really use any of his multitude of powers Batman doesn't have and kill Batman from a distance, because in the end, Superman is superhuman, Batman isn't, stop trying to make convoluted explanations for why Batman could totally hold his own, dweebs.

The key issue that tends to help even the odds in most Batman vs. Superman stories I've seen is that Superman doesn't WANT to use his powers to hurt Batman. Whereas Batman is cynical and sees Superman as a threat, Superman is idealistic and sees Batman as a good but misguided person who is just fighting for what he thinks is right.

In other words, Superman could defeat Batman but ordinarily wouldn't, whereas Batman would defeat Superman but ordinarily couldn't. Thus, things usually end up with a stalemate until Batman and Superman get over their differences and join forces.

 

 

The new torso piece is absolute rubbish, what was wrong with the old one that needed to be replaced?

 

As many G2 haters will tell you, the old one was smooth. That's bad, apparently.

I kinda feel bad for TLG. First people want more detailed pieces that remind them of G1, but when we do get them, they dislike 'em.

Different people, different opinions. If you listen only to the people who complain the loudest, then of course the Bionicle fandom is going to seem fickle or contradictory, because no set is ever going to be able to please everybody.

Of course, there's also another factor, which is that adding more detail willy-nilly doesn't necessarily make things more like G1. The Autobots from the Transformers film franchise are packed with detail, but I don't think you'll find a lot of people confusing them for G1 Toa. There are specific ways different series use detail that set them apart from one another.

When comparing the new Toa to G1 Bionicle, the new Toa have 23 pistons on their torsos alone (counting the torso shell and the unity piece on their backs). There aren't any G1 Toa that can be said for. The 2008 version of Onua had just 12 pistons on his torso, and most had far fewer. The Toa Metru had just 23 pistons in their entire bodies. Put too many pistons on a design and it can start to feel like meaningless decoration rather than functional mechanisms.

Now, I'm not sure how many people complaining about the 2015 sets care about this distinction and how many simply believe that "more detail=better". But I'm sure that just as there are people who like this year's Toa and dislike next year's, or who like next year's and dislike this year's, there are also people who like or dislike the Toa from both years, and many will have different reasons for feeling that way.

Personally, I like some of the 2016 Toa (particularly Lewa and Gali), but I don't like any of the 2016 Toa individually as much as I liked the 2015 Toa in general. I feel like it's much easier to single out things I DON'T like about the 2016 Toa than about their 2015 counterparts.

 

The link in the article appears to be malformed. The correct link is:

http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2015/12/17/lego-reveals-final-building-sets-for-batman-v-superman-dawn-of-justice/

Fixed, thanks for catching that. Apparently I inadvertently doubled one of my html "href" tags. I need to get in the habit of testing all my links in future news stories.

 

I'm not a fan of blended silver masks. Especially on Tahu and Onua, seeing as they have gold in their sets. Single coloured masks would have been better.

Tahu and Onua's colour schemes look so perfect in 2016. Tahu 2015's colour scheme was a trainwreck, he had silver hands and feet and black and gray bones, his bones should look like lava, not black/gray. Onua looks so much better colour scheme wise in 2016 because he doesn't have as much silver. Blended masks feel more collectible to me and they look like they're filled with POWER 

 

I liked Tahu's 2015 color scheme way better than his 2016 color scheme. His neutral-colored bones, hands, and feet helped balance out the bright colors of his armor, and I liked how his hands and feet matched both each other and the color of his head. The new one's color scheme doesn't bother me too much, though it could use more red in place of some of the gold or Tr. Flu. Reddish Orange. I like the new Dark Azur accents, which do help his other colors "pop". My bigger issue with Tahu is his incoherent textures. I think his textures might have been improved if the add-ons on his shoulders or forearms had been replaced with more of the new crystal add-ons from his legs.

Onua's color scheme was pretty excellent in both versions, though, and I like that we now have so many more Tr. Bright Bluish Violet parts for MOCs.

The Preston Stormer art WAS used, although cropped to a much smaller size, on the "Testimonials" page of the 2010 Hero Factory website. The Furno art also appeared in some videos, if I remember correctly.

Nice work! It's impressive how you were able to use straight, geometric lines to recognizably construct a mask that has so many curved contours in real life.

I adore the way you work with lineweights so much. And the way the characters you draw always look so dynamic while retaining the set-like appearance. Same goes for this one.

