BIONICLE is a sci-fi toy franchise created by LEGO, started in 2001 as a desperate attempt to save the company which, unexpectedly, became incredibly popular. The initial run, expected to end after two years, was extended all the way to 2009, when it was canceled. There was a reboot in 2015 and some fans are really trying to convince us that it was good, but let’s not talk about that…yet.
Bionicle’s whole thing is the standard good vs evil thing, except all the characters are humanoid bio-mechanical beings who fight each-other with magic, swords and guns. The initial storyline had a mystery and spiritual element to it…but the latter point dumps all that in favor of political intrigue and more sci-fi action.
An aspect that isn’t talked about a lot in Bionicle, because the fans are stupid, is that the story was made up as it was going on. There were parts of the story that were planned from the beginning, but the lack of planning applies generally and it’s a key fact that should be kept in mind.
I’ve been a Bionicle fan since I was…I don’t even know, probably longer than Warcraft. Bionicle is one of my favorites and a big deal…though, as I have learned, it is not as good as I thought it was.
Bionicle’s lore also isn’t as complex as it’s often represented, though it is complicated (unnecessarily so) and there’s a lot there. Fans are simply obsessed with the idea that the lore is complex for…I’m assuming ego reasons.
I’m about 90% sure that once Bionicle fan communities discover I exist, I’ll be blacklisted and, honestly, I’ll be disappointed if that doesn’t happen.^A)

I don’t think I’ll write about the 2015 reboot at all, because I’m not interested in it. I’ll only note that I did buy a few of the first few sets and I liked them, kinda, but would have preferred if they weren’t designed in CCBS.
The story just didn’t catch my attention. I could complain more, but I don’t want to. All it proves is that LEGO shouldn’t reboot Bionicle.

Speaking about it in general, but all the major gathering points for Bionicle are heavily left-leaning. This is to the point of ridiculousness, but you can count on the idea that they’ve developed into echo-chambers.

I’m reviewing the whole thing (excluding the 2015 reboot) because, for now, I don’t see much of a point in individual stuff.
I’ll be a bit blunt: Bionicle’s story is…probably not great. I say probably because I have surprisingly little experience with it directly. For me it was mostly movies, ads, the rare comic I got my hands on, some of the games…and the rest is reading/hearing second-hand information. Considering that second-hand information, it’s likely what I heard was skewed in some fashion. Although it is currently far easier to get into the majority of the content (books), I just haven’t had the time…or much motivation…and it will be clear why.
However, taking all that into account…yeah, I think Bionicle still has serious storytelling issues. This is also something bonkle fans should probably come to terms with. The worldbuilding? Fantastic (sometimes). But the story itself kinda falls apart if you think about it.
Considering the biggest guy in the story of Bionicle has been Greg Farshtey…well, all I’ve heard about him suggests that he is, in fact, not that good of a writer. He disregarded much original canon and did things based on what he wanted to do rather than sticking to pre-established lore and set-ups. For example, MNOG was decanonized when there was zero indication outside of future retcons and his own word that it was non-canon. He also decanonized love, which is hilarious on the one hand, but also just bizarre. And, of course, he introduced the multiverse, although he didn’t introduce time travel. Arguably, though, the multiverse is much worse than the time travel and all the multiversal stuff had the effect of breaking Bionicle canon to the point of no return.
Seriously, just sit down and think about the implications of the multiverse in Bionicle canon. It produces a whole…well, something filled with plot holes and contrivances…and there’s zero ways of justifying it.
Worse still, we lack justification for many things within the Matoran Universe. This was not noticed by me, but by a Mister N on his MNOG Chronicle blog.¹⁾ Here’s the deal: why do the Vortixx or Skakdi exist in the Matoran Universe? What critical function do they perform within this space-ship, exactly?
Greg’s changes and whatnot broke the worldbuilding that previously existed, so it’s a bit bizarre that he is considered by Bionicle fans as this…well, savant who created Bionicle’s story. Although I can’t prove this, I have a suspicion that there are many Bionicle fans who assume he created/wrote everything and that what he made was perfect. Those two things aren’t necessarily the same group of fans though.
As a note, if we look at the early Bionicle storyline and worldbuilding…that meaning the Mata era, leaning slightly on the Metru era…you can see the worldbuilding is a lot more sensible. The Toa, Matoran, Bohrok and Turaga all perform specific tasks within the Great Spirit Robot. To be fair, Greg can’t be blamed for everything, as pre-established canon was screwed with during these early days (although not to the same degree).
There is an obvious counter here that Bionicle may not have always fit together, but that it was ambitious and tried a lot and blah blah blah. However! Ambition is worthless unless it can be backed. Ideas are cheap, executing them properly is not. Bionicle shouldn’t be praised just for trying but for succeeding which, unfortunately it did not at times.
Now, moving on: the decanonization of MNOG was a very big mistake, probably one of the worst…and the fact it was done was a tragedy, really. It was the first major piece of Bionicle media that existed and, for a time, basically the only real way to experience the story. The fact they didn’t continue making more MNOG-style content is also tragic.
This is also a pretty big issue with how Bionicle went about telling it’s story: it was too fragmentary. You had books, comics and…the rest. But the books, a non-visual medium, was the primary method of communicating the story…probably because the head of the story team (Greg Farshtey) was a writer. Not to mention that not all of the content released was canon. Fun fact, the Game Boy game is canon, while Bionicle Heroes…y’know, the major multi-platform release? Yeah, that wasn’t canon.
Let’s quickly mention a few things that I personally don’t like. The focus shifted away from the Matoran as POV characters (MNOG, Mask of Light) to the Toa as POV characters. I think this wasn’t a great idea, though I can’t articulate why right now. Just note that the Mata Nui portion of the overall story is really the only one that dedicates a significant amount of time to the Matoran.
I think the Matoran designs significantly declined after the Mata storylines, though this is not really that controversial.
Now, for the conclusion…I expect that this review will not be received that well…and I think it’s because the tendency of modern fans is to believe that the thing they love is absolutely perfect and the people who made it are absolutely perfect…except in the very small specific ways that are considered common knowledge.
But, well, Bionicle’s not that great…it’s good, but it could have been much better. But I like it anyway.

