Here’s my attempt to move the gender conversation away from the art poll.
Feel fee to express your thoughts and opinions, under guidelines of the message board.
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Moving that coversation from the poll - it is so nice. When Great Beings need to solve a problem, they create a solution. 
Well, if talking about the topic: there is no gender differences in physical appearance in the Matoran Universe. That is confirmed. Regarding Roodaka: those Rahksi heads are just armor! I don’t see anything in it. It easily could be male Vortixx armor. If you disagree, then what about Shadowed One? He uses those pieces as chest armor too. Only thing that confuses me is heels. But, I think, it is not “must-have” thing for any Vortixx, it is just accesory Roodaka has. And one last thought: who said that Vortixx males can’t wear heels/have long hair? They are not humans. They have no rules/restrictions (for not knowing a better term) we have and they don’t think like we do.
Regarding Kiina: she is Glatorian. In fact, she is my favorite Glatorian. Glatorian and Agori do have gender differences. Than again, who said that Kiina has that structure of body because of her gender and not because she just looks like that? Maybe there are male Glatorians with similar structure, who knows? That was my opinion, “like” if you agree.
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The Shadowed One uses those Rahkshi heads as part of a larger, multi-piece set of chest armor, like a larger version of the Nuva chestplate. With Roodaka, they’re undeniably used to imply a large chest; just like how she’s the only Bionicle character who has an accentuated rear end, high heels, and hair. Roodaka was the first humanoid woman in Bionicle that wasn’t part of a clone wave, and the set designers blatantly gave her as many stereotypically feminine features as possible as a result. Sure, maybe all Vortixx could have those features, but that doesn’t change the fact that Roodaka (the first Vortixx to show up in the story) was undeniably made as a caricature and the appearance of any other Vortixx is directly inspired by her appearance.
As for Kiina, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with her. If she was given that body structure because she’s a woman, that’s honestly fine, since she looks like any other Glatorian - just with slimmer shoulders.
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I’m unfamiliar with this conversation. Can someone fill me in?
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There was a large conversation stirring about the use of gender and appearances of characters in Bionicle over on the latest art poll. I thought that it was a little inappropriate for it to be there, so I created this topic to redirect those who still wished to talk about it, separate from the art poll. If you wish for a backlog of this conversation to join in or whatever you wish to do, you can go there to see how it started and the conversation that followed.
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Yes, designers tryed to to use stereotypical woman features in Roodaka. But I still see those arguments:
- Her armor meaning is up to us: you see something in it, I don’t, who knows what other people think.
- Vortixx might be unindentical, the same way the Toa do. Some of them can lack heels, hair or have a different armor pieces.
- Fact that she is fiminized is could be solved in the same manner: Roodaka just has armor that makes her look so, and she chose to wear that armor herself - who konows what for - and it is said that males and females in Bionicle do have pcychological differences.
Here goes up one more question: what do we count as detachable armor? Are heels actually a part of her feet or not? Also, do her hear actually grow over time?
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Quick, disconnected thoughts and opinions on the subject:
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Not all female characters need to look excessively feminine, and that’s fine (especially in Bionicle). It is, in fact, fine if there are no traits to make a character look feminine. Gorast is a good example.
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Conversely, for the people saying that there is no reason for anyone in the Matoran Universe to have visibly distinguishable genders, by the same token you could argue that genders needn’t exist in the MU at all. I don’t think there’s an issue either way.
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Just because a character does not have a “feminine” figure, it does not mean they necessarily look like a male. Nokama Metru’s Miramax design is a great example of how her gender is shown through facial expression and movement, rather than any intrinsic elements of her physical design. For Bionicle, this is personally my favorite approach to the issue to see taken.
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Many of the sets were designed by set designers that didn’t know much about the characters - Roodaka was the first female character who the story specifically required being female (Visorak Queen) and was a part of the basic outline for the year, meaning she was likely one of the few sets designed with that in mind.
