Just a Few More Laps in Shadow High (Epilogue)

Please read part 1, part 2, and part 3 of my Shadow High deep-dive for the full journey I went on, which provides a healthy overview and quality-control study of this brand. This post is here to squash my issues with the dolls of part 2 and investigate some things I was really compelled by, but which didn't need to be featured for my overview opinion.

Alright. The second post of my Shadow High exploration was a bit downbeat, the Empire Strikes Back or Last Jedi of the trilogy, if you will, because I ended up feeling like both dolls were losses. Zooey's face was poorly done enough to spoil the character and Heather's hand was stuck and broke off. I needed new copies of both, and I let that be known during my look-over, but I decided to have those resolutions in an epilogue post rather than bloating the reading time and structure of my review. Keeping it centered on the six unique dolls from their first copies felt fairer as an overview that became a quality control study as well. But here's where we get catharsis for part 2's disappointments.

Since I found her first, Heather II was the first replacement to arrive. I went through eBay for both Heather II and Zooey II because I needed to know the faces of the specific copies I was getting--for Zooey because the face was the sole reason I was replacing her and because I didn't need anything more than the undressed factory-state doll, and for Heather because I couldn't check the joint issue I was buying her for, but I'd be damned if I was getting a bad faceup on my second one regardless of how her hands turned out. For Heather II, I opted to get a new-in-box copy. Chiefly, it was because nude Heathers were seemingly only being sold by people who undid her hair enough to remove the rings around her braids and I wanted her hair intact, but also, my Monster High brain saw enough potential in her clothes that having second copies of her pieces (like the jacket) made getting another complete package worthwhile.

Here's Heather II's box.

Unboxing her was much the same as Heather I. 

Here's the differences I saw between the copies.

Her lips were painted more accurately than Heather I's, but they had some excess glitter that fell "outside the lines". Fortunately, this was easy to scrape off. This is a better faceup than I's. 

Her left hand rotated, but did have a bit of a stick inside the joint somewhere where it met resistance before twisting through it, so I will be heating her hand up a lot and attempting to remove it and cut out whatever bump is keeping her hand from smoothly going through it all. To have two Heathers with a left hand peg sticking is indicative of a wide problem with this doll (so it's not just incredibly bad luck for me in particular like I assumed with Heather I), but fortunately, Heather II's hand has a milder issue that seems entirely fixable and I know exactly how to approach the issue now--heat it and yeet it!

And then fix the joint issue and put the hand back in, of course.

Heather's hand popped out easily with hot water--like pulling a needle from a pincushion, actually, and there didn't appear to be any bumps on her peg or inside her arm. It's still a little bumpy turning her hand in a circle, but I'm not worried at all about it getting stuck and breaking. It's just quirky, not damaged.

Heather II's snakeskin heels had a touch of the Dalí about them, being very warped and not standing up properly.

 I still cut slits in the back and tested them on Heather I's feet to see if they shaped up while worn. Fortunately, they did.

I combed out Heather's front locks again and cut them short, but this time, shorter than before and shorter than I had intended. I don't think it looks bad on her, fortunately. Just different. 

This time, I decided not to trim her pigtails. The keyring locks of hair are already shorter than them, so there's already an interesting silhouette. I think Heather I's pigtails being made to hang shorter than the keyring locks made her hair look too short. I did boil-dip her pigtails to straighten them, though, since II's hair felt more kinked by the tie tags than I's did.

While I now had a good Heather, there was one more thing I thought would improve her--different eyes. For such a spooky, goth-looking doll, her pale blue eyes felt a little soft--and redundant next to Natasha's. I thought Heather would look a lot more Halloweeny with brown eyes, or even orange, if there was an RH doll that had 'em. I get that the wave 1 kids are meant to look very colorless, but the blue just holds Heather back for me and orange-brown eyes would make her look way more awesome to me. Fortunately, there are multiple RH dolls with an eye color that reads as a quite orange brown tone, so I chose whichever I could get cheap on eBay. I decided to go for a dressed Karma Nichols in her primary outfit. Her second outfit is more appealing to me, but whatever. Might as well have the clothing pieces if they come in handy somewhere else. Poor Karma's not here to join my collection. 

