Wednesday Addams, Part Two: Ellowyne Wilde by Robert Tonner

I'm back with the second review in my series of Wednesday Addams doll explorations!  In the first installment I looked at two Living Dead Doll interpretations of Wednesday, and today I'll showcase Robert Tonner's Ellowyne Wilde version of the character.

Ellowyne Wilde is an interesting vehicle for Wednesday, since the two girls have some overlapping personality traits.  Both wear a lot of dark clothing and have dark outlooks on life.  Ellowyne is melancholy and overly-sensitive, though, while Wednesday is cunning, morbid, and emotionally stilted.  

Let's see how Wednesday's aesthetic crosses over into Ellowyne's world: 

Any Wednesday Ellowyne Wilde doll by Robert Tonner ($235).

In my head, I reviewed Ellowyne Wilde dolls very recently.  Like I would have said it was a few months ago.  But it was actually almost a year ago, way back in October of 2024.  That's crazy.  What's going on with time?  I actually think that for me, blog time is different than regular time.  Since I typically produce a few reviews per month (if I'm lucky), last October is only about 30 reviews ago, which seems short.

In any case, I decided to review Ellowyne Wilde dolls last year in part because they've been around forever and I'd never reviewed them, but also because these days there are new dolls being released by Happily Ever After and Virtual Doll Convention (VDC).  The Ellowyne Wilde dolls in this review are both from VDC.

The first doll that I bought is called Any Wednesday.  She was released in late October of 2024 and sold out quickly.  I believe she's a limited edition of 400.

There's a companion Neema doll, too, named Another Wednesday.  She's still available on the VDC site for $235:

I appreciate this doll a lot more having seen the Wednesday television show.  With her blue eyes, Neema is reminiscent of the cool siren character, Bianca Barclay:

I think Bianca has a more sympathetic role in Season 2 of Wednesday, which makes the Neema doll even more tempting.  But I haven't caved yet.

Any Wednesday came in a traditional Ellowyne Wilde box:

These boxes are lovely, but it would have been fun to see a darker box with design elements that reflect Wednesday's personality.

Wednesday was secured inside the box with white ribbons around her neck, waist, arms, and legs:

Most (if not all) Ellowyne Wilde dolls come with a poem, and this one is no exception.  Wednesday's poem is written on a card, alongside a nice drawing of the character:

The poem says:

On any Wednesday, shadows creep,

Where Ellowyne sighs in a restless sleep.

Her gaze drifts past a cracked windowpane,

Where whispers swirl like autumn rain.

The clock chimes slow, in mournful tune,

As fog rolls in beneath the moon.

Ennui wraps tight, like a ghostly vine--

And haunts her thoughts at ho nine.

I'm thinking that "ho nine" is meant to be "hour nine," but the letters are obscured by Wednesday's skirt.  That's cute, I guess?  But the entire word "hour" would have fit perfectly on the line below.  So it's an odd choice.

Also, the meter is off with this poem, I think.  I'm no expert.  And nine o'clock is really early to be fast asleep.  Especially for young people like Wednesday.  And can you really get bored while you're sleeping?  Hm.  And is this doll meant to be Ellowyne dressed like Wednesday, or Wednesday herself?  I'd assumed the latter, but actually think the former is true.  I'm still going to call her Wednesday.

I know I'm overthinking here, but one last observation about the poem: typically these verses have something to do with the specific outfit that Ellowyne is wearing.  But here, the story is all about Ellowyne fast asleep...and yet she's clearly dressed for school.  Why not write a poem about being nervous on the first day of school, or falling asleep in history class?  Something like that?  

Here, I fixed it:

On any Wednesday in the fall,

Ellowyne glumly walks the hall.

She tries to smile and greet her friends,

But knows that when the hour ends,

She'll be slumping into history class,

Struggling for a way to pass.

She tries to learn, for goodness, sake...

If only she could stay awake.

But enough about the poem already.  There was something else inside the box with Wednesday, which we need to investigate:

It's a vinyl zip-top bag with a note and something else inside.

Here's the note:

Basically, the note says that the Tonner factory included an extra pair of arms for everyone because some of the dolls have staining from the dark blazer.  That's a nice gesture!  But it sets a very dangerous precedent, as we'll see later.

