Disney and Jaxx Pacific surprised everyone with a sudden doll release. Coming off the back of the 18 inch Disney "inspired" dolls from last year, a new line of 1/6 scale fashion dolls has been released.
In a show that put literally every other toy manufacturer to shame, Jaxx and Disney ALSO managed to release these dolls simultaniously in the USA, UK and several other countries. Something Mattel STILL hasn't gotten their heads around.
In the US these dolls are exclusive to Target in the US but available at Shop Disney everywhere it looks.
I don't have much more preamble to add here, so let's just dive into this.
When I ordered mine Disneystore.uk had all but the Cinderella themed one listed in stock. Cinderella you could order, but her tag said "coming soon" rather than "new". Not sure if that was an error or not, but I elected not to risk it as I wanted to get my hands on the dolls sooner rather than later.
The price point of these is $30 usd and around £26 gbp. That puts them into a similar price bracket to the g3 Monster High and cheaper than pretty much ALL of MGA's offerings.
The original ILY dolls were released in 2022 and are 18 inches, putting them in scale with American Girl, Generation Girl and Designafriend. Not a scale I generally collect but I admit, I thought they were pretty dang adorable.
They have inset eyes and what look to be unique sculpts for each "character". They were released with several fashion packs as well.
Jaxx Pacific did the same thing again with the 1/6 versions. Not only did they drop 6 dolls on us out of the blue, they also dropped 12 fashion packs (priced at £15 each) and 6 accessory/playset packs (also £15 each) which is rather a lot of confidence right there.
These dolls are inspired by the "Disney bound" trend, where people dress up in modern thematic outfits for their favourite character rather than a full costume.
I don't know much about Disney stuff because it's just not an area I have that much interest in, but I know there's a fair few Disney adults out there who live and breathe this stuff.
Me? I just like good quality dolls and outfits heh.
I ended up ordering the Snow White and Tiana girls as well as one of the fashion packs.
Snow White's box arrived damaged and Tiana's got a bit of a wardrobe malfunction going on but otherwise they look fine.
"Inspired by Tiana" (as her box actually reads) was the first I opened. She comes in a large white box with one curved corner and a large window showing off all the doll and accessories. it's quite a plain box actually, stark white with the very simple "ily" logo and an image of Tiana herself. I can't say i've ever seen a fashion doll with a little portrait of someone else, they're usually a little image of the doll. It makes sense here, but it's still a bit unusual.
Lol the wardrobe malfunction.
One of the less advertised aspects of these dolls is this "surprise" feature which comes inside the balloon. I think that's a nice idea. Kids love surprises but having it being a small little accessory means it's not disappointing and you can still see the doll and her stuff before purchase. It's just a little bonus extra. I vastly prefer this idea.
One side of the box feaures a photograph of the doll herself in front of a blurry out of focus disneyland castle.
The other side is that same image of Tiana from the front with some heart graphics. Again, this is a very simple box but it works. The white makes it eye catching but also feels a bit special I think because we now associate stark white with things like Apple products so in our minds there's this subconcious bias that white = deluxe or something.
The back of the box is more typical for a doll box. There are assorted food graphics (mmm churos) and a full photo of all 6 dolls.
I find it really interesting that Jaxx elected to only make one white doll for this line. I just kinda wish she wasn't a blue eyed blonde, we have so many of those already on the market you know?
They've also been careful not to associate any of the princesses of colour with a corresponding doll which I think was smart. Tiana's doll is the Asian one for example, while the Black girl is themed after Belle. The White girl is Jasmine while the Desi looking girl is Ariel. I appreciate this because it avoids stereotypes but also tells kids "hey, your favourite princess doesn't have to LOOK like you." which I think is a really good message. You don't have to look like someone else to identify with them.
The box is surprisingly easy to open. It has a little card tab at the top and then two small tape circles holding the edge of the curved side closed. Once you peel those off the whole backing card slides out no trouble.
