Monster High - Haunt Couture - Clawdeen Wolf

 It's been a while since we had any Monster High content to review huh? 

And though the line ended on a very sour note (good god those gappy reboot bodies were unforgivable) I still have a great deal of fondness for the franchise as a whole. It was the first doll brand I was an active collector for the release of rather than picking dolls up secondhand after the event. I have very happy memories of trawling every Argos across two cities to get the new releases (lol), the excitement of new argos catalogue day or new stock coming into Toys R Us, trips out to the nearest TRU for their latest exclusive. Oh so many doll hunts. 

I miss doll hunts actually. I mean yeah it was a bit frustrating when things didn't hit your region for ages but the thrill of going into a store and seeing all this NEW stuff was awesome. 

In the UK now we just don't get that so much. Argos doesn't do new catalogue days anymore, they just kinda... add stuff as and when to their website. TRU no longer exists. Smyths have no stores within 2 hours travel for me (wtf smyths? wtf?) and the past few years we've just been seeing less and less stuff hitting physical stores as everything goes online only.

and I miss physical stores. I miss sitting in the aisle going through all the boxes to find the "perfect" one. I miss the friendships I made with store workers who came to know me very very well (that one argos guy who would yell across the store "No new dolls today!" or "we have a new shipment! come see!" lol. 

But still, it's nice to see Monster High making a comeback. I'm just not totally sure I trust Mattel not to cock it up like they did last time. 

But when they annouced their collector Haunt Couture dolls I knew I needed to get Clawdeen. After all, I have a ridiculous number of Clawdeen dolls in my collection, she's like.. my girl you know? 

Now granted, the release was pretty shitty. Very short notice for both Frankie and Clawdeen, the price was OBSCENE especially compared with other "collector" dolls being produced and the line was only available from Mattel's online store. Thankfully they've fixed their international shipping. Last time they had a webstore exclusive their online shipping was asking an eye watering $60 to ship ONE freaking doll. I was relieved to see it's now a far more reasonable $15. 

But even so, at $75 each, plus shipping and whatever customs fees I may have to pay, I was pretty anxious about it all. But I didn't want to pass and regret it. I sold a bjd to get funds together. I was lucky to find a buyer quickly.

So, was Haunt Couture worth the inflated price tag? Let's take a look shall we?

Rainbow High Pacific Coast Simone Summers

 Another day, another Rainbow High doll. 

What can I say, they are currently the most interesting doll line on the market. 

I've been eying the Pacific Coast line for a while but at £35 for a bloody SWIMSUIT line, the price made my eyes water. (for reference, the regular dolls are between £30 and £35 with two full outfits so... yeah)

However, Simone was just too gorgeous for me to keep putting off getting. I had some amazon vouchers and she kept popping in and out of stock so I took the chance to grab the last one they had with the reasoning of "I don't want to miss out completely, she seems to be selling the best of the lot"

Rainbow Junior High - Poppy

 MGA continue to saturate the market with more and more and more dolls. 

So now we have "junior high" rainbow high dolls too. 

Somewhat oddly, they elected to make these younger versions of the same characters rather than say, younger siblings. Which I find an unusual choice. I suppose it's also what they did with a lot of the Bratz kidz but at the same time, surely the "going back in time" element should mean their clothing styles are outdated fashions from several years ago then? lol. 

Also, isn't it a bit wierd to have the same character as a tween and also as an older teen?

Whatever, let's look at the doll.