Sunday Surprise: MINNEE by Zuru!

Blogging life feels a little frantic right now!  There are so many new dolls coming into my house, it's hard to keep up.  But it's also really fun to be surrounded by so many new things.  I wasn't very happy with the new Zuru Spaces room that I reviewed last week, mostly because it isn't really new: it's just a copy of a Rolife Super Creator set.  I'll admit that my experience with that toy produced some uncharitable thoughts about Zuru as a company.  But, in the whiplash way that is so typical of the doll world, this week's review has those opinions turned upside down.

One of my most eagerly anticipated summer releases has been Zuru's blind box Minnee collection, or technically MINNEE collection.  The name feels uninspired to me, despite the all-caps font and the reversed "N."  But the concept of these dolls is great.  Zuru claims that they are "the world's smallest poseable fashion dolls," and if that's the case, I'm already a big fan:

Zuru Minnee blind box ($14.99 each).

Mirror Mi Dolls by MGA Entertainment

With all of the big summer releases that I mentioned in my last review, I wasn't sure which ones to buy first, and then which ones to review first!  I guess I'm most excited about the KPop Demon Hunters dolls. I've been waiting for those like a predator ever since I saw the movie.  And I've pre-ordered everything associated with that franchise.  But I preordered a lot of other new releases, too.  And, as it happened, the Mirror Mi girls showed up on my doorstep first.

Even then, I was hesitant to review this brand right away.  The Mirror Mi doll who I'm the most excited about is Suki Goldpetal, and I haven't been able to get my hands on her yet.  She's a Walmart exclusive and has been slower to roll out than the other characters.  It feels competitive to buy Suki right now, but I know that feeling won't last.  MGA doesn't tend to limit their dolls, so for collectors, a little patience goes a long way.

As a reviewer, I don't have time to be patient.  There are so many new and exciting dolls that I want to look at this summer!  My schedule is full and I can't afford to wait around for one elusive character.  So, I decided to forge ahead with a review of the Mirror Mi dolls that I have right now.  One of whom, as you might have predicted, is the spicy redheaded rocker, Blaze Maxx:

Mirror Mi Blaze Maxx by MGA Entertainment, $29.99.

Fearbook Ghoulia Yelps from Monster High: A Guest Review!

Today I have a treat for you: a new guest review!  I don't feature a ton of guest reviews these days, but when Cherry emailed and said that she's been reading the blog for fourteen years and would love to write a review...well.  Of course I said yes!  Anyone who's been hanging around this place for fourteen years deserves a medal.  When I learned that Cherry wanted to review Fearbook Ghoulia Yelps, I was even more impressed.  That's not been an easy doll to find, at least not in this part of the world...or at least not for me.

Cherry is a twentysomething doll lover from New Zealand (which is arguably much cooler than New Jersey...) who likes puns and bad jokes.  She'd fit in perfectly at my house.  I feel like I live in pun stereo, with my husband in one ear and my son in the other.  But anyway, Cherry is a delightful person, and also an excellent artist.  In fact, I've been given hesitant permission (she is modest) to show you two of Cherry's drawings, but I'll save those for the very end.  For now, I'll stop yammering and turn it over to my esteemed guest!

***

Hello! Thank you Emily for having me on the blog! I'm Cherry, and today I'll be reviewing the new Monster High G3 Ghoulia Yelps Fearbook doll!

A gaggle of Ghoulias!

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 tiny 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).

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.

Cupid Asteria from Monster High

Happy Valentine's Day!  I don't usually write a special post for this particular holiday (not sure why?) but I got a comment on my Lucky Doggy review with a few suggestions for Valentine-themed dolls, and that inspired me!  Besides, I feel a lot of love and gratitude for all of you, so what better way to show it?

I did a big review of the new G3 Monster High dolls when they first came out in 2022, but haven't done a great job of keeping up with all of the subsequent releases.  However, I've enjoyed several of the G3 character interpretations enough to purchase the dolls--with vague intent to review them, but also simply to enjoy them.  My favorites so far have been Venus McFlytrap, Catty Noir, Jinafire Long, and Cupid Asteria.  Can you guess which one from that list gets her time in the spotlight today?

