Hmm. Well, color me surprised. One thing I will say, though, is that quite a few people seem to enjoy it because of the sacrifice towards the end, which is something else in its own right entirely.
Regardless, my point still stands, being that a consistent sense of dread simply doesn’t continually capture interest because it becomes predictable. If nothing else, sales fell drastically in 2008 when they tried to pull the same thing once more (and I’m pretty sure they were falling in 2007 as well, but I digress). Bionicle has never been able to consistently keep enough fans involved without a significant amount of world building, something that I think should be indicative of a future without it.
Actually, they had consistent world-building throughout both shows. In fact, LOK Season 2, which I have already explained was one of the bad ones, had probably the most world-building out of either show, as it explained the mechanics behind many concepts behind the show, and even answered a few questions that we hadn’t thought to ask, while expanding the mythos in a completely unique direction with the introduction of two rather… important… characters.
I may be wrong, of course, but I honestly get the impression from the way you phrased that response that you view world-building as the primary ‘interesting’ point in a story, with the characters and plot as secondary elements. I’m not actually sure the Avatar series is for you if that is the case, as while it does have worldbuilding in spades, that is secondary to the plot, which is in turn secondary to and driven by the characters.
Speaking as a writer, those should always be the priorities, and with the exception of certain epics, (Lord Of The Rings) putting the world first generally is not a good move. Indeed, while Bionicle G1 had an absolutely fantastic sense of World-Building, as you’ve said, it was ultimately driven by the story first, world second, and characters third.
Similarly, while G2 seems to be putting characters before world this time, I think the plot is still the dominant factor - so long as that’s good, then G2 will do fine. While perhaps simple at the moment, I have seen nothing to suggest how well that aspect will fare in the long run, good or bad. I think that more than anything is what is compelling me to keep an eye on it.
In short: While you have a right to your opinions, I honestly don’t think you’ll find much to like in media if you really believe the Worldbuilding to be the primary point of interest. G2 is still based most heavily in story, which strikes me as promising.
And just for the record, I hated 2006 (though my opinion has softened considerably over time) and love 2007 - and not just for Matoro’s sacrifice, though that certainly contributed a bit.
I’m certainly not opposed to character/plot as taking the main role in a story, but it needs to be well done in order to do so, and I’m generally more wary of stories that choose to focus on that because they seem to screw it up most often. If Avatar/LoK does do it well, then more power to it, that’s fabulous. I’ve enjoyed plenty of stories that have focused mostly on character development (the Ace Attorney series being one), as well as those focusing on world building. Really, all I want is for the story to do what it does well.
All of this, in turn, is why I’m so skeptical about G2 Bionicle, because characterization is something that Bionicle has rarely done particularly well, and focusing on that over world building seems like a mistake.
Ok MT I have a bone to pick with you. You keep citing MNOG (as a whole) as a source of world building… but MNOG wasnt even done at this point of the year in 2001. Also if you pull the “but you could explore Ta-koro’s out skirts and talk to kapura and see Tahu! Thats more world building than what we have now!” argument on me I swear I will find you and kill you! Looking at the outskirts of one village and talking to one character and watching one cutscene does not a good world building make. Also, were getting books this year BOOKS! I rest my case.
Again, though, you’re missing my point - both the world and characters are secondary to the plot progression with Bionicle, and while which of the two is focused on more will have a definite impact, neither are end-all-be-alls to determining the line’s overall quality.
[quote=“MT_Zehvor, post:61, topic:7428”]
Is it bad that I laughed a little?
[/quote]Alright, I’m going to be completely honest.
Most of us were pretty young during BIONICLE’s run, I myself being a teenager then. This was pretty much the first remotely complex story I had even gotten into, and that’s even more true for 70% of the fan base. In the end, however, LEGO is a toy company – they know very little about complex stories, and even if they did they probably don’t want to do it.
Greg Farshtey is a pretty good author, and Matoro’s sacrifice was very well-written, however, once again, you’re right – most other story lines have much more numerous and even more tragic sacrifices. For most of us, when we first saw it, it was pretty much all we had.
Since you seem pretty disappointed with BIONICLE as a whole, may I ask why you’re a fan in the first place? It seems like you would want to gravitate towards more complex stories.
Resting your case that quickly? That’s…moderately disappointing.
Let’s do a bit of research so we’re actually comparing situations fairly. Bionicle sets weren’t actually released here in the grand ole’ US of A until mid 2001. At the point where the sets were actually released, MNOG had been updated all the way until the Nui Rama hive section. By 4 months after the sets release (roughly where we are now), MNOG had been completed.