The arms came wrapped carefully in plastic bags:

I'm not sure I need extra arms, but I can make my very own Thing, in the style of the 1964 The Addams Family!

That's a very elegant Thing.

The only items left in the box at this point were Wednesday, her stand, and her shoes.  The shoes came loose in the box, which I thought was odd.  Typically Tonner shoes come in plastic bags that are stapled to the edge of the box:

Because Wednesday has heeled feet, she can't stand on her own without her shoes.

The shoes are gorgeous little black heeled boots made out of imitation leather:

But they have real laces, which always strikes dread in my heart.  I hate tying tiny little laces like this, no matter how realistic they look:

I don't want to deal with all of that.

I wish that the laces were permanently tied, and the shoes opened down the back with velcro.  That type of thing is so much easier to deal with.

In addition to the tiny laces, these shoes have an extremely tight fit.  I struggled to get them on over Wednesday's tights:

What I hate even more than tying tiny laces is loosening them around the tongue so that I can jam the shoe onto a foot...and then having to tighten them again.

I managed to squeeze the boots on eventually, but they're difficult and frustrating to deal with.  They don't come off easily, either.

The boots look great when they're on, though, and the laces are long enough to tie but not so long that they look messy:

Here's Wednesday, fully-clothed and standing on her own:

She comes with a nice saddle stand, but I didn't need it for this review.  It'll come in handy for display in the future.

Wednesday has the classic Ellowyne Wilde face mold, with black braided hair, heavy bangs, and dark eyes:

I'm thrilled that the eyes are a nice, dark brown--similar to Jenna Ortega's eyes, but still not quite dark enough.  I also appreciate the thin braids; so often this type of braid is way out of scale with the doll.  

However, the heavy bangs are not my style.  I wish they were wispier, or had short tendrils hanging down at the sides of Wednesday's face:

If you look at Jenna Ortega's hairstyle in the television series, her bangs are long, but not especially heavy.  And they frame her face nicely:

On closer inspection I also noticed that the braids have a lot of short pieces sticking out, making them look ragged and unkempt: 

I wish that this was a wigged doll, so that I had the option of changing the hair.

Anyway, here's Wednesday from the side:

And from the back:

From the back you can see the rooted center part in Wednesday's hair, and also the 2020 Tonner copyright molded into her neck:

I was tempted to take this hair down to check the rooting and see if I could make the braids neater, but I was worried that I'd only make the situation worse.  I'm also probably going to sell this doll, so don't want to mangle her hair too much.

I was able to clip the hair apart near the scalp well enough to see that the rooting isn't good:

That's a lot of bare scalp.

And, during the process of taking these last eight-or-so pictures, Wednesday's right shoelace came completely untied:

Facepalm.

I was a little frustrated at this point: the shoes are a pain and the hair isn't great.

But let's take a closer look at Wednesday's face paint.  Ellowyne Wilde dolls often have beautiful hand-painted faces:

The heavy bangs are a distraction, so I clipped them to the side for a better look:

Wednesday has lovely dark brown eyes with some tan iris lines that lighten the appearance of the eyes quite a bit.  Her eye shape looks narrower than a typical Ellowyne Wilde doll to me--like she's squinting or angry.  

She has applied lashes on the top, and these are slightly messy on one side.  There are also three big outer lashes on top that are painted.  The lower lashes are all painted, and very faint.  

I like the dark eyebrows, and wish they weren't hidden under heavy bangs.

Wednesday's mouth is interesting in that the upper lip is a slightly different color than the lower lip:

The upper lip is a soft coral pink while the lower lip is bright pink.  This must have been done intentionally to create some kind of effect, but I'm not getting it.  To me, it just looks like the lips don't match.  

And lip the color feels wrong for Wednesday, too.  I don't think she'd wear bright pink anywhere on her body: she's allergic to color, after all.

So the face paint is nice overall, but I wish the lips were different.

The best thing about Wednesday is her outfit:

She's wearing a grey blouse, a tie, a striped blazer, and a pleated wool skirt.  The uniform isn't completely accurate to the television show, but the inspiration is crystal clear.

I particularly like the neckline of Wednesday's outfit, where the black tie lays neatly against her chest, the tailored lapels of the blazer are flat and even, and there's even a plastic spider accent on her left shoulder!

