Anyway, after waiting and waiting.. and waiting.. and being unable to order from the US due to a system glitch hating my computer, then waiting some more, finally the news came.
Wydowna Spider and the Mansters 2 pack had hit the UK!
So of course I had to get my butt to Toys R Us.
I was delighted to see case upon case of Wydowna, but more delighted when I noticed a whole case of the mansters on the bottom shelf as well.
better yet, the price tag! Instead of the £35 I was expecting (the price of the previous tru exclusive 2 pack) they were £24:99.
HECK YES!
honestly that's a damn bargain for a two pack in this country. Nevermind two boys.
So a set of each came home with me and I got to deboxing my new boy dolls.
Gil's position in the box is a bit awkward. A lot of them had his head twisted in really unnatural positions which made figuring out if his eyes were even kinda tricky.
ALL the Deuce's seem to have had their eyes printed a little too high. Wiiiierd.
The picture of the boys at the bottom of the box there absolutely cracks me up. Deuce trying to look all tough and grumpy and Gil just looks all "oh hey."
The back of the box is the typical EU "no word bubbles for you" deal. We got two shadowy chairs and the boys. Gil's all "yesss" in this understated slightly shy way, and Deuce is all "grrrrr i'm not happy about this rargh."
Wth is going on in that room man? Are they watching sport and supporting opposing teams?
Supposedly they're meant to be playing some bizarre rpg, but those poses don't scream rpg to me, unless Gil just rolled a 20, allowing him to stab the bad guy through the throat with his sword, and Deuce is peeved off because it ruined his villain monologue.
(fun fact, that happened in a game hubby was in once. His actions lead the gm to tear up about 4 pages of monologue ahahahaha)
Of course, the back of the box had me wary. If the back of the box was devoid of any writing, what were those diaries?
Sure enough, one short entry repeated ad nauseum in different languages. *sigh*
It's crap like this combined with the huge price hike of MH that makes me less and less inclined to actually buy from the UK anymore. We don't get full content, we pay significantly more (close to double in many cases) and Mattel UK don't give a shit about any QC issues we report. you call up because you deboxed a doll and her leg fell off? "return it to the store you bought it at, not our problem" seems to be the attitude.
Meanwhile Mattel US are usually very polite and very helpful.
What a difference not being "preferential" customers makes huh?
The map i'm at least happy to see. It makes the D&D geek inside me smile. Then I get this massive urge to play D&D and get bummed out because I haven't got any friends to come dungeon bash with me. *sadness*
Anyhoo, the dolls themselves weren't too painful to remove from the box. Thankfully due to the way they're both packaged, neither had any plastic tags in their heads. They were just elastic banded in. I MASSIVELY prefer this, I hate those horrible plastic staples.
Unfortunately this is the closest I can get to their box art poses hahah.
Gil comes wearing a purple and teal tee with a shiny wave pattern that reminds me of those Japanese prints. He then has some fairly plaint black cotton shorts. They're nice shorts, well made and decent feeling fabric which is refreshing considering how crappy Slo Mo's 5 pack pants felt... ew.
I don't mind that Gil always gets shorts, his body sculpt restricts his ability to wear long sleeves and pants.
He has purple scale printed flipflops.
Or are they sandals? Because unlike his Skull Shores ones, these don't have the faux big toe thong.
The soles are fishscales, cuuute.
Deuce wears a black tee with deep green shoulders. There's a wonderful metalic skeletal snake print on the front.
His pants are ridiculous green plaid with a snake tail winding all around. Ugly though they are, I kinda dig ugly prints so I dig these.
He has a recoloured version of his DOTD Aviator glasses, with red lenses.
His shoes are white high tops with a scale pattern. These shoes have potential but they feel unfinished, kinda.. prototype rather than proper shoes.
the completely blank soles don't help this image. Poor Deuce has no tread on his soles, the guy is gonna slip and slide all over the place man! Even the dance class dolls had tread and they could be excused for having super slippy shoes.
Manster Deuce's eyes are as I said, printed a little higher than usual. His head scales are yet again gradiated differently but most prominant of all is his skin tone.
Manster Deuce is positively PINK. Usually Deuce is a sort of tanned peachy colour, but Mansters Deuce looks like he hasn't seen the sun in months.
I like to think that's intentional considering the box's basement backdrop lol.
Mansters Deuce has a black earring in one ear and dull sorta olive green scales running down one arm. Quite different to his usual verdant green and yellow combo.
His lips also have a lot less shine than usual, they're a matte peach and I like how they don't look like lippy.
Gil also has a lot of subtle differences to his other releases.
Mansters Gil's eyes are actually a rather soft baby pink rather than the more muted tone they usually are. They're also bigger.
His lips are super shiny and shimmery.
