#and onua thinks its funny when he DOESN'T use his

[maspers]

Bionicle is weird yall

Okay so let's talk Bionicle. The Lego action figures with surprisingly deep lore and themes, and basically one of the coolest things to ever exist. You either love Bionicle or have not read Bionicle.

Who's your favorite? Mine has got to be Kopaka. For various reasons, including his general competence throughout the whole story. He's just pretty rad.

Now, you might be surprised I like Kopaka, since all things considered he's kind of a prick. He snarks at basically everything that enters his line of sight, and largely acts kind of stuck up due to his (admittedly justified) belief that he's the smartest person around. He spends the entire story fed up with everything else. He is completely and utterly convinced that he is the only sane person in the entire universe, and that nothing in the entirety of Mata Nui is behaving in a logical and rational way.

But see, here's the thing: all of that bluster about being the only rational thing around is complete bullcrap and lies, and here's why:

Kopaka, like all the original six Toa, is an amnesiac. He popped out of a magic canister in the ground and basically has no backstory to speak of since before he woke up he essentially didn't exist. And we know he's not a possible exception to this since, unlike the other Toa, he's the one we actually see it happen to. He has legit no idea who he is until Nuju tells him. What this means is simple: KOPAKA HAS NO FRAME OF REFERENCE. You can't judge something to be insane if you have not experienced sanity. Nothing is "irrational" in the abstract, you need context. Most people have extremely well-developed context obtained by living, but since Kopaka had not yet lived until he woke up he has NONE OF THAT.

And even if he did, he'd still be a massive hypocrite. Sure, the Matoran society and the Makuta are kind of weird, but Kopaka is a TOA, and Toa are a whole new kettle of craziness. Kopaka is a magic space warrior robot with the power to control the very concept of THIS STUFF IS COLD. His face is a magic mask that grants him X-ray vision and then gets even more powers later on. He can physically combine with other Toa to create a weird mega fusion Toa. Heck, after his first upgrade his primary weapon was skis. SKIS. He basically shapeshifts into a new body every time he goes somewhere else. And, as noted before, he legit just popped out of the ground one day, which makes him and his sibling Toa objectively weirder than all other Toa ever, since all the rest are transformed Matoran. Kopaka's entire existence is really freaking weird. He has no legs to stand on in his "I am the only rational being in the universe" belief. So where the heck did he get it from?

The simple answer: Mata Nui himself. When designing the Toa to act as a sort of internal anti-virus for all the weird garbage in his system, Mata Nui decided "You know what let's make the Ice one a prick who thinks he's sane" and somehow that idea perpetuated to the very end of the design process. The only reason Kopaka has to deal with everything else seeming completely bonkers to him is because Mata Nui, massive benevolent Troll that he is, *made him that way*. I bet when Kopaka finally made it to Bara Magna he was probably internally extremely relieved, because now he could judge the Agori by comparing them to the Matoran and vice versa instead of judging the Matoran on no actual justification whatsoever.

TLDR Kopaka is my favorite Bionicle because the entire premise of his personality is absurd and he probably spent the entire plot trying to internally justify it. Also ice powers go brrrrr

[ymawgat]

i rewatched the first bionicle move yesterday, for the first time in probably a couple of decades lmao

a lot more racist than my tiny kid self noticed. a lot of the spirituality bullshit you can kind of defend in that its something that's treated as true, or that the characters you're supposed to agree with believe in it?

however there was some shit like Lewa's speech patterns that are just indefensible. like that has only one relationship with reality and it's not a relationship that is kind to native and indigenous peoples.

also a lot of weird animation stuff that again, i just didn't notice as a child?

like, for example there were a lot of sequences that involved a singular motion, with a cut in the middle where the objects are different or in different places after it cuts to that second angle?

(and To Be Fair you could argue that they intentioned it to be a kind of mythic register that isn't really constrained by logic?)

but like as a kid you just watch those little disjointed bits and go "hhmmm, does that make sense?" but then you just kinda internalise it as something that somehow does somehow make sense, or else internalise it as a stylistic choice you don't understand,

instead of viewing it like, the result of a low animation resources and/or shoddy storyboarding.

Gali's head poking out of a waterfall at a funny angle is one of the best examples of this.

Gali was pretty cool in general tbh. Kopaka was clearly the writers' favourite but Gali has so many cool moments in this movie. "The Toa of water aproaches! The Toa of water-" "Is here!" is an underappreciated brainworm.

I forgot how good the Makuta's "Takuuuuuaaaaaaa" was as well. Definitely a formative memory for me.

I found it weird on rewatch how the Takua/Jaller break-up has like, zero consequences?

Like Teridax pushes Takua to leave Jaller, and then they're apart for a couple of scenes, and then the just get back together?

The Tahu poison arc was similar- he gets poisoned and becomes a allegory for dis-unity, and then they become united again when he gets healed but like, said poison and dis-unity doesn't ever actually matter?

(Onua having his strength sapped is another, lesser version of this - he kind of just, gets back up and keeps fighting lmao?)

There's another version of this story, where Takua and Jaller don't reunite until the final Toa-Rahkshi confrontation at the temple, and because Takua gets there late, he ends up blaming himself for Jaller's death?

Similarly, Tahu could have stayed down until that fight as well- they could have healed him and then just gone "we don't know if he'll wake up" until he comes back to save the day at the last moment and reconcile with Gali then.

(oh and throughout the whole movie there's the super inspirational heroic theme is playing at almost every moment)

at the same time however, I remember really liking the healing Tahu plot beat when i watched this as a child?

I liked that there were moments of lower tension (even if I obviously wouldnt have used that term), and that the characters were smart and competent enough to solve this problem before the finale.

On rewatch I also realised that there is like, actual foreshadowing of Takua being the seventh toa/a light matoran as well? Like as a kid I just didn't clock that the Rahkshi focusing on him in the earth village fight was evidence of him being light or whatever lol

on the subject of Takuanuva the transformation is like, unquestionably a trans allegory on rewatch lol.

like this freak who doesn't fit in and then discovers why he doesn't fit in and transforms and gets energy blasts

its definitely not intentional because he gets like a minimalistic cleft-chin like Jaller's, but at the same I think his voice literally gets higher???

and then at the end of the movie they all stand on different spots on the bionicle symbol with Hali in the "unity" spot (feminine-something that Gali has also been focused on the whole movie), Jaller stands on the "duty" spot (with his duty being captain of guard- masculine) and with Takuanuva standing in the middle, confirming him as canonically non-binary :)

Teridax's goals seemed very different compared to what he is then "revealed" to canonically care about, as well?

Like in this the movie it really seems like he genuinely believes staying asleep is the best for matanui?

and then when him and Takua fuse it feels like, it's still the same care/compassion for his brother, but with Takua's clarity to know exactly what that means?

which is extremely different from subsequent plots LOL

although having a straightforward upbeat heroic story which then veers hard into high-concept body horror right at the very end is like, extremely Bionicle lmao. Extremely bionicle sequence of story.

gonna watch the second movie now 👍