Bionicle Canisters

Unknown Knight · Post by **Unknown Knight** » Thu Sep 29, 2005 4:14 pm

I was just thinking, why does Lego put bionicles in plastic canisters? After all, are not they always trying to cut costs? Packing a toy in a plastic package must be more expensive than packing it in cardboard and plastic bags. I think it would be cheaper for them to just pack them the normal way (cardboard box and plastic bags).

May be the packing toa and inc. in plastic container is more stylish?
(I have to admit it was kind of cool at first that they came in plastic containers.)

Also on a side note, those canister take up to much space when you store the toa in it. I recently threw away a bunch of them because they take up a lot of space (by the way the bionicle canisters are recycable). I found it much more space efficient to just store the toa and inc. in large plastic storage containers.

Anyways, what your thoughts?

Snap Dracone · Post by **Snap Dracone** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 9:44 pm

Well, originally, the canisters were part of the story. In the 2001 comics, the Toa washed up on the shores in their canisters, and in 2002, the Bohrok slept in their pods. After that they just kept using canisters for the sets of six...

ottoatm · Post by **ottoatm** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 12:59 am

Snap Dracone wrote:Well, originally, the canisters were part of the story. In the 2001 comics, the Toa washed up on the shores in their canisters, and in 2002, the Bohrok slept in their pods. After that they just kept using canisters for the sets of six...

Hmm... I didn't know that - that is kind of interesting, as I had been wondering why they used canisters as well. Nice marketing by LEGO, if I do say so myself. The Bionicle line seems to be the first step in their attempt to mix a story with their product's marketing scheme.

Tanotrooper · Post by **Tanotrooper** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 10:02 am

If you ask me, after 2 lines of bionicle, it isnt cool anymore. How much series have they already released? 10 or so? And its always the smae storyline that the toa have to save the planet or so...

When i have a lego catalog, i skip the pages of bionicle, seriously.

ottoatm · Post by **ottoatm** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 1:24 pm

Tanotrooper wrote:When i have a lego catalog, i skip the pages of bionicle, seriously.

Yea, me too actually. I did a buy a set or two out of curiosity, and I have seen some great MOCs lately that use bionicle... but actually, I just can't get into it.

LEGOFREAK · Post by **LEGOFREAK** » Sun Oct 02, 2005 3:44 am

some of the lids are pretty cool, like the round ones. you can snap two of them together to create a ball, usefull for big giant wheels and such. Or a counterweight if you filled it with other parts.
Most of the lids have holes to do stuff like this with.
the Bohrok containers were meant to be stored on their sides sorta like a wine rack I guess.
plus they were clear and you pulled off the stickers if you stored them upright so you could see the dude hanging inside.
as far as some of the new shapes I dont know. The Vahki stuff is weird.
my son just keeps his in a big drawer, and throws them away. Except the lids he can use of course.

Trigger · Post by **Trigger** » Sun Oct 02, 2005 12:17 pm

ottoatm wrote:
Snap Dracone wrote:Well, originally, the canisters were part of the story. In the 2001 comics, the Toa washed up on the shores in their canisters, and in 2002, the Bohrok slept in their pods. After that they just kept using canisters for the sets of six...
Hmm... I didn't know that - that is kind of interesting, as I had been wondering why they used canisters as well. Nice marketing by LEGO, if I do say so myself. The Bionicle line seems to be the first step in their attempt to mix a story with their product's marketing scheme.

The Bohrok used canisters because there is some strange link between the Toa and the Bohrok.

Snap Dracone · Post by **Snap Dracone** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 1:41 am

Trigger wrote:The Bohrok used canisters because there is some strange link between the Toa and the Bohrok.

Yes, there is, but that's not why they used the canisters. The Bohrok canisters are the pods that they sleep in until they're awoken. We don't know what the connection between Toa and Bohrok is yet.

Oh, and another function of the canisters: the tops for the original Toa from 2001 serve as the Toa Suva for displaying the six masks for each Toa. The Rahkshi tops (or bottoms, since they're upside-down) hold the Kraata, and the Toa Hordika and Visorak tops hold spare spinners. But the Vahki tops don't have much alternate functionality...

lil Jon · Post by **lil Jon** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 1:47 am

I have to admit that I own a bionicle. My girlfriend and I got it out of curiousity, I swear.

I don't know about the story or where one even reads the story. But the canister seemed to be part of the toy. His "mask" could go on the top of it, which I thought was kind of nifty although it made no sense why one would place it there.

Anyways, I don't know what happened to my bionicle. I hope he's ok.