 

I also really really love the drill. Looks great. :3

Thank you! Believe it or not I have very little experience working with lineweights like this, but it was something I was encouraged to practice with in my first semester drawing class at my last college. That class is one of the few good things to come out of that particular college experience. In the past I've felt really anxious in most art classes, which was compounded by pressure from my teachers to hold my pencil differently, erase less, etc. The art class at my last college was the first one where I really felt competent and could focus on improving my craft. That was more than two years ago, and I'm glad that experience is finally paying off in the artwork I do for fun.

I'm thinking of going back to my first college to enroll in their bachelor's degree program in studio art, but I'm a bit nervous after my experience at my last college was such a train wreck. But maybe I just need to be more confident in my own abilities? I don't know, this is starting to get off-topic.

I think the drawing is very accurate, but I fail to see how it looks feminine, as you wanted it to. 

I'm sorry I wasn't able to make the drawing recognizably feminine for you. But I didn't want to stray from the set's appearance too much, just highlight the set's slim waist and the curvature of the chest and thighs.

I don't think the drawing ads femininity, but as you mentioned the set does actually have an hourglass figure (very much so after removing the stud shooter). But few Lego figures look like a perfect human shape... I mean even Emmet and Wyldstyle when you think about it share the exact same build!   And that is where this drawing works, it is a spot on depiction of Korgot's set form with only a few modifications to smooth over the CCBS's shells back ends. I can only imagine the work it took to get every piece proportioned and shaped just right to form this sketch, and the effort shows in the final product. 

I wasn't really trying to add femininity, just to bring out the femininity that was already present in the set's appearance. Sort of the same as with my previous Gali drawing. I liked a lot of the Korgot artwork and MOCs I saw after it was revealed the character was female, but it bothered me how pretty much all of them saw the need to deviate from the set's proportions (as if she wasn't believable as a female character otherwise) so this was partly a reaction to that.

The shoulder armor was definitely the hardest part to get right, because it has so much detail and such an unusual shape. In the pencil drawing, the armor on her left shoulder was much larger than the armor on her right shoulder, but I tried to balance it out better before I finally went to ink it. The mask was also difficult, and it's probably still smaller than it should be. The basic CCBS beams and shells tend to be a lot easier to draw, which is one of the many things I like about those pieces.

Thanks for the feedback, everyone!

I know people aren't necessarily wrong for doing this and it's just my personal taste, but it bothers me a bit when people write an extremely elaborate block-of-text backstory for their MOC. Even more so when the backstory is extremely dark and gritty. I prefer a MOC that can mostly tell its own story through its design, not one that needs an entire fanfic just to give you enough context to understand it.

I'd much rather read. "<insert name here> is a stern and sarcastic Toa of Iron who carries an Iron Mace and a disk cannon and wears a Mask of Hardening" than read a lengthy story about how <insert name here> betrayed their entire team, was exiled from their home island, lost both legs, was mutated in a freak lab accident, and now hunts Matoran and sells their parts to the Brotherhood of Makuta in exchange for new weapons.

Apparently it totally escaped my notice when looking at these pics or reading the set descriptions on The Brothers Brick, but apparently Dogshank (the "bigfig" from Tiger Widow Island) is actually a woman.   Amazing!

I'd say Tahu's cheek grooves are fairly iconic to the character. Overall, though, I don't know if it's possible to narrow down one essential trait for every character. Sometimes a set with or without certain iconic traits can still be plenty recognizable as the character if they maintain other traits iconic to that character.

As an example, the 2002 Pohatu Nuva's Kakama Nuva looked next to nothing like the original 2001 Pohatu's Kakama, but thanks to his feet additions, his color scheme, the twin "fingers" on his claws, and the narrow shoulders and wide hips of his upside-down torso build, he still felt fairly recognizable.

By contrast, the 2015 Pohatu doesn't have feet additions, doesn't have two-fingered hands, doesn't especially wide shoulders or narrow hips, and doesn't even have quite the same color scheme as Pohatu sets of the past. But he is shorter than most of his teammates, just as Pohatu has always been, and his mask is instantly recognizable as a new interpretation of the classic Kakama. So it's still possible to look at the character and recognize him as a new version of Pohatu.

The important thing is to just keep trying to build. It's frustrating when you can't come up with any ideas you like, but every attempt and every bit of experience you get makes a difference.

