Disney Descendants

Descendants! Which only hit the UK a week or two ago and has done so in really random drabbles. 

For those who don't know, Descendants is a Disney made for tv movie. Basic premise, the kids of various Disney villains get a chance to go to school with the kids of Disney heroes, shenanagins happen... it's as you'd expect, cheesy harmless fluff with musical numbers of the campy variety.

Anyway, there's dolls, the first of the Disney licensed dolls made by  Hasbro. 
Hasbro won the Disney franchise off Mattel last year and come 2016 are set to be doing ALL the Disney princess dolls, so Descendants is a good first look at how Hasbro might handle this lucrative string to their bow.

Suffice to say, many have noticed the parallel between Descendant's premise and Ever After High and I refuse to believe a few of the design choices were simple coincidence from either side.
Both for instance, have ambiguously brown skinned daughters of Sleeping Beauty. Hmm... 

Anyway, a new doll franchise is always exciting, particularly from a company who's been mostly absent from fashion dolls for such a long time (No, i'm not counting those crappy Equestria girls dolls, those things are just... suffice to say, i was very unimpressed with the one Husband bought for himself.  ahem) 

I've missed there being proper competition for Mattel, they've been playing with themselves way too long (and yes, I DO know how that reads bwhahaha) 

So let's take a look at these new dolls shall we?

 

The first doll husband came home with (for this is HIS doll) was Mal, the main character of the movie and daughter of Maleficent. Yeah... Disney weren't feeling creative when they named the characters. 
Anyway, for some reason the Descendant dolls are all packaged with their shoes off and to the side, which... is a bit bizarre. I think it's to show off the detail of the shoes but it seems pretty odd. 

 The back of the box features artwork of.. and island? I think it's MEANT to be the country where the good guys live though, not the isle of the lost where the villains all wound up. But it's a bit confusing with her blurb saying "isle of the lost" and then having a picture of what looks like an island.

There's also a large photo of Dove Cameron in her Mal costume. Aaand the box totally gives away the movie ending. not that the ending wasn't plain to see from the start but even so, come ON guys, did you have to put "choosing good above all else" there?
 "Spoileeers", as River Song would say.

The dolls have a very "Disney" look to their faces, which I rather dig. They've been designed not so much to look like the actors playing the character, but to look like a disney animated version which I think is kinda fun.

She comes with a spell book which is actually a plastic box with a sticker inside. It makes a nice prop though.

For... reasons... Hasbro decided to glue the tabs to the backing card. *headdesk*

Mal's packaged with her arm held out, one arm on her hip and her hair stitched to her clothing.
Her hair is a crunchy gross mass of ick and it's cut ridiculously. It's waist length at the front and then super short at the back and just looks silly, like a child attacked her with scissors.

Her face has this cute sort of lopsided smirk, arched purple eyebrows and big brown eyes. I'm pretty sure her hair is nylon, it's sort of frazzled and the product isn't helping matters.

I mean look at this! This is ridiculous! The ends are fried and uneven, the hair is sloppily cut and it flat out looks terrible. Her hair isn't even like this in the movie, it's an inverted bob style yeah, but nothing on this level of "cut it myself, in the dark, with a blunt pair of hedge shears"

The shoes btw, are awesome. They're dark purple with a scale pattern and moulded dragon tails on the heel.
They're quite soft and very easy to get on and off which is nice.

Here they are with less flash, the purple is so dark it almost looks black.
Digging these funky shoes.

Sadly not all the characters seem to have gotten particularly interesting shoes. most of the girls seem to just have kinda meh shoes but we have been rather spoiled by Monster High's fabulous footwear.

Mal has this plastic collar piece as well, it's soft moulded plastic with dragon scales and shoulder pad "wings" which I think are kinda neat. I don't usually like plastic moulded clothing pieces but in this case I think it was really the best way to get that standing up collar look.

on the back there's a heart shape made up of what looks like two abstract dragons. This symbol appears a lot in the movie, usually scrawled on something by Mal herself. it looks to be her personal "tag" or symbol along with the words "live evil"

What's nice about this shoulder piece is that it actually stays on without elastic bands. Mattel need to relearn how to do that, i'm sick of cutting tabs only to find they were the only way to keep a hat or a necklace or something ON the damn doll. 

The rest of her outfit includes a pair of leggings with painted on "cutout" effect, which makes them more durable for dressing and redressing, and a plether top/tunic with a black lace underskirt.

All the pieces are nicely made and there's an interesting mix of fabrics which I always like. Her top is a little stiff because of what it's made of and feels perhaps a little plasticky but it looks pretty good I think. The "studs" of Mal's movie outfit have been simplified of course into well, gold dots but it's close enough.
Honestly i don't think they could have replicated the movie outfit at such a small scale for the playline price point.