Of course, this was not an avenue I'd ever consider without knowing it was doable and relatively easy, but fortunately, eye-swapping is pretty common among R/SH collectors and tips are easily found. 

To give myself practice with the eyes, I decided to pop out one of Heather I's. I'd mentioned she would make a good base for a spooky goth custom, and I had gotten some work done on that. I undressed her, undid her hair, and then cut it down to the roots, which took forever. Irrespective of their specific root density, these dolls have a lot of hair! I didn't want her head fully de-rooted, since having the roots made her look more like a mistreated broken toy, a la Babyface from Toy Story. 

Peak character design, honestly.

The roots are a lot denser at the front of her head than the back.

Then I wiped off parts of her faceup, removing her blush and her eyebrows and her lips to make her look more pale and expressionless, and to remove her encrusted lip glitter. Then I did an eye-removal based on a really helpful tutorial I watched. I heated up her head (for this doll, I just dunked her head in boiling water, but Heather II will need heating with a more delicate method) and removed it from her body, then I poked a de-bladed X-Acto knife handle into her head and pressed it against the cup holding her inset right eye to pop it out until I could grab the eye and twist and pry it out the rest of the way. I'm only removing her right eye for broken-doll asymmetry and to balance the missing eye opposite the missing hand. Here's the head with the eye out.

The eye sockets have two indents and the eyes have two bumps, likely to help align them properly inside the head. The lashes are attached to the eyes, and the backs have markings saying which side they go in.

I painted the empty eye socket black and gave her new black lips without teeth showing. To replace her hand, I wanted her to have a metal attachment or prosthetic to make her look more goth and scrappy. Looking through the tool box in our basement, I found some screw hooks with vinyl coverings, and cut off the vinyl of one and screwed the hook into her wrist. Perfect. It reminds me a little of Blade from the Puppet Master horror films, who has a hook for a left hand and a...well, guess...for the other.

Blade from the Puppet Master series post-slash job. His eyes are
screws that can drill into things, too!

Then I tried dressing her up a little. My initial idea was to make her up like a baby doll in another copy of Shanelle's dress, but I think she looks great and extremely goth in pieces from Heather and Shanelle's more mature wardrobes--and this way, I don't need to buy anything to complete her!

She's reminding me a lot now of Living Dead Dolls
and BEGoth dolls now!

The hair rings make good bracelets on the side with the hand.

She's wearing the tank from Heather II, which has
a clean lower edge.

Someone this painfully goth needs a painfully goth name...what's coming to mind is Helen DesTroyed (as in, a terrible play on "Helen of Troy") and it's just bad enough to be brilliant. Helen it is. You can't take this vibe too seriously. Goth in its prime was tasteless in its edginess, and I think the best way to reconcile with that is to embrace it as silly. 

Have a bio.

Helen DesTroyed

Helen was a rosy, lovely girl. She painted butterflies, braided her hair in bows, and wore the fluffiest pink skirts she could find. She had the sweetness of an angel for most of her life, but one day, she went to take cookies to her boyfriend's place and disaster struck when she got mauled by a rabid chihuahua in an alleyway. 

The girl that emerged from between those apartments was not the Helen everyone once knew. She was a girl with a darkness ready to take on the whole world. 

With a fierce hook and a no-nonsense style, Helen laughs at pain and misery. She left her home (in ashes), dumped her boyfriend (into a river) and struck out on her own, looking for problems to be ended. She still bakes cookies...but she can't stomach them anymore without her new favorite ingredient--cyanide.

And with eerie timing, Karma Nichols and her brown eyes were delivered late right as I was taking those photos of Helen, so the next phase of Operation: Heather was a go with no waiting!

Here's Karma. Her face was covered in a holographic shimmer effect that was made to last, as it didn't wash off in water. She's one of the older RH dolls that didn't have tipping motion in the head-- her head just rotates laterally with a a neck peg that doesn't move. Fortunately, Shadow High debuted after RH improved the head articulation so all of the dolls I've been getting have the better range!