Here's a closer look at the spider:

The spider certainly fits with Wednesday's personality, but why not a scorpion?  That was her beloved childhood pet.

The construction of the blazer is excellent.  It has darts along the sides for a trim fit, and little decorative pocket folds at the waist:

The blazer is fully-lined in black (which might explain the staining problems):

Here's the blazer on its own:

It's perfectly made.  My only critiques are that it's blue (Wednesday only wears black and white), and the printed fabric isn't ideal.  Because the material has a bit of stretch, all of the tightly-seamed areas show specks of white where the pattern is disrupted:

Here's a closer look at the right lapel, where you can see white areas along most of the edges:

The top of the pocket flap has a lot of white, too:

Woven stripes would have worked much better here.

The back of the blazer looks great, though, and the stripe pattern navigates the darts fairly well:

I see why the blazer caused staining on the arms.   It's impossible to pull the blazer on over the grey shirt without the sleeves of the shirt riding up.  So the dark lining of the blazer came into contact with Wednesday's forearms.  Fortunately, the staining on my doll isn't too bad:

It's worse on the left arm:

But I have the extra arms if I need them!

Without the blazer, we can see Wednesday's light grey collared shirt and tie much better:

The sleeves of the shirt are wrinkled (from being pushed up by the blazer) but the tie is nice and smooth and lays beautifully:

Like the blazer, the fit of this shirt is excellent, with neat darts in the back:

I wanted to remove the tie so the I could photograph the front of the shirt on its own, but it was hard to take off.  It has an elastic section in the back that goes around Wednesday's neck:

Like a noose.

And the elastic is too tight to fit over Wednesday's head:

So I just left it in place as a gravity-defying headband while I was photographing the shirt:

Try to ignore the tie.

The shirt closes in front with three metal snaps and is tucked neatly into the broad waistband of the pleated wool skirt:

The skirt is really pretty. I love the lightweight wool fabric, and the pleating is beautifully done.  The uniforms in the television show have striped skirts, but I like this interpretation.

The skirt opens at the waist with two metal snaps:

And you can see that the waistband is lined in black, which is a nice touch.

The shirt was tucked into the skirt so well because it's actually a bodysuit!

That was a really good design choice.  I'm so grateful that I don't have to tuck this shirt in every single time I dress and re-dress Wednesday.

Like the blazer, the construction of this shirt is great.  I see no flaws.  It's like a miniature version of something I'd wear.

Underneath the shirt, Wednesday is wearing two pairs of stockings...which might explain why her shoes are so tight.

She has skin-colored stockings underneath thin black stockings:

And, fortunately, this double layer has effectively protected her legs against staining:

No need for spare legs.

I got Wednesday dressed again, but left the blazer off for a few portraits:

I love the clean look of this outfit, and the muted tones are perfect for Wednesday:

I tested out the Living Dead Doll's Thing figure with Wednesday.  It's actually more in scale with her than with an LDD doll!

What is this strange thing on my shoulder??

Oh, it's just a Thing thing.

But let's not forget that Wednesday has her own version of Thing:

This is more fashionable, yes?

I've reviewed Ellowyne Wilde articulation before, but I always forget how limited it is.  I expect these dolls to be able to move better.  It's especially frustrating that Wednesday can't touch her face.  But at least her balance is good.

I added the blazer back in for a few more pictures:

In order to put the blazer back on without scrunching up the shirt sleeves, I applied clear tape around the shirt cuffs.  This worked well, so there should be no more staining!

Well-protected.

The full uniform looks great.  I'm not sure that the style suits the Ellowyne Wilde character (there aren't enough "flowers, lace, and frippery") but it's great for Wednesday Addams' universe:

And all of the dark colors look great with Wednesday's hair:

Ugh. Those bangs, though.

This doll falls short for me because of her heavy and uneven bangs, untidy braids, poor hair rooting, and limited articulation.  I'm also not crazy about her lip paint.

That's a lot of complaints, Emily!

But her outfit is every bit as wonderful as I'd expect from a Robert Tonner doll, and I like her dark, hand-painted eyes.

Even if she does look a little angry with me.

Before I move on to the second Ellowyne Wilde Wednesday doll, I have an update regarding my Living Dead Rave'n Dance.