She has a pair of gold earrings which are ornate dragons and super difficult to get a clear picture of.

The doll herself has jointed wrists, elbows, shoulders, neck, hip and knee. So she's on par with Ever After High in how posable she is.

Her lower limbs are made of soft plastic, so like the Bratzillaz she has a tendency to have slightly wonky legs and they don't like to hold in a pose too long due to the weight of the lower limb.

Her body is substantially larger though, more realistically built and honestly closer to a barbie shape. She's shorter than Barbie though, but taller than EAH.

Mal's about twice the width and a good inch taller than Ever After High dolls, so there's no way they can share clothing. She can sort of fit barbie stuff, so i'd say she's probably closer to teen skipper in size.

Her hands are sculpted with these terrifying long nails and beautifully posed fingers. There are moulded painted gloves too, which honestly is the only way to do decent looking gloves on dolls.

Her hands are very spell casty, but man those nails are freaking me out. They're like talons!

Like many dolls these days, Mal's hands pop off to allow easier dressing. Horah!
Look ma, no hands!

Her hair was bothering me far too much so I cut it.
And washed it.

it still feels ick but it looks a lot better.

Of course, while we're here, may as well talk about EAH. When the pictures first were shown everyone, including myself's reactions were "wow, Mal looks just like Raven" and I still kinda think that. Clearly in Mal's case her purple is a nod to her mother, Maleficent, but I can't help but wonder if Raven's inspiration was somewhat similar.
While they don't share a mother, Raven's mother is the Evil Queen from Snow White, they do share some style trends. both have the evil villain high collar, both have purple and black hair, both have a chains and studs motif going on. But while Raven and indeed all the EAH girls seem to exist in a strange universe where girls all wear some sort of prom wear at all times, Mal's outfit is much more modern punk "rebel" and looks more like well... clothes a person would wear instead of a princess costume.

They have similar length feet, but eah feet are clearly designed for MUCH higher heels than the Descendant dolls. They can't comfortably share shoes. Some stuff kinda goes on, but the foot doesn't sit elegantly.

Sadly the descendant dolls don't come with a stand, and believe me, they kinda need one. Mal can't stand on her own any more than a regular Barbie can.

But she CAN touch her own face... mostly.

And lounge awkwardly.

Her hips don't splay outward much at all, so it severely limits her leg motion. Also her knees will only bend to this angle, no more due to the restriction of the knee "cap"

She's got some nice head motion though, she can look up and down.

Back in her original outfit you can see the kink in her leg, this is the sort of strange warping that seems to happen with the heavy solid vinyl lower leg, they just.. bend strangely at the knee.

Overall though, I quite like Mal. Her body is nicely articulated and well made, minor gripes aside she has posablility and I love being able to pose my dolls.
her hair is pretty wretched but it's short so the crappy hair fibre isn't so much of a problem. Still, it's a shame they cheaped out on the hair because bletch... it's so caked in product it feels awful and it flakes white glue-like gel when you comb it.Even rinsing it under hot water didn't seem to help the texture much, and it has a bit of a mind of it's own when it comes to sitting neatly.

Her outfit is fairly well made, though the leggings are a little more fragile and likely to suffer some wear and tear around the seams thanks to being made of quite thin fabric.

Her shoes are lovely.

I love her face sculpt. She has such personality in that little face, something I sadly cannot say for the ever after high dolls who all seem a little... flat (and that's not just their crushed in moon faces).
I think it was a really cute idea to design the dolls to look like animated disney characters instead of realistic, it gives them more personality but also means they should hopefully fit in with the later Hasbro Disney dolls, which is great for play.

At £19:99 the price is perhaps a little steep, but given the current price of Monster High it's not surprising. I feel like ALL dolls are a wee bit overpriced in the UK right now.
Certainly the dolls don't feel hugely "cheap" so you aren't getting hugely short changed. Personally i'd have liked a stand but that's just me, these are dolls that are meant to be played with not just displayed, so I understand why they don't have them. I do find it a little curious there's no brush though, as like.. ALL doll lines seem to have to come with a sodding brush. I can't say I miss another plastic crappy comb to add to my collection, but it's an odd thing to be missing. Particularly with a doll who so desperately needed her hair brushed.

I give Mal a resounding 8 campy musical numbers out of 10. 

The Disney store also got new stock in, amongst which are their exclusive versions of the Hasbro dolls. Single packed Carlos (who comes otherwise in a 2 pack with Evie) and Jay, a main character who's doll is ONLY available via the Disney store.
They also had Mal in a different outfit and a two pack with Prince Ben where Mal is wearing a slightly different dress to the... other two pack with Prince Ben? I dunno.

At just under £16, I had to get these two but they sold out when I finally decided I wanted them
Thankfully they restocked a week later and I wasn't taking the risk of missing out again.

