Once upon a zombie

Monsters are hot property right now, and who doesn't love zombies?
Also hot right now? Fairy tale princesses.
So Wowee decided to blend the two and came up with Once Upon a Zombie, a line of zombified disney-like princesses.

heck... yes.

I've been wanting one for a while now, and my trip to Toys R Us netted me Belle. Oddly the ONLY one they had in stock.
at £14:99, I had to pick her up and see what I thought. Besides, i'm a sucker for a redhead.

  

I'm not totally sure "Belle" was the right sort of name to use here. It's a bit too Disney. She's supposed to be the "beauty" from Beauty and the Beast right?  But I suppose "Zombie Beauty" and "Zombie sleeping beauty" were too similar? 

Anyway, that aside, this is Zombie Belle. 

Now first things first, the box. 

I can't compare this one with the others in the set as they only had Belles in the store, 6 of them! but this particular character features an orange backdrop with roses and... stars? It all reeks of clipart honestly lol. The roses are cute though, it's those star things that let it down, they make no sense. Why are they here?

The plastic window has moulded detailing which really doesn't show up well in photos. At the top there's two moulded skulls and there's cracks in the window that make it look like the doll is trying to escape. Cute heh. 

Belle's also posed in a way that makes it look like she's trying to push her way out. (albeit a little casually, but the cracks are near her hands so I have to assume that's the intent) She's posed leaning one hand against the box edge. I do like it when toys react with their packaging, it's always amusing and clever. 

 The back of the box is a little cluttered for me, but I put that down to the international packaging meaning the blurb is repeated several times. 

The character art is cute, though looks very little like the doll itself. The hair is totally different and the doll hasn't got those bandages for starters. 

This is the "story" for this line. Some.. magic happened, now they're zombies. What do they mean by "empower"? Empower what? or whom? Themselves? Are they gonna go full on Zombie apocalypse and eat everyone's brains?

And it's hardly a secret if they know they're zombies. Oh i'm so confused.

There's also an app apparently, though I haven't downloaded it yet. Looks like you can... turn a photo of yourself green and add random effects and scars? Ok.. whatever.

At the bottom there's the 6 characters, and I have to admit, much as I like the artwork of characters, I do wish boxes would feature photos a little more often. So frequently the art and doll look nothing alike, i'd like to know what to expect.
I still find it odd Belle is "Belle" rather than Beauty, as all the others are named after their fairy tale. I have to continue to assume it's due to the sleeping beauty/beauty similarity.
Also kinda a shame they have 4 blondes here. They could have gone really mad and given the little mermaid blue or green hair or something, that would have been awesome. Just kinda a shame that out of 6 characters, 4 of them have the same hair colour.

Anyway, let's open this box already.

Oh dear, looks like we have a competitor to MGA on the "how long and how much will I injure myself opening this overly taped, over glued box" contest. the back panel you kinda peel back after removing tape on all sides (I HATE this box style, means you can't keep the box afterwards as you effectively destroy it opening it. Arghhh). Then there's those two orange strips that are not only taped, but GLUED DOWN. The tabs for the plastic front piece is taped under these, so you have to get under them to ease the tabs out. Wth? Why?

Hate it hate it hate it.

anyway, after a bit of a struggle, a lot of tearing of card and the use of a long needle and some scissors, I finally got the damn thing open.
Please companies, stop with the wasteful packaging. Can't we take a leaf out of Mattel's book and move to card boxes with tabs and next to no tape?

Got the plastic off, but it's not over yet. Noooo, she's tacked into the box with plastic ties, elastic and even sewn in. Argh. Snip, snip, snip.

Now just her hands are stuck. This kinda amused me, she looked like she was struggling against her puny plastic restraints.

One hand eased out easily, the other I had to have a closer look at. the tiny little gap just large enough for the wrist reminded me of the MH packaging, which meant her hand must come off right? Or else I was about to break my new doll.

Thank goodness I was right! The hands do pop off, and they do so quite nicely. the peg feels sturdy and strong and removal and reattachment doesn't need too much force, but likewise the hands don't just drop off when you move the doll. I approve.
The pegs in the hand actually feel a lot more robust than the MH ones which have a tendency to sorta bend and need some real force to jam back in. This one didn't feel like it was going to snap off, which is really nice.

The other stuff in the box, she hasn't got a lot. There's a brush with a stitched heart. And a stand, the clip is under the brush. The base under the doll herself, and the stand part to one side of her.

I like this stand. It's very lightweight, feels rather cheap however it goes together solidly. The upright clips into the base very securely, something that cannot be said of the MH stands that constantly topple out of the base section on me.
The clip slides down the strut as standard, but what I thought was a nice touch is that there's a little guide stopper just a little bit down the strut that locks the clip at exactly the right height for the doll. So you don't have to guess or slot the doll in then adjust the stand, you just pop her in and it's right. I like this.
Overall the stand just feels better thought out. It holds the doll, it doesn't fall over and it doesn't feel like it's going to break on me, unlike the Monster High ones that feel very brittle and a little shoddy honestly.

It's worth nothing the OUAZ dolls have no shoes, no jewellery and no bags. They come with a stand, a brush, a single hair accessory and their dress.
However, you can tell they put some effort into what little they did do.

