Onua 2015, the In-Depth Look

[InfurnallDragon]

I was bored, so here this is. Idk if I will do it for the other toa or even the protectors, but here this is.

Here I have with me is my Toa Onua Mata from 2001. Despite not being the first set I got, despite not being one of the high priority sets I plan to get, he is perhaps my favorite of all the sets. There is something really cool about him having two clawed arms with the function and- well wait STOP! *tosses Onua aside*[actually sets Onua gently aside]

I do not have a 2015 Onua in my possession, but what we all have right now is the new, early promotional images. For this reason I will not compare & contrast 2015 Onua's image to my physical Onua, but rather this other promotional image of Onua Mata from 2001. (Both will be at the bottom of the page for your own comparisons). And not just the image of Onua Mata, but promos of every Onua iteration to date shall be compared. That is the theme of this, not to look at the sets themselves here just the images for fairness.

This thread was mainly to share my thoughts on 2015 Onua compared to the other iterations of him, and is also for discussion focused on him and his many forms without any other toa or characters involved. There are a lot of things can be discussed about the pair of clear images of Onua's set, but not enough room in Official Bionicle 2015 for all of them.

This is pretty much an examining of ONUA THROUGH THE AGES

Armor (The Medium-Length Section):

First thing that is noticeable right off about the new image is probably 2015's armor. The first toa mata didn't have armor (and I know CCBS wouldnt really be much to look at without it), but it is just really noticeable on its own. In the leaked images, before I knew it was Onua I knew it had these massive sheets of metal all over him. These new metal plates he has did not really seem to belong to the figure wearing them. They are very detailed, unlike most of the other parts in the image. The more and more I look at it though, I see that LEGO tried very hard to capture "the BIONICLE look" in these new pieces by using piston designs. They do contribute to the feeling of this being a BIONICLE set rather than a Hero Factory set. It can be said that Onua's silver shoulders resemble how the Toa Nuva all had those uniform silver shoulder armors. I see that, but I also see a pretty good resemblance to Onua Mistika's shield. It looks like they may have made his shoulders with that shield in mind. They are both long, wide, and sort of rounded. From what can be seen of their images they have some pretty similar axles to attach them to things other than shoulders. I can see them starting off with 2 Mistika's shields as shoulders on 2015 in some prototype, deciding "It would look pretty cool, but we destroyed all these molds and we could make something better." Which they did and somewhere along the line turned it into a dual function, but more on that later.

Another thing that really sticks out are the golden shell attachments. Their coloration stands out strong on the black, purple, and silver of 2015's other pieces. They too have an attempt at the "BIONICLE look" using pistons. They also bear a strinking resemblance to Toa Mata torsos due to the positioning of these pistons on the sides, and the circle were the ball on an axle is usually put on Toa Mata sets when you rotate these attachments (but not 2001 Onua, but that detail can't be seen in Onua's picture). I'll cover the shells in the build section, because they are more the meat on his bones than armor.

Head/Mask (The Shortest Section):

The next thing I tried to focus on- away from the massive shoulders- was the head and the mask. Now it may be kind of hard to tell in the 2001 image, but Onua's eyes were originally transparent dark green. His Nuva form's were also dark green. This changed in his Mistika form, when they became transparent yellow. This is one of a few similarities to Mistika Onua's picture. 2015's mask appears to have strong influence from 2001's Pakari mask. It has the general shape, similar slits on the sides and at the top, and a sort of arch-indent resembling the "mouth" of 2001's mask. A big difference in 2015 seems to be that it is shaped to look more like a miner's helmet. It has a strange outline built around the main "face" of the mask that gives it this shape. The top of 2015's head looks like it could easily get a mining light put there, but it doesnt have one (I can see there being a more humorous cartoon animation where he has a light in his mask). I dont think it really looks anything like Nuva's mask at all. It seems to have inherited another minor detail from the Mistika: it seems to have the bridge of a nose. It doesnt have a complete nose, but more of that bump you can feel sloping off of your face that the end of the nose is attached to. This gives it a sort of strange unfinished skull look in the hammer-wielding 2015's picture, but in the shovelhands 2015 picture it looks even more like an accented arch-indent that was on the original 2001's mask.

Tools (The Other Shortest):

Another defining feature of a toa is their toa tools, so lets look at that. 2001 had 2 claws for digging, scraping, and scratching. The Shovel Hands 2015 image starts making a lot of similarities to the 2001 image here. Both show Onua wielding claw-like instruments in an underground area. The 2001 image clearly suggests he digs with these claws. The 2015 tools are more like shovels than claws, and since shovels are for digging they sort of suggest their purpose by being there, even if it doesnt really show him digging a narrow tunnel so much as wandering a more open, cave-like area. Hammer 2015 image shows 2015 Onua takes a few more concepts from Nuva Onua. It shows he has more than one purpose for the shovels he can wear on his hands. I don't think Id notice if they didn't go together to make the hammer, but Shovel Hands 2015 is more like Onua Nuva than Hammer 2015, because it is 2 tools wielded at once. It could be said that the shovels are his "transportation" function because he gets around by digging while others may surf or ski, for example. The Hammer is composed of not just the two shovels, but also axles, at least 2 of what I call "turaga mittens" providing the -| shape connections, 2 technic beams with axle | pin | axle holes, the infamous red short axle, and some piece I havent seen before serving as the top of the hammer and possibly holding the shovels together. It is attached by a gray axle. The turaga mitten above 2015's hand seems to either serve as a way to put the extras away for sheathing while 2015 wields his shovel hands. These tools are definitely not the strange chainsaw things Nuva has, or the blaster Mistika has.

