It’s hard to imagine a time for LEGO before everything
truly was awesome, but in the early part of the 21st century the
company was on a steady decline towards bankruptcy. The market was changing and
LEGO was slow to adapt. It began making moves to try and correct this by
bringing in a new generation of innovative designers to oversee their set
creations and acquiring licenses to hit franchise properties like Star
Wars and
Harry
Potter.
In
2001, LEGO decided to enter the growing build-a-figure market by creating a toyline
tying into and financing a new upcoming science fiction program, Galidor: Defenders of the Outer Dimension.
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| Allegra with the map. |
Created by Thomas W. Lynch,
the series focused on average teenager, Nick Bluetooth (named for Danish king Harald Bluetooth
and originally named Christian by Lynch, played by Matthew Ewald), who had been
having strange dreams about a completely different place. He was given an
electronic map that led him to a spaceship called the Egg that took him and his
best friend, Allegra Zane (Marie-Marguerite Sabongui), to the Outer
Dimension—the place from Nick’s dreams. It turned out that Nick’s father,
Samuel (Randy Thomas), had created the Egg and had adventures in the Outer
Dimension where he met Nick’s mother, Queen Riana (Tara Leigh). He was brought
to the Outer Dimension to help stop the invasion forces of the sinister Gorm
(performed by Derrick Damon Reeve and Steven P. Park, voiced by Ian Finlay), a
former royal advisor who was banished and spent his time amassing a huge army
and conquering various worlds; leaving a wasteland in his wake. However, in
order to conquer Galidor, Gorm must find and assemble a shattered key that will
open a gateway to that world.
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| Promo shot of Euripidies, Allegra, Nick, Jens and Nepol by the Egg. |
Aiding Nick was Jens (performed by
Sam Magdi, voiced by Michael O’Reilly), the chief royal scientist whose
original plant body was destroyed by Gorm resulting in his being placed into a
robot one; Euripides (performed by Jeff Hall, voiced by Georges Morris), a
frog-like creature called an Amphibib who was the royal scholar capable of
using telekinesis and generating heat through his staff; and Nepol (performed
by Claude Giroux, voiced by Walter Massey), a blue-furred Siktari that was
shrunken by Gorm and could run at great speeds or freeze things with his spear.
Riana would appear in holographic messages only Nick could see to provide cryptic
guidance on his journey. Eventually, Lind (Karen Cliche), a Galidorian trained
by Gorm to take his place in the royal court that could dissolve into a purple
gel, would join the team. Aiding Gorm was Tager, a being with mind control
abilities; Caliphonic, the leader of the Aquarts; and Bala (Sean Devine), a
cyborg bounty hunter. Gorm’s primary army was composed of Boges; human-sized
bug-like creatures that could fly.
 |
| Gorm. |
In the Outer Dimension, Nick
discovered he gained a special ability to “glinch.” Glinching meant he was able
to channel an energy that allowed him to shapeshift parts of his body to
resemble those he had come in close contact with, temporarily gaining whatever
skill was associated with those appendages (such as super strength with Jens’
robotic arms). Gorm also possessed this ability but to a lesser extent than
Nick, necessitating his use of a device to increase his power. This glinching
ability was used to explain the core aspect of the toyline: where a character’s
body parts could be swapped for others. While Nick and Gorm, and to an extent
the Egg--which was revealed to be partially sentient--were the only ones on the
show who could do this, all of the characters in the toyline were able to be
mixed and matched. It was a simplified version of LEGO’s more-successful BIONICLE line.
Galidor:
Defenders of the Outer Dimension debuted on FOX on February 9, 2002. It
was one of the last programs to debut as part of the Fox Kids
programming block, which was replaced by the 4Kids
Entertainment-produced FoxBox that September. Along
with LEGO, the show was produced by CinéGroup
and the Tom Lynch Company.
It was filmed digitally to reduce the time required to add in the necessary
computer-generated imagery. It was also filmed in a wide aspect ratio, although
only the previews were broadcast as such. The series was written by Lynch,
along with Chad
Fiveash, Damian
Kindler, Erik
Saltzgaber, Jonas
E. Agin, Tom
Chehak, Alex
Epstein, Shari
Goodhartz, Vijal
Patel, Terry
Saltsman and James Patrick Stoteraux,
with music composed by Andrew
R. Powell.
Unfortunately, Galidor failed on two fronts. Not only did the show underperform in
the ratings, but the toyline was selling poorly. This was due in large part to
LEGO’s miscalculation of making the toys incompatible with other LEGO sets and
doing away with the construction style they were best known for. Only 15 of 17
planned sets were made before sales saw the line cancelled. Without the toys to
draw revenue from and the ending of Fox Kids, Galidor ended on a cliffhanger after two seasons; which aired
without a break in between. Reruns would air on ABC Family
following its conclusion.
To promote the series, a set of five
toys and a mini
comic book were included with McDonald’s Happy Meals
that year. Nick, Jens, Euripides, Nepol and Gorm were all present with fully
interchangeable parts. LEGO also published a single issue for a proposed comic
book series, Galidor: Danger in the Outer Dimension. A poorly-received
tie-in video
game
was developed by Tiertex
Design Studios for the Game Boy Advance
and released by LEGO
Interactive and Electronic
Arts
in October of 2002. Asylum
Entertainment was developing a version
for PlayStation
2,
GameCube
and PC with an early 2003 release date, but financial instability caused them
to cancel the game and lay off the development team. A Flash
game was also featured on the Fox Kids website. One of the toys, the Kek Powerizer,
featured a built-in game that could be controlled by moving the toy’s limbs in
certain ways. It also had a special sensor that allowed it to interact with the
show when it was on by playing sounds, screen animations and activating new
missions for the game.
Although LEGO eventually rebounded,
the blunder with Galidor almost
pushed the company over the edge. It wouldn’t be until 2010’s Hero
Factory that
they would again attempt a tie-in television series to one of their toy lines.
The Galidor concept was eventually
reused for the Ben 10: Alien Force toyline,
which met with similar success (or lack thereof). Galidor was later mentioned
as a location in the Guardians
of The Galaxy: The Thanos Threat
series
of shorts and was seen as a t-shirt worn by Rufus McCallister
in the Ninjago
City set from The
Ninjago Movie.
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