The Collection - pt 5 - Liv, My Scene, Barbie and more

We're getting through the boxes now!

this is some of the boxes that were in the bottom of the wardrobe rather than the upper shelves.
I think I missed some upper shelf boxes though because i'm missing a few dolls I KNOW I have (several Bratz, my Action Girls and so on. So i'm assuming there's a box up there I simply didn't get down or thought i'd already done. Whoops?)

But we're getting there.

The first box i'm going through tonight is the Moxie Girlz box.

I loved Moxie Girlz. I still have a soft spot for them.

I mean, they were basically sweet little Bratz alternatives for parents who didn't feel comfortable with their young kid having such hoochie dollies right?
Like, they are EXACTLY what the treechange fans WANTED MGA to make, only MGA had already made them like years prior to that fad. *sigh*

Anyway,

Moxie Girlz came out when Bratz was off shelves. It was during the "lawsuit" years when Bratz future was all over the place and it was all just a bit ridiculous in court with the ongoing nonsense between MGA and Mattel and the constant appeals and reappeals and just eugh.

The Moxie Girlz were cute, they were hefty and they were perfect for younger kids.

I fell in love specifically with first wave Sophina in tesco.

I saw her, I NEEDED her in my life. It was love at first sight.

She came with a pretty cute outfit, gorgeous jeans, GLASSES and a mini dolly laptop I mean COME ON!
A realistically coloured dolly laptop at that! During a time everything Mattel shat out was pink pink pink and glittery for Barbie.

I think she was about £12? something like that. Not overly expensive but enough for me to pause for a moment before I grabbed her off the shelf and took her home.

I was impressed by the quality. Her jeans were proper denim doll jeans, her satin feel top was nicely made, she had insanely thickly rooted nylon hair, well printed eyes and a hefty solid feeling body. She felt like she'd withstand a LOT of play.

Soon after I bought her I spotted "more 2 me" Lexa in Tesco.

The More 2 me line was interesting in that they had 2 outfits and accessories that were double sided so "switched"

In Lexa's case she came with a kinda nerdy school girl outfit and a "rocker" outfit (the shirt from that set is now Sophina's, MGA's often used ABCD logo lol) with a violin that became a tiny guitar and a computer that turned into a stereo.

Yeah... wierd. but kinda fun.

Thing was, the set was £20, which was at the time rather painful.

Back then Barbie Fashionistas (full articulated ones) were only £9:99

But this was 2009, before Monster High hit and kinda shook up the doll industry heavily, pre the 2010 Bratz relaunch even.
The Moxie Girlz were one of the few new interesting things on shelves that wasn't Barbie and I really really liked Lexa's outfits nghhh.

So I ummed and ahhed about it and finally just bit the bullet and bought her.
She was expensive, but damnit, I wanted her.

Like Sophina she's a beautifully made doll. Both her outfits are exceptional quality. She has socks even and her hair, unlike Sophia's, is a much higher quality fibre (I dunno if it's saran or what but it's not nearly as frizzy and dry)

All the Moxies, much like Bratz and indeed most doll lines pre MH had the exact same face, just different hair, skin and eye colours to differentiate them.

While Sophina is an olive skinned brunette with brown eyes, Lexa is a peach skinned black haired girl with green eyes.

They all have pretty much identical screenings with little to no variation beyond those broad strokes.
their makeup is minimal and fairly neutral and their clothing generally pretty modest but, at least in the early days, fairly realistic.

It was only as time went on the Moxies became a lot more gimmicky and "doll-like" in their costumes.

This girl here was my first ever reroot project, one I abandoned about 1/4 of the way through for a couple of reasons. 1: Moxies have really hard heads so omg it was painful. 2: they have really BIG heads with a bajillion holes so it takes forever and 3: my eldest stopped attending the scip thing he was doing once a week during which i'd sit in the reception and reroot mindlessly for a few hours lol.