My MOCing tends to come in fits and starts. Some months I'm very productive, others I'm less so. I'd like to get to a point where I can produce at least one MOC I'm proud enough to share every month, but I will probably need a bit more self-discipline to make that happen.

To get out of a MOC block, I feel like it can be useful to experiment with parts or subject matter you don't normally use, since that can sometimes inspire you in ways you hadn't considered. But as I said, I still go through periods of low productivity rather frequently, so I might not be the best person to be giving advice on this.

I definitely appreciated the improved articulation they offered, but the fact that they so few pieces for such a high price was bothersome. Also, the fragility of the joint pieces in 2008–2010 really limited their usability in MOCs. I do think the Agori and Stars did a very good job improving on and arguably helping to redeem the Av-Matoran build by introducing slightly more creative and less formulaic builds and tools. Then the first wave of Hero Factory heroes reverted things right back to a more formulaic build, which is part of why I didn't buy any of those sets.

Thankfully, the CCBS did a lot to improve on sets that size. The 2.0 and 3.0 Hero Factory heroes cost just a dollar more than the Av-Matoran but had twice as many pieces (30 pieces average rather than 14.3). They used more custom builds for their weapons instead of just single-piece blades, they fixed the fragile joint issue that had plagued the previous three years of sets, and they had leg and arm pieces you could actually customize the armor and proportions of instead of each limb being just one single piece. As much grief as the 2.0 and 3.0 Hero Factory heroes tend to get for their somewhat repetitive designs, it was really incredible getting sets with around the same proportions as the Toa Mata but as much articulation as a Toa Inika!

Now that Bionicle's back, I think the CCBS-based Protector sets are probably the best Bionicle villager sets we've had to date, even though they cost around twice as much as a typical pre-2008 Bionicle villager. They have very similar proportions to the Av-Matoran but more diverse torso builds, more complex weapons, and all the customization potential that comes with CCBS. I don't know if the Av-Matoran builds were a necessary step in the evolution of sets this size, but they weren't an entirely negative step either. I hope we get more Protector-esque villager sets in future years of G2 Bionicle.

Good review. I have to admit, when I read the bit about "a Chir brother correcting me" regarding the new and interesting parts, the only thought in my head was "my god, somebody's going to read this many years from now and have absolutely no idea who or what it's referring to". But I don't know, maybe I'll be remembered longer than I give myself credit for. Or people will just be able to tell from context that "oh, I guess there were some users back in the day with obnoxious nitpicking know-it-all tendencies".

I definitely agree the shoulders seem like they'd be much improved just by raising them up one module. I have generally had a harder time getting interested in this set than the Toa, perhaps because it's a character we know little to nothing about, but I love his general "forest spirit" vibe, and have really taken more of an interest after reading this review and VBBN's on Eurobricks. I promise I'll watch the video sometime when I'm not in such a hurry to get to bed.

When did this weird expectation that the Toa would look almost exactly like the original things with only slight changes after becoming better and stronger than the characters in question sneak into everyone else preconceptive minds? I never had that nor cared for that. XD

I didn't have any such idea in G1. I was fine with characters getting new masks that looked different from previous masks, but even then "different" didn't have to mean looking deformed and slightly evil like it did with the tranformation of the Kanohi into the Kanohi Nuva.

Plus, as the years have gone on, I've come to appreciate making changes or improvements while still keeping characters recognizable for who they are, and LEGO has in turn gotten a lot better at that. You no longer have to stretch your brain so far to realize the 2015 Mask of Water is the same character as the 2016 Mask of Water, or that the 2012 Evo is the same character as the 2011 Evo.

To be fair, this wasn't as important with the Kanohi Nuva since the rest of the Toa Nuva's designs were so very similar to their previous forms, almost to the point of redundancy. Their color schemes, proportions, and builds changed very little between 2001 and 2002. Still, I'd be able to look back more fondly at the Kanohi Nuva if they felt more like a natural evolution of the Kanohi and less like an unnatural mutation. The new Mask of Water feels like the 2015 Mask of Water with only subtle proportional changes, plus magical crystals embedded in its forehead! That's a much more aesthetically AND conceptually pleasing upgrade in my eyes than stretching it out and adding a lot of bulging veins, which is basically the simplest way to describe the changes between the original Hau and Hau Nuva.