The backdrop is the same for all the dolls I think, it's a sort of gradiated pink, purple and blue bisexual flag fog.
Along with the doll you also get a jacket, a bag, a water bottle and the balloon. All of these are either tacked in place or elastic banded. The balloon is held in place with a plastic clamshell cover, to open this you have to peel the tape on the back of the backing card and slip one of the plastic tabs back through. I cut myself on Snow White's so yeah... *sigh*
For some reason Tiana has one foot that was held in place with a normal plastic tie and the other is held to the bottom of the box with plastic coated wire.
Wierd.
Snow White, for the record, had both feet held in with the wire.
There's a fairly typical number of plastic ties to snip. A couple per leg, one for the arm, one around the waist and a couple of plastic staples in the head.
Tiana's pigtails were also tabbed in place with plastic staples but once I removed the two in her head they slid out of the box without having to touch any of the others so that was nice.
The energy saving bulbs that light my living room cast a far more yellow tone on everything, which makes the doll look a lot more sallow than she actually is. She's very very pale with the slightest yellow undertone but she's nowhere near the lemon tone my lights suggest.
She has weak ankles, particularly the foot that was packaged bent in the box. This makes getting her to stand a bit of a pain because you have to carefully position her floppy ankles flat every single time. Once you do it right she will stand unaided, but every time you move her the ankles will flop and misalign again.
gah.
Her knees on the other hand are really sturdy.
With her shirt fixed you can get a better look at the doll.
She has very soft makeup with a neutral but slightly metallic lipstick and the tiniest shimmer above each eye. Her eyes are inset acrylics and dark brown with a little white "light" dot in each. They're positioned asymetrically so that she doesn't look cross eyed or too intensely starey, they've actually done a pretty good job there.
My girl has a slight flaw to her makeup on one eye, the black is a little chipped but it's only really visible in photos (wierd). She also has a crack in that same eye, but you have to really get close and study her eyes to notice it.
Her skin tone, as I mentioned, isn't this yellow. She's very very pale, but the light in my living room likes to pick up the yellow tones and emphasise them. *BAH*
Her hair is black and quite silky soft. I think it's nylon but i'm not sure. It's styled into pigtails with two short strands at the front which are CAKED in gel.
Her sparkly headband is literally sewn to her head in three places. Removing it takes a lot of effort.
My first impressions getting Tiana out of the box was "damn this is a hefty doll". She's quite solid and has more realistically proportioned limbs than a lot of dolls out there.
Alongside Barbie she's actually a very similar height, but the ILY girl is broader in just about every dimension. Her proportions, least her limbs, remind me more of the Rainbow High limbs, but ILY is a lot taller.
Stripping the dolls off demonstrates this a lot better. Barbie on the left is a little taller but a lot of that is due to her being on perpetual tip toes rather than flat feet. The shoulder width is similar, but the ILY doll has chunkier limbs and a more realistic torso.
The Disney store body on the right demonstrates this even more. While they're a similar height at the shoulders, the Disney store body has a very snatched in waist and spindly limbs.
The ILY body looks more in keeping with the Rainbow High doll but even then, the Rainbow High girl has a very pear shaped body while ILY has a more athletic body type with fairly narrow hips.
And for completeness sake because I know someone will bring it up, here's the ILY body alongside the jointed Disney store princess body.
The ILY arm articulation is pretty rubbish. They can only JUST manage 90 degrees. She cannot touch her own face and she sure as heck can't bring her drink bottle to her lips. Sorry girl, you're gonna be perpetually thirsty.
For the record, I don't think her hands come off either. I gave them a tug but they wouldn't budge so i'm assuming they're not supposed to be removed.
Her knees on the other hand actually have a proper peanut joint which allows them to bend completely. Unfortunately her hip joint wasn't designed to actually accomidate this.
As you can see, the poor girl cannot sit. The poorly designed hip joints mean that she can't actually bend her leg enough to sit down and in trying to make her sit I learned that her legs are held on with little ball sockets and the legs can and will pop off if you push them too hard.