This was an Avery, the blonde, blue eyed girl of the group but I wanted a redhead.
Wouldn't you know it, about 6 months after I started this project they released Kellan, a redhead!

Damnit.

I never went back to this head and I feel kinda bad about it because it's a waste of a perfectly good head, but I really hate rerooting and I can't justify the several bags of hair it'd cost to finish this off.
Her head is MASSIVE man.
There's already like 2 bags of saran in there.

My Kellan, much like my Avery, is one of the dolls who must be in "another box" because I can't find either of them right now.
Damnit.

This is Bryten? I think. She came wearing a Rapunzel outfit so she has excessively long strawberry blonde hair (an unusual colour on dolls). 

Her hair is nylon so it frizzes, hence why it's tied back. That and there's just too much of it.

Another green eyed girl with dark blonde hair, this is Monet. Monet's colourings are stunning.

She has a beauty spot like Bratz Yasmin too. 

Mine is one of the "artitude" dolls, a line they released fairly early into Moxie's run but has returned time.. and time.. and time again and become more shitty, more plastic and more gimmicky as time's gone by.

See, the original Artitude outfits while pretty crazy, at least still felt like cohesive outfits. Monet has a cute little plether jacket for example, and a high waisted skirt that goes over  her print leggings. 

the idea of this line was that you were supposed to colour the clothing in with the pens provided, because toy companies love to encourage kids to fuck up their toys right? 

In all seriousness though, I was never convinced it'd 1: wash out and 2: actually added anything other than making things look messier. 

but the doodlebear concept was one MGA clung to for a decade or more.

I dunno why. 

Sasha here was another Artitude doll. Yes, Sasha. Once MGA got the Bratz license back this girl was quietly dropped and replaced with a similar looking dark skinned friend. 

It raised the question, why use the name Sasha in the first place? I mean, does it have special significance to MGA? Yasmin and Cameron do (being the names of the CEO's kids) but why Sasha? 

Bizarre. 

Anyway, you can see she has the "art print" bodysuit underneath a blue shiny tunic thing. 

Later Artitude dolls gave up trying to look like actual clothes and elected instead to dress the dolls in this vinyl plastic crap that looked and felt horrible but I suppose wiped clean after you coloured it in huh? 

ew. 

Bria replaced Sasha. Unlike Sasha she has sort of blue-grey eyes instead of brown. 

It took me years to get a hold of a Bria (and a Sasha for that matter.) 

they weren't readily available here in the UK. MGA had begun their needless segregation of the black dolls into a B case assortment I think, which meant stores only got the "safe" paler skinned dolls in. 

-_-

for a company who's major appeal back in the early 2000s was how diverse their dolls were, they really have fucked things up majorly with that segregated case nonsense huh? 

Poor darker skinned MGA dolls, they don't just sit at the back of the bus, they have to catch a whole different bus altogether. 

Amberly is gorgeous too. She has Sophina's skin tone but bright blue eyes and jet black hair.

She was one of 3 characters introduced for the "head Gamez" line (which Bratz fans might recognise as a rehash of a bratz line of the same name) 

It was a bizarre concept though. Basically they released 1 full doll with 2 spare heads.

because uh.. kids.. like having decapitated heads rolling around? 

It was a concept that always bugged the shit out of me, I itched to get bodies for the other heads you know? 

But it was, for quite some time, the only way to actually get a doll of a few of the characters. 

Ada, Amberly and Monet all debuted in this line.

Jaylen and Sarai were the Moxie Girlz "twins" because MGA has a bit of a twin obsession. 

they're tan skinned with brown hair with blonde streaks and hazel eyes. 

Gorgeous pair.

They also did two "Moxie Boyz". Owen here, and Jaxson (You can tell it's MGA, they refuse to spell names normally.) 

Unfortunately much as I wanted to love the boyz, they didn't work as well as the Bratz Boyz for me. They have big baby heads but a really mature body and I find it honestly pretty creepy and offputting. 

