Monster High g3 Abbey Bominable

 In a surprise move Smyths toys randomly got their shipment of new Monster High in early. 

Abbey wasn't due in til June but I was just browsing and saw she was in stock, so obviously this meant I had to order her. What can I say, i'm weak. Ahem. 

Weirdly it seems Smyths is the only store that's really bothering to get new Monster High in. A lot of UK stores got the initial wave, but Smyths is the only store to have gotten any subsequent releases. It looks like the skulltimate secrets line are exclusives to them while the sleepover line, Ghoulia, Toralei, the Deuce/Frankie 2 pack and the budget dolls haven't hit the country at all. 

It doesn't bode well to me. 

But let's not think about Mattel's horrendous mismanagement and instead look at this new doll shall we? 

Poor Abbey is rammed rather haphazardly into the default box which is too small for her. She looks really cramped and her pose is quite uncomfortable. 

Like the first wave she comes with a pet, a random "jacket" piece, a backpack, a phone, a pair of glasses and some snacks.

Her art is quite cute and really highlights her new design. Abbey now has little horns which are ADORABLE and she's curvy! WHoo! I love me a curvy doll. 

This art is SO MUCH BETTER than the first wave art. It feels finished and doesn't have that odd pencilly look to it.

Her brief biography as usual tells us bugger all. She likes ice cream.... 

her pet's name has changed too. Her original pet was named Shiver. I wonder why they changed this. Copyright issue maybe? It's a bit odd. Particularly as it's clearly the same pet, a little wooly mammoth.

Abbey's horns are completely obscured in the box but her face paint is crisp and clean with purple brows, dark purple lips (I always love purple lips on Abbey), little snow freckles, a snowflake "beauty mark" on her cheek and aurora borealis inspired eyeshadow. 

She still has her little "tusks" but now also sports a purple nose tip, presumably to make her look cold. I'm not totally convinced it works. 

Unlike her original dolls she has no embedded glitter on her skin, which i'm honestly very happy about. I always HATED that glitter. It feels ick and it yellows badly.

Her snacks are a drink of some sort and two frozen treats. I'll get to them later. 

Straight out of the box one thing is evident, Abbey is BIG. 

When we first saw her promos there was a lot of speculation about whether she'd be tall and what body she might use. Well, turns out Mattel elected to make a completely new body for Abbey. She's curvy like Draculaura but also taller than Frankie. 

Another thing immediately stood out as well though, and it's not a good thing. Her hair. 

Her hair is a beautiful blend of colours, being predominantly a very pale icy blue with pale purple and white streaks and a few strands of tinsel at the front, however, it's Poly rather than a nice high quality nylon or saran. 

for those who are thinking "so?" let me explain WHY collectors hate poly so much.

the big one you'll see people mention is that it rots. It doesn't age well and over time it brittles and breaks off at the root. Now of course, from Mattel's perspective they aren't thinking about longevity, they don't consider a doll being in decent condition in 10 years time to be a priority because they're thinking short term. "kids won't still be playing with this doll in 10 years" they'll argue. My response to that is that they're full of crap because there's a very healthy market for secondhand toys, particularly for people on low incomes or children's centers and nurseries. Some of our local nurseries/kindergartens still have toys from the 80s in their toy boxes that are going strong! 

Given the concern about the environmental impact of plastics creating a toy that will knowingly deteriorate within a decade is simply adding to landfill. 

But the arguably bigger issue with poly is how it looks NOW, brand new. Monster High g2 used a lot of poly as well, it's got a very specific LOOK to it. It's very shiny, very plasticky, sort of coarse and thick feeling. Each strand is thicker than it should be, which results in a lot of bulk on the doll's head. It doesn't "flow" like saran or a high quality nylon would, instead it sort of puffs up at the scalp. This is why Abbey's hair looks so big, why you can't see her horns under all that hair. Her hair is too thick because the fiber they're using is too thick. It's thick, it's stiff and it has a tendency to tangle and frizz. 

Abbey gets some leeway because her hair is straight, curled poly is even worse as shown in most of Clawdeen's dolls. But it's a real shame to see Mattel do this KNOWING that poly is a fiber most people hate and one that limits the styling of the doll's hair and makes it more difficult to manage. 

from a play perspective even, poly is not pleasant to brush, it's not fun to style and I don't particularly like how it feels against my fingers. Too plasticky. 

I can happily run my hands through a Rainbow High doll's hair for ages, it's soft and silky and really tactile. Several of the new Monster High dolls similarly have quite tactile hair but Abbey? Oh god no. 

Also, what was the point of giving her these cute little horns if you can't see them because of the bulk of her hair!?

Abbey's hair is ankle length for some reason, and very very choppily cut at the ends. 

Giving a doll this much hair but opting for such a cheap fiber just baffles me. like come on Mattel, you should know how to make a fucking doll at this point. 

Apparently the person who picks the hair just picks based on colour, which raises two questions. 1: Why is the hair person that incompetent that they don't even know the differences in fibers? and 2: Why is poly even an OPTION in the first place?

