IRNAKK, set number 8626 is one of the combiners for the PIRAKA, in this case he’s made from VEZOK, THOK, and REIDAK. You could build him out of the three using pictures from the back of the PIRAKA instruction manual, you just wouldn’t get the gold parts, which I think added because without it you would really just be getting a dollar in savings buying the three together like this. Now that I think about it you do get an instruction manual (which combines all four manuals into one) that first shows you how to build IRNAKK, fallowed by PIRAKA instructions and finally ads for the titans. There is also an add indicating BIONICLE® HEROES wont be out until winter 2006/2007, but that’s on IRNAKK’s packaging along the side.

The set comes with four gold tubes along with the spine, one pair is about 16 spaces long, the other 6, which help to tie in the gold coloring of the spine and give him a more muscular or massive look for the shoulder region, and stabilizes the long neck somewhat. A downfall is that it limits neck movement, and compared to the box pose I suspect the photographers used even longer gold tubes as the neck wont post that way for me in my attempt to do a box pose. In fact I noticed a couple small differences between the directions and the box pose. When I first saw IRNAKK with the gold parts it looked like the tubes served to hold in more ZAMOR spheres, well, they don’t really do that, not effectively anyway. The upper body does have enough space to store about six ZAMORS, combined with his awkward hand he can hold about ten in all, perhaps you can squeeze more in?

When I was messing around with the hand I figured I could hold more ZAMOR spheres by flipping the PIRAKA shins that held the ZAMOR spheres over. In this case I was wrong, while I could hold more inside, they just fell out of the gaps in the claws. Turn out those shins extent outward just enough to keep ZAMOR spheres from falling out between the fingers, and flipped over they cant prevent them from falling out. A BIG drawback in the hand, is first, that it Is held in by a plus rod and swivels freely, so you cant really pose it in place or play with it too well. In fact posing the hand also proved difficult when I attempted the box pose. I suspect for the picture they glued the hand in place on the other side since I could not get it to hang at that angle. Another downside, the hand is just too heavy, and while the arm does support it, it’s stuck at a forward range of motion and cant move up or down at the shoulder. From the wrist you have to move the socket just right to support holding the hand up, otherwise it lazily flops back and looks broken.

The opposite arm has the PIRAKA shin plugged in the other way, and holds the ZAMOR gun by the neck of the PIRAKA skull. I don’t know if the skulls are there just to hold the eyes (as practically no other part in the set can hold the eyes anyway) and give it more use of the parts, or if it’s there just to be there, but the skulls give it a more nightmarish look. This is a plus because IRNAKK is the PIRAKA‘s worst nightmare come true, according to Greg Farshtey;

So here is the lowdown on Irnakk —

As you know, all of the beings now known as “Piraka” are from the same species and originated on the same island (though they are scattered about in many places these days). As with any culture, they had their share of myths — figures of good, figures of evil, figures that might exist and figures that couldn’t and shouldn’t.

Irnakk falls into the category of “things that should not” –he’s a figure of nightmare, tales of which the rulers of that species’ island use to keep their people in line. In the same way the Turaga used tales of the Toa to fill their people with hope, the rulers of this species used tales of Irnakk to fill their people with terror.

When the Piraka get closer to the Mask of Life, they encounter an area in which this figure is drawn from their nightmares and made real. The Piraka, beings who inspire fear, must face their own horror if they want to reach the mask.

More to come on his powers …

So being an enemy and manifestation of fear of the PIRAKA’s species, what better way to demonstrate that by placing their skulls on your gun? I did notice when I first saw the pictures that the rods holding the skull in seemed to be too big, by that I mean I never recalled seeing a plus rod that long in the set to stick out so much from the side of the skull. Turns out those were the rods from the other two unused ZAMOR guns, which is a big downside because the set comes with two other rods that would just as easily hold the skulls in place, and free up those parts to use the other two ZAMOR guns for another MoC.

I was skeptical about the leg design at first, but it supports the weight rather well and gets some good articulation, but I don’t like it when legs are doubled like that, they just seem kind of messy to work with, but they play well into his bulky design. It’s rather annoying trying to balance him, he could use bigger feet too! But a lot of my complaints are just based on the set itself, when he’s very well designed having been limited to the parts of the three PIRAKA. My main complaint for the set is the arms, which are rather skinny and hard to work with. I suspect many of you shall use other parts from your collection to improve upon the design and make him more playable. Well, I did have a couple more details to go over, but I stretched this review into a page and a half on Microsoft word so I think I covered him well enough.