As you might recall, this doll came with a sloppy, braided up-do:

And I couldn't resist the temptation to take the hair down...but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be!

However, I wanted to try and restore the hair to some degree, since I plan to keep this doll.  So I measured her head (just over 7 inches) and bought a size 7-8 wig with braids that I thought would be reminiscent of the original style:

Not so much.

The wig is way too big, which is a bummer.  And the braids are out-of-scale.  I haven't been able to find a 6-7 wig with a similar style, so I'm at an impasse for the moment.

This hair is cramping my style.

I might try taking the hair down, because I suspect those big braids are part of why the wig looks huge.

In any case, the second Ellowyne Wilde Wednesday that I want to show you today is also inspired by the Rave'n Dance scene from Season 1 of the Wednesday television show, so I was curious to see how she'd compare to the Living Dead Doll version.  Hopefully she has better hair.

The doll is called Dark Nights and cost $235:

She's limited to 200 pieces and sold out in under 10 minutes, which is crazy.  I wasn't even thinking it would be a competitive shopping experience, I just tend to set reminders for doll releases so that I don't forget.

There's a companion Neema doll, Just Beyond, who's also gorgeous...and also sold out:

There's not much of a resemblance to Bianca Barclay here, and the dress is very different from Bianca's Rave'n Dance dress.  I guess the mermaid silhouette of the dress hints at a siren?  But that's about it.

Dark Nights came in exactly the same type of packaging as Any Wednesday, complete with a poem card, a saddle stand, and a pair of earrings that I forgot about until literally the end of the review:

Here's a closer look at the poem card, with its charming illustration:

The clothing doesn't block the open this time.

The poem says:

In shadowed halls where music played,

She danced alone, hopes slowly swayed.

A whispered promise, then left behind,

A disappointment heavy on her mind.

But in the dim, a voice called clear,

"Rufus is here!" -- a friend so dear.

From dark to light, a smile took flight,

A sweet surprise on this dark night.

This is better than the first poem, I think.  Or at least it's relevant to the doll and her outfit.  But the mention of Rufus takes away from the Wednesday Addams vibe.  Also, I was never a big fan of the Rufus doll.  He doesn't fit with Ellowyne at all:

His outfit looks amazing, though.

Like, why is his face so angular while Ellowyne's is so round?

Feels like a completely different doll line.

He seems way too old for Ellowyne.  Or too goofy.  The pair of them would have very strange-looking children.

But at least Rufus is better than Carpatina's Adam.  Do you remember Adam?

Adam is like a forty-year-old man on a child's body....sold alongside girl dolls who look about eight.  No, thank you.

That whole tangent prompted me to investigate the Carpatina website for the first time in a while.  Surprisingly, most things haven't changed.  But there's a beautiful new historical girl named Emma, who's especially appealing now that A Girl for All Time has closed shop.  They also still have the younger-looking boy character, Stephan, and the mini-Spock character, Carter.

But let's get back to the doll at hand.  

Here's Dark Nights Wednesday out of her box.  She also came with her shoes loose in the box:

I tried and tried (and tried!) to jam these black patent leather heels onto Wednesday's feet, but I couldn't do it.  They're way too tight:

Not gonna happen.

So, I removed the two layers of stockings.  Once again, there's a nude layer and a black layer:

Without the stockings, the shoes fit nicely and look great:

I always wanted shiny black shoes like this when I was a kid.

Unfortunately, the double stocking layer didn't prevent the legs from being badly stained:

Oof.

And there's no extra pair of legs to make up for this--not that an extra pair of legs would even be possible, considering how these dolls are constructed.

So, by including extra hands with Any Wednesday, VDC and the Tonner manufacturers are admitting that staining is a bad problem that should be fixed, and yet...this doll is badly stained and there's no mention of it and no fix.

With her shoes in place, Wednesday balances nicely on her own, and has no need for the saddle stand:

Here she is from the back:

This doll has a hairstyle that's elegant from the front, but messy from the back.  On her right side, she has two graceful curls of gelled hair that cascade down her cheek...and then a frizzy ponytail (or bun?) at the back of her head:

The left side has a less-elegant chunk of gelled hair hanging down, and the same frizzy ponytail/bun at the back:

I wish there was a more elaborate braided hairstyle that fit with the Rave'n Dance scene in the television show, not just a quick-and-dirty bun.