G3 Monster High Cupid Asteria ($24.99)

Winx Club Dolls by Playmates Toys

My country is in a shambles right now, and it can feel hard to do everyday activities.  But I continue to forge ahead with my reviews because it helps me to balance the bad with some good in my life.  I hope the blog offers a retreat for others of you in the United States right now, and for anyone in other countries dealing with the toxic fallout. 

Today I'm going to be looking at the newest Winx Club dolls.  I'm not a lifelong fan of the Winx Club franchise, but I started to appreciate this magical fairy world back in 2012 when I reviewed Believix Bloom by Jakks Pacific.  I became even more invested in 2014, when I compared an Italian Witty Toys Bloom to the dolls from Jakks Pacific.  By now I have a decades-long interest in the evolution of these dolls, and I was particularly excited to see the newest version of Bloom, the spunky redhead who's at the center of the Winx Club stories:

Winx Club Bloom by Playmates Toys, $17.99

Polly Pocket Follow-Up: The Modern Playline Compacts

It's been a very restful Thanksgiving week for me here in New Jersey, and I was especially thankful that my son came for a visit and I didn't have to work on the holiday!  I hope that those of you who celebrate had a pleasant time as well.  I was a little stressed to come out of this week realizing that December is upon us, though!  Yikes.  That means I need to start getting my advent calendar series ready.

Between planning the advent calendar reviews and eating a lot of stuffing, I didn't have much time to pull together something new and creative for this week.  So, I decided to tie up loose ends from my last Polly Pocket review.  In that extensive post, I mentioned a few of the playline compact-style sets that are available right now, but I didn't have time to look at any of them in person.  Today I'll make up for that by showing you three of my favorites: the Monster High set, the Care Bears set, and the Hedgehog Cafe:

Polly Pocket in her Hedgehog Cafe from 2020 ($24.99).

Polly Pocket, Then and Now

I've talked about Polly Pocket dolls several times over the years.  The first time was back in 2015, when I reviewed  3.75 inch dolls from 2011 and 2012, and compared them to a Polly Pocket-themed Kinder Surprise egg that my husband generously bought for me.  More recently, I looked at the bizarrely entertaining Pop 'n Swap Pollys from 2008.  My advent calendar feature last December also included a 2024 Polly Pocket set with the smaller 1.25 inch Polly dolls.  Oh--and speaking of advent calendars, I have plans to do another advent mini series this December, but it'll be shorter and more focused than last time.

Anyway, the Polly Pocket advent calendar from last year got me thinking about the original Polly Pocket dolls--you know, the tiny little two centimeter ones that come in compact cases.  I never had any of those sets when I was a kid, and didn't purchase any as an adult collector, either, until just recently.  Today I'm going to be looking at a few sets from the late 80s and early 90s, and comparing them to similar toys from the last few years.  Because Polly Pocket is such a distinct and beloved brand, this review feels long overdue...and it's pretty long, too.  So grab a snack or a drink and settle in.

Various Polly Pocket toys, current and vintage.

Woof & Co. by Sunny Days Entertainment

I feel like I should call the last month or two of my life the Walmart Phase, because a lot of the things that I'm excited about lately are from Walmart.  And I don't shop at Walmart very often.  It all goes back to that tip about the LUV dolls being on sale for $7.50 (which they still are, btw).  While I was investigating that deal, I found about six other doll lines that were either on an irresistible clearance sale or were simply too appealing to ignore.  I really didn't need any fresh ideas for reviews, since I have enough dolls in my basement to last the rest of my life, but this is a good time of year to investigate some affordable dolls and toys that might be appealing to kids.  The Hey Besties that I just talked about would make wonderful holiday gifts, and I think the dolls in today's review would, too.

I hesitate to call the critters in today's review dolls, though.  That hesitation prompted me to look up the official definition of a doll, which is something you'd think I'd have done by now.  According to Merriam-Webster, a doll is "a small-scale figure of a human being used especially as a child's plaything."  So, yeah.  These aren't really dolls, because they're definitely not figures of human beings.  They're dogs:

Woof & Co. Finley, by Sunny Days Entertainment ($29.98).