Let's start at the top.

on top of Belle's head is a little tiny crown. It's somewhat hidden under all those curls to be honest, and not hugely interesting. It's just a crown. It's small, it's gold, it has little gems painted on it.

Belle has deep red/auburn hair, it's decent enough nylon, fairly soft to touch. It's style into three big curls. One either side of her face and one giant ponytail curl behind her. It's a little messy and a bit odd but she's a zombie, so it works fine.

 

Her eyes are inset and green, with lots of iris detail. They're a bit staring, but again, she's a zombie so it works well.

She has inset lashes, something you don't tend to see on dolls in this price point.

around her eyes is vivid green shadow, it goes nicely with her grey skin, giving her a certain... decaying beauty? I dunno.
Across one eye is a stitched scar. Each of the characters seems to have unique face stitch patterns, which is a nice touch.

her lips have a bit of fuzziness to the paint, ALL the 6 in the store did. I couldn't find a single one without that error. That said, I found none with wonk eye or any major flaws.

You can see her inset lashes a bit better here.
She also has this random error on her chin. It seems to be an air bubble or something that's left a tiny hole,which has something dark inside I can't get rid of. I have to assume it's a manufacturing error, but again, she's a zombie so minor blemishes can be forgiven. She's lucky she's undead, gives her a lot of leeway in terms of flaws lol.

She has a somewhat odd head. Her ears are really large and placed quite far back while the rest of her features are a little flat and her forehead slopes. It's not unattractive though, particularly alongside the lollypop headed flat faces of most modern dolls.

Her dress doesn't seem to fit her very well. The bodice part just seems slightly too long, i'm not sure if this was intentional or not though, given the tattered, rumpled look of the thing.

she has one sleeve, the other torn off. The hem is tattered and the whole thing is supposed to look worn and damaged.

At her waist there's a teeny little gold skull.

The single sleeve has a tattered cuff and little holes, which I find quite a cute touch. Makes it look really damaged. there's a lace underlay with a sort of cobwebby pattern.

The skirt has that same lacey underlay which is tattered and torn, as is the skirt itself. here's holes, there's tatters. Now i'm not certain this would all stand up to play but to be honest, the more damage would probably add more "authenticity" to her zombie look lol. Again, she gets away with a lot for being undead.

The dress is solidly constructed, the seams all feel sound and there's no fraying edges.  Aside from the fit being just a little wrong, there's nothing wrong with the dress. It's made of red satin fabric with gold satin and tuel of some sort.
It's a good little outfit with a bit of heft to it, it's made of decent fabric which is more than I can say for a lot of modern dolls.

She has beautifully expressive over sized hands and massive feet. There's no way she can wear any shoes, her feet are too flat and long. I like them though, they're well sculpted.

her lower legs are soft rubbery like the Bratzillaz, something that kinda bothers me because they warp. Again, zombie, she can get away with a twisted bendy leg but it still irritates me that companies keep using this really soft rubber for the bit of the doll that's going to support them when standing.

Nude, she's quite obviously very different to both Monster high and Bratzillaz. Her torso is quite long but also a lot more realistically shaped. She has a sway back, but she also has hips and a waist which is nice. Her head is more in proportion as well, though her arms are really overlong. This does however give her very expressive poses.
Her articulation is on par with both lines, if anything she has slightly better poseability than both thanks to her socketed hips. While Monster high now uses pegs that restrict the splaying of their legs, OUAZ can do full splits both ways which is cool. Her knees bend decently enough for most poses though her rubbery legs mean there's a lot in common with the Bratzilla on that front. The motion isn't quite as smooth as with the Monster high knees, but they do feel stronger and less liable to snap.

Belle's elbows bend fine, as do her wrists. She has great hand motion which will be displayed later on in this review.

Size wise, she's a similar height, but still broader bodied than the MH adults.

in fact, the closest body I could find in my collection was the new taller Bratz or Barbie bodies.

Belle CANNOT wear Bratzillaz clothes.

Barbie clothes are a little too large.

Taller Bratz (and therefore most likely Skipper clothes) fit her great in the top, though the pants were waaaay too long. Dresses and tops would work fine here.
likewise, Sasha could wear Belle's dress but it was a little baggy in places.

Overall I really do like this freaky girl. She's cute but she has the right amount of creepy and macabre. I know there's some who'd complain about the lack of shoes, but honestly I think it's an interested aesthetic and it works for the line. That said, this is NOT a fashion doll line. These dolls feel much more like something you'd see sold in Forbidden planet, collected by adults with a love for twisted fairy tales. As a playline doll, the lack of shoes and accessories is a problem. As a collectable? It's not. She displays great, she poses great and she's fun to photograph.
I just hope TRU get the others in stock soon, I'd like Rapunzel and Snow White.

Overall, I give OUAZ Belle 9 tasty braaaainssss out of 10. I really do like her. She feels of decent quality, the price point is just fine for what she is and she's got so much personality. how can you not love this crazy little redheaded zombie girl? She also fits in great with my other dolls, and has begun her own menagerie as you can see.

BONUS crazy posing time:

I've fallen and I can't get up!

 I see yoooou

Fainting

 I'm a little tea pot....

Ronan:   Uh... I um... just remembered I have to be somewhere else.

Braaaainsssss