Even if you use the European release date for the sets, by 4 months in, we were into Po-Koro (I believe, little less sure on that one). By contrast, there’s been nothing even comparable to MNOG 4 months after the release of the first G2 Bionicle sets. So, no, not a fair comparison in the slightest.
I’d argue that isn’t necessarily the case, as both world building and character development are often times a mechanism for getting the viewer interested in the plot to begin with. One might almost view them (particularly world building) as a gateway to the plot in the first place.
I think I covered this a bit in the OP, but basically establishing an interesting world is what got quite a few people (including myself) interested in the actual narrative in the first place.
At the end of the day, very few things are a be all end all to a story’s quality, but much like losing your starting quarterback for the rest of the season in the first game, choosing to ignore what you’ve arguably done best in the past is an excellent predictor that things will go poorly in the future.
I certainly enjoyed it, though I’d like to also think I can also point out what the stories I enjoyed did poorly as well. There are plenty of things that got me interested in Bionicle as a kid; the sets themselves, the mystery that the world offered, the feeling of being almost an explorer discovering an engaging new land. All of that got me interested in the storyline itself, which I enjoyed to varying degrees up until the end of 2006, when my interest in things slowly began to dip as more and more (at least, in my opinion) questionable decisions were made and the storyline got more and more convoluted.
I suppose you’re welcome to “question” my enjoyment of it all you want, but I think it’s fairly obvious by the simple fact that I’ve been around the series since it began and that I’ve been active on Bionicle related forums for the past 8 years that, if nothing else, I have some stake in the quality of the series.
Hey. Hey MT forgot about the Mctoran did ya? Also I’m talking about from the beginning of the year which was when G1’s story started we were never talking about the sets. so what you just said it well… wrong and I hate using absolutes.
Then, again, even by that extremely arbitrary standard, just measure where we were 4 months into the storyline. We had up to Po-Koro in MNOG, and we’re nowhere close to anywhere near that in G2.
…because I literally already said
This topic is pretty clearly nothing but opinion, and I’m not quite sure where you’re getting that I think my opinion is absolute fact when I’ve stated multiple times that this topic is simply what I personally believe. Heck, I already mentioned that if world building wasn’t your thing, then none of this would likely bother you at all.
I guess I can restate it on the offhand chance that people still somehow miss this; this is all my subjective opinion (as is literally any assessment of a story’s quality), and it’s not an absolute fact.
MT, did you forget he said this? Best point he made here IMO.
Everyone brings up Matoro’s sacrifice as if it were this noble thing. Does nobody remember Lhikan? He was the first character to die in G1, but nobody remembers him. Granted, we knew Matoro better, but still.
If we’re going to bring up the McToran, then we might as well count that clear Hau at NYCC.
Excuse my french, but that is the single most bass-ackwards thing I have had the displeasure to see in a long time. In any good story - heck, in any even moderately decent story, the character development is there for the sake of the character development! The story supports and is driven by this, and the world is the backbone that gives context to all of this. That does mean that the world-building is indeed important, but it is not and should rarely (if ever) be the primary focus. Ideally, one would achieve a perfect balance of the three - and that is what makes for great stories such as Avatar, Harry Potter, ect.
I frankly don’t expect Bionicle to achieve that balance. The characters, while good, ended up being shortchanged the most overall, and this time it seems world-building is getting the least attention. As I said in my original post, while I do agree that Lego seems better with worldbuilding than character development and that will likely have a negative impact on G2, I don’t believe either factor is big enough in the long run to make G2 “terrible.” Sure, it won’t be as good as G1, but it can still be good on its own merits if the plot is at least decent.
Furthermore, what I am saying here is that Bionicle is somewhat of a special case, given who’s producing it. In almost every other context and in the absence of that “ideal balance” I mentioned before, I would rate the characters as the most important attribute to focus on, followed by story and then by world-building.
well with a title like
“why the new Bionicle story will be terrible”
can you really blame people?
maybe an “I think” in there somewhere would have helped show it was an opinion piece.
[quote=“ThisIsAnUnusualUsername, post:73, topic:7428”]
If we’re going to bring up the McToran, then we might as well count that clear Hau at NYCC.
[/quote]considering the mctoran made up most of mnog, and were actual characters, no, not really. they actually had story significance.
and were more than just a mask.
you’re comparing kohli balls to zamor spheres.
I don’t think so. The point was that Zamor spheres have a ton of story significance, like the Mctoran, while Kholli balls are largely meaningless, like the clear Hau
)