LIke, the Bratz Boyz look like teenagers so them having a 6 pack works, they girls also have a bust. But the Moxie Girlz have next to no chest at all, they're like 12 or something, so the Moxie boyz having this taller, buffer, 8 pack body just... 

it's like a baby body builder and it's squicky as shit man.

Also Owen was literally the only one they gave vuagely interesting hair to. 

Jaxson got flock, yawn. As did "Chance" a later 2 pack release who looks exactly like beach Owen (with blonde flocked hair)

It's DULL MGA! 

and lazy.

But Owen does have super cute layered clothing. Which I dig. 

I just wish he had a more well.. age appropriate body sculpt. He has a cute face, just seeing it on a buff as shit body makes me super uncomfortable.

The Moxie Girlz were a really nice line, but sadly over the years sales slumped and they became cheaper and cheaper and gimmickier and gimmickier. The later 2012 and later dolls have much lighter bodies, really dry unpleasant hair and often very very dull clothing. They also have far less well printed faces, having switched from layered printing to just stamping the eyes in place. It results in more defects (wonky eyes) and less vibrant faces. They sort of look flat and dead and cheap. 

And it's a shame because at launch it had such potential. It was what people had claimed they wanted for years! but those same mothers who bitched and moaned about Bratz didn't buy, because heaven forbid they ever actually get what they want and stop complaining huh? 

Is that cynical of me? Probably.

Still, if you come across older Moxie Girlz for cheap, they're worth a look. I still really enjoy them. I like how robust they feel and how heavy in your hand they are. I also love how easy it is to get clothes on a doll who's feet pop off lol. 

Back when I first got into dolls of course I started to collect Bratz Boyz and from there discovered My Scene. 

Mattel's answer to Bratz, the My Scene line have really characterful faces i've always quite liked. 

I enjoy the cartoonishness of them. 

I used to own a LOT of My Scene dolls, most of which were purchased secondhand as by the time I got into dolls the line was starting to wind down. 

Nowadays I have very few left. 

This isn't all of them, I know there's another boy at least in another box. 

Byant was bought secondhand but MIB for fairly cheap. I couldn't resist his ginger frizzy hair, it's so unique. 

The My Scene boys all use a modified 70s Ken body that's lanky as shit. They have really long limbs and a really long neck. It's kinda strange how they're proportioned. But it's also jointed,nominally anyway. Knees and elbows have hinges which is better than nothing for sure. 

Kelsey is gorgeous. This one came with a moped the kids stole years ago lol. 

I used to have a few Kelsey dolls but when I downsized I elected to only keep the one I loved best. This girl. 

Because she was on a scooter body she has hinged elbows and knees too. 

Most of my My Scene dolls were actually rebodied onto articulated fashionista bodies back then. Fashionistas were only like £10 so weren't that expensive to buy for extra shoes and clothes and a nice jointed body to use. Often they were a little more discounted which made it even better. 

But the ones who already had hinged elbows and knees never ended up getting a full upgrade, I suppose I didn't see the point when they were "good enough".

Sometimes I regret selling a few of my My Scene dolls. I had some really gorgeous girls like Delancy and Nolee but such is life. 

Maybe i'll find replacements one day.

I used to own several Sutton dolls as well. He's cute, and British! And in his animation is supposed to have glasses (WHY DOLL COMPANIES!?? WHY? why give a character glasses then not release them with them? this is a huge pet peeve of mine arghhh)

This one was always my favourite though, his curls are adorable. I'm a sucker for a boy with curls okay? ahem. 

Jai, beautiful beautiful Jai. One of my all time favourite My Scene dolls. She's gorgeous. 

She I actually bought MIB very very cheap online way back in like 2009? She came in a two pack with a tandem bike and a flocked hair Sutton. 

She has occassional teensy braids in her hair. 

Of course nowadays this girl is ridiiiiculously hard to find so I consider myself quite fortunate to have found her cheap and new so many years back. 

