BIONICLE 2016 Creatures: Rahi sounds more badass, just saying

The joys of BIONICLE sets from a reviewer's perspective: Most of them are clones, so I can get through six in one day. Why? Because that's exactly what I'm doing. All I can review are the Summer (for here) sets of this year, can't do the winter wave because they're not being released here, which I am a bit bitter about because they look awesome, and more interesting then the Skull things from last year.



Getting a common complaint for these out of the way, you need to have a lot of imagination for these. They are based on animals, but due to their size, execution varies on person to person. We have what are supposed to be a phoenix, dragon fly, scorpion, polar bear, fish and ... another bear? It doesn't help when they share pieces for the sake of gimmicks. Going down the list on the official site:

The little one, the big one's next week

Melum: The one you only get with Kopaka, who I'll review next week. Because of the way its built I can never get it into a pose that doesn't scream Bear hug. Thank Arceus its not Bewear. Its defiantly the simplest of the six, again due to it being bundled with Kopaka, but what lets it down is the gear function build, something that all of these have, but on Melum, it just makes posing his arms even worse, even when I'm trying to combine it with Kopaka. Being bundled made it one of the worst sadly.

Terak: The one I thought would share a build with Melum, but I was wrong, in that it actually fixes Melum's arm issue. The gear function is still in the arms, but instead of bringing the further back, here the arms go up, making for a good scratching gimmick. Its actually up there as one of my favorites of these six as it makes the gear function actually usable for something other then bear hugs. Only complaint I have is that the gold on his arms, like others in that mold, is painted on a translucent plastic. While on the others, its another colour that blends in with the character, here it looks like it should be purple, but comes off as clear. Minor nitpick, but still.

Iker: Again showing up Melum because this is basically a clone set of him, but again the gear function makes sense because instead of arms, its wings. Wings made of Fire that makes it look regal, like a phoenix should. In a nice bit of detail, you can pose it in a way that looks like its perched on a tree branch, even with pose-able talons. I actually don't have any issues with this one, its a bad ass bird.

Akida: The turbine propelled, heavily armed fish. This thing is packing more firepower then most official sets I own, and would make things like the Striking Venom and Mobile Devastator from the old Exo Force sets look subtle in comparison, when taking into account size. At least Akida does come with its own stand as it doesn't have legs, it is still a fish after all. There is no real gear function here, just more relying on the friction in the technic bars and connections, and unlike the others, this one only exists for the combination gimmick with Gali, so while play-ability on its own isn't as good as the others, it does do a better job at looking like something recognizable in comparison to Terak and Melum. Though to be fair, unlike the last three, Akida is, again, packing heat with two six shot stud launchers, and lots of spare ammo. Care to make its day?

Ketar: Ok, I railed on Melum enough, Ketar beats it out. I freaking hate this one. With all the others, the builds are solid, Gear function may not be good, but there's enough there to be solid. Ketar loves to come apart thanks to its gear function, which is supposed to be "twist the tail, make the """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""claws""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" move". Well, the claws barely move because most of the claws is those sword blades, the stinger barely moves and moves nowhere near enough for it to actually work as a stinger and the connection to the gear is so badly held together that it can wreck the whole effect and can also lopsided how far the tail turns. It is a freaking mess that even looks bad on Pohatu's back. It was kinda interesting to build, but that's about it as almost everything else fails.

Uxar: Last, but not least. Another one where the gear function is in the wings. Unlike Iker though, the wings are pretty much locked down, there's not much posing in them and as a result, it always has a large wing span which makes it a shelf hog. It is annoying, but at the very least it stays in one piece when using its function. Like with all of these though, it is WYSIWYG.

While I do plan to go into more detail when I look at the Toa... sorry, the "Uniters" next week. All of them have a combination gimmick to them, where they all become backpacks. Some are beneficial to their toa, some are redundant, some look freaking rediculous, but all of them are fidgity to get in a way that best flows with their characters, but that's a more "To each their own" situation.. For the small sets of the wave, they are solid, and far more entertaining to build then the small sets of G1 BIONICLE. They feel like sets, not just a collection of spare parts for MOC's. See you on Wednesday for Red vs Blue.