This used to be a bit longer, but I realized it didn’t have to be.
‘The Maori Situation’ refers to the event where the Maori sued LEGO over the use of names and whatnot from their culture/mythology. LEGO and the Maori, I believe, settled out of court and the result was that LEGO had to change the names of several characters…and change ‘Tohunga’ to ‘Matoran’.
Now, Bionicle fans are quick to side with the Maori (I wonder why…) so I’m going to be a contrarian because I think the Maori were in the wrong. Don’t worry, I’ll explain my thinking.
First, let me get out of the way that I think the Maori had the right to complain to LEGO about it. I mean, for example, the specific word ‘Tohunga’ is culturally/spiritually important to the Maori in particular. Though, what they and most fans apparently don’t know…the word was actually being used correctly during that first year of Bionicle. I digress.
The reason I think the Maori were in the wrong is because they went and sued LEGO over it, which I don’t consider an appropriate response. Now, the settlement with the names being changed is an okay compromise to the situation, but I don’t think a lawsuit was necessary to get that far. It’s not like anything we say about it now really changes what happened though.
I’ll re-iterate and elaborate on my ‘right to complain’ thing. It’s entirely understandable to me that they’d get miffed about it…but consider a few other things. First of all…this happens to other cultures all the time. Take the Disney film Hercules. The Greeks reportedly did not like that film at all…and then consider all the feminist Greek retellings. I’d argue that these are much worse than Bionicle, because Bionicle is incredibly disconnected from the source material. They are flesh robots on a giant man-shaped spaceship.
Also, I get it…when I heard ‘Baba Yaga’ translated as ‘boogeyman’ in John Wick, I rolled my eyes. Like, yeah, you have an obligation to adapt these things correctly when you’re using them. Though, again, what’s interesting about the Bionicle situation is that they did actually seem to do just that, which is another reason I find the Maori reaction to have been too extreme. They could have also used Bionicle as a method of promoting their own culture and mythology…but they didn’t.
I do get it’s the enlightened position to always take the side of the minority…but let’s actually think about the context, yeah?

• BIONICLEsector01
  • It’s very detailed. I’d argue a bit too much, but it’s a great source of information.
• BZPower
  • The Bionicle forum.
• BioMedia Project
  • An archive of a lot of Bionicle content. If you want to watch the ads or movies, go here. If you want to play the games, go here (excluding the commercial releases IIRC). If you want to read comics, like a loser, or books, like a bigger loser; go here.
• Avoid the reddit community.
• Something I will note is that the TTV Channel is one of the more influential aspects of the Bionicle community, despite their YouTube channel not really suggesting that. My relationship with the TTV Channel is kinda quirky, since I tend to forget they exist for several months before returning to them and watching a couple’a videos. They’re also responsible for introducing me to Danganronpa, so that’s nice of them. I’m certainly gonna make a dedicated article for them one day…but, no rush. I like them, though I’m not sure I’d call their content super high quality and some of their opinions on Bonkle are weird or bad (ahem CCBS).