Anyway, Abbey's body is, as I said, a whole new sculpt. 

She's a little shorter than the original "big sister" body and taller than the original Abbey who was on the standard MH body. 

She's also a brighter blue but some of that may be due to the original Abbey bodies all yellowing thanks to their glitter layer. 

She has the fur detailing that Clawdeen has at her wrists and ankles, which is always fun too. She also retains her clawed hands. I always liked Abbey's hands, they're fabulously monstery.

Alongside the new dolls Abbey's body looks most like a scaled up Draculaura body, though her torso seems a little shorter than Drac's and her bust is fuller. 

She's taller than Frankie who previously was the tallest of the g3 gang and she practically towers over the dinky lil' Draculaura. 

EVERY part of Abbey's body is bigger. Her hands, her feet, all of it. I don't believe she can share any clothing with any of the other dolls, not even shoes. 

this is an interesting choice on Mattel's part. MH was always a franchise that could get away with not having cross compatibility purely because all the clothes and shoes were SO character specific in the first place. They all had their own colours and graphic patterns associated with them, which made swapping clothing awkward anyway because even though it fit, it didn't LOOK right to have the vampire wearing something with lightening bolts or the yeti with Egyptian motifs.

So this decision makes sense to me. 

But of course, there's still the question of "okay, so what CAN she wear then?"

This Barbie dress is a little baggy in the top but it's not too bad. Fits her hips pretty well.

Rainbow High stuff is pretty good. The tops fit really well, however the bottoms need to be stretchy to go over her calves. So she can wear these shorts but none of the trousers/jeans I tried would fit. They're all too tight in the leg.

Most of the skirts work though. 

Dresses don't, they're too short. Rainbow High dolls have really short torsos so with the dresses you end up with something that barely covers Abbey's butt and has a waist band under her bust rather than at her waist. It looks weird. That is, if you can even get the thing ON over her legs.

Still I was surprised by how well the separates fit.

Shoes are a bigger issue as Abbey has quite large feet. Regular g3 shoes won't fit, which means Rainbow High shoes won't fit either. I didn't have anything around that looked like it would fit so she's stuck with her weird little sandals for now. 

And they are pretty wierd. 

They kinda look like slippers but also a bit like crocs? They look to have fur at the top and then a woven strap to hold them on, then there's a big chunky "ice" platform sole. 

The underside of the sole has molded tread which is always fun to see. 

These shoes are made of hard plastic which I worried would make them difficult to get back on but they actually go on without too much effort. Still, I would have preferred a softer plastic. I have weak fingers so having to force shoes on can be quite painful. 

The two plastics effect here is quite cool. The sole is made of a semi transparent glittery plastic to make it look like ice which is quite effective.

I restyled Abbey's hair a little for all these photos to try to pull the bulk of it away. I tied the pieces at the front that weren't part of her two little uh... pigtail... things... back and into a ponytail hidden under the rest of the hair. 

it's still quite bulky, particularly at the back, but it at least means you can see her horns a little more and it looks less messy. 

She only has tinsel in the front pieces with a couple of strands across the rest which is a relief because I HATE tinsel in doll's hair. It loves to stick out in random directions and it feels gross. I'm also relieved that it's normal flat tinsel here and not that weird bobbly stuff they used for g1 Abbey which snagged a brush every time you tried to comb the hair. ARGH.

Abbey's outfit is simple but it works well. Her top is a printed tee with a snowflake motif and a purple contrast stitch around the edges. The sleeves are a semi opaque sort of mesh fabric with fur cuffs.

Her trousers are made of some sort of foiled fabric. It's thin and a little stretchy with a silver snowflake pattern against a purple background. They have slits up to the knee which is a bold look. 

Her "jacket" is a fur shrug which I couldn't get the doll to wear alongside her backpack, it's fur shrug OR backpack, you can't have both. This irks me. It annoyed me so much I just kinda tossed it aside and forgot to take a photo of it. Ho hum. 

but also, a fur shrug is not exactly a practical thing to wear as day to day wear. Every time you lift you arm it falls on the floor. A fur gilet or vest would have made a lot more sense here. I really can't see any high school student wearing a formal fur shrug to school. It's just weird.

Her earrings are little pink glittery icicles. Her other ear also has an ear cuff attached which is cute. 

 

Her ears themselves are furred which is adorable. I love g3's ears, they're all so cute. 

(you can see here how I pulled her hair back out of her face) 

on to her snacks! 

So Abbey comes with three snacks like everyone else. 

first she has a drink with a removable lid. The one problem with this is that the lid doesn't actually stay on very well. It looks to have horns on the cup lid, a very soft straw and an ice effect that also looks like fangs which is kinda cool. The cup itself has eyeballs floating in it. I assume it's supposed to be a boba or bubble tea and the eyeballs are instead of tapioca? Maybe? 

The brown ice cream is shaped like a horned tombstone and says "death by chocolate" on it. So it's some sort of chocolate flavoured shaped icecream thing.

