Bionicle characters are said to not be robots-they’re living beings with organs, muscles, etc. Throughout the story, Toa, Glatorian, and Matoran were described as getting tired when they exerted a lot of energy. The Toa even had a “heartlight,” which is presumably a counterpart to a human heart.
But what about eating and drinking?
Despite having cybernetic components, the Toa and Matoran still have hearts, muscles, and lungs. Those are all products of living beings that are classified as animals. Unless I’m not mistaken, every species in the Animal kingdom need to eat and drink in order to survive. And, since the Toa, Turaga, and Matoran are frequently said to smile, frown, scowl, grin, and make other facial expressions, they must have mouths.
Of course, with the Bara Magna inhabitants, this is already explained. On Bara Magna, there were a good number of food and water sources that the Agori squabbled over; therefore, we know that that’s what the Agori and Glatorian eat. But what about the Matoran universe? Was there any information given on what the Toa/Matoran/Turaga/Skakdi/Vortixx ate or drank?
It is said on BS01 (Matoran page if I am not mistaken) that Matoran, Toa and Turaga eat through touch. They just touch food and absorb its energies. As I recall there wasn’t said what they eat.
If talking about expressions and mouths, there are some different variants. In sets mouths are those holes to which Kanohi are connected, so they are unseen. In movies (1-3) Masks were actually faces and were moving (I don’t like this one, just why they are looking like Toa Inika’s living Kanohi). In “The Legend Reborn” masks and helmets are static, only eyebows are moving. Also some Kanohi pieces have something resembling mouths (Pakari Nuva, Kakama Nuva).
Nokama drank water orally at one point, but they usually absorb stuff through their hands. The 4th Chronicles book mentions Whenua packing a lunch for himself and Onua, but the food is never specified. We know about some fruits that grew on Mata Nui, but that’s all we know. The Matoran could have eaten a variety of things based on where they lived–Onu-Matoran probably had to farm tubers, whereas the Po-Matoran likely relied on their livestock and desert plants.
Can’t find it now so maybe my mind’s just making it up, but I distinctly remember seeing a screenshot of a background vendor in Onu-Koro in MNOG selling various fishes, presumably with the intent that they would be eaten. Additionally, Island of Doom opens up on Garan looking for fresh water to drink, and in general it’s said that Voya Nui frequently experienced droughts and famine, so presumably they had crops of some kind.
All that said, they also had more esoteric means of feeding as well. Both Ga-Metru and the Daxia Fortress had spots where beings could gather energy as nourishment. The Ga-Metru one in particular was cited as being pilgrimaged to once a year to replenish their energy, so at the least I guess Matoran don’t need to eat nearly as often as people do.
If I had to guess for story reasons, it might be that the Great Beings included the ability for Matoran to orally consume food simply because they were based on the Agori.
However, I suspect this “energy absorption” thing was meant to be their primary source of nourishment. Considering the Matoran weren’t originally meant to be sapient and were expected to be maintaining the MU constantly, they probably wouldn’t have the time to physically eat.
I feel like they would only physically do so when it was required. Living on Mata-Nui would probably be one such instance.
Personally, though, I don’t see much wrong with the idea that they could, or did, eat. It just doesn’t seem like a detail very important to the overall story, and could therefore just be assumed that they eat when they need to. Matoran are life, the same as any other, they’re just far more mechanical than the likes of the Agori or Glatorian.
Oh, I meant that, in the official canon, the characters could make facial expressions with their mouths, indicating that they have mouths.
Then that would suggest that they have the option to eat/drink with their mouths?
There was that line in the Mask Of Light movie that went something like “Toa squabble like Gukko birds over a berry.” And, given that the “water” that the Toa of Water control is supposedly liquid protodermis, then maybe Toa, Matoran, and other MU inhabitants drink some form of liquid protodermis.
But they’re still workers. Workers, human or mechanical, still need some sort of fuel, whether it’s food or electricity or gasoline.
As far as I’m aware, they can both eat both by touch as said before or by using their mouths, but the second option was seen as something gross, so matoran and many species wouldn’t do it (maybe in the case of matoran they would need to take off their masks and that would be against their culture, I’m speculating in this). But for example, Skakdi like the Piraka use their big jaws to eat instead (I think all of this is in the Skakdi page in BioSector01), therefore the way the Skakdi eat would seem kinda repulsive to matoran and other “more civilised” species.
Not only that, but they’re going to have to get used to our kind of eating canonically, now that they’re on Spherus Magna, where the Agori and Glatorian have to eat food orally.
Regarding your question about how Matoran would have time to eat while working, we do know that there was a “Matoran Feeding Point” in Ga-Metru where Matoran would report once a year to recharge their energy (referenced here: Ga-Metru - BIONICLEsector01). So, while they probably would eat things whenever they could, places to recharge their energy without physical food also existed, presumably throughout the MU.
I believe I remember reading somewhere that Skakdi prefer the more unrefined method of eating food (as we do), to the disgust of the Matoran. Don’t quote me on that though.
Skakdi are known to chew and ingest their food, choosing to do so over the typical method of absorbing energy, as other inhabitants of the Matoran Universe view this act as repulsive.