Whoops.
at least they pop straight pack on. But damn.
What she actually needs is some more material removed from the hip/groin region. That would then allow the upper leg to move enough to allow her to sit down rather than sliding off any chair like a drunk.
This is as far as her legs will splay, pushing them any further results in the leg popping off.
Now, this might actually be able to be used to your advantage if you want to modify her hips. If you can pop both legs off without damaging anything, which it looks like you can, it allows you better access to the pelvis for those mods. Then you can just pop the legs back on when you're done.
She can look up, but wierdly enough not down. Her head will look down, but it immediately springs back to straight when you let go. There's something inside there that's forcing it up.
She can also tilt her head very slightly to the side. This allows for a little more personality in her poses which I like.
She has earring holes but doesnt come with earrings.
I'm not keen on dolls coming with earring holes when they don't have earrings because it makes me think there's parts missing.
In this case though, at least 3 of the fashion packs look to come with earrings so that's likely WHY they gave all the dolls earring holes.
still, would it have killed the budget to just give them all boring little studs? Just so they didn't look incomplete?
I dunno.
The outfit consists of a little purple tee with "new orleans" written on it and a skirt with suspenders with flowers on. The fabric feels like some sort of textured polyester. Both pieces are well sewn and fully hemmed, the skirt even has teensy little metal "studs" on the suspender straps. Cute.
Her shoes are little lilac sneakers. They're very simple but perfectly painted and fit great. They really help the doll stand too. Bare foot her weak ankles are substantially more of a problem.
She also has a little bracelet with a.. .I think it's a crown charm. It's tiny and slightly metallic with purple, green and white molded beads.
The headband is the Micky Mouse ears, but with a Princess and the Frog twist. They're blue and glittery with a floral (lotus?) petal motif in between the ears.The glitter has a texture but it's also very very solidly on there. No glitter shedding here, which is a relief.
The headband itself was sewn to the doll's head in three places. At the top and on each side. There are actually little notches in the sides for the thread to sit in so it doesn't slip. Clever. As it stands, it actually stays on without the thread purely because of the doll's hairstyle. The edges slide into the sides of each pigtail which helps keep it in place. It's not overly secure like that, but it certainly means it won't fall off if I pick her up.
The back of the ears are also glittery and the blossom motif is molded on this side too.
Tiana's other accessories include a fluffy "sheepskin" style jacket, a waterbottle and a backpack.
The jacket is, like the other pieces, really nicely sewn. It has two little green studs/gems on the faux pockets. It isn't designed to fasten.
The bag is plastic with fabric straps, which is unusual. The bag itself is a cream colour with beige splotches that are maybe frog pattern? A couple of the splotches look like leaves or clusters of grass.
There's a silver lotus blossom badge on the front and a faux front pocket with painted zipper.
the straps are some sort of faux suede type stuff, it's quite stiff.
The bag does have a little slit opening but it's so small you can't fit anything in there.
The waterbottle is slightly metallic too and has a puckering frog painted on it. Lol.
The lid I don't think is designed to come off. On mine I could start to pull it off but it felt like it was glued on one side so I stopped pulling. the little strap on the lid is also molded in place, it doesn't move.
it's a pretty realistic looking little thermos though. Up close the paint work is quite grainy but from a distance it looks okay.
With her full outfit on Tiana can still wear her backpack which is nice to know. Sadly she can't put her bottle into the bag, she has to just carry that.
So now we get to the "surprise balloon".
I hasten to point out that in all the promo images for these dolls this balloon is prominantly featured.
Here for example.
And again here.
In fact, every single doll has at least one photo of them holding their balloon.
So I don't think it was unreasonable to expect it to be shaped like an actual balloon, right?
But alas, this is where Jaxx put on their "eh, it'll do" hat and gave us this bullshit.
half... a fucking balloon.
Are you serious? How hard would it have been to make this actually round? Like one of those many many surprise egg toys out there.
