Bionicle/YMMV

"Teridax: We both know there are a thousand ways I could destroy you right now. And 941 of them hurt.""
 * Alas, Poor Villain:
 * I felt the same way.
 * Alternate Character Interpretation: The Order of Mata Nui was created specifically to allow them to do things that the Toa's moral code would forbid. That hasn't stopped some of their more morally gray missions from pushing them into Knights Templar territory for some.
 * Angst? What Angst?: Considering that, Mata Nui's a pretty together guy.
 * Badass Decay: The Skrall in the battle at the end of The Legend Reborn, though Word of God justifies this by saying, 1.) They were scared out of their minds by this giant made out of bugs that suddenly appeared, 2.) The Glatorian, not being in the arena, have an excuse to employ all of those dirty tricks that they've learned over the years, and 3.) Screw the Rules, I Make Them / Hand Wave. Also, the Glatorian had the element of surprise, plus a handful of them had Elemental Powers.
 * Better Than Canon: Greg's ban on romance hasn't slowed down the Huki/Maku Shippers at all.
 * Complete Monster: Makuta Teridax is the Big Bad of the franchise as a whole, and is responsible for nearly every bad thing that happens in the BIONICLE universe in his quest for godhood. Starting out as a member of The Brotherhood of Makuta, Teridax coerced his teammates into betraying Mata Nui, then infected him with a virus. After Mata Nui succumbs to the virus and falls into a coma, causing innumerable amounts of destruction throughout the Cosmos, Teridax plans to erase the memories of an island of Matoran, then play himself up as their Savior. When the Toa, the heroes of the Matoran, try to free them from Teridax, he tries to kill them all before being sealed away. Eventually escaping, Teridax begins a centuries-long war against the Toa, at one point releasing the omnicidal Bohrok, who attempt to wipe out thousands of innocents. Teridax influences the Piraka into finding the Mask of Life, to which The Spirit of Mata Nui is bound, and they commit numerous atrocities while under Teridax's influence. Teridax assists the Toa in finding the Mask, knowing one of them will have to sacrifice themselves to keep The Spirit of Mata Nui alive. Teridax then reveals he played them all, takes control of Mata Nui's body, achieves godhood, then flings Mata Nui into space. Teridax goes on to murder his former allies, wage war against the remaining Toa, and subject any rebels who try to stop him, or minions who anger him, to horrific punishments. Traveling to the planet Mata Nui has been residing on, Teridax's last act is trying to blow it up just to spite him. Teridax was a monstrous and sadistic sociopath whose god complex cost millions their lives and ruined countless more throughout his 100,000-year campaign of evil.
 * Makuta Mutran serves the Brotherhood of Makuta for the chance to perform his psychotic experiments unimpeded. Causing trouble even when the Brotherhood was more heroic, Mutran creates Matoran-devouring monstrosities and is known to have unleashed his beasts during the time of a civil war so as to cover up the death and destruction his creations wreak. Once gaining insight into the future and learning of Teridax's plans and the universe-wide destruction it will cause, Mutran doubles his efforts to get into Teridax's good graces and happily joins his revolution against Mata Nui, continuing his horrifying experiments in the process. Once developing the nightmarish Shadow Leeches, parasites that painfully devour all of the good out of their target, Mutran happily obliges Teridax's order to use them on an entire island, and thus rips out the morals of hundreds of Matoran, turning them into the Brotherhood's evil slaves. Wanting nothing more than to torture, experiment, and dissect all around him, what Mutran lacked in power he more than made up for in unbridled scientific sadism.
 * The Shadowed One is the cruel head of the Dark Hunters, a shadowy organization of assassins and bounty hunters willing to do anything for profit. Ruling the Dark Hunters with an iron fist, the Shadowed One punishes minor slip-ups with torture and dismemberment, failure with death, and treachery with fates worse than death. The Shadowed One uses the Dark Hunters to carry out countless acts of murder, slavery, and kidnapping, and, though many of the Hunters are just psychotic and greedy, some are forced into service by the Shadowed One when he threatens their lives or the lives of their loved ones. With no loyalty or true care to any but himself, the Shadowed One's Dragon lives a constantly tortured existence due to horrifying experiments the Shadowed One performed on him, while the Shadowed One's "closest ally", Ancient, is coldly executed by the Shadowed One to cover up a secret weapon of his own. By the end of the story, the Shadowed One has foregone all form of secrecy and subtlety to instead wage a war against the entire city of Metru Nui, and later attempts to harness the power of a lethal virus to blackmail any civilizations he wants with it. The Shadowed One is regarded as the most dangerous person in the universe alongside Makuta Teridax, and he does nothing to dissuade this proclamation.