I repeated the process I did to take Helen's eye out for both Karma and Heather. I had to dunk Heather's face in while holding her pigtails and keyring locks out of the bowl of water to get her head to soften for all of the steps. Their eyes came out easily...

...but popping Karma's eyes into Heather's head was a bit of a wrestle. Not because they didn't fit, but because it's awkward to squeeze them in. For both, I had success pushing them in from the outer edge  (closer to the ear) first and then pushing the rest in, and wiggling the back of the eye cup inside the head with my tool and pushing the eyes from the front to tune their alignment. During the dunking and squeezing, Heather's hair rings fell out and that was how I discovered they're clip loops, not closed rings that you'd have to undo her hair to take out. Now I know how the eBay sellers were doing it! (Getting a second complete copy was still worth it, though, especially for Helen's benefit.) I wish the rings were actually closed loops that were "locked in" by her pigtails, but they went back in easily enough. Here's the eye transplant and the body back together.

Nice!

Then I redressed her and decided to tighten her pigtails with more elastics. First, I tried raising them to see how that would look, and it's cool, but it feels like she's not Heather anymore this way.

I then pulled the pigtails back down and a little more to the side so her keyring locks would have more space to stand out. I think this gets her closer to her character art, too.

I think she looks great with the new eyes and hair adjustment. The orange tone of the eyes complements her goth look well, and the fact that her eyes pop more than her fellow SH wave 1 students is fine because she's the SFX makeup girl and would totally wear color contacts to make a statement. I'm getting Bratzillaz vibes from her new look, and in a positive way!

I also took this wonderfully eerie surreal photo with her holding her old eye over her face.

Yeah, this eye color was the perfect move. It bumps Heather way up in my esteem and elevates her character design significantly.

 

I'm glad I got a great Heather doll with my second copy, and that I was able to turn her first copy into an edgy and ridiculous broken goth doll. We've closed the book on Heather now--both of her! Disappointment over!

I'm so pleased I got a good doll out of the broken one!

Then, Zooey II arrived. 

First, I wanted to have Zooey I compare faces. It's absolutely night and day.

It almost looks like they even have different face sculpts, there's such a difference! Zooey II's eyeshadow is more subtle, her white paint is much more visible, and her baby hairs have more visible paint coloring them. Zooey II looks more delicate and detailed and has a more calm and open expression. Zooey II's skin seems a little bluer, while Zooey I's is greener. 

There are some other weird differences.

The tails of Zooey II's buns were half chopped-short, which don't blend nearly as well into her hair. Zooey I's bun tails are long and combine into her loose hair very tidily.

Half of this tail is long, but half is short. I'll take it. The face is better!

I also noticed that Zooey II's hair tinsel is red-toned and contrasts her hair a lot more while fitting into the red elements of her design. It feels more electric and fiber-optic to me than the green-toned tinsel of Zooey I.

Zooey I's hair seems a lot wider and more voluminous, which I don't necessarily prefer. II's silhouette
works really well.

I like this tinsel color better!

These Zooeys had even more differences than I expected, so they have to have come from separate manufacturing facilities. And literally the only thing Zooey I's factory did better for her was giving her buns long tails. Here's Zooey II with wet hair dressed up, and looking miles better than Zooey I ever did.

Zooey II is the A-game I expect from Shadow High. The facility manufacturing the dolls Zooey I was a part of is doing a shameful job with the face.

Since I had so much fun making Helen DesTroyed, I decided to continue the broken goth doll theme to make Zooey I and my eye-donor Karma into something. I gave them both chopped-down hair sections and removed their left hands to continue the theme from Helen. A broken left hand was the impetus of the first doll, so I thought I'd make it a constant for the other incomplete RH/SH dolls I was repurposing, and even came up with a name that suited it-- These are the Left Out Dolls!

Since Zooey I's flaw was her faceup, I leaned into that for her reinvention, with her being a goth depiction of a failed-glam day! I undid the spiral buns and combed them out, whereupon they turned into a wispy cloud of hair. That mess thus became her only hair, with everything behind chopped to the roots. I gave her Heather I's left eye, made her faceup more warped and surreal, screwed a chain into her arm, and dressed her in Natasha's spares. 

