Lego Stories & Themes Bionicle Visorak Tower of Toa (8758)

Nice idea, with a new type of monster 2005-10-02 This Bionicle Visorak series stands among the best ideas Lego has ever pursued. It's clever, inventive, and just plain fun!

I haven't kept up with the Bionicle story over the years. I always just liked the action figures. The Bohrok were very cool, as were the Rahkshi. I began to lose interest in Bionicle when the Vahki came on the scene, but I still collected a few of them. As far as I can tell, the dynamic of Bionicle stories is usually the same. The heroic, robotic Toa versus a horde of monsters. That's pretty much what's going on here.

The Visorak are cute four-legged monsters with large pincers. There are nine of them here, and they are fighting against the six elemental Toa (humanoid robots). It should be noted that the Toa figures are not posable like other Lego minifigs. They're more like mini figurines. Each guy stands in his own heroic pose, and each guy carries his own unique silver weapon. There are spears, halberds, and battering rams. I'll forgive the lack of posability here because the rest of this set is so cool.

There are six different Visoraks (they have different styles of pincers). This set comes with nine of them (did I get an extra one by mistake? Other sets come with eight). Three of the cute little monsters are duplicates. They're made of semi-flexible plastic. You can push down on a monster's back and spring him into battle to knock down the robots. Very cool. The Visorak also glow in the dark. Both the Toa and Visorak figures have some great textured detail, and the Visorak have some very nice color detail as well.

We also get a larger Visorak who I haven't seen before. He has no pincers like his smaller buddies. Just small tusks like an elephant. Like the other Visoraks, he's a four-legged monster. He's constructed from Technic Bionicle parts. Pushing down on his back raises his head to reveal a spring-loaded missile launcher with soft-tip missile (it also fires the missile). Colors are dark blue, dark gray, and he has a gold head piece. This guy isn't quite as cool as the Visorak Queen from the Battle Of Metru Nui set, but he has an appealing uniqueness.

The backdrop for our frenzied melee between monsters and robots is a tall tower with a big black mask for a front gateway. Above the entrance to the tower is a grated window that can be flipped open to reveal a spring-loaded missile launcher on a turntable. This one fires a silver soft-tipped missile. The launcher can turn left and right, raise and lower to aim, and it can also move back and forth on rails. High atop the tower is a target for our large Visorak to aim at in the hopes of knocking it over. The tower also has opening doors at ground level, and a manually operated catapult that can launch a flaming boulder. The finishing touch is some vines that our little monsters can use to scale the walls. The little Visoraks can be snapped firmly onto a vine.

Going into the construction of the tower are mostly regular Lego pieces, with just a few Technic parts used for the catapult. Colors are primarily dark gray and black. The tower also has ornamental blades in silver to spruce up the look, a Toa mask, some torches, some really nice flame pyres, and we get decorative decals for the opening doors and mask gateway. This set has a lot of tiny white horn/spikes. I found the construction here to be easy enough. Nothing too challenging. The finished model is sturdy and easily portable.

This set isn't quite as action packed as other Bionicle Visorak playsets, but it still has that Visorak charm. An added plus is that the tower can be connected to Metru Nui. I have to say, all of the sets in this series are great! This is the kind of thing I like the most. Lots of guys with cool weapons, lots of cute little monsters, and a really nice techno-stronghold with cool action features so I can stage an epic battle. My verdict: thumbs up!

Lego Stories & Themes Bionicle Visorak Tower of Toa (8758)

- Amazon