She has the hinged body too, and as she's quite dark skin finding an upgrade has never been easy. It was practically impossible back then. 

Hudson here is a new addition to the collection. I found him in a charity shop a month or so ago. He's a "Club Birthday" doll, which means he has a whole new face sculpt. Mattel did this a few times with the My Scene dolls. Getting Ready all had grinning faces for example, and Club Birthday the boys all got this new sculpt with a shorter neck and a wider head. 

He's cute, though i'd rather like to get the others. They're not very common to find. 

I found this boy in another box. 

He's Tyson, like Jai a character who was only ever released the once. 

He looks a lot like Sutton only his hair is blonde flocked. 

 

Despite being pretty rare as well, I actually have TWO of them. (what?) 

Yeah... I dunno why. I'm keeping this one. The other is going on the sell pile when I finally get around to photographing it. 

Man 2010 was a great time for dolls. I got into doll collecting shortly before a huge explosion of interesting lines hit and it was awesome. 

Liv was Spinmaster's first foray into the world of dolls, they were apparently originally supposed to be robotic but then test audiences (read: little girls) hated that so they ripped the electronics out, kept the articulation and created Liv. 

I liked Liv. Sure their face sculpt left a little to be desired, it's big and blank and a bit staring, but they had really exceptionally good clothing that was very modern and stylish and well made, a lot of shoe options and a fully jointed body with, at the time, the best articulation available in the playline market. 

I used to have quite a few. They were expensive, about £20 each new, but they were really fun. The changeable wig concept meant there was a customisation aspect that i'm a sucker for, and their jointed bodies were in high demand for rebodying because they came in more varied skintones than the Fashionistas at the time (who were either tanned barbie tone or pale brown nikki tone) 

Jake I actually imported from the US with his fashion pack. I love this fashion pack omg. 

You know what struck me though when I got him out to photograph? omg he reminds me so much of KJ Appa! lol. Maybe i've just been watching too much Riverdale... ahem. 

He has, like the girls, a fully jointed body with very good articulation, but he doesn't have the wig gimmick. It's a shame but I suppose they couldn't figure out a cheap way to make short wigs that looked decent so opted to just root it instead. 

I can't say I don't fully understand that design choice, especially not having seen the shit short wigs Mattel put out with the Monster High boy CAMs. 

Kate, or "Kit" as I call her was one of my first Livs I think. I always loved her green eyes and fairly neutral makeup. 

And Haydin who's factory default is blonde hair to go with her hazel eyes but I liked the dark on her. She and Kit look like sisters this way heh. 

Maybe one day i'll get them better wigs. The Liv wigs are okay but they tend to get a bit messy and frizzy over time and the plastic cap is pretty obvious. 

I sold the rest of my Liv dolls years ago, though I have quite a few hybrids using their bodies still lol. 

they're blocky bodies but they're really good at posing and look fine dressed so... yeah.

I quite like them. They're a cheaper option than a Made to Move body anyway.

And the Barbies.

I used to own a lot of Barbies but honestly I sort of lost interest. I buy occassional fashionistas that are really unusual or interesting but generally speaking there's just dolls out there that inspire me a lot more. 

I'm pretty sure there's more of these about though.

One of the newer Kens. I do love me a non grinning black Ken. I absolutely HATE the Steven face sculpt, I think he's creepy. I also hate the old Ken mold from the same sort of era. *shudder* I just.. don't much like grinning face sculpts, they creep me out. 

This boy is pretty. 

He has a really gentle face and though his clothes are pretty cheap, he's not bad for a £11 doll these days.

He has molded cornrows which is fun. 

My only Petite. I was so excited about the Petite body, finally a body that was short like meeee. 

But sadly i'm probably closer to the curvy in shape hahahah.

I love her curls. I do like some proper tight curls on a doll. They're a nightmare to brush (you have to finger brush them) but I like to see them. 

Polka dots was a gift from my sister. 

This is a terrible photo. Her paler skin was being awkward. 