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I definitely think that fan designs that push the boundaries any further than Roodaka did are unnecessary, as by that point it’s well and truly obvious that the character is female and it starts becoming less about conveying the character and more just… being a bit creepy.
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Beyond those sorts of designs, I have no issue with whatever approach the MoC creator or artist decides. The six finalists for the Helryx art contest varied from “somewhat feminine” to “not at all feminine” and neither approach really impacted my voting. Again, the only thing that would turn me off is the unnecessarily exaggerated stuff.
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I’ll just restate here what I said before.
There is no good reason for Matoran Universe inhabitants to exhibit sexual dimorphism, since they do not sexually reproduce.
Since Spherus Magnans do sexually reproduce, it would make sense for them to exhibit sexual dimorphism. (Kiina)
That being said, this is a story about biomechanical robots with scientifically improbable powers fighting over a scientifically impossible object, inside of a scientifically impossible larger robot.
If Lego wanted to be more inclusive with male/female body types, even in the Matoran Universe, that wouldn’t be the craziest thing to happen in the story. If the canon contests produce a feminine-looking Toa, I don’t really care either way, so long as it matches that character’s current canon description.
And if that doesn’t convince you, you could maybe say that the Great Beings made females smaller and slimmer, to perform better on stealth missions or fit into small spaces. This would be same way they gave females gentler personalities, so as to cause less collateral damage.
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If you’re talking about the MOCs themselves, then, you’re in for an uphill battle. These LEGO pieces are more form fitting to a male figure than a female one. Still, it’s possible to do a feminine proportional body on a moc. Much harder, but possible.
Look, Bionicle characters already don’t even look human. '15 Onua looks like he’s been badly stretched out in MSPaint. All the official female Toa and Matoran look pretty much identical to the male Toa, and very few female characters are noticeably more feminine (by human standards) than the males in any regard. This is established canon and, considering the alien environment Bionicle takes place in, makes perfect sense. G2 even canonized sexual reproduction (seemingly?), as there are child characters; and yet Gali honestly looks like a jacked dude–which is fine because she isn’t human.
Far as I’m concerned, that’s where the discussion begins and ends. Roodaka’s design is clearly meant to convey conventional human femininity (the Pohatu claw arguably represents a butt, the Visorak foot is a ponytail, she has high heels, and the Rahkshi heads…yeah), but this is in service to conveying what sort of character she is to the audience. She’s a femme fatale, a “seducer” sort of villain, albeit not in a sexual sense. This canonically means nothing in-universe; it’s just character design.
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I don’t think the question really involves how similar they look to humans. It’s about how the genders appear relative to one another, not relative to us.
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yes oh yes
Well, Gali’s design in Mask Of Light was meant to look more feminine. And Nokama’s in LOMN and WOS, too, sort of.
I appreciate this topic, as it’s something I’m mulling over often while writing for my stop-motion project. I also appreciate how generally it’s phrased, providing no angle or opinion to control the conversation’s direction.
Personally, I always wished there was more gender diversity in BIONICLE, having no problem accepting that there was no noticeable dimorphism in the matoran lifecycle. It was simply annoying to have this 5-to-1 sausage fest, and it spoke plenty on LEGO and our society as a whole that there couldn’t be remotely as many heroic women as men in this already potentially alienating franchise. What is this “hard men doing hard work” BS?! It’s 2000, not 1930! And you’re just marketing to kids, you can’t actually convey the things that would really make a fully grown half-metal man break. Though, I suppose it might’ve done us young men a service in preparing us for the struggles we’d have to face later in life. But even by 2000, the message was becoming internationally acceptable that “women can do anything men can do.”
I’m actually down with removing gender altogether, and handwaving what we’re programmed, as humans, to assume about the tonality of any voices we hear in the films. If they had known “love” was not gonna be “canon” from the beginning, it would’ve been a valid move to make every character agender from the beginning, though no less controversial of one. I’m betting it’s more likely they’d make every character male, at that point, though somebody would find a way to stir up controversy then, too…
But, in any case, it’s been fun going back and forth on whether specific characters make more sense as female or male as I write, aiming at a more even representation. I know the point can be validly made that “equal representation” isn’t necessarily important to the story itself, but the balance could certainly stand to be less ridiculous. Since they play no sexual roles, but it’s conveyed that there are psychological differences, I think there needs to be great consideration put into why a character is described as male or female. Otherwise, it seems silly we even had to start talking about all this.