The other thing is a bit more bewildering. It's a rectangular little box with "sno corpse" written on it (well that's morbid Mattel). Of course the wording "sno corpse" makes me think "sno cone" but it's clearly NOT a sno cone, it looks more like maybe an ice cream bar? 

As a Kiwi my first thought was "hey, that looks a bit like an eskimo pie!"  Or the UK equivalent which would be a choc ice. Basically a rectangular block of vanilla ice cream coated in chocolate and sold in a wrapper. 

Maybe it's a reference to some American iced treat that's not immediately recognizable to anyone outside the US? Does anyone know for sure what it's a reference to? Because i'm sort of stumped. 

I have to admit I do find it a bit lazy that BOTH of Abbey's snacks are ice creams of some sort. 

AHAH! I have been informed that they're a chocolate covered candy called "sno caps". they look like what the British call "jazzies" and in Australasia are called "chocolate freckles", little chocolate disks covered in hundreds and thousands. 

As an aside, I absolutely HATE jazzies, they're gross. I always felt so cheated when they were the "chocolate" given out. Like ew. Cheap crap chocolate covered in flavorless hundreds and thousands? Get outta here with your bullshit. 

but yeah, an American reference the rest of the world simply WILL NOT get. Way to go Mattel. *eyeroll*

Abbey's bag is a pink glittery snowflake. It's cute, but it's a pain in the arse to open and it hurt my fingers. 

I do like that the g3 dolls come with backpacks instead of handbags, it feels substantially more in keeping with their school theme.

Abbey's bag opens on a hinge like this, but it's absolutely TINY inside. And also as I said, really difficult to open.

Because it's so small and due to the design of the latches you can only really fit ONE thing in it. Either Abbey's phone, which just about fits....

Or the "sno corpse" box. 

The ice cream thing is too big, it will not fit. 

Boo! 

I like when I can ram the snacks into the bag and know they're safe in there. It keeps them with the doll so they don't get lost. 

Abbey's ice cream obsession continues in her phone design. it's another horned iced treat! 

It's a sort of pearly purply pink colour with glitter.

The front has the horns and a little swirl but it honestly makes me think more "unicorn" than it does "ice cream" and I dunno why.Maybe it's the colour and that cloud-like swirl shape.

Shi... I mean.. Tundra is cute enough but like all the pets has a lot of obvious seams in their construction. 

She? has a pearly plastic for the hair parts while the rest is a soft purple colour with white tusks. 

I find it fascinating that many of these g3 pieces aren't painted but rather constructed from multiple separate pieces of coloured plastic. Like Abbey's shoes. 

Tundra's ears are like batwings which is... certainly a choice. Makes me think of Neopets, the Elephante pet has bat wing ears too heh. 

am I the only one who sees it?

Like all the pets, Tundra's eyes are pixilated and kinda blurry. 

She's cute enough though. 

Abbey's hair is already looking bedragled after her photo shoot. *sigh* 

 

I also forgot to mention her bum bag/fanny pack belt thing. It's made of semi transparent blue plastic with glitter and designed to look like ice. There's a little purple icicle charm hanging from one side of the belt. 

The one problem with this piece is that it spins around as there's no belt loops or anything to keep it in place. Straight out of the box it was held in place with an elastic band wound in a figure eight around both of Abbey's legs. I reinstated this as it was the best solution.

 

She also has her glasses which are also glittery. Lots of embedded sparkle in the plastics here lol. 

They're kinda narrow and sit a bit low on her nose. 

But they do contribute to Abbey's kinda... contrasting oddness with her outfit. The mesh sleeves, the loose floaty pants, the sandals and the sunglasses along with her icecreams all scream "summer" and yet she also has all this winter iconography with snowflakes and snow and ice and fur. It's a fascinating contrast.

She is a beautiful doll, i'm even adjusting to her flushed nose. But her hair is an absolute pain in the arse. It's SO STIFF. 

I do hope we get an Abbey who has a better hair fiber but i'm not going to hold my breath here. I'll be honest, i'm not entirely sure this reboot is going to last too long. The dolls themselves are gorgeous, the effort put into their designs is right up there, but Mattel being Mattel they continue to self sabotage with stupid choices like poly hair and poor distribution. 

It's also perhaps worth mentioning that when i deboxed Abbey, the first thing I did was brush her hair out of her face with my fingers. This caused on whole plug right at the front to come out completely, leaving a hole. 

*sigh* 

I get it, these things happen, but goddamnit it Mattel. 

that was though, interestingly, the only hair drop I got from her. The rest of her hair didn't even shed when I brushed it. 

I wish her horns were more prominent, they're such a cool little feature.

I'm not disappointed in Abbey, I do think she's beautiful, but I can't help but wish she had better hair. 

They got everything else so right so WHY Mattel? WHY? It's like throwing the race when you're seconds from the finish line. 

argh. 

it's frustrating is what it is. 

 

Look at that pretty face! She deserved better damnit.