So here's Carlos and Jay, the two male "evil" kids and lesser protagonists of the movie.

The back of the boxes feature both boys with their arms crossed. Carlos in his movie outfit and Jay in... an outfit that's not quite like what he wore in the movie (his movie outfit wasn't so... pink)

Their slogans are also a bit random. Unlike Mal's spoilerific one, Carlos describes him as "Dude's best friend" (for those who haven't seen the movie that's just absolutely baffling) and Jay is "one of the fighting Knights" (which I assume is the name of the sports team, not sure if it was mentioned in the movie that this was the name of the team but eh)
For the record, Tornie, the game they play in the movie is the ultimate sport and needs to be made a thing.
A cross between Hurley and dodge-ball/bombardment? heck yeah.

 First up Carlos, son of Cruella Deville. Since when did Cruella have kids? I assume that babies were fashionable at some point and she stole this kid, getting bored of him and casting him aside to be raised by nannies once he stopped being cute/babies stopped being the "it thing".
That's my head canon anyway, heh.

Carlos is frankly adorable in the movies, and his doll is equally as cute. Her has this bright grin and adorable wee freckles and eeee.

Anyway uh... heh. Like the girls the boys also come inexplicably barefoot.

Carlos' boots look more like hiking boots or something. They're not hugely exciting, tehy seem to have moulded black socks.

 Such a cutie.
Sadly my Carlos has a bit of eye wonk and the shadow of his eye paint makes him look like he has a rose coloured birthmark over the one eye (that pink smear)
But his freckles and smile are just darling.

Her has sculpted moulded hair painted in white and brown, a nod to his mother's iconic two toned barnet. Husband thinks it looks like icecream.

Her has a little snub nose and big eyes and actually I think looks rather like his actor. I just wanna pinch his ickle cheeks, yes I do.

His outfit is very Cruella as well. All in red, black and white he has a fur collar and some sort of... tail on his belt.
Like Mal he has moulded painted gloves.

His outfit is made of some sort of soft material that feels a bit suede-like in parts and plethery in others.  The jacket's pleather, the pants are soft suedy with a cotton tee.

The jacket comes off, but the top and pants are stitched together as one piece. Booo.

 The zippers and pockets are all painted on, which is a shame. It looks ok, but it's a shame because it feels a bit cheap.

Still, he's stinking adorable. I'm sad mine has wonk but with his head tilted he looks ok.

Then there's Jay, son of Jafar. I don't know, the choices of villains seems  a little arbitrary to me. Cruella, Evil Queen, Maleficent and... Jafar? Wha? I'm not certain i'd class him as an "iconic" villain but what do I know.

Jay's existance does raise a few questions for me. like, wasn't Jafar a genie at the end? (spoilers!) so...why is he human again? And why does he have a kid? Who'd he have a kid with? Husband suggests a harem girl lol, but seriously, I can kinda understand evil queen because she's meant to be gorgeous and Maleficient has all the power so who'd say no? but Jafar? Who's this kid's mum???

Well, whatever.

His doll i honestly wasn't sure I wanted because his outfit. His outfit is just... so.... terrible.

I mean, for reference, THIS is his movie outfit:




















First off, where the heck is his hat?
Second, since when were his pants PINK? Since when was his shirt PINK? Where in his outfit is there pink? I... I just... what?

His top is like, a reddish brown with yellow and blue. his pants are freaking BLUE. Where'd the pink come from? What are you doing Hasbro? What IS this?

I nearly couldn't see past this monstrosity of an 80s glam rock outfit.
I mean GOOD GOD it's bad.
and the pants fit terribly.
It's all shiny and pink and... and.. pink.

At least his shoes aren't pink though. They're black and look pretty stompy.

he has a beautiful face too. A long straight nose, a soft sly smile and almond shaped eyes.

But good god look at the bulging of these pants. What the heck is even going on there? Jay, what are you wearing? Are these clown pants so you can fit more stolen goods down there? Dude, don't' shove stolen goods down your pants, nobody wants that.

He has one moulded glove hand.

Both boys have their symbol on the back of their jacket. in Carlos' case it's crossed bones (dog bones?) and Jay has a cobra, a reference to his dad.

The velcro line kinda spoils the effect though. I wish Hasbro had thought this through and made his jacket fasten at the front or something, like it's clearly supposed to.

Oh god... the bagginess of the pants is even worse from behind. Look at that baggy butt!

Decendent boy shoes are WEIRD as you can see here, they have really wide slits at the back so they don't actually close at the back and it makes them look like they don't quite fit the doll. It does make them really easy to get on and off, but it's still odd. 

Jay's hair is as bad as Mal's. It's dry feeling, scratchy even and sticks out in all directions. I tied it back, least till I can find him a hat.