 * Pridak, known as "the Shark", was once the self-appointed ruler of the "League of Six Kingdoms", a villainous empire headed by himself and 5 other criminals, together known as the "Barraki". As the leader of this League, Pridak organized the other Barraki to conquer nearly the entire Matoran Universe, slaughtering all those who aren't enslaved, with Pridak's own minions fairing no better, as he orders an entire battalion massacred simply because 3 of the over 50 soldiers in said battalion took a break. Though severely weakened after being locked away in the underwater prison the Pit, Pridak continues his plans for conquest, as he dismembers fellow Barraki if they question him, sics his pet sharks on Matoran, and forces another to watch as his city is ravaged by Pridak's forces. After escaping the Pit and ditching the other Barraki, Pridak tries to resume his insane plans for conquest, successfully wiping out a small island before being stopped. Pridak was the absolute worst the Barraki had to offer, and gleefully accepted this role in stride.
 * Tuyet is a fanatic who is obsessed with imposing her own "order" on the universe. While a nasty being who sadistically murders 3 Matoran to cover up a weapon she found in the "prime" Matoran Universe, it is in the Dark Mirror alternate universe where her evil shines. Having evaded capture for her Matoran serial killing by murdering Toa Lhikan, Tuyet uses the Nui Stone to convince other Toa to join together and create the "Toa Empire", a military ruling body that imposes their version of peace on the Matoran. Any Toa who stood against Tuyet were summarily brainwashed or executed, with the same fate befalling countless Matoran for the pettiest of infractions, with Tuyet ordering the liquidation of an entire tribe of Matoran solely because they have the ability to stand against her; one Matoran was frozen alive for walking too slowly. Along with covering the walls of her base with "trophies" ranging from weapons of fallen opponents to the opponents themselves, turned into living statues and decorations, Tuyet treats the Matoran as animals to be subjugated, going so far as to almost wipe out hundreds of them who rebel, only hesitating because it would leave her with less to lord over. With a final plan of conquering all other universes and turning then into totalitarian society she has created in her own, Tuyet was a terrifying example of a Toa's ability to take their "duty" way too far and become far worse than those monsters they claim to oppose.
 * Annona, from Sahmad's Tale, is one of the few villains to surface only after Teridax's defeat, and handily the worst. An ancient, dream-devouring entity, Annona drains entire civilizations of their dreams for empowerment, and the resulting lack of dreams drives the victims insanebefore they agonizingly die, something Annona drags out as long as possible so as to savor the taste of the dreams. After failing to drive the Great Beings themselves to madness to assert her dominance, Annona replenishes her strength by draining the Iron Tribe's dreams, leading to the annihilation of the Tribe, and later grants all females of the Skrall species with psionic abilities to watch as they wipe out the male Skralls for nothing but her own entertainment. Once awakening from her slumber, Annona enslaves the female Skralls for failing her, turning them into controlled puppets, then attempts to continue her spree of dream-devouring, even attempting to weasel her way out of a fight so as to feed on an entire planet. Treating her victims as nothing but "lunch", Annona was a purely evil monster who stands out as the worst villain the Matoran encounter on Bara Magna.
 * Contested Sequel: Some like Web of Shadows for being Darker and Edgier, others dislike it for Vakama's unnecessary Face Heel Turn.
 * Crowning Moment of Awesome: Has its own page.
 * Crowning Moment of Heartwarming: Also has its own page.
 * Crowning Moment of Funny: Guess What?
 * Crowning Music of Awesome: A lot of the music used in the commercials, such as "Caught Up In A Dream", "Move Along", "Creeping In My Soul", "Gravity Hurts", and "Bye Bye Babylon".
 * Watched the end credits of "The Legend Reborn" lately? It ends the movie with an epic piece by Presence known as "Ride".
 * Those are nothing. The soundtrack of the Mata Nui Online Game is often praised as The definitive Bionicle soundtrack, and for a good reason.
 * The console games are nothing to sneeze at either.
 * The movie soundtracks anybody?
 * Ensemble Darkhorse: Takua/Takanuva
 * And Vezon... Don't forget Vezon.
 * Even Better Sequel: While undeniably has it's flaws, the second Bionicle film was a far better written and executed, not to mention far better looking than it's predecessor and is far above most Merchandise-Driven direct-to DVD childrens' movies. The third and fourth film on the other hand...
 * Evil Is Sexy: Roodaka. I mean, just LOOK at her! Well, the movie at least.
 * Fan Nickname: the "Fauxrok" (fake Bohrok) and "Kratana" (Krana/Kraata hybrids)
 * Fan-Preferred Couple: Macku x Hewkii became this after Greg Farshtey declared all romance non-canon.
 * Fridge Horror: The Boxor vehicles are made of Bohrok parts. The Bohrok.