Her name? 

Busted Keaton

Some girls are effortless beauty queens. Keaton would just be happy to be a labored  one. Every day of her life and death, Keaton has struggled to "cut a figure" in any way that wasn't literal, and the only face she's ever served  was on a platter. She's never even slayed anything but her babysitter that one time. No matter what Keaton tries, she always looks like a surrealist painting, not a supermodel. 

Her hair falls out in different patches every week, and is never remotely tame. Her makeup ideas all look ridiculous to her when she tries them, and she always runs out of product or damages it before she can finish, anyway. And every nail, rusted meat hook, and chainsaw she could catch her clothes on, she does. 

At the end of the day, you just have to give it up and embrace it. Maybe Keaton is just an icon in the making--well ahead of her destined moment in the trends. And there's something beautiful and humbling about being reminded you're just a mind in a silly messy body, rotted or not. For Keaton, looking bad is her style. It's exactly how she looks best.

Keaton is feeling more like the Living Dead Dolls Fashion Victims
spin-off.

Keaton's arm ends in a screw loop attached to a long chain.

For her face, I rubbed some of it off, including the brows, white rings, her left cheek's blush, her lipstick, and parts of her eyeshadow, and then painted one brow, wonky lashes, and puckered black lips on. It's made to look exaggerated and harsh but also fairly surreal and expressionistic. 

Here's the back of the head.

I also broke one of the straps of the top and damaged the hem of the skirt a little. Natasha won't be wearing these pieces again, and a poorly-beaded skirt fits a glam-disaster doll perfectly.

As with Helen, I turned a dud into a hit, and the two dolls have hugely different personalities now.

I feel like I ended up at this really interesting intersection between camp and goth here. This is like "a drag look gone wrong" gone right, and it also reminds me a bit of Helena Bonham Carter's characters, the Bride of Frankenstein, and the "before" states of the FailFix doll line! I love Keaton. She amuses me and looks good while looking wrecked!

[UPDATE: To lean into the fashionista-flop theme, I later switched her hand replacement to a clothes hanger with Natasha's coat de-sleeved and gave her mismatched socks to reduce the risk of her loose shoes dropping off.

I like this setup more.]

For Karma, I leaned into the fact that she lost her eyes and that her head had poor articulation, making her an eyeless decapitated goth. No guesses on what I decided to call her--the obvious was the best:

Bad Karma

Karmyn was a reckless biker who liked to tear through quiet old folks' neighborhoods and perform stunts, rocketing up rooftops and not caring whether any squirrels were in the way. In cities, she always tried to cut through traffic, and she never hesitated to push cyclists out of the way in peaceful bike lanes. One day, she cut in line one last time as she pulled right in front of a speeding bus. She never wore a helmet, of course, so the damage was extreme. 

Everyone said she got what was coming to her. 

She still thought they had something coming to them. 

Now, Bad Karma rides around at night, itching for games of chicken with people who had disdained her. She holds her head up on her arm... but frequently tips over and spills on the ground. Who can steer no-handed? Otherwise, she rides blind with her head bumping behind her attached to its chain. Her nasty spirit survives, but every day and every night, Bad Karma meets her match--herself, trying and failing to ride with her mangled body. 

She refuses to admit anything. So what if the world is winning? It's still her against the world!

I painted her empty sockets black with white goth cartoon-dead Xes in them, chopped up half her hair and tied the rest with a loop for carrying, cut off her neck peg and added black blood, and dressed her in a mix of Karma and Shanelle and Ash clothing. (I'm unsure if I'll review Ash, but if I do, it's going to be alongside Luna and maaaybe Nicole, neither of whom I have yet.) For Bad Karma's broken arm embellishment, I hammered tacks and a nail in. 

[UPDATE: Karma got upgraded later, too, with a more biker-appropriate costume and hand replacement--Keaton's original chain, attached to a nose ring!

Much better.]

These were a fun no-extra-cost way to repurpose these dolls. It was a more relaxed, improvisational form of doll customizing than what I've done before, since these are dolls that I didn't shop for or mentally plan as much-- I just put them together out of the pieces I had! 