I think she uses the same face sculpt as the girl I refer to as "resting bitch face". I love this girl's snarky expression, it cracks me up. 

Can you tell I really like the curvy body? Heh. 

I think it's hot okay? and it looks sooo good in just about anything you put it into. 

Zig Zag here has awesome hair. Lots of blodne curls on one side and molded cornrows on the other. Fun. 

LA girl needs her hair sorted out. She's been in storage a while. 

She's on a Liv body which doesn't quite match her very pale skin tone but is a lot closer to the eye than the camera. 

I love the half flocked hair on dolls. I like when you get modern hair styles on dolls, it's interesting and makes them feel a lot more current. 

LA Girl uses the teen skipper mold. This is 2009's Teen Skipper, who was sent to me by a fellow doll collector. 

She's stunning, an absolutely gorgeous doll. She uses the short High School Musical height body with the 90s Teen Skipper face and side glancing eyes. Ooo I love me some side glancing eyes lemme tell ya. 

I love her. 

So In Style Kara looks so DONE with her box hair omg. 

The SIS dolls were hard to find over here, the fully articulated Baby Phat line hit a tiny toy shop in Croydon where Husband was working at the time and he brought them home to me. 

I was in hospital at the time I think, pregnancy related nonsense, and initially he brought me the two darkest toned ones he could find then went back and got the other two as well lol. 

The others are somewhere, though one of them has always been Husband's and not mine. 

Chandra's hair needs sorting too but oh gosh... she's such a stunning doll. 

She came with a one piece suit I didn't like that much so I redressed her in a taller Bratz top and some Barbie jeans. So gorgeous. 

Another thing I really like about this line, along with having some really varied and seldom seen at the time skin tones on offer, was they were on Fashionista articulated bodies. YES wrist joints! 

The tiny toy shop got only 2 cases in and sold out in 48 hours. 

So yeah.. remind me again how black dolls "don't sell" in the UK Mattel? 

Fuckers. 

In another box I found my curvy made to move. 

I LOVE this body omg. Sure it's not as poseable as the regular MTM but screw it, it's a well articulated curvy body! I'll take that baby.

Hurry up and release it in more skin tones Mattel. 

Another version of this face sculpt heh. I like this face sculpt (same as resting bitch face and polka dots). I'm also weak for pink haired dolls which is kinda funny because I don't really LIKE pink. But there's something about pink hair that makes me happy. 

My one and only DC Superhero Girl. 

I wanted to like a line of superhero dolls, i really did, but I objected to the marketing. Why the needless gendering? Why make it all about friendship at a bloody school? What the hell was with heroifying villains? It was weird. 

I dunno, it bothered me and I could never really get into it as a result.

 Anyway, I like this doll even if I wasn't so keen on her costume or the franchise as a whole.

I'd have preferred to see like, Justice League but focusing on the female characters without the bizarrely contrived "school for superhero" nonsense and with villains who were you know.. STILL FUCKING VILLAINS and not part of the main cast for no clear reason. I didn't get that, it was wiiierd.

And the bizarre time bending thing of having Wonder WOMAN (not girl, woman) alongside Barbera Gordon and various Teen Titans? Wiiiiiiierd. 

Yes, i'm a nerd. lol. 

Still Bumblebee is a cute doll. She has hair like Zig Zag fashionista with the molded braids. I like it. I also think she has a cute face. 

I still dislike the gripping hand, it looks rude with nothing held in it. 

Another charity shop find. This is a Wee Little Miss doll. Her eyes would have once "opened" and "closed" with ice water and warm water but the gimmick has long since failed.

She's from the early 90s. That crimped hair is fantastic

Even more random dolls omg. 

 This old Belle clone came from a pound shop yeaaaars ago. I actually think she's a factory reject head they rerooted with shit nylon but I kinda loved the random orange streak lol. 

Her head is really nice quality, hence my belief it's a reject head and not a clone. 

She was on a cheap shit flimsy body but she now has an EAH Apple body and I love the proportions. I think it's fun. 