Wednesday Addams, Part Three: Monster High (and Knockoffs)

I've been eagerly waiting to do this installment of the Wednesday Addams doll series, mostly because it's been a while since I looked at a new Monster High doll.  I think my last Monster High review was Skelita Calaveras back in 2023.  Can that be right?  I think it's right.

That doesn't mean I haven't bought a few Monster High dolls in the last two years, though.  Believe me--I have.  I've been captivated by pretty much everything in the Skullector series.  But for some reason there hasn't been occasion to review any of those creatures.  Also, I have issues with how Mattel is marketing their Skullector (and Barbie Signature) dolls these days.  But we can talk about that later.

For now, I'll just say how delighted I am that Mattel contributed to the Wednesday doll deluge.  Monster High is an excellent brand to represent this trendy character.  Today I'll be looking at two Monster High Wednesday Addams dolls, and also a few knockoffs that are trying to ride their coattails.

Wednesday Addams by Monster High, $40.

Wednesday Addams, Part One: Living Dead Dolls by Mezco Toyz

I'm not a die hard fan of The Addams Family franchise by any means, having never read the original comics or watched the 1964 television show.  But I enjoyed the 1991 film when I was a kid (especially Christina's Ricci's deadpan portrayal of Wednesday) and had a great time with Season 1 of Tim Burton's 2022 television series, Wednesday.  It was hard for me to imagine an actor capturing the Wednesday Addams character with more skill than Christina Ricci, but Jenna Ortega did a wonderful job.

The second season of Wednesday has been highly-anticipated, as evidenced by the deluge of Wednesday Addams merchandise currently on the market.  I've been particularly impressed by the diversity in doll offerings.  Off the top of my head, I can think of Wednesday dolls or figures from Monster High, Robert Tonner, Funko POP!, NECA, Hot Toys, Lego, Polly Pocket, and Just Play.  And I'm sure there are more that I'm missing.

As I immerse myself in the second season of Wednesday, I thought it would be fun to do a miniseries here on the blog.  I have three or four short-ish reviews planned, each featuring Wednesday Addams dolls from different companies.  I'll start things off with the Living Dead Doll's depiction of the character, because LDD seems like the perfect brand to represent this morbidly monochromatic mischief-maker:

Living Dead Dolls' Wednesday Addams, by Mezco Toyz ($44.99)

My Scene Swappin' Styles Barbie by Mattel

Here we are on the final head-swapping review of the series!  Or at least that's what I thought.  As a few of you mentioned in the comments, Mattel has recently come out with their new Barbie Basics line, and these dolls have...wait for it...swappable heads!  They also have Made to Move bodies.  Eee!  I immediately bought all five dolls (gulp) and am eager to take a closer look at them.  However, the five Basics dolls don't share a common skin tone, so there's not a lot of head-swapping that can happen, yet.  Fortunately, Mattel also announced three You Create kits to accompany the Basics dolls.  These kits have additional heads, bodies, wigs (!), and fashions, which I suspect will add to the fun considerably.  It all reminds me a bit of Monster High's Create-a-Monster kits from 2012...although I hope the quality is better.  Anyway, my plan is to wait until I have at least one You Create kit before I write a review, and while the kits can be pre-ordered now, they won't arrive until April.

That's all very exciting to me, and I can hardly wait for April, but I'm also super-excited about the dolls in this review.  Today we're going back in time to look at a much earlier head-swapping doll from Mattel: My Scene Barbie from 2005:

My Scene Swappin' Styles Barbie by Mattel, 2005.

Barbie Dream Besties by Mattel

Well, November is almost over and December is shaping up to be either a busy month for the blog or a bust.  Let me explain.  I've been on an advent calendar kick for the last few weeks, finding myself amazed and overwhelmed by the diversity and complexity of the current choices.  So I wanted to do an advent calendar feature all throughout the month of December, and I bought about ten calendars (maybe a few more than that...) for the occasion.

