Bionicle 2015-????

So Bionicle is back and that’s awesome 13 new sets and more to come later this year. This makes me really happy I was so bummed when it was canceled back in 2010. Now I always felt like I was part of the problem as I never bought set after the original six toa (5 of 6). Though I did buy the movies and visited the now dead site BionicleStory.com a lot and kept up with the characters and story. So as I was putting together my new Kopaka and I got to thinking how is the story going to be conveyed to the fans.  So let us begin looking into what would help the line grow and continue on.

So let look at what the original Bionicle had to tell the story. They had a website and various things like animations and web games. Outside of the web site there where books and comics and the animated movies that told the tales of Bionicle. Now this worked for a world pre internet but in 2015 and our short attention spans I don't think so. Let us look into Different types of media and how they would work today.

 Comic book is one of my favorite mediums of entertainment. It works hard to balance both story and art. Now will this work I don’t know the old one worked well with the tone of the line and was very early on meant sell toys. It conveyed the story very well and was a great way to pull in older near teen fans.  However now this might be harder as the old monthly issues where published by DC comics and now new Lego comics go straight to Graphic with the Papercutz. So we will be hopeful that maybe the comics can be entertaining.

The Chapter books of old are well written but intended for younger audience to get them to read and this is not a bad thing because they are written well enough to draw in older readers as well. Will this work today? Maybe we live in a post Harry Potter world where the next great Teen book can become popular and be the next summer blockbuster. So yeah you got kids reading thing like Hunger Games and other things. The new books are already confirmed to be happening and I’m looking forward to seeing what will happen next with the books.

Next we move to a more visual media TV and maybe movies. The original series had four movies and those were nice the animation was very good. Now here one of the big problems remember when I use the phrase “short attention spans” well it applies hear. Bionicle needs something like a regular TV series like other Lego properties like Ninjago or Chima (though that only lasted 2 seasons). This can also hurt it in the example Hero Factory, which ran 11 episodes and covered every story line in 3 ½ years.  Each season of the show need to tell a whole story another. The best example for this is Ninajgo, however the purpose of the show was to show off sets and minfigs. Now this would work but only for the figure sets and nothing else. As for movies I don’t know how to approach that subject Lego is big now with 3 movies on the horizon one a sequel to the highly successful Lego Movie, the other a spinoff from that movie starring Batman, and the last a theatrical Ninjago Movie. Depending on the success of  Ninjago we may see other 1^st party story based Lego movies. We will see what the future holds.

Next up is a media that kept me from being super involved in the toy line Video Games.  The original Bionicle games were developed by a multitude of publishers and developers that included a Lego owed development, EA, THQ, and Eidos. Now Lego has a strong brand of Games with developer TT Games who also worked on the last Bionicle Game Bionicle Heroes. So what is next for the gaming life of Bionicle? It’s hard to say at this point with Lego Games as any 1^st party property seems to only get a handheld release (we are excluding the Lego Movie Game and Lego City Undercover). If Lego where to do a Game for Bionicle I would like to see it be the open world Action adventure games on a major console or PC as well as handhelds. Now in light of very little characters you can either play Devil’s advocate or create new ones or you include versions from the original Bionicle.  As the unlockable characters though there would not be a lot especially compared to Lego Batman 3’s 120 plus characters. I do think Lego needs to not just with Bionicle but with well every 1^st party property needs to move onto the consoles as well as the handhelds.  We will see what the Future holds for Bionicle games let’s hope it more than a screen mashing mobile game.

I’m very much looking forward to the future of the franchise and what comes with it. Lego is big now and Bionicle can be big too if handled properly.  I look forward to the future.