So, the Descendant boy body. They have articulated ankles, knees, hips, neck, shoulder and elbow. NO wrist joints, much like the old Monster High body.
I don't quite understand this, why do boy dolls need articulated ankles? they're not gonna be wearing heels and flats right? Surely jointed wrists would be more useful?

As a result, the boys end up with kinda... robot arms. Their articulation isn't great. Their arms are quite restricted in their motion and they can only spread their legs this wide.
The larger flat feet do make the boys more stable on their feet than the girls though. They can sometimes actually stand unsupported, yay.
So long as you don't breathe... ya know.

The boy body is most similar to the Ever After High boys, Jay and Carlos are actually slightly shorter than the EAH boys with broader shouders and a slightly narrower waist. Huh... go figure.

They can fit Ken clothing... sorta. The tops are a bit baggy and pants are loose but this outfit fitted. Trousers are way too long.

EAH clothing fits really quite nicely. the pants are a wee bit loose but otherwise pretty good.

The shoes are a bit tricky. I didn't want to force them but the Descendent feet are slightly smaller than the EAH or Ken feet. 

I'm not actually sure who's jeans those are, but they fitted Jay like a glove around the waist. they were too long but that was easily fixed. What a difference decently fitted pants makes. Suddenly that plastic looking shirt doesn't seem so bad.
I still just can't get over Jay's outfit.

While, granted, the boys are a good £4 less than the girls, Jay's outfit particularly feels so much cheaper. ALL the zippers are printed on, as are the studs. The fabric is super shiny and plastic feeling and the pants don't even seem to fit him!

Carlos' outfit is much more screen accurate and only having one zipper and  the two "knee pad" sections makes his outfit look less iffy and cheap with the printed on detail. Yes his outfit is a one piece jumpsuit under the jacket, but the belt hides the ugly seam and it looks fine when he's dressed.
his moulded hair is actually a good thing, short hair is super hard if not impossible to get to look good in actual fibre and this style would be just... not really easily doable. But the other thing is that it means no wretched hair fibre to deal with!
Jay's hair feels like freaking steel wool, it's scratchy and nasty and ick.
I LOVE seeing a boy with long hair, but I wish they'd given them just a little bit better quality nylon.

Jay's head is bigger than Carlos', which is strange to me. I assume it's something to do with the rooted scalp making his head look larger but both boys actually fit in really well with the EAH boys. They're a similar height, a similar build and their heads are a similar size. They look quite good together, though the Descendent have SO much more personality in their faces.

Overall Descendants has a lot going for it. On the whole the outfits are decent (let's just forget Jay's pants ever happened ok?)and each doll does have a unique face sculpt as well as a unique skin tone. The shoes are detailed with painted elements where it's needed and they're super soft and easy to change.
The face sculpts are expressive, full of character and super cute cartoony. They're a nice size and the bodies feel well made and sturdy enough to withstand regular play.

I wish the boys had articulated wrists, because without it they're left looking a bit robotic and they cant' stand in a way that's natural, their arms always look a bit awkward.

I also wish they'd used slightly better hair fibre because while I don't mind nylon, I don't like hair that looks frazzled and feels dry and damaged straight out of the box.

There's a lot to like about the Descendants line, the dolls are super cute but they aren't without some pretty major flaws (hair and Jay's pants being pretty massive sins)
I like them more than Ever After High, but that comes down pretty much entirely to their face sculpts.
While EAH has only a couple of sculpts for a large cast and giant flat faces that lack anything resembling personality, Descendants ooze attitude in their smiles and slanting eyebrows. I also feel like unlike MC2, these dolls really DO look like the actors they're portraying. In a Disney cartoonified way sure, but they look like the live action counterparts.

Sadly the boys feel like a bit of an afterthought designwise, particularly Jay. Their faces are excellent, but their bodies are awkward and their outfits are far less detailed than the girl's.
What bothers me about that is that these two boys were MAJOR characters, while many of the princess characters literally had SINGLE damn lines in the movie.

I would LOVE to see a 4 pack of the villain kids, preferably in their fancy party attire because I do rather love me some boys in smart casual wear heheh. Hasbro, make this happen.

Descendants will always be compared to Ever After High, it's something they flat out cannot avoid but you know what? I think Disney and Hasbro are ok with this. This line is acting as direct competition to the EAH line which needed a serious boot in the rear, so i'm hopeful this might galvanise Mattel into some ACTION. The cheaping out of EAH is just gross, painted on tights, missing accessories, so much of the same damn face mould, here's Hasbro making dolls who present a real competator.
competition is GOOD for consumers, so I want Descendants to do well.

Besides, there's still a few characters who haven't gotten dolls yet. Hehehe.

Overall, I give Jay and Carlos 7 robot dances out of 10. Those arms and Jay... those pants man... those pants.

totally shipping this. <_<