Like Deuce, Gil is also paler than his usual self. Dance Class Gil is a much deeper more saturated colour.
Mansters Gil's fins are more of a green than the blue of Dance Class. Skull Shores Gil's fins are closer to the green of Mansters.
Mansters Gil's hands are really shoddily painted. His fingers are half transparent. Boo.
The boys come with a bunch of uh... stuff?
Two... plastic... things. I honestly don't know what these are supposed to be. I thought maybe they're character sheets, but if that's the case, why are they plastic? They're not Icoffins or tablets, they're just random rectangles of plastic with a picture on the front. Uh... yeah, i'm totally baffled.
They actually remind me of the random rectangle thing Toralei's fashion pack came with. And that was I THINK supposed to be a box of candy.
Maybe they're the boxes their dice and miniatures go into? I dunno.
They also come with two cans of drink, two miniature zombie figures, a teeny dice (a d6 alas, I was hoping for a d20 hahah) and two cardboard pieces. A board and an er... diagram? Maybe it's Deuce's GM notes.
The thing about the way these are packaged though presents a problem. How the HELL do you get the zombie figures OUT? They're not the most robust of things, they in fact feel like they'll snap off their base if I tug them too hard so looks like the only option is to literally cut them out of the packaging. Which isn't ideal, this plastic stuff is sharp and whenever I try to cut it I end up slicing myself.
I also can't help but think the cardboard board is a bit cheap. Couldn't you guys at least have laminated the thing or something?
Also, it and the diagram thing are SELOTAPED TOGETHER. Yes, some brightspark thought it was a good idea to selotape two cardboard pieces to one another. *headdesk*
wow.. just... wow.
These cardboard pieces just will not last without some protection. I've opted to keep them inside the plastic packaging sheath until they're needed for a photo shoot.
The dice is adorable though. It's actually marked with numbers on all sides, a detail that makes me so happy. it's a working dice! YES!
(Heath promptly rolled a one, and his character tripped and impaled himself on his own sword)
I love that the dice is actually about the right size to be held by the boys, and rolled. I just want.. more dice man. d4s, d20s, a bunch of them for each player hahah. I can see teeny dice bags in these guy's futures.
I was left on a bit of a D&D kick after playing with these guys.
Deuce took a look at the monsterous manual.
"m.... Mooom?"
Gil took a look as well
And Heath insisted on being allowed to paw through the pages as well. He didn't want to be left out.
These boys desperately need a proper gaming table.
And books... and dice... argh.
Anyway, in summary. I do love this set.
They DO come with stands (black ones) and the US version has two little journal/diaries which are always fun to read. The UK/EU version doesn't, because the EU versions suck and need to go die in a fire. -_-
That gripe aside, the dolls are really nice dolls. Both had no real errors, the outfits are nicely put together and well made, and as an added bonus, are actually made of decent fabric instead of bargain basement lycra!
The metalic prints on both shirts adds a somewhat "deluxe" feel to both boys.
I would have liked Deuce's shoes to feel more finished. They just don't quite feel done to me. Even the cam shoes had treads so wth?
at least I suppose they painted the laces.
i'd have also liked the gaming board to have been made of something a bit more hard wearing. Plastic like the inexplicable boxes maybe? or even just laminated card. It just feels too insubstantial and prone to damage.
Likewise those zombie miniatures feel flimsy and fragile. Also I can't get the damn things out of the packaging.
The dice and cans of drink however are wonderful little accessories that add a great deal to play and posing. I had a lot of fun with that teeny dice, but then again, I am a bit wierd lol.
This set made the D&D nerd in me delighted. And the fact Mattel decided to release a two pack with two boys in is a massively positive sign for male dolls in this franchise. Two packs are risky, boy dolls are supposedly risky, so a two pack with just boys is something we never thought we'd get in the MH community. Yet here we are, and I for one am absolutely delighted this set exists.
Yes, it could be better, but it could also have been a LOT worse.
This also is the first release of Gil that hasn't been super difficult for non US residents to find. That Dance Class multipack wasn't released outside the US, Skull Shores was totally borked (2 weeks Gil was available in the Uk. TWO WEEKS.) so this Toys R Us exclusive set is very likely to be the first chance a lot of people have had to actually get a Gil.
And he is WELL worth it. Gil is beautiful and his body sculpt is stunning. The more Gils we get, the better because he's a gorgeous gorgeous doll damnit.
Now Mattel... let's discuss this Holt Hyde situation shall we?
Overall, I give the Mansters 2 pack a resounding 9 Critical hits out of 10.
Love em, delighted to have them. Hope Mattel gives us more boy only 2 packs.
Those weird boxes ARE actually more boxes of candy. They're weird energy bars.
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