Canon Updates: Canonical Contradictions Conundrum!

 By: Andrew Bermudez

(Mustache Maniacs Film Co. Headquarters; April 23, 2022)

    It's just past Earth Day, and while we've continued our commitment to a green, clean planet, we've discovered where we also need to do a different kind of cleaning up. Here's the latest.

Captain D. Rom Films Are Changing Character Ages!

Title Card for Captain D. Rom in: The Felony at the Fruit Stand (Canon); ©2014 Rioforce Studios

    Like we mentioned earlier this month, Rioforce's Captain D. Rom films were canonized for our cinematic universe as events that take place on LEGO Island from 1978 through today. This, inevitably, led to some additional canon changes, mainly related to character ages, but since we've fully integrated this series into the timeline, we now have a clear picture of what ages need to change.

• Laura Brick was now born in 1958. Her birthday (June 19) is staying the same.
• Nick Brick was now born in 1962. His birthday (February 12) is staying the same.

On a related note, there was one more age that needed changing...

And So Is Radia's Age!

    According to the official canon, Radia entered college in 1989 (which one has not been determined), where the former Professor William Ogel began to, uh, have feelings towards her. She rejected those advances, which started him down his path to villainy (though, quite frankly, anyone his age hitting on a young adult was already headed in that direction, anyway). However, PeabodySam discovered an issue with this in the story bible: Radia's birth year is listed as 1981, which makes her too young to have been in college at that time. Because of this, we have a new canon change.

• Radia was now born in 1971. Her birthday (September 24) is staying the same.

We are still working on going through the canon and fixing any contradictions, which will be done by the end of the year. Speaking of which...

Canonical LEGO Magazine Comics: Do They Contradict the Canon? Yes They Do.

Comic from LEGO Alpha Team Instructions (Non-Canon); Artist Unknown; ©2001, The LEGO Group

    Recently, as part of our (surprisingly short) network update to link canonical stories that are not owned by us to the official timeline, we've continued our year-long project to clean up and double-check the canon for any errors (which included the previously-mentioned age changes). This past week, we checked in with the five LEGO Magazine comics that are considered canonical (The Return of Ogel from March/April 2001 and the four Alpha Team: Mission Deep Freeze comics from July/August 2004 through January/February 2005) and discovered something that we had not noticed before: contradictions to the canon! Here's what we noticed in our review:

• The comic The Return of Ogel does not depict Ogel's wrecked base as it appears in Evil Music, even though they are supposed to be the same base.
• The first comic in Mission Deep Freeze uses the phrase "Initiate Alpha Mode," even though that is not a phrase any Alpha Team agent utters in canon (the canon does state that the vehicle transformation sequence is still called Alpha Mode, though).
• The same comic refers to Charge (who looks like Flex) as Arrow, which is incorrect.
• Between comics two and three of Mission Deep Freeze, Dash and Charge are frozen then rethawed with no explanation.
• Speaking of comic three, where do we begin? While the time portals behave the way that they do in When Barrels Fly, their appearance is vastly different. It's also worth mentioning that the robots and dinosaurs time travel to Knight's Kingdom II and Star Wars, the latter of which only exists in-universe as a fictional franchise (just like in our world). Knight's Kingdom II hasn't been confirmed or denied a place in-canon, but if that story were canonized, then this comic would contradict that story! The comic also refers to LEGO City as World City, which is the least of this comic's offences, but is still a contradiction, nonetheless.
• Comic four of Mission Deep Freeze depicts the heist of world landmarks. While not really a contradiction, this is never touched upon ever again, making this a loose thread.
• Finally, all five of these of these comics face the same issue as all of LEGO Magazine's comics: being aimed at young kids, the comics are too quick, leave too much to the imagination in what is supposed to be a grounded narrative, and paint their events in too many broad strokes. This is fine for LEGO's intentions, but not for ours.

Because of this, we're going to go over these issues with the story team next week and figure out our best course of action. However, since we've already adapted LEGO Alpha Team for the modern day in the past, this begs the question.

Will We Adapt LEGO's Original Alpha Team Story Once and For All?

    This is the most obvious solution to this problem. We've adapted LEGO Alpha Team as a continuation to LEGO's established narrative, but this also places us into a position to adapt the original LEGO Alpha Team narrative as well. We have several options available to us, which we've covered below, on how to fix this.

1. Animated Films: Being our foray for almost twenty years, this would be the most obvious choice, as well as the best way to introduce some Alpha Team content in the years leading up to Alpha Team: Mission Deep City. They wouldn't need to be that long per story arc (since the original comics aren't, either), but this would easily solve all of these problems. If there is one ding against this direction, it's that there are a lot of animated projects on our plate between now and the end of 2024 (it's mostly just Project U after that).
2. Short Stories: Another direction that is equally viable is a series of short stories. It could be seen as a cop-out (since it would be easier to go in this direction than a film adaptation), but with several short stories in the works for the future, why not add a few more? Because that is where this direction's set-back comes in: we also have a lot of stories on our plate as well, especially through the end of 2024. On the other hand...
3. Comics: Crazyhouse Comics shut down at the end of 2020, but that doesn't mean that we couldn't work with the story team to write and create new comics depicting these events. It would be a good way to pay tribute to how the original story was told, as well as expand our library of content in a new and fresh way. However, there was one big reason that Crazyhouse Comics was shut down, and the biggest issue with this direction: with a small staff, comics would take forever to finish. We would need more artists on our team before we would consider this idea.
4. Resurrect the Stagnant Alpha Team: Mission Deep Past: Finally, there is the dormant film project that Just. Won't. Die. John Hitchcock officially shelved Alpha Team: Mission Deep Past due to complications with the story, but if the premise was overhauled and reframed as the events of LEGO's Alpha Team story, that could fix a lot of the film's issues. This, however, begs the question: if Alpha Team: Mission Deep Past was reworked into something entirely new, why not just cancel that film and just go with option 1?

Regardless of which solution we tackle, we'll announce our chosen option next year, along with a release timeframe. But there is one more thing that we need to address...

How Does The LEGO Group Fit Into the Canon?

LEGO Store in LEGO City Undercover (Canon); ©2017 TT Games & The LEGO Group

    It's been kicked down the road for several years in semi-canon territory, but we are finally addressing the elephant in the room: if this universe includes LEGO's original characters, some Pioneer Drama Service characters, and our own original characters in a world like our own, does The LEGO Group exist in-universe? Does Pioneer Drama Service exist? Does the source material that created these characters exist? If so, how are these reconciled into a world where these fictional characters are real people? The answers to those burning questions are: Yes, yes, yes, and they're kind-of sort-of based on true stories in-universe. Think of it how action figures exist of real-world wrestlers and politicians, or how celebrity vloggers get merchandising rights in our world, or how play sets, film adaptations, and legends exist surrounding real-world events. Granted, this does take things several steps further, but it's the best explanation that we have for this inherent contradiction.

Lead Out

    When PeabodySam helped us to sort out any issues with the canon, we did not expect to end up starting a new project because of it! Do not consider this an official announcement, however. Rather, look at this as us pulling back the curtain and seeing what our thought process is and where it may lead.