I love that Dark Nights Wednesday doesn't have heavy bangs, though.  And her face paint is gorgeous:

Her eyes look bigger than Any Wednesday's to me.  Maybe it's an optical illusion?  Let's look at a GIF to compare:

Wow, yeah.  A lot of things look different here!  The variable lighting and perspective of the two photos are part of what we're seeing, but Any Wednesday looks like she has narrower eyes, a broader head, and a lighter complexion.  In reality, both dolls have the same face mold and complexion.

I pulled Dark Night's bangs back for a better look at her face.

The dark wine color of her lips is much more in keeping with the character than the bright pink lips on Any Wednesday:

The rest of the face paint is similar to what we saw before, with dark brown eyes and black brows.  One difference is that rather than three painted lashes on top, this doll has a dramatic cat eye shape to her eyeliner:

The absence of bangs, larger eyes, choice of lip color, and striking eyeliner make a huge difference here.  I felt lukewarm about Any Wednesday, but I adore Dark Nights.

Before I forget (again), I should show you the earrings that came with this doll:

They're metal studs with black faceted gem-like dangles.

The earrings look good, and go well with the outfit, but they're obscured by the sections of hair on either side of Wednesday's head:

She doesn't need earrings.

I took the earrings out and put them away after getting that one shot.  I didn't want them to get caught on the hair and mess things up.

Wednesday's outfit is a black chiffon dress that closely mimics the Rave'n Dance dress from the television show.  Because this dress is entirely black, Wednesday came encased in plastic:

Her entire torso (all of the way up her neck) and full arms were protected with plastic bags.  The plastic doesn't look good, though, so I was eager to take it off.

The dress opens down the back with a row of three metal snaps:

Here's all of the plastic that Wednesday was wearing:

Somebody was very worried about that dress.

Despite all of that, she does have some faint stains along her waist.  I have no idea how this happened with all of the plastic:

Here's the dress on its own:

On top, there are ruffled sleeves and a crisp collar with a transparent section of chiffon underneath:

There's a lovely belt-like metal accent at the waist:

The inside of the dress has a mesh lining in the bodice, but I don't think this will protect against stains very well:

The dark skirt is completely unlined.

The skirt has three ruffled tiers of chiffon, and an underlaying layer of black satin:

I forgot to show you the back of the dress before it was unbuttoned, so here's a peek at that now:

It has the same area of transparent chiffon that we saw on the front.

The dress is gorgeous.  No question.  But it's clearly going to leave bad stains on Wednesday's body.  So what am I supposed to do?  I'm not going to wrap her back up in plastic.  That looks silly.  But I'm also hesitant to display her in the black dress.

It's frustrating to me that no effort was made to design a black dress that could safely be worn by a vinyl doll.  And clearly the company had stains on their mind.  Why not line the dress in beige or nude?  Heck, line it in plastic for all I care.  Do something.

All of this reminds me of my Maru and Friends Mini Pal who came in a bright red dress.  The company was so aware of the staining potential, they fully lined the dress in beige.  Then, when customers noticed some small stains caused by red fabric poking through at the seams, Maru and Friends sent out free undershirts to everyone to fix the problem:

That's how you do it.

For now, I want to be able to enjoy my Wednesday doll wearing her black dress with no plastic.  She looks really wonderful:

I especially like the curls of hair on the right side of her face.  The shapes are beautiful and photogenic:

Wednesday looks great standing there, contemplative, but the real question is: can she dance?  Let's find out:

The Ellowyne Wilde articulation might not be perfect, but it's good enough for dancing!

Wednesday has all kinds of moves:

And very good balance...although not quite this good.  I used some trickery here:

She certainly has no trouble reproducing the classic pose form the television show:

You'd better duck, when I show up.

I was curious about Wednesday's frizzy bun, though.  How short is the hair in that messy thing?

I cut one of the rubber bands holding the bun in place and part of the hair fell down:

It's longer than I expected!  Thank goodness.  I don't really want another Wednesday doll with a short bob.

I cut the second rubber band and let the hair all of the way down.  It looks good:

Phew.

