sometimes dumb, ridiculous and/or offensive shit happens in the lego fandom (or fandoms plural i guess given how separate a beast the bionicle fandom is) we're here to point and laugh and occasionally write long-winded essays about the fandom or even more...
i just wanna express how glad i am that i didn't find my cringy 12-13 year-old ass on this. i realize y'all haven't posted since 2016 (it's 2019 now) but 8 years after i left bzp and the shit i did still leaves me cringing on nights i can't sleep. bless this account
i donât know who you are but honestly itâs entirely possible your stuff was on here in the past . . . i think a while back i went through and deleted like a whole bunch of posts. although it was mostly just stuff that really didnât belong here in the first place, like for a while we were desperate for content and kind of just posting any bad/weird art even if it was probably better than what we could have drawn ourselves at the time? honestly this whole blog hasnât aged terribly well and i kind of wish i could just delete all of it, but some of the stuff here is still genuinely hilarious and itâs actually kind of important to bionicle fandom history so i probably shouldnât =o but i might at least get around to âcleaning upâ a bit more eventually so it can serve that purpose without making me cringe at my past self too , , ,
What does spelling have to do with grammar? And more importantly, why are you willingly comparing yourself to a group that has gone down in infamy as historyâs greatest villains?
Letâs keep the ball rolling with Pohatu, the Master of Stone. Pohatu was originally one of the worst-selling Toa, because apparently kids hate brown. Then they made him bright orange, which looked ridiculous. Whatâs going on with him now?
PRESENTATION
The front of the box, as usual, shows Pohatu, the Skull Scorpion, the Golden Mask, and the Lord of Skull Spiders skulking in the background. Pohatuâs pose is fairly uninspired (and bears only a slight coincidental resemblance to his G1 pose, though that could be because he no longer kicks) and his twister blocks a view of the neat elemental background that makes this box art so Bionicle in nature. This box art is also known for fooling innocent people into thinking Pohatu has trans yellow (he doesnât).
The back features Pohatu into an even less inspired pose where he basically is just floating with his boomerangs strapped to his feet and his âdaggerâ in hand. Also shown is his promotional comic, his Actual Size image (FRUSTRATINGLY CLOSE TO ACTUAL SIZE), his power-up mode, and various infoboxes on his features.
Notably, his comic shows his boomerangs on his feet folded up, as opposed to the bizarre official function.
PIECES
Pohatu comes with a disappointing dearth of pieces, at 66. Thatâs one fewer than his Protector, which, even accounting for the Protectorâs studs, is pathetic.
Pohatuâs new/interesting pieces include:
the redesigned Kakama
his exclusive boomerang pieces
the Guurahk staff, back at it again
trans neon green bones
the new add-on
the new head and eyes
dark orange plates
Intriguing, yet underwhelming in its lack.
BUILD
Pohatu will snap together more easily than any of the other Toa. Heâs boring after having built four of them already and provides absolutely nothing new or interesting.
OVERALL DESIGN
Pohatu is boring. Thatâs the biggest thing. Besides his asymmetry (which I am decidedly not a fan of), there is nothing, overall profile-wise, to set him apart from other Toa.
One new thing with Pohatu I can appreciate is his color; we havenât seen much Dark Orange in constraction in ages. Might even have last been in 2003. I think this is an excellent compromise between the dark browns and the garish, un-stone-like Bright Orange. Itâs a little washed out, however, by his plethora of silver. Metal colors reign supreme in the smaller three Toa, and I hate it. I would have loved the return of tan, but alas, itâs not to be.
Speaking of colors, I was actually rather intrigued when I saw images of Pohatu and thought he included trans yellow, which I thought would look quite interesting with the Dark Orange. Unfortunately, it was all a trick; his translucent color is trans neon green, which, while not as ugly as I first thought, does not look as nice as trans yellow.
Iâm really not feeling the white spikes on his arm (and apparently, the animators feel the same way; theyâve been completely omitted from his animation model). With no spikes anywhere else, they stick out terribly. I donât even get what they have to do with stone.
Pohatu is right up there with Kopaka and Onua in the heavenly halls of mask recognizability. His mask is gorgeously similar to the original Kakama without being a straight-up transplant of it onto his face. If I had to criticize anything, itâd merely be that it feels a little too compact, though that could just be the added air intakes. Still, theyâre nowhere near as intrusive on the design as Lewaâs.
Pohatuâs Adrenalin Mode, as mentioned above, is basically just strapping his boomerangs to his feet. It really isnât working for me; the shape is weird, and it forces his feet waaaaaay apart. (Itâs also difficult to remove the boomerangs from his feet without pulling the pin out of them, resulting in constantly having to reassemble them after pulling them off.)
However, I do think thereâs a reason for this; this wasnât originally supposed to be his adrenalin mode. My proof is the boomerang piece.
The boomerang piece has actually been designed to fold up completely, to form the foot things shown in both the animations and the promotional comic. The problem is, the Bohrok eye pieces on the end interfere with this, so they had to make a decision: abandon the Bohrok eyes, or give up on the folding-up foot attachment idea? They went with the latter, which means his boomerangs look more complete, but it also negatively impacts his Adrenalin Mode. I, personally, prefer the folded-up boomerangs; it makes a nice call-back to his 2001 incarnation.
Pohatuâs Power-Up Mode is pretty much just his Adrenalin Mode holding PoSâs staff, with his dagger rather perplexingly slapped on the end and one of PoSâs add-ons used as a gauntlet on his armored arm. Itâs okay, I guess? Not the worst Power-Up Mode. Itâs just kinda⊠there.
I donât own Pohatu G1, so a comparison is sadly out of the question. One thing, though, is that itâs a darn shame Pohatu, who once broke the mold for the Toa, now has a conventional gear mechanism. I acknowledge it as a necessity, though; a leg gearbox would have looked terrible.
Like the other Toa, conflict in a box. Not much else to say, besides him having the only unique Skull Spider in that they added an extra leg piece to make it a Skull Scorpion. Certainly a better effort at one than the summer set.
CONCLUSION
Pohatu is easily the most boring of the Toa. He has no real defining features besides a couple that make him kinda ugly. However, if the worst I can say about him is heâs bland, then heâs already won over Lewa, so thereâs that.
Pohatuâs price-to-piece is dreadful. If you want him, Iâd suggest waiting for a sale or using VIP points or something. Still, for all his blandness, he holds up okay visually, even if I wish he was more colorful. I'd definitely recommend him over Lewa.
Can I be honest? Dragon Bolt is one of my favorite Hero Factory sets. It reminds me of a 2001 ish Rahi, plus its a dragon. Also its large head in proportion to its body kinds reminds me of a T-rex. It needs modification to be a truely GREAT constraction set, but overall, I think its passable. Also, I really like the pieces it gives out. Kinda makes me want to build a 2015 version of a Tarakava (which resembled real animals even LESS, but i still like them). Also, the wing flapping feature's cool
As someone who knows quite a bit about T. rex, its large head is nowhere near as colossal as Dragon Bolt's is to its body.
That's not quite relevant to my criticisms of it, though; I just think that overall its proportions make for a jumbled, terrible set that aimed too high for its price point.
The wing flapping feature came at the expense of the wings actually looking like wings, sadly.
idk I guess I don't care if other people like it but I just despise pretty much everything about Dragon Bolt.
damn all these upstanding nice people here in the bionicle community on tumblr
honestly i'm just surprised there are people who decided to follow this blog who weren't aware of our standing on social issues considering, back when we were more active, we posted about them fairly often.
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