I mean, yeah, I’m speaking from the perspective of me and my opinions, and I think I’ve made that abundantly clear by now. I’m talking about the impact this small fraction of the book left me on based on my own self-imposed, rigid, and unforgiving criteria. So that is a thing, and it’s why you’re probably not going to succeed at convincing me of anything in this particular discussion, considering the issues I’m having stem from how I think of culture.
Because we haven’t been shown those things as of yet? I have no reason to think anything about those things. I’d love nothing more than to see how their struggles have impacted them and their non-combat lives, but alas, all we get is a Fortress. because as you said, their non-combat lives don’t exist at the moment.
It also must be said we do not know exactly when the Skull Spider invasion cropped up; I’d wager it was probably a recent occurrence, or at least it only got as bad as it did recently, or else there would be no reason why the Protectors would have waited so long to summon the Toa since they’ve had the information on how to do it for literally generations. I’ll give you that their recent life is probably nothing but combat, so admittedly it’s unfair of me to expect anything else considering we don’t get to see what they lived like pre-invasion.
It’s like we said on the podcast, it’s all about checking expectations. I wanted to see a MNOG-esque insight into village life, and that’s something I doubt we’ll get because, like you said, since we’re not starting with a prequel we only get to see the villages during the invasion so they’re all about warfare. So at the end of the day, what I’ll concede to you is something which I’ve already said a few times but it bears repeating nonetheless; the issues I’m having with G2 can mostly be explained as unrealistic expectations based upon applying G1 principles to G2 as opposed to legitimate flaws with G2 itself.
But the fall of Ta-Koro was a great loss. Tahu was devastated when he failed to save the village- and it was a significant blow to his confidence and was the first in a string of events that caused him to second guess his leadership role. Nilkuu acts as though this is a common occurrence, and from what we’ve seen it doesn’t even seem like it was mentioned to Vizuna. And sure, like Meso mentioned in the episode itself, this could just be Ryder Windham not properly articulating the weight of this event- but considering the guys prowess I highly doubt that’s the case. If this were THE jungle village then it would be a big deal that it was destroyed.
It’s not like Bara Magna where the factions are constantly competing against each other. We know all the villages in Okoto are allies; there’s no reason that a giant undertaking of an entire region would go so unnoticed by the other Protectors. (You could argue it may have been the last straw towards summoning the Toa, but then Nilkuu would have already known about it prior to his journey to the Temple of Time).
I’m assuming Nilkuu is bright enough to realize he’s in the Jungle region (since its the only region in Okoto with giant trees) and that the nearest village would be the village of Jungle if that were the case. Simple put “the nearest village” would not be his choice of words if there was only a single village of Jungle.
Besides, we know they’re color coordinated- he’d be able to tell he’s a Jungle villager simply by looking at him.
Fair enough. Makes me wonder why neither Bingzak nor Nilkuu felt the need to tell Vizuna that his home no longer exists…
I admit, however, that the full story hasn’t been revealed yet though- so this isn’t an entirely factual statement for me to make just yet.
It’s simply not something you can just disregard. It is their culture. It does define who they are and what they believe and stand for.
Sure, something obviously led to their final decision to summon the Toa, perhaps it was a recent attack? Maybe it suddenly got worse? Or maybe they just got fed up with putting up with it a realized that the fighting would never end if they didn’t summon the Toa.
For all we know, the mask of time might have been hidden away just like all the other masks of power and they had to find it before they could summon the Toa.
Regardless of what took so long; we’re continually ignoring what is actually being presented to us. I already know you’ve admitted to your flawed line of thinking in terms of trying to cling to old G1 tropes and expectations- but you’re not making any effort to think differently because you’re still ignoring and discounting all the actual world building we’re getting because it’s not the same presentation you’re used to.
I mean, for me to assume that to be correct, BIONICLE should actually show us their way of life. That’s the crux of what I’m saying; for us to be truly invested in Okoto and its villagers I’d like to see what they do every day. It’s why MNOG was pretty much the undisputed best piece of BIONICLE storytelling media; it presented an alternative window from which to view the events of the story, offered unparalleled levels of insight into the workings of Mata Nui, and fleshed out the world and the inhabitants of the island.
All they had to do to was make a strong first impression of Okoto was a similar thing, be it a game or a book or a comic or a web animation series. As of now, we don’t know a thing about their lives other than they fight Skull Spiders, and if you’re correct in saying that’s really all there is because their culture is so tightly woven around defending against the invasion (and I’m leaning towards saying you are because that piece of art supports your point of view quite a lot)… huh. If their lives revolve around combat and survival to such a high degree, that presents a whole other set of problems altogether as far as world-building goes.
In fact, I’d actually go so far as to say that is actually worse than them having a culture and us just not getting a chance to see it. I’ll save that particular statement for a future podcast episode, though, because that’s a purely subjective opinion and has no bearing on this discussion. XD
To touch back on the piece of art, though, yeah I can’t really think of a reason for them to have that artwork unless the Skull Spiders are a pretty pivotal part of their lives. I’d like to say it was just a prophecy and did not reflect current events, which is the only excuse I could possibly think of, but I heavily doubt that because the only prophecy we’ve heard of is the Prophecy of Heroes and that wasn’t told in artwork, it was whispered by Ekimu.
Also, I wouldn’t say I was ignoring and discounting any of the actual world-building. I appreciate what we’re getting, which is a fact I’m probably going to stress next podcast because I feel that happiness over the book’s contents has gotten lost in the shuffle of nit-picking and trying to prove who’s right and who’s wrong. Any discounting that I’ve done has been because the stuff doesn’t really have any bearing with the points I was trying to discuss so I discounted them in relation to that particular discussion, but not overall.
However, the artwork does make a strong point in favor of your argument, SO… fair enough. 3 out of 4. I recall saying that by the end of the episode as well (because of the language), so hooray for preserving the status quo.
If he was near the border of the Jungle village, maybe he was closer to another village, like the fire village.
You’re right. That hadn’t occurred to me. But maybe Bingzak likes to be different and wears pink or something?
Seriously, though, it’s a definite possibility that Bingzak doesn’t wear his tribe’s colors.
That may be because Vizuna and Bingzak don’t live in the same village. So, the loss of a neighbouring village may not be too much of a concern to Vizuna. Here are a few ‘search results’ from the book:
Page 7 …from skull spiders!��� ���I know this boy,��� said Vizuna … Page 7 … ���He is from a nearby village.��� Facing Bingzak, Vizuna …
Page 7 … added, ���I am relieved to see you are okay.��� Nilkuu gestur…
