Since Tahu and Kopaka have been fleshed out on a previous episode, I have a few thoughts for Pohatu and Lewa that could serve as a base layer for their backstories. I mentioned a bit of them on youtube, but this seems like a better place to bring it up.
Pohatu/Nilkuu:
Nilkuu could be a nomad with Ahkmou, traveling the desert. Due to the harsh conditions, they learn to defend themselves, but not in a formal way of fighting like Narmoto or Izotor. One day he meets Hewkii who says he’s from one of the permanent villages of the region. He persuades Nilkuu to settle down in the village, where he could make a better living. Hewkii would have originally been a nomad, but made a name for himself as an athlete of <G3 Kohli/sport>.
Nilkuu agrees and becomes a simple mahi herder. Ahkmou would feel betrayed, and would eventually come back as a villain with his gang (as was mentioned in a previous podcast). Nilkuu’s herding staff could become his toa weapon. As for personality, I see his normally easy-going, jovial demeanor having a bit of his G2 seriousness to turn it into more of a dry humor/wisecracks.
Lewa/Vizuna:
Vizuna could be a cartographer, due to the wind/sky aspects making for great aerial views. She could be in it more for the freedom of adventure and exploring the island that the job gives her. Kongu could be a fellow cartographer that tries to focus her on her work (Duty). Her spritely demeanor would carry over as a toa and she would be excited for the new adventures she could have.
She could also have some tie in with the Storm region that was fleshed out in the most recent episode. She could be curious about this region that they stay away from, and wants to eventually graph it, since it’s left out of their archives. As Lewa, she may be the one to bring it up for the toa to learn about when it’s time to bring Voriki into the story.
One other detail:
I had been thinking about the whole “size of Artakha” discussion that was briefly brought up, and I have some ideas about that. Crunching some numbers shows that Texas actually would be a fairly accurate size for the 2 week walk from end to end. With an average walking speed of 3.1 mph (5 km/h) and walking about 16 hours a day, the average distance walked could be 49.6 miles (79.82 km).
I decided to detail this a bit more, and came up with a unit of measurement that the matoran can use (similar to the bio/mio units in G1). The unit is called the nui, and acts as the foot/meter of their world. It is equal to 3.818 ft (1.164 m).
The kininui (knui) is 10,000 nui and is equal to 0.496 miles (0.798 km). So a day of walking would be about 100 knui using the 49.6 miles. For the 2 week trek, it’s about 694.4 miles (1117.53 km) which would convert to 1400 knui.
So there’s a nice rounded number for a standard day’s walking and the total island length. I also got estimates for each region lengths, but I’ll stop for now. Let me know what you think of all this.