There's a lot of curl in the back, which is definitely not a feature of Jenna Ortega's Wednesday (or any other Wednesday I can think of, for that matter), but it looks fine:

The rooting is sparse, but the volume in the curls makes up for that to some degree:

With her hair down, this doll looks a lot more like Ellowyne Wilde than Wednesday Addams, but she's beautiful:

I've always wanted a black-haired Ellowyne.

And all of that black with the pop of dark red in the lips is classic.  I love it.

Here are both Wednesday dolls together for a final shot (I tried to put Dark Nights' hair back into its original style, but it's a little sloppy--sorry):

Bottom line?  I'm a big fan of Robert Tonner's work, and a recent (and enthusiastic) convert to the world of Ellowyne Wilde doll collecting.  I also enjoy the Wednesday Addams character and the new television show, so these two VDC dolls felt like an obvious purchase for me.  What could go wrong?

Plenty can go wrong, as it turns out.  Let's start with Any Wednesday.  I like her braided hair for its realistic scale, but the braids are ratty, with short hairs sticking out, and the bangs are overly heavy and too abrupt.  I'd have loved some tendrils coming down to frame her face and soften the look.  Also, the rooting, from what I can see, looks sparse and does not make me optimistic about restyling the hair.  Another issue that I have with Any Wednesday is her lip paint: the color is too bright for Wednesday's palette, and I'm not sure why the top and bottom lips are different shades.  While I appreciate the delicate detail in Wednesday's eyes, and their dark brown color, I'm not crazy about the shape.  She looks a bit squinty to me, which isn't in keeping with the Ellowyne Wilde character or Jenna Ortega's Wednesday.  My last critique of this doll is her shoes.  They're extremely tight and hard to get on and off (probably because of the double layer of stockings) and the laces are a pain to tie...and frequently come untied.

There are plenty of good things about Any Wednesday, too.  I like that her facial features are hand-painted, and the detail in her eyes is nice.  I also love her outfit.  All of the clothing pieces are made extraordinarily well, especially the fully-lined blazer and the perfectly-tailored grey shirt/bodysuit.  The fabric choices for the grey shirt and pleated wool skirt are wonderful, but I'm less impressed with the blazer since the printed stripes on stretchy fabric show a lot of white around the tighter seams.  The little accents like the spider and the tie are great, although it would have been nice if the tie was removable.  I was afraid I'd break the elastic trying to stretch it over Wednesday's head.

I like the Dark Nights version of Wednesday much better, but there are still a few problems.  The biggest issue is staining.  Despite two layers of stockings, my doll still came with badly-stained legs.  What's more, the stockings make the shoes too tight to fit on Wednesday's feet.  Also, the dress is pure black, with only a thin lining in the bodice area.  There's no way Wednesday can wear it for long periods of time without accumulating even more stains on her body.  As a precaution, she came covered in plastic bags from neck to fingertip, but displaying her with this type of protection isn't feasible.  It's frustrating to have such a beautiful doll, with such a beautiful dress, but the two can't be shown off together unless you surrender to the idea of full-body staining.  The second issue I have is the hair.  I love the gelled tendrils on either side of Wednesday's face (and the fact that she doesn't have bangs) but the frizzy bun-like ponytail in back is a cop out.  However, the hair looks very nice when it's let down, which is a huge relief after my experience with the Living Dead Doll Wednesday.

The good things about Dark Nights outnumber the bad.  I think her face is fantastic.  The lip color is just right, and her hand-painted eyes are big, dark, and beautifully framed by applied lashes and dramatic eyeliner.  I might not appreciate Wednesday's simplistic ponytail hairstyle, but when her black wavy hair is let down, it looks lovely, has nice length and volume, and is reasonably versatile.  The dress is yet another exquisite piece of Tonner clothing.  It's very well made, with light chiffon ruffles, an intricate metal belt feature, and a detailed illusion neckline that evokes the dress from the television show extremely well.

In terms of capturing the essence of Wednesday Addams, so far I think the Living Dead Dolls do it best.  These Ellowyne Wilde versions of Wednesday don't echo the character quite as well, but they both have incredible outfits that are wonderful interpretations of Wednesday costumes.  Also, Dark Nights is a straight-up gorgeous doll, regardless of her connection to The Addams Family franchise.  If only the staining issues had been addressed.