Build/Shape (The Longest One):

Lastly the overall build of Onua is something to behold. The shape of his form, the dimensions, that sort of thing and the parts that make this shape. Without any real order lets just look at the feet for a minute. I've read that is 2015's claws to resemble 2001. I disagree, they look quite a bit like Mistika's feet (probably out of coincidence since these are IFB feet?) with those 4 toes in the front. The pair of parallel technic beams that are part of those feet also resemble the 2 points at the back of Mistika's feet.

Going up, notice the bones and shells. There is a strong prescence of black, the signature color of Earth in old BIONICLE. We also see something thats a pretty big deal in BIONICLE: PURPLE. In BIONICLE, purple was not used very often. In fact- the only strong presence of it in a set that I can remember is Onepu's feet and his version of the 2001 Onua mask, the Pakari which 2015's is modeled after. Hero Factory had a few runins with purple, but it was not a very common color there either. Something completely new is ofc the transparent purple bones. Aside from those we have not-very-new gray bones, black bones, black shells, and black Hero Factory hands.

Reverse to most CCBS character shapes, 2015 is made to be like a hulk (no pun intended, but is inevitable). He has really long arms, and short legs. This is different from Nuva, who had short arms and long legs. A similarity with Nuva however is 2015's pair of high shoulders, practically level with his head. Mistika stood tall without any sort of hunch. 2001 had a somewhat noticeable (by the image's depiction) hunch, but he could still probably stand up a little straighter. I think this most resembles Nuva though. Like I said the shoulders and head are about level in each image for 2015 and Nuva. They are standing pretty tall to wear Nuva's hunch could look a lot less serious in ceratin angles, and more like the result of muscles in other angles. This is like 2015, where he could look like he had a hunch depending on how he stood, but could also look be interpreted as very muscular shoulders. Mistika looked very lean compared to 2015 and Nuva who are quite bulky.

There is also the matter of that strange printed chestpiece that looks like a tiki mask with a mustache. I think the ribs on the sides along with some of the non-purple detailing looks a lot like the torso of 2001 Onua. The purple looks very odd and unlike the other iterations. Im still not sure how I feel about it, but it doesn't really look liek other Onua's. Its really odd that this covers his front, but we can't see much of any closing pieces on his back. This is kind of discouraging, and more incomplete than the other iteraions in appearance. Sure Nuva didnt have armor on his back, but he did have a back! 2015's positioning in his photos seems to just conveniently conceal a massive gap along with the gearbox that I would not expect to take up 2015's entire massive torso.

In the promotional image for 2001 does not show Onua with a gear function. If 2001 had one (which we know it does) it is edited out of the pic. It is somewhat obscure, but still visible in Nuva's picture. Since the advent of the Inika build, gears were dropped from most sets so Mistika has none (mistika does however have those red short axles that became standard, and are also in 2015's visible design). The gear function is intentionally hidden on 2015's picture (likely because they want us to see that awesomeness make a comback). Shovel Hands' golden gear pretty much screams "Look at me! Im a gear! That means I do STUFFS!" It is hard to tell exactly how his arms will swing. Will they both swing? Possibly, 2001 can be seen using both of his arms and this would be a throwback to that. It would look really odd for both arms to swing for Hammer 2015 though. Could LEGO have found an easy and convenient way for us to mod 2015 so that his function can either be one-handed or two-handed? This might justify a larger gearbox area for Onua than any other set.

So, did I miss something? What have you noticed about Onua? What is your theory on his arm's? You don't have to read my Wall of Text, but go ahead and run what you do read through your own judgement.

Images Used in my Analysis:

2001 Onua

Nuva Onua

Mistika Onua

"Shovel Hands" 2015

Hammer 2015

Edited October 9, 2014 by InfurnallDragon

[InfurnallDragon]

What if Onua's gear box was large enough that there is an axle for each arm, and a gear on each axle that can slide back and forth from a gear between the two of them; that gear between the two being connected to the gear that we directly turn. That way, we could control which arm is able to swing by the function. A piece connecting 2 balls between them could hold the arms together, and with friction not hindering the function too severely.

+ gear

= axle

O Ball

H double ball joint bone

_____________+

_____________||

_____________+

ARM|O====+OHO====+O|ARM

On left: gear is close enough to reach central gear; On right: Gear is too far to reach central gear.

Having trouble imagining a double ball joint short enough for a gear to reach though.

We know how it works now and it isnt anything like this.

Edited October 14, 2014 by InfurnallDragon

[Jared]

Ewww, why am I suddenly swimming in a pool of my own drool? ;)

Thanks for the descriptions! Saw the image as well on the website. :drools:

[vvscoersd]

good,Thanks for the descriptions! Saw the image as well on the website.thanks

Edited October 10, 2014 by vvscoersd