But one of my kids has to be in the hospital at the beginning of December, and I want to be as helpful and present as I can.  So a lot of the month will be spent traveling across the country and being a mom.  That will either give me a lot of time for the blog (since I have a few weeks off from my animal shelter job), no time at all, or something in the middle.  We'll see.

As I wait for December and whatever it might bring, I have some time to chat with you about one of Mattel's newest playline releases, the Barbie Dream Besties:

Barbie Dream Besties Brooklyn (left) and Teresa (right), $19.99.

Ellowyne Wilde (and Neema!) by Robert Tonner

I've lived in New Jersey for four years at this point, and have just recently gotten around to installing some shelves and unpacking the majority of my doll collection.  Pretty lame, right?  But better later than never, I guess, and it's been a fun project.  I've uncovered a few obscure dolls that I forgot I owned, and gone on several feverish basement searches for dolls that I thought I'd lost.  I should do a whole post about that at some point, and maybe show you some of my shelves once they're organized.

My collection is much smaller than it used to be, but there are still quite a few Tonners in the mix--things like Patience, Rapunzel, Déjà Vu, Ella Enchanted, Agatha Primrose (she's one of the ones I forgot about...) and of course the Cinderellas.  It's a close call to say if I have more Tonner dolls or more Monster High dolls.  There are a lot of both.

In any case, as I was admiring my newly-unpacked Tonner collection, it occurred to me that I never got around to adding Ellowyne Wilde to the group--at least not permanently.  I owned an Evangeline Ghastly for a short period of time, who is also from Tonner's Wilde Imagination company, and I briefly had a basic Ellowyne with inset eyes who I couldn't bond with.  So, all these years later, I feel like there's a hole in my collection where Ellowyne should be.

I thought I'd lost my chance to buy an Ellowyne doll at retail price years ago when Tonner discontinued the line, but recently--and somewhat randomly--I discovered that Ellowyne Wilde is back!  In fact, she's been back for almost as long as I've lived in New Jersey.  I love second chances, so today I'll review one of the newer dolls from the Ellowyne Wilde line, and also an older doll, Languid, that I've always coveted and finally purchased:

Ellowyne Wilde Languid, by Robert Tonner for Wilde Imagination (discontinued).

LUV Dolls by Far Out Toys

Life has been even more hectic than usual for me these last few weeks, so my productivity has declined further.  Sorry.  I blame it mostly on the fact that I have eight foster animals in the house right now (yes, eight), and four of them are kittens with underdeveloped brains who make a huge mess and have to be hand-fed.  They're really cute though.  

I've been stealing moments in between my work and feeding kittens to investigate a new brand of fashion doll.  This brand has been on my mind since an anonymous reader mentioned it in the comments section of the Unicorn Academy review.  That was way back in June, which I find slightly hard to wrap my head around.  It feels like last week.

The new brand is called LUV (which reminds me of LIV!) and has been around for about a half a year.  These nine-inch dolls are made by Far Out Toys, which is the company responsible for the Glo-Up Girls.  I couldn't think of any other dolls that this company has produced, so I poked around on their website for a little while.  Apparently there are also a few surprise doll brands, like Squadz Place and Love, Diana under the Far Out Toys umbrella.  The Love, Diana dolls look pretty cute and come in little ice cream cone packages, but I absolutely cannot add anything else to my review queue right now!  So I'll try my best to stay focused on the LUV girls.  Here's Brooke:  

L.U.V. doll, Brooke, by Far Out Toys, $29.97.

LULUPOP Dolls by SAMG Entertainment

Spring has definitely sprung here in New Jersey, with temperatures creeping into the 80s and lots of flowers everywhere.  The beautiful weather makes me eager to get back outside with my dolls, and that's on the agenda for next time, but today I want to share a review that I've been meaning to write since September of last year.

During one of my random browsing sessions on Amazon, I found a big-eyed fashion doll that I'd never seen before, from a South Korean brand called LULUPOP (also written "Lulu Pop").  The LULUPOP dolls are based on virtual K-pop idols, so there are a few full-length songs and music videos featuring the animated idols.  From what I understand, the dolls used to be available exclusively in Korea, but they made the jump to Amazon about a year and a half ago.