So the half egg opens to reveal some paperwork and a surprise wrapped in tissue paper.
The paperwork gives us a fair assortment of different things that might be in the balloon. All food.
There are some lollypops (sorry the flash ate that image), a waffle?, popcorn, some toffee apples, some.. pancakes? cookies? not sure. And a chocolate bar with a pite out of it.
on the other side there are some little chocolate things in what looks like waffle cone cups, a muffin/cupcake, a pancake and some sort of drink. All in all that's 10 different foodstuffs. Not a bad assortment.
I also like that they're foods because it's something where duplicates don't matter.
the balloon still disappoints me. If you slide the string over the doll's hand so she can "hold" it, it displays the flat side quite obviously. The amount of camera trickery they'd have needed to fake those balloon photos, it leaves a sour taste in the mouth honestly. Why fake that? Why pretend they could actually be used as a balloon?
I mean doll balloons are annoying already because they're top heavy and tend to be very difficult to get to stay upright when being held by a doll, but these half balloons just offend me. there was no reason to do that and the way they're advertised and displayed in the box gives the illusion they're a workable accessory, not just a box to hold a surprise item.
I really liked the idea of an accessory that doubled as a mystery box but these aren't that. They made me think they were, but they're just another plastic box that i'll never use. -_-
BAH.
On a happier note, who can wear these new doll clothes?
Rainbow High i found the shirt to be a little baggy but workable. The skirt fits around the waist but the straps of the suspenders are waaaay too long.
the shoes are too small.
On the Disney Store body (this is the same body they use for all their princess dolls, just with a smaller head than this Attractionista) the fit is pretty good. It's a little loose in the skirt due to the much narrower waist but it works.
Shoes are too big.
Barbie is much the same as the Disney store body, though the fit around the waist is a little better. Again, shoes are too big.
Vintage Sindy fits the clothes pretty well. Even the shoes fit. The suspender straps are a fraction too long.
On the flip side, rainbow high bottoms fit around the waist but the tops are all far far too small.
Modern Barbie stuff seems to fit but YMMV. Pants are quite snug and anything tight will likely be too narrow for her wider legs.
The Disney store outfit fits, but it's snug on the waist and pulling it up over her butt was a little nerve wracking. I suspect these dolls will be able to fit most Disney store princess outfits, but they may be a bit tight in the hips.
back in her original outfit, i'm quite enjoying this girl. No she's not perfect, but I appreciate a doll with some decent quality behind them. The clothes for these dolls are really nice, much more what I expect and want from doll clothes than anything Mattel has given us for years now. More akin to Rainbow High imo. Though even rainbow high suffers from some really iffy seams in some items.
I like how hefty her body feels and I quite like her proportions. Her face is beautiful and her hair is fine.
My cons would be:
The hip articulation. Not being able to sit is a pretty big engineering fuckup and something that really a company like Jaxx should know better.
That goddamn balloon shit which im still salty about.
and the fragility of the leg/hip sockets which results in the legs popping off if you push them too far trying to either sit the doll or splay her legs.Two things that will commonly happen with play, mark my words.
Oh and the weak ankles. But i've never yet encountered a fashion doll with articulated ankles who hasn't had stability issues.
I need to rinse the gel out of her hair but otherwise, i'm really pleased with this girl.
Of course, I didn't just buy this one girl.
I also have Snow White and a fashion pack.
Snow White has a cute little updo with tiny little ringlets framing her face and a braid wrapped around the head.
She has freckles which is adorable. She makes me think of the characters from Enchanto and I wonder if that was intentional there.
She has thicker brows than Tiana and the little hairs painted toward the middle are more noticable here.
Her mouse ears are snow white themed with a yellow bow and red little shapes that emulate the sleeves of Snow White's dress.
Snow White comes with glasses and what's cool is that they actually magnify, but they're too small for the doll. They're too narrow and don't quite fit so while one side will go over her ear the other side won't and if you try to straighten them up they ping off her face.