I dunno, she's a wierd little hybrid but a lot of fun. 

Another charity find, this girl is an MGA Fairy tale story doll or... something. Either way, she's Beauty from Beauty and the Beast. 

She's SO HEAVY. She has really chunky solid vinyl legs and she's a meaty as heck doll for sure. 

I kinda love how very "mga" her face is. A lot of MGA's dolls really do have a lot of Bratz about them. 

Bratzillaz repaint. This was originally a midnight beach glow in the dark Yasmina. 

what a wierd line that was. "oh hey, let's take our human toned characters and make them all sickly green and glowy!"

uh.. why?

she glows pretty brightly and the purple hair looks nice against the green but she didn't work as a humanoid character I didn't think.

Inspired by the repaints of people like Dollsahoy, I painted her eyes black, glossed the heck out of them to make them shimmer, painted some markings and hacked her hair into an asymetrical bob.

I really like her. 

Star Darlings were a failed Disney line that just failed to gain traction. 

It was odd because they'd put a lot of effort into the lore and had a whole series of books and such, but for whatever reason the advertising campaign just wasn't there and the dolls flopped. 

hard.

They only released a few of the characters as dolls and they came with two versions. Their "wish world" human version and their true form.

Both these dolls are Sage. I don't know much about the lore beyond they're star beings who grant wishes or some shit. I dunno, I never got that into it. 

I just thought the dolls were pretty.

The star form ones have shimmery skin and tinselly hair and all of them have inset acrylic eyes which are pretty damn cool. 

Scarlet has annoying short tinsel strands that stick upright, but I love that she has this asymetric little smirk. 

Some wtf dolls. 

What's Her Face were made by Mattel in the early 2000s, the gimmick was that you painted on their faces using the provided felt pens and stamps.

they always looked goofy and weird. 

They have velcro on their head that the wig sticks to and chunky bodies they used for the wee 3 friends line as well. 

They are... really fricken odd.

And the flat folding doll. She's a Metti and one of a few flat folding dolls that were made in the 70s. I dunno what the fuck that was about but for some reason there are more than one flat doll out there. 

Whaaa?

Metti folds up, she has hinges on each limb so she folds down into a small shape and then folds out again.

She bewilders me. 

Some of my Frightmares were in the bottom of a box. 

they were a strange spinoff Monster High line weren't they? Cheaply made but not that cheaply priced, I think had these been like £8 from the start they'd have done a lot better.

they're fairly cute in a bizarre sort of way and certainly quite fun to play with, but their lack of fabric clothing means they're not really dolls, they're little figures and shouldn't have been priced like a doll as they were (they were £15 each over here! the same price as a proper monster high doll. Wtf?) 

Also some other small bits. 

The cat is from a La La Loopsy i think, I just thought it was cute (charity find). 3 of my small LOL collection (I think I have like 7 in total? they're too expensive and not varied enough), a novi pet and Bratz Babiez Harvey. 

The only Bratz Baby I actually still own because I find the girl ones really creepy. I mean they have loads of makeup on and usually lingere, it's uncomfortable man. (LOL have a fair few like that too and it's like.. eugh.. why MGA? Why?)

what's up with MGA and babies in sexy underwear?

Harvey is cute though, he's like a baby version of Thad lol. 

though the Babies aren't really in scale with the Bratz themselves, which is a bit annoying. They're too big. 

Finally Alex (I think that's her name) Who is a Hi Glam doll. MGA's reboot of the Leggy Dolls from the 70s.

She's RIDICULOUS. 

She's quite pretty though. And suitably bizarre. 

I got mine in TK Maxx for fairly cheap. Oh I miss the days where TK Maxx would have shit worth buying omg. 

I've always kinda wanted to get a Leggy doll to go with her heh. 

And that concludes the first lot of boxes I got out. Next time, we'll tackle the plastic tubs! 

Look at theeeeem. 

till next time!