Vrahno

Lore describes Guurahk's power as a cone-shaped energy wave, but it's shown in the comics and other promotional works with very different visuals. I wonder what direction the movie would have taken.

A deleted scene shows Guurahk stepping on a Kolhii ball and smashing it, then planting its staff into the ground to do something. Disappointingly, its power receives no unique visual.

Guurahk is the outlier, its disintegration power has no special effect in the movie. It knocks a hole in a wall but its staff isn't activated. The one time Guurahk does use its staff, it shoots a combined beam with Panrahk and Lerahk, so we don't get to see its power separately.

Turahk's fear power is a stream of red rings that send swirling "fear smoke" around the target (which look more like bubbles), turning them into cowards, terrorizing or straight-up killing them.

Kurahk's anger power is a series of bluish white rings that cause Tahu's body to smoke and puts these weird swirls around him while making snarling sound effects. If you're depicting an abstract power like anger, might as well be creative with it.

Vorahk's energy-draining hunger power is straightforward, it sucks purple energy from Onua, turning him pale.

Panrahk is meant to have another power, exploding the ground with each step, but this isn't shown in the movie or other media I can think of, so I don't know why it was written. Promo art shows the ground getting smashed under all the Rahkshi's feet, *except* Panrahk's. Nice job.

The beam seems to have a concussive effect too. When it hits Tahu's force field head-on, it sends him flying, smashing the wall behind him. But Kopaka can simply block the beam with his bare swords and channel the explosive energy into doing a backflip off a mountain.

Panrahk's fragmentation power is a purple-green explosive beam that shoots upwards and arcs down rather than affecting its target directly. It's a clunky and very slow way to hit someone, but it looks cool. It can also be shot as a straight beam during flight.

I like that most of the Rahkshi powers in Bionicle: Mask of Light were given a distinctive effect, despite censorship concerns greatly limiting how they could be used. Lerahk's poison is a spreading, bubbly gas or fluid that glows green.

Pewku's 3D model, sans claws, would at least make a return to be used as random critters scampering about in establishing shots in the later Creative Capers films, although some of their appearances were cut. They are more prominent in concept art.

Ultimately, as Bionicle became more self serious, action-heavy and fast paced, there was less and less time for animal sidekicks. Click is an outlier due to being allowed both levity and plot relevance, but sadly Pewku herself would fall completely by the wayside in post-2003 stories.

2007's Mahri Nui arc also had Jaller's temporary pet Hahnah crab, which he abandoned by the end of the arc (or rather, Jaller was teleported away and the crab was left to eat shit in the sea) and 2009's Bara Magna arc had Click, Mata Nui's transforming Scarabax beetle buddy.

Bionicle would experiment with further "cute animal sidekicks" in later years. The originally planned 2005 film about Lhikan and Nidhiki's backstory was set to feature a giant bio-mechanical bug-turned-vehicle called Womp, a kind of precursor to the Toa Terrain Crawler from 2007.

She was also meant to appear in the final few shots as the characters approach the balcony overlooking Metru Nui. I wonder why Pewku was dropped so abruptly if the story clearly called for her presence and she was a fairly important character in the film's first three quarters.

The film never bothered to animate her into any crowd shots, similar to how the script called for ALL of the island's Matoran to amass in Makuta's lair but the film only shows Hahli and Jaller. Supposedly, there are meant to be hundreds of Matoran in this shot, plus Pewku. They simply aren't there.

Pewku's sudden vanishing is one of the many examples of why the movie's last portion is a mess. Pewku was present on the storyboards where she cheerfully reunites with Takanuva after his victory, carrying on the running gag of tackling and licking him like a cheerful dog.

Pewku gets rather unceremoniously forgotten by the end of Mask of Light, disappearing from the film after Takua is upgraded to Takanuva. This shot is the last we see of her, standing beside the Toa, but she's gone when we get a closer view of them, and her owner never acknowledges her.

The story reason for the change is apparently that Ussal crabs get a growth spurt at a certain age. This is a kind of awkward explanation, as she was already said to be old in MNOG, yet she was still a tiny crab until she suddenly grew even older, bigger and changed her colors. Whatever.

Like her owner Takua, she was a story-only character given more prominence in Mask of Light, receiving a more elaborate and realistic design, becoming big enough to carry two riders. Her colors became more earthly brown and grey, and her first official toy was based on the film design.

Like most of the models in the set, the Ussal crab was a tiny grey and orange model. Puku was based on this design but in an alternate color scheme that she carried well into 2003 in the Bohrok-Kal Flash animations. She was not yet released as her own Lego toy at this point.

Ussal crabs were among the many animals of Mata Nui originally planned to be released in 2001 with building instructions provided in MNOG, hence the crabs' prominence in the game. This didn't happen and the release of the Bionicle Master Builder Set was postponed until 2002.

Pewku is an example of toy plans influencing the story, which curved back to influence toys. Originally named Puku, she was introduced in MNOG as a retired blue and yellow Ussal race crab who now served as a taxi crab and had no accurate toy representation. She befriended Takua, hauling him around.

Pewku thread. Bionicle focused so hard on super-powered heroes, villains and their millennia-spanning cosmic mysteries, it's easy to forget that one of the main heroes had a giant cute pet crab who behaved like a dog, complete with licking tongue and wiggling tail, and was ridden like a horse.

A Godzilla.

In addition, the elevator seen in TLOMN's cutscene and briefly shown but not explained in MNOG is absent from the film. In the film, there is no mechanical device located under the Kini Nui temple shrine that leads underground, only a vertical stone shaft opening into a generic cave.

With the "island falling apart" concept being cut and delayed for later stories, Mangaia's destruction ultimately doesn't factor into the film's plot, probably explaining why the aforementioned two shots were cut. Hence, Makuta's destruction of the pillars carries no weight.

My best guess is this is the outside view of the Mangaia chamber as its gets gradually blown apart by the fight between Makuta and Takanuva. This would tie in with an early concept for the film where the whole island crumbles and the characters have to flee deeper underground.

There are two mysterious deleted shots that also look like a crumbling cave wall. I have long wondered what they mean. You can see the vein-like structures described on concept art on the top. As more of the wall falls off, what seem to be the green pillars become visible.

Plot-wise, most of Mangaia's chamber also gets destroyed by the end when Makuta recklessly smashes his own place apart to taunt Takanuva. Despite being intangible to allow the Rahkshi to be "born" in earlier scenes, the walls of the pillars are now solid and crystalline.