 * I Am Not Shazam: The characters are not "Bionicles".
 * I Knew It!:
 * Jumping the Shark: This is a dodgy subject. Many people say that the series jumped it after 2009-2010's Doing In the Wizard, some people however say it happened somewhere 2007-2008 while others say it happened after the revelation of there being more than one Makuta. There are also people who says that the Shark Jumping went as far back as 2004-2005. So the thing is, there probably was a shark jump, but no one can decide when it happened.
 * The fact that the comic books have been steadily getting shorter with each story arc, and that the comics themselves began ending with cliffhangers that were resolved in tie-in movies and books certainly didn't help.
 * Magnificent Bastard: Makuta Teridax; especially after the end of the Matoran saga. The below quote actually does him justice on this matter.


 * The Shadowed One, but not to the extent of Teridax.
 * Roodaka gives them both a run for their money!
 * Memetic Mutation: The Zyglak. Hai. I r on a Zyglak Quest. Would you liek to join me?
 * "BURN STUFF!!!"- any parody of a Toa of Fire, mainly Tahu.
 * "Beware my stinger tail!" and "I AM THE MIGHTY TUMA!"
 * *Insert character here* died for/to save your *Insert noun here*
 * OTP: Macku/Hewkii and Hahli/Jaller.
 * Pandering to the Base: Just the sheer amount of Sure Why Not cases made by the author is enough to get on a significant amount of people's nerves.
 * The Problem with Licensed Games: BIONICLE: The Game and BIONICLE Heroes suffer from this, the latter going all the way to They Just Didn't Care considering there's three bosses that are canonically dead and one that's actually supposed to be good. Then again, the developers of Heroes' say their case was deliberate, believing that by going past the limits of canon, they can make a more fun game
 * Partially subverted in that Heroes was still fairly enjoyable (especially the DS version, which is basically similar to Metroid Prime Hunters) despite being canon rape, and fully subverted with the GBA RPG Maze of Shadows, a direct video game adaptation of one of the chapter books.
 * Same Character but Different: As a result of Conflict Ball, some of the characters in the movies have suffered this, but none more so than Takua/Takanuva. Before the first movie, he was potrayed as adventurous, if a bit unsteady, but ultimately a resourceful and very heroic character. In the movie, the "unsteady" part suddenly became "irresponsible" and at the same time lost all of his resourcefulness and selfless heroism, becoming almost a full-fledged load until the last act or so.
 * A less Egregious, but still notable example would be Vakama in the third film. In the previous movie, he had constant insecurities with his role as a Toa and the leader, but eventually grew more confident and became the hero he was meant to be. Apparently in between the third and the second film, he became so confident that he pulled a brief Face Heel Turn because one of his team mates questioned his leadership.
 * The Scrappy: The Toa Inika designs are widely disliked by the fans, mostly because of the hideous masks and the flat, unoriginal designs (that have been used for every other character since).
 * The Bohrok-Kal have it even worse, being Palette Swaps of characters that were already Palette Swaps of each other. Note in both cases, the trope only applies to the toys and not the story characters.
 * The Toa Mistika (sometimes also including the Phatonka) are just as detested, if not even more so than the Inika, for not only recycling the same design but also looking absolutely nothing like the original six Toa they are supposed to be. This and coupled with head-scratching weapons (with four of them basically using the same one) and very hideous looking masks only added fuel to the fire.
 * So Bad It's Good: The Piraka Rap
 * Special Effect Failure: Ever so noticeable in Legends of Metru Nui, Web of Shadows and The Legend Reborn.
 * Tear Jerker:
 * Lhikan's death will make you cry all night.
 * They Changed It, Now It Sucks: The fan reaction to learning Makuta's name.
 * Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny: Tahtorak kept being pit against other giant monsters, such as Zivon, Kardas, and the Kanohi Dragon.
 * Viewer Gender Confusion: Nobody has any Tertiary Sexual Characteristics (besides Roodaka), so I dare you to ID one of the girls without resorting to the color-coding - and even that's hardly foolproof (see Vezok, Takadox, Gorast, Krika, etc.).
 * Averted with Nektann, as the fanbase by then had gotten used to blue villains being male in general and Skakdi always being presented as male in specific.
 * Villain Decay:
 * Brotherhood of Makuta. The first Makuta introduced to the audience was set up as a dark god of unspeakable power, and even later Makuta were still some of the most dangerous foes the Toa have ever faced. By the end everybody kills them by the dozen.
 * Wangst: Vakama in Legends of Metru Nui. Oh god, how much he angsts...
 * The Woobie: Krika, of all characters. Yes, a Makuta has been turned into a Woobie.
 * And the two first Toa of Air introduced, Lewa and Matau.
 * And Lesovikk, another Toa of Air.