On a less related note, irrespective of gender, it would’ve been nice to see more love in a general sense in the stories. I mean like post-2001 or so. It seemed like every good guy’s struggle was not to hate or be hated by their fellow good guys, while – one could argue – hating the bad guys just enough not to kill them. There’s the “unity” message, but I personally find that to have exclusive undertones, when you look at the whole “Matoran” universe. Almost fascist. I’m always skeptical to toot the Caped Crusader’s horn, but I would’ve loved some struggles mirroring Batman’s many decisions not to kill his enemies. That’s some really important stuff that I think children’s content could, and possibly should touch on from time to time, with light steps. Would’ve brought a nice “all the power in the world doesn’t absolve you from doing the right thing” message. Instead, I think it showed that the writers, and/or LEGO were more focused on their product than their message. And let’s be honest, the story was the product, even in its early conception.
But I can’t really blame them for that, honestly. LEGO wasn’t exactly known for it’s authorial prowess back in those days, being a toy company. And I know Greg and the team had their constraints to work under. It just doesn’t disguise the way I see much of the dialogue, specifically.
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i don’t think you know what facsism means
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You’re probably right. My point was that it could be seen as a kind of nationalism, but I was a little careless with that wording there.
While it makes little sense for MU inhabitants to have gender, I feel like it falls in the realm of acceptable suspension of disbelief. While Toa, Matoran, etc. need to have some alien qualities to them, as BIONICLE does take place in it’s own unique world, we the audience are human and still need to be able to relate and empathize with them. Humans are a gendered species, so it makes sense from a narrative perspective for our main characters to reflect that as well.
As for sets, MOCs, and their canon accuracy, it is possible to make a MOC/set appear feminine and not be “sexualized”, for lack of a better term. For example, making them slightly thinner, giving them smaller shoulders and/or wider hips. As pointed out earlier, Miramax provided a good example for this. I also suspect that’s what LEGO designers were going for with Kiina. (Her custom shoulders are smaller than the standard inika torso.)
@SansoSings Comparing real-world politics to BIONICLE is a slippery slope. I mean, one could argue that the MU consists mainly of theocratic ethnostates with separate-but-equal caste systems, but at that point you’re taking a toyline for children way too seriously.
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I agree. I’ll just go ahead and try not to bring that up too casually. Sounds like a smart way to go.
Now’s probably a good time to mention that a lot of the time, corporations base their decisions on gender inclusivity and marketing around their expected target audience. Companies have it in their heads that kids care a lot more about gender than they really do, and are likely to reject things for being for the “other.” While this is true to a fault, it doesn’t extend as far as the out-of-touch turboboomers think–but they, of course, don’t know that.
The 5:1 gender ratio was about wanting Bionicle to be a “boy’s toy,” playing to expectations of and projection by the desired masculine audience. There’s this prevailing fear that boys don’t like the toys that represent girl characters…which is clearly a load of crap, given that the blue sets apparently sold really well despite being mostly female characters. I never got Hahli Mahri because she was sold out when my parents went to buy her.
In short, companies don’t do things based on personal beliefs as much as business. They try to predict what audiences will do and plan their moves accordingly. This doesn’t always work out, but corporations tend to be too scared of risk to see what the most rational choice really is, and that’s how we get stuff like…well, this. It’s not Big Gender micromanaging gender representation in kids’ media to bring about the New World Order, just bigwigs who don’t understand people.
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Worth pointing out that the majority of buyers probably couldn’t tell that these sets were female, because unless you follow the story not many of them appear that way at a glance. At least some portion of those sales will have come from kids who go “Look the blue one has wings I want that one!”
Not saying you’re wrong, though. Just thought it needed to be mentioned.
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