I'm always fascinated to explore brands from other countries, because they often have a new aesthetic or offer a window into a different culture.  In this case, the aesthetic looks very familiar, but the songs and videos definitely offer up something new and fun.  So, with high hopes, I purchased one of the girls, Tania, to see what the brand is all about:

LULUPOP Tania, by SAMG Entertainment, $25.99.

Monster High's Day of the Dead Doll: Howliday Skelita Calaveras

I'm back, as promised, with the second Day of the Dead doll, but first I want to outline my plans for the first Virtual Garage Sale event.  At this point, nothing will happen until after Thanksgiving.  But sometime during the week of November 27th, I'll start posting dolls for sale in the shop.  These will either be dolls that I've already reviewed, dolls that I'm realizing I don't have time to review, or dolls that are kicking around my house for some random reason.  I'll probably create short blog posts with groups of dolls as I list them for sale.

At this point I have no idea which dolls will be for sale, since I've had zero time to organize all of that, but there will be a lot of bundled, loose dolls from old reviews, including Rainbow High's Maria Garcia, who we met last week, and the beauty from this review: Howliday Skelita Calaveras.

Monster High's Howliday Skelita Calaveras, $45.

Rainbow High's Day of the Dead Doll: Maria Garcia

I can't believe that a big chunk of November is already gone!  Ack!  For anyone who noticed the announcement on my Virtual Garage Sale page, my plan has been to hold two big sales events during the year: one in May and one in November.  November is looking very crowded at the moment, though, thanks to Larvie swanning in and bumping other dolls from their scheduled slots.  Also, I'll have a full house for the holidays...including a foster dog and two foster kittens, so not much will get accomplished then.  Being realistic, at this point I'll probably have to shift the sale until after Thanksgiving, but I'll keep you posted.

Today I want to rewind and pretend it's November 2nd again: the Day of the Dead.  The Day of the Dead, or Dia de los Muertos, is a multi-day celebration to remember and re-connect with those who have died.  The basic idea of this holiday can be traced back to old Aztec customs, which were adopted by Spanish settlers and merged with the Christian All Soul's Day.  Currently, the Day of the Dead is celebrated mostly in Mexico, with colorful, joyful festivities that have attracted increasing attention from tourists in recent years.  The broadening fascination with this holiday is probably also responsible for several new Day of the Dead dolls, like MGA's Maria Garcia, who is the subject of today's review:

Rainbow High's Maria Garcia, by MGA Entertainment, $124.99.

Disney's Ily 4EVER 18-inch Dolls--A Guest Review!

Dear Toy Box Philosopher blog readers, I’m Hannah, an adult doll collector from London, United Kingdom, and the author of The Toy Gems blog site. I have been collecting dolls since I can remember - which dates back to the age of two when my happiest photographs are with my dolls. I am also a writer/screenwriter and an English graduate who loves collecting dolls and figurines to surround my writing desk. My favourite toy brands growing up included these doll lines: MyScene, Liv dolls, Monster High, Moxie Teenz and of course the popular brands - Barbie and Bratz. 

I also hold American Girl close to my heart and as a British child I was always flicking through their digital catalogue and like any young American Girl, I grew up loving the doll brand. Before AG, other 18-inch dolls lines that made a big impact on me involved the BFC Ink Club dolls which were my favourite along with Journey Girls, My London Girl and Gotz. In recent years, I have enjoyed expanding my doll collection with dolls of varying heights including, the Ruby Red Fashion Friends/Siblies and the British brand A Girl For All Time.

Thank you to Emily for providing me with the opportunity to share a review of the 18-inch ily 4EVER dolls on this iconic site. Growing up, I read every single blog post from The Toy Box Philosopher and spent hours scrolling through images and reading reviews. It was especially exciting reading about doll lines that did not have a Europe/UK release and accessing this knowledge was only viable through this blog.

I am a huge fan and have been reading for more than ten years now. And so it may continue… It’s also great to see what the future holds as ten years ago I would never have guessed that I would be writing and publishing a guest review here of my very own.

Ily 4EVER Minnie (left) and Tinker Bell (right).