OK, everyone knows I'm a hardcore BIONICLE fan, but 2003's Bohrok-Kal were definitely a lull in the line. I was nuts over the original Bohrok in 2002, and getting the revamped Toa Nuva later that year seemed to hint (even the instruction manuals for the Exo-Toa and Bahrag showed menacing "bumps" rising alongside the Nuva from the protodermis) at equally-formidable enemies to come. Alas, the Bohrok Kal were just re-colors of the original Bohrok, with some new shield designs. Very cool designs, I might add, but that was about it.

I think LEGO was aware of this because they tied the Kal sets with a lucrative lottery. Five thousand random Bohrok Kal sets would contain a white metal Krana-Kal (the living organism controlling the Bohrok and Kal inside their heads) and an even smaller quantity would include a sterling silver Krana Kal. Plus, the canisters were a very clear plastic, so long before people were feeling up CMF bags, fans were peering into the bottom of Kal canisters at the store to see if they could spot that special black felt bag among the other loose pieces. This strategy yielded in several instances at high-volume stores people finding even more than one WMKK at a time. I, however, was not so enticed by even these odds, and while I looked every now and then, I wasn't compelled to shell out my meager savings for essentially re-colored "clones" of last years' innovative lineup.

And there was another reason for reticence in purchasing, which again, LEGO may have engineered or allowed to happen: the Rahkshi were coming! Us BZPers saw a leaked photograph from a display at a Japanese toy expo in late 2002 that revealed some AMAZING new BIONICLE canister sets coming out in the summer of 2003, just in time to be the antagonists for the Mask of Light movie. They blew us away! Neck articulation! KNEES! They looked very menacing, too. Perfect counters for the Toa Nuva, though we knew little at the time of what their personalities or powers would be. But obviously, LEGO was going to release a new set of six canister sets in the first half of 2003. And after blowing the budget on the Rahkshi designs and parts (this was right at the bottom of LEGO's financial abyss) , it stands to reason the designers needed to whip out something simple to hold us over.

Story-wise, the Kal proved to be interesting, cunning antagonists for the Nuva. Far more intelligent and independent than the Bohrok swarms they were based on, they were united fanatically in their purpose: find the Bahrag, free the Bahrag, and unleash the swarms once more. At the time, power had gone to the Nuvas' heads, and separate, they were easy pickings for the Kal, who stripped them of their powers when they stole the Nuva symbols from each village's suva, or Toa shrine. To defeat them required a temporary settling of differences, a deus ex machina in the form of the Vahi, the Mask of Time, and some clever reasoning from Gali Nuva. It was a near thing, but as the online flash animation and comic book showed, the Kal were spectacularly defeated by their own powers. Even as the Toa Nuva's powers returned, they returned to their isolationist ways, just as an old foe reformed down in the depths below the island of Mata Nui...

I only ever got three of the Bohrok Kal sets in the end. Gahlok Kal's mastery of magnetism was cool, and used to good effect. The Kal Kaita combiner model was featured in the second part of the Kal saga comic story, and it looked so cool that I always wanted to make it. Alas, I only have Lehvak Kal and Kohrak Kal to this day, and I wish I could find a sealed Gahlok Kal (for a good price) to make it a reality!

I can't understand how some people know so much about Bionicle and I know pretty much nothing. Bohrok? Rahkshi? Toa Nuva? Gali Nuva?? Kal? I only know the Kal from Titanic. :D

^I was 14 at the time of the Kal's release, and I was a BIONICLE fan since the start of the theme in 2001. And although BIONICLE proper ended in 2010, I have been blessed/cursed with a good memory and can still recall those details!

LEGO did a good job of hooking me. The "point of entry" into BIONICLE back in 2001 was easy and cheap. I was already a Lego Club member, and the BIONICLE comics (which told the stories in which all of that information I posted above originated) came free with each issue every two months. The BIONICLE website, launched before the toys here in North America, was also an immersive, fun experience. All that without having bought a single BIONICLE set! But this stuff only stuck out to a kid like myself, with a severely limited piggy bank of funds and lots of free time. If you were much, much younger or just a few years older, BIONICLE's presence was likely ignored outside of the occasional sighting in the LEGO aisle at the store or a stray TV commercial. Then again, I can't speak to how BIONICLE was marketed in Finland, either.

^^ 12 identical sets, if you wanna get technical about it.

Thanks Lego Lord Mayorca for this description. I did not imagined when opening this random set of the day page that it would lead me to learn so much about the Bionicle legends and history. That is what a fan is!

My two cents. I did not grow up with the comics and only knew the basic premise of the early years because I wasn't allowed very often to go on the internet. I was still able to get into the story from the setting and descriptions in the catalogs from the toy stores. For me the design of bionicle was what drew me in.

I loved lego before bionicle, however. I experienced the mid to late nineties and experienced firsthand how lego became 'weirder' with all the strange endeavours that lego took at the time. To be honest, most current AFOLs that look down on bionicle have no idea how many bad un lego-like themes lego made at the time. Bionicle wasn't the first constraction theme. Those were Slizers/Throwbots and later RoboRiders. Those early sets even used system and technic parts like minifigure katanas and standard gears.

If you look at a catalog of 2000-2004 only the middle pages were used for traditional lego themes. There were many weird toys for toddlers, many toys with electronic components and many different construction systems like the belville system, scala system, duplo system, primo system, quatro system, 4junior (jack stone) system etc. Remember spybotics? No? Why would that be? There were even basic lego games like lego soccer mania. Not created by existing game developer, but built by hiring dev themes for in the company itself. These systems seeped into what are now considered regular sets. The odd set had constraction, belville or even scala parts. Even the 'creator' sets had jack-stone like figures. Remember, lego was at a time where they were so desperate that it renamed Duplo to 'Explore'. Town had already disappeared until World City came in 2003-4. There was no more space or castle either.
But my love for bionicle only grew. If there were nice regular themes back then, I probably wouldn't have been nearly as much of a bionicle fan. Most of the nicer themes were either one-shots like Life on Mars, Orient Expedition (technically from the earlier adventurers line) studion and the like, recurring themes like Alpha team (that changed drastically each year) or expensive licenses like Harry Potter and Star Wars.

I daresay my interest in lego might have been a lot lower without bionicle. Especially in 2002 and 2003.

Later when I was able to use the internet more often I found out about the lore. I spent days upon days just reading the wikipedia pages. It was an amazing story! I remember finding the list of rahi. Most of those didn't have an official set.

That is why to me constraction is just as much a part of lego as system sets. It's not that weird. It was a result of lego trying new things. Many of those things did not survive for long. But because of its story, set design, customizability and rebuildability, it became a rare system that stood the test of time. It's like technic. On its own it might look like something seperate from system. But it surely is compatible. And it holds up on its own. Would you consider the technic line as not true lego? No? Maybe because you know that it sprung off from system with studded beams. The same is true for constraction. It used to be a lot more technic-like.