The Rise of the Toa Nuva

Who doesn't have a young teen boy these days that hasn't heard the words "Toa Nuva", "Bionicle", and "Masks" in the same sentence? On our bookshelves, guardian bionicles stand watch over slumbering children, waiting for the dreaded enemies of the Toa Nuva (probably new warriors in some lego language). The toys are very cool. What was once Johnny West, Batman, or Spiderman is now full poseable, fully changeable, and the dynamics of the body structure are such that these 'toys' could even be our bodies in mechanical form! My eyes don't usually glow, and my hands are digitized, but movement wise, they are magical. Just like this book, collecting the Lego magazine stories, there is a sense of completeness about the story now. Whenever I read the Lego installments, I always thought that it was time for a collection. Papercutz has a remarkable reputation for quality books printed on quality paper, and is a natural choice for such a property. The team of Greg Farshtey, Carlos D'Anda, and Randy Elliot have created a world around the characters that is very cool. The setting is other worldly, but the battle for survival is no different than any humans have endured. This is no 'band of brothers', but it is a 'band of others'. The arrival of Makuta on the Island of Mata Nui signaled the transformation of Nui into a place of evil. The Tohunga wait for salvation, and six arrive who control the forces of nature to help them find it. Collect the masks, and defeat the Makuta no matter what the cost. The art and color in the books is amazing. D'Anda and Elliot have captured the feel of the characters beautifully. The challenge of illustrating any book with non humanoid features is to make them 'real' and the artists have done that very well. I can imagine their studio. Shelves filled with BIONICLES in various poses, giant boxes of LEGO waiting for construction. How do they ever get any work done? Read in short installments, these stories made little sense. Now that Papercutz has collected the episodes, the story is clear, and even for adults who have had to learn new words in a new language, the story of the Bionicles has just become more interesting. www.papercutz.com