Wild Hearts Crew by Mattel

The doll world is poised for an explosion of big summer releases.  Mattel is rolling out their Moonspell Magic Monster High line and their KPop Demon Hunter dolls, MGA launched their Mirror Mi girls (who look like shrunken-headed Rainbow High dolls), and Zuru is tantalizing us with their pregnant My Mini Baby mommies and the 1:12 fashion doll line called Minnee.  It's overwhelming to have so many great things coming out all at once, not to mention extremely dangerous for the budget.  I'm eager for the future, when I can get my hands on all of these new dolls, but for today's review we're going to take a trip to the past: 2019, to be precise.  That doesn't sound like very long ago, but it was a different world back then--at least for me.  In my personal life, both kids were still in college and we lived in Maine.  We only had four dogs and no cats, which feels completely insufficient...but also adorably rational.  And of course the pandemic was just around the corner, although we had no idea it was coming.

In the doll part of my world, I'd recently stopped writing reviews and was focusing attention on My Twinn restorations.  I wasn't missing a whole lot at that point, I don't think.  The last few reviews that I wrote in 2018 included mostly vintage and discontinued dolls, which suggests that nothing new was grabbing my attention.  I did write about the Boxy Girls and the blind box Hairdorables, which were relatively new in 2019, but I can't remember anything earth moving going on.

What was Mattel up to in 2019, you might ask?  Well, Ever After High had been gone since 2017, and G2 Monster High was more recently deceased.  But Barbie Fashionistas were getting increasingly inclusive, American Girl was in full swing, and the charming Creatable World sets had just come out.  I reviewed Mattel's 1:6 scale WWE Superstars in 2018, so I assume they were still kicking around to some degree as well.  But a 2019 release that I was completely unaware of at the time (and have heard very little about since) is the Wild Hearts Crew.  And that's exactly who I'll be talking about today:

Wild Hearts Crew Kenna Roswell (2019).

Tea with Lena: A Rainbow High Doll House Renovation

Lena and Ian's house is finally done!  Or it's done enough...for now.  These projects have a way of stretching on and on, because there's always some cool new accessory or decoration that can be added.  For example, not only did we squeeze in a record player from the last review, but Lena will be sifting through some Mini Brands Masterpieces artwork today to see if any of it can be used as a last-minute finishing touch.

So this review will have two purposes: the first is to show off the house and talk about all of the products I used, and the second is a mini review of the Masterpieces surprise balls.  But Lena's going to be in charge for the most part, so I'd better turn things over to her:

Lena in her renovated Rainbow High house.

Tea with Lena: A Comparison Review of the Mini Brands and Miniverse Record Players

I've been putting the last few finishing touches on Lena's (and Ian's) house this week, and one of the final decisions that we have to make is whether or not we can fit a record player into the space!  I didn't really have this in my original plans, but then I realized that not only has Zuru come out with a Mini Brands record player and accompanying surprise balls, but MGA has followed suit and done the same exact thing with their Miniverse line.  Sounds familiar.  

However, I think the release date of these two products was exactly the same, so it's not clear what (if any) copycatting was going on.  The companies are very competitive these days, with a lot of parallel products.  I wonder if there are spies or something who try to figure out what the other company is doing all of the time?  Maybe that's too dramatic.  I tend to act as though I'm living in a movie.

Anyway, today Lena's going to help me explore both record player options and see if she'd like to try and fit one (or both?) of them into her home:

Lena with a Zuru Mini Brands Vinyl surprise ball, $9.99.

A Sunday Surprise Assortment!

I've been in a kind of blog limbo for the last week or so, a lot because I'm waiting on a few finishing touches for Lena's house.  She and Ian have already moved back in, but I want everything to be just right before I show it to all of you.  It should be done by the end of this week!  I was also doing a bit of traveling to see my family, which was wonderful.  We got to celebrate the married kids and enjoy upstate New York in spring.  If it weren't for ticks and poison ivy, upstate New York would be perfect at this time of year.

Anyway, I wanted a casual review to fill the space, and decided to do a Sunday Surprise!  It's been a while since I've done that.  At one point, maybe a year ago, I hoarded a lot of surprise-themed toys with the intent of being more regular with my Sunday Surprise posts.  I've obviously made no progress with that goal, so I decided to gather up a bunch of those toys and look at them all at once.  Which means I have a grab bag of surprises for you today!

From back left: Monster High Potions, Disney Tower Surprise, OG Surprise Lunch Bag, and Pea Pod Babies.

Modern Era Dolls from American Girl

After my experience with the underwhelming American Girl advent calendar, I wasn't sure if I'd be tempted back to the brand any time soon.  However, I'm a sucker for new things, and lately American Girl has decided to do something new.  Sort of.

What they did was take a few of their Historical characters, shrink their faces down, stick them on Wellie Wisher bodies, and dress them in modern outfits inspired by the corresponding Historical doll's clothing.  It's a lot of recycled ideas.  I would have been more impressed if the dolls had come with a brand new body type--maybe something with better articulation?  But I'll admit to being charmed by the dolls as they are, so I bought two of them to share with you here:

Modern Era Josefina from American Girl, $90.

My Way Kids by Geppeddo

I got a comment about Geppeddo dolls on my recent 1:12 Phicen review, and it reminded me of the My Way Kids.  It also reminded me that I wrote a review of this brand in 2021, back when I was posting on The My Twinn Project Shop blog.  I cross-posted that review here, for reference, but hid it away as an isolated page that I can link to, but that can't be seen or searched on the blog.  I should have just made it a normal review!  To remedy that, I decided to take a bit of time to spruce up the text, add some more photos, and make it an official TBP post.  Apologies if you've already read this and were hoping for something new!  I'll have something new soon.

I was clueless about the My Way Kids (and the entire Geppeddoo brand, for that matter) until about five years ago.  I stumbled across these dolls while I was doing one of my semi-regular eBay My Twinn hunts.  eBay's recommendation software must have been in good form that day, because a little thumbnail picture from a My Way Kid auction popped up on my screen out of nowhere.  The doll looked like a mini My Twinn!  I was instantly curious:

My Way Kid doll, 2001-2004.

1:12 Scale Super Flexible Seamless Figures by TBLeague (a.k.a. Phicen)

Okay, so it's mid-May already and I have yet to write a review for this month!  Ack!  My excuse is that I've been working on two reviews at once, which slows me down in the short term but makes up for itself eventually.  I also took a weekend to go see my mom for Mother's Day, which was a lot of fun.  And I've been working hard on Lena's house, which I told her would be done by spring (oops).  It's almost ready.

Today I'm going to be looking at some 1:12 scale figures from Phicen, a company that's now going by the name TBLeague.  I like the sound of Phicen better, but I gather there were some trademark hassles that cropped up in about 2017.  For right or for wrong, I'll use "TBLeague" and "Phicen" interchangeably here.  Incidentally, the last time I reviewed a Phicen doll was back in 2017, when I did a three-part Figuring Out Phicen series.  That trio of reviews looked only at the 1:6 scale figures, which are remarkable.

I've been interested in checking out Phicen's smaller dolls for quite a long time.  Almost a decade, to be more precise.  They look highly realistic and are more affordable than the 1:6 equivalents.  This felt like an opportune moment to finally take the plunge, in part because Zuru is preparing to release their own highly-articulated twelfth-scale Minnee line.  I'm eagerly anticipating those dolls, and thought the Phicen figures would offer an interesting comparison.  Even without any comparison on the horizon, these are intriguing little dolls in their own right:

TBLeague 1:12 scale Super Flexible Seamless figure, $47.99.