*sigh*
It's a bummer because I love a good pair of doll glasses.
Like how Tiana has a bracelet, Snow White gets a necklace. It's the poison apple, you know the one, the skull faced drippy thing.
Yeah, that's the one.
Her outfit is fantastic. The dungarees are made from a thin weight fashion denim with purposeful tears and distressing. I don't know how well these will stand up to play with those frayed edges but it's a cool realistic touch.
the little pocket on the front is a real pocket but there are just stitched ones on the hips.
The socks are simple little white socks with yellow and blue stripes.
Her shoes are really cute red loafers or slipons or something with a giant matching red bow. They're adorable.
She also comes with an apple print sweater/cardigan which is made of actual knit with the apples printed onto it. If it were human scale I imagine the apples would be part of the knit itself but at this scale I understand why they had to take that route. Getting apples to look like apples this small would be really difficult with knitted material.
And here's my two girls together. I adore Snow White's outfit. Everything about it is just fantastic to me. I love her little socks and shoes. I love her cardigan. I love her dungarees.
I think I actually prefer Snow White to Tiana. Part of that is the outfit. Not only do I feel like Snow White's outfit is more complex and detailed, but because she's such an older princess her iconography is so much more well... iconic. The Princess and the Frog hasn't exactly set the animated world alight, nobody would call it a "classic".
I feel like Tiana suffers in much the same way a Merida themed doll or a Moana themed doll would, in that they just aren't instantly recognisable to the general non disney person. While Snow White particularly is one of the Disney princesses that everyone knows, recognises and associates the blue red and yellow with. You see blue and red and yellow and it immediately pings "oh yeah, snow white." which simply isn't the case with the more modern princesses. Snow White is iconic, so much so that whenever anyone does anything "snow white" even when they're not doing the disney version, that blue and yellow and red reappears over and over and over again.
Don't get me wrong, I really like Tiana as well, but her outfit doesn't feel quite as "wow" to me. Even though it's technically the same number of pieces.
Maybe she'd have benefitted from socks too.
Oh and if you're wondering, the surprise in her "balloon" was the lollypops which are stuck forever in a jar so can't even be removed and held by the doll.
Boo.
I'd like these food items a lot better if you could remove them from their plate/jars and pretend like the doll was actually eating them/holding them.
So, bottom line? Do I think these dolls are worth £26?
Well let's put it into perspective.
Rainbow High in this country generally cost around £35-50 and usually come with two outfits, two pairs of shoes, a stand and a brush.
Monster High costs around £30 and those come with one outfit and one pair of shoes, a bag, some random foods and a pet.
LOL omg are about £30 and come with one outfit, one pair of shoes, often a bag but not always and some plastic hat boxes.
Barbie Extra come with one outfit, one pair of shoes, a pet and a bag. They're £30 as well.
I'd say these are about on par price wise in which case.
You get for your money 1 full outfit, 1 pair of shoes, 1 bag, 1 piece of jewellery, 1 mouse ear headband and 1 "other" accessory (water bottle, glasses) as well as a surprise food item.
I think they're worth it and honestly i'm surprised they aren't more expensive over here because we usually get absolutely shafted on prices.
But how about the fashion packs?
Let's take a look.
The image on the back shows Snow White's doll wearing this pack. She's rocking it.
"Inspired by Aurora" my ass, this is clearly a set inspired by Maleficent.
I think it's kinda sad that Aurora is such a bland princess that they couldn't even figure out a way to design a set that screamed HER and instead went with her villain.
But Maleficent is pretty freaking awesome.
speaking of Maleficent... obviously this set brings to mind Disney Descendants and the fashions the character Mal wore. Same inspiration after all. I hadn't thought to check how these ILY clothes fit the Decendants dolls.
Well let's ignore the state poor Mal here is in, she's one of the tlc bundle and was the only Decendant I had in easy reach.
The good news is that the shoes seem to fit, which suggests that ILY dolls should probably fit the Decendant shoes as well.
