Wall of History annotations: 2004-2005

http://wallofhistory.com/

2004 (winter)

Proposed order:
- Adventures #1 – Mystery of Metru Nui
- Adventures #2 – Trial by Fire
- Comic #16 – “City of Legends, Part I: Toa Metru!”
- Lunchables comic #1
- Lunchables comic #2
- Lunchables comic #3
- Comic #17 – “City of Legends, Part II: Disks of Danger”
- Comic #18 – “City of Legends, Part III: Seeds of Doom”
- Adventures #3 – The Darkness Below
- Metru Nui: City of Legends (extracts)

There is only one possible ordering for the first half of 2004, as there is no version of the mini CD-ROM games which can be played in-browser. Adventures #1-2 form a complete narrative, while all the comics adapt that narrative and add in a few extra scenes. We tried chopping and changing between the books and the comics but it created a very jarring experience. More importantly, the last page of comic #16 actually spoils a "reveal" in Adventures #2 - namely that the Morbuzakh is hiding in Ta-Metru's Great Furnace - and as such shouldn't be read before the book at all.

2004 (summer)

Proposed interactive order:
- Bordakh flash animation
- Nuurakh flash animation
- Rorzakh flash animation
- Keerakh flash animation
- Vorzakh flash animation
- Zadakh flash animation
- BIONICLE 2: Legends of Metru Nui (film)
- Comic #19 – “City of Legends, Part IV: Enemies of Metru Nui”
- Comic #20 – “City of Legends, Part V: Struggle in the Sky”
- Comic #21 – “City of Legends, Part VI: Dreams of Darkness”
- Adventures #5 – Voyage of Fear
- Adventures #6 – Maze of Shadows
- Bohrok in Maze of Shadows Mini-Contest winner – “Protection”

Proposed prose order:
- Adventures #4 – Legends of Metru Nui TBD
- Comic #19 – “City of Legends, Part IV: Enemies of Metru Nui”
- Comic #20 – “City of Legends, Part V: Struggle in the Sky”
- Comic #21 – “City of Legends, Part VI: Dreams of Darkness”
- Adventures #5 – Voyage of Fear
- Adventures #6 – Maze of Shadows
- Bohrok in Maze of Shadows Mini-Contest winner – “Protection”

While it's hardly a surprising twist, the winter story does for the most part keep the fact that Turaga Dume is evil a secret. That changed with the summer wave of 2004, and the Vakhi flash animations make this evil-ness much more overt. They're effectively plotless anyway, so we placed them immediately before the movie as foreshadowing for its twist, in the order they're presented in Templar's official player.

There's a large narrative gap between Adventures #3 and comic #19, and comic #21 seems to have a pretty heavy focus on setting up aspects of 2005's storyline, so we moved all three comics after the movie, placing them before Adventures #5-6 (which have a similar focus). Things are obviously easier using the prose adaptation of the movie. The contest-winning fan explanation for why there's Bohrok in the Maze of Shadows game really has no place to go but at the end of this year.

2005

Proposed interactive order:
- Adventures #7 – Web of the Visorak
- Comic #22 – “Monsters in the Dark”
- Adventures #8 – Challenge of the Hordika
- BIONICLE: Rahi Beasts (extracts)
- Comic #23 – “Vengeance of the Visorak”
- Comic #24 – “Shadow Play”
- Comic #25 – “Birth of the Rahaga”
- Comic #26 – “Hanging by a Thread”
- Comic #27 – “Fractures”
- Toa Hordika and The Mask of Light animations
- Web Comic #1 (script only)
- BIONICLE Encyclopedia (extracts)
- BIONICLE 3: Web of Shadows
- Adventures #10 – Time Trap
- BIONICLE Encyclopedia bonus story – “Birth of a Dark Hunter”
- Comic #27 "Special Sneak Peek" backup strip

Proposed prose order:
- Adventures #7 – Web of the Visorak
- Comic #22 – “Monsters in the Dark”
- Adventures #8 – Challenge of the Hordika
- BIONICLE: Rahi Beasts (extracts)
- Comic #23 – “Vengeance of the Visorak”
- Comic #24 – “Shadow Play”
- Comic #25 – “Birth of the Rahaga”
- Comic #26 – “Hanging by a Thread”
- Comic #27 – “Fractures”
- Web Comic #1 (script only)
- BIONICLE Encyclopedia (extracts)
- Adventures #9 – Web of Shadows
- Adventures #10 – Time Trap
- BIONICLE Encyclopedia bonus story – “Birth of a Dark Hunter”
- Comic #27 "Special Sneak Peek" backup strip

Comic #22 is an adaptation of Adventures #7, so you could probably cut it from an actual reading order. Although the first few scenes of comic #23 are set during Adventures #8, dialogue in #26 tells us that the continuous storyline told through to #27 is set after that book. The "Toa Hordika and The Mask of Light" animations follow on from the backstory revealed in comic #25 and ends with a meeting of all six Toa; we can perhaps say that the script for the first part of the unreleased web comic takes place immediately following that gathering.

The encyclopedia was released alongside Adventures #10 but seems to have been written with the intent of keeping the events of Web of Shadows a surprise, referring to what happens as "currently unknown". The "Birth of a Dark Hunter" prose story in that encyclopedia, however, features many characters who were introduced in "Time Trap", and leads nicely into 2006's sorta-Dark-Hunters-centric storyline.