However the waist of the shorts is too big and slips around and the sleeves of the jacket are too long.
The outfit fits okay on the Disney store body but again the shorts are a little too big in the waist and I feel like there's too much gap between the hem of the tee and the top of the shorts, like the torso of this doll is too long.
The shoes are way too big but on Ariel's hinged feet they'll at least kinda stay on.
But look at these boots, they're absolutely amazing. Photos don't really do them justice. They're irredescent, shimmering blue and purple and so much more detailed than the shoes the dolls come with. They even have a molded tread which the doll shoes don't.
Along with the amazing boots you get all this.
A tee with maleficent's dragon printed on it. This tee is made of thick cotton and beautifully made.
A pair of denim shorts with purple dyed ombre effect and sewn in fishnets. Another nicely made piece but I do wish the fishnets were separate, they're sewn right on in and even have a sewn groin so I don't get why they didn't just sew the last top seam and be done with it. The shorts are similar light fashion denim like Snow White's dungarees but the added paint/dye on them gives them a rougher texture. They have slits or slashes in each leg and frayed bottoms. Like the dungarees the pockets are just stitching.
A headband with roses and spikes. This is a cool addition to replace the mouse ears, I like it.
A shimmery foil fabric jacket. This jacket is thin foil fabric, it's actually quite similar to the holographic shimmery jacket one of the Kid Kreations Sindy dolls came with. It feels just as light weight and kinda fragile. This jacket is more detailed than the Kid Kreations one though. It has faux zippers and studs and stuff. The sleeves are a deep purply blue maybe indigo colour while the body of the jacket is half pink and half a blue that changes to purple depending on the light angle. It's freaking awesome.
There's also a clear tote bag which is made from exactly the material a full sized one of these would be, that thin plastic they also make rain coats from. It has a plastic insert to help it hold its shape in the box which you can remove if you want.
The final thing is a tiny doll scale paper ticket. It's made of a sort of glossy paper and I was honestly scared i'd tear it as I tried to remove it from the packaging.
The back of it is just that same blue and black background pattern, it's not very interesting. But I do like that this looks like a real ticket with even a section, row and seat number.
no venue though heh. or date.
The fashion pack fits the dolls well and is pretty easy to get on and off even though the doll hands don't come off. All the sleeves have been designed with this in mind so that's nice.
Tiana looks amazing in this outfit. Her black hair contrasts beautifully with the purples and blues. I love it.
Also, the tote bag fits her water bottle! Which happens to be purple as well so fits right in.
I love this look on her. That rose headband is so good.
At £15 this fashion pack was a bit pricey but I had a quick look on Amazon to see what Mattel is currently giving us with Barbie fashion packs.
This Minions themed set, cute enough, but very very basic. £10:99
This Jurrassic world ensemble with a crappy pink camera and ugly unpainted shoes. £13:59
this frumpy as all hell one piece dress £11:99
these were just the first page of results.
I don't know if these are their RRP or not, but it's what Amazon are asking.
When this is what a tenner will get you, £15 for something like the ILY packs feels like an absolute bargain.
Overall I really like this line. A little fix to the hips, upgrade the elbow joints so they have the same motion as their knees and I think they'd be absolutely wonderful.
But I do kinda resent a doll who can't sit the fuck down.
like come on Jaxx, sitting is kinda an important element don't you think? Especially if you're packaging the dolls with food that'll require them to sit at a table to eat.
also, a day at the theme park, these girls are gonna need to rest their feet eventually.
No wonder their ankles are so floppy.
They are beautiful though. I might have to get a few more, and i'm certainly eyeing more of those fashion packs. Especially now I know that they do indeed fit Sindy.
Ahem.
so this was a long one and I kinda got a bit scattered there. but I hope you found it helpful.
The Disney ILY dolls can be found at Shopdisney and as I mentioned, Target in the USA. No word yet on whether any physical stores here in the UK will be getting them. I won't hold my breath.
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