I could technically make any doll body I'm not using into a Left Out doll, but there's something about how the Rainbow High 'verse takes to the goth look that makes me feel like this'll only be something I do with unwanted dolls from these two brands. And maybe the Left Out route will be how I engage with Rainbow High dolls I like but don't want for their base human characters--I can take their fashion and gothify them to keep the fashion sense mostly intact and make the characters more strange and appealing to my horror-character preferences. Shadow High dolls can be largely as-is, while Rainbow High can get converted to Left Out Dolls!

Lastly, I want to investigate two loose ends. 

The first is purses. I didn't mention it previously, but it does bother me a little that Rainbow High and Shadow High dolls do not come with purses as a rule. For one, I know MGA has done some awesome fabric bags that are on par with their best clothes, and for two, purses are a great way to include storage for accessories and can add some dynamism on display. Rainbow High does sell purses through a line of "Mini Accessories Studio" blind boxes, which are offered in both bag and shoe flavors. I don't need shoes for dolls that all have at least one pair, but I was interested in the handbags. These boxes are selling for $10 each, which I find slightly extortionate, so I only selected one blind box and hoped it'd suit one of the characters I had. 

The boxes are made to look like little clothing trunks and have a plastic sleeve around them which can be cut off easily.

The side of the box reveals that you get one bag (or one pair of shoes for those boxes), a drawstring pouch, a receipt, and a certificate of authenticity.

Three of those things don't justify the price like a second handbag would!

The lid pops open pretty easily, revealing the packet with the certificate taped inside the lid and a drawer with a ribbon pull to grab it which holds the bag.

The tape for the certificate packet is strong (it tore the packet) and an ugly yellow color.

I can't fathom the need for a certificate on a blind-box item, but here it is.

MGA, honey, these are not real designer bags!

The packet also contained the receipt-- a very tiny ticket with a tiny ticket sleeve, which lists information about the item, including which bag is enclosed. 

So maybe you should leave the packet for last if you want to avoid being told what you got.

I guess this ticket could be posed as a doll accessory, like it's for a concert admission?

It's small enough for it, though physical tickets aren't
in use as much now.

The drawer insert of the box contains a tissue-wrapped bag with a sticker seal and a collector's sheet with the Accessories Studio bags on one side and the shoes on the other. 

Most of the shoes and bags are designed and denoted for specific Rainbow High characters, with some named characters getting two bags and pairs of shoes in this array while others get one. A few items, though, are generic RH and there are character-nonspecific Shadow High items thrown in as well in the minority. There are higher rarities for some of the items than others. Some of the bags are intricate fabric and seem to offer good storage, but some of them seem to be vinyl like I'm used to for doll bags, and some don't seem to offer a lot of function. It's a little disjointed, and it bothers me that not every bag here looks like I'd find it worth this blind buying experience, craft-wise. 

Amaya Raine is collecting purses...

Avery Styles shops for shoes, which are not an option for this particular blind box.

The spoiler ticket told me I'd be getting Skyler Bradshaw's Paris bucket bag, but Skyler's name does not appear at all among the bags on the collector sheet, so I wondered what was going on. 

The bag I got is a muted, informal pouch shape with drawstrings and a strap with simulated chain links in it, and tiny pearly beads that say "RAINBOW PARIS", with an "R" designer logo reminiscent of Chanel's mirrored letters.

This bag is evidently a bucket Paris purse as the ticket said, but it took me a lot of time to find it on the collector sheet because this bag might not be Skyler Bradshaw's! Instead, the collector sheet attributes this bag to Sunny Madison!

The links are also golden here, but silver on the bag.  I also love that embroidered sun/moon purse.

I'm guessing it's actually the collector sheet that's incorrect and wrongly attributing two bags to Sunny when this one is actually Skyler's. I mean, look at the character designs of each doll and you tell me who it matches better.

MGA stock photo of Sunny Madison.

MGA stock photo of Skyler Bradshaw.

The purse looks like it could have been cut from Skyler's jacket! The collector sheet got it wrong.

Anyway, this purse does not really suit any of the characters I have, so it's not giving me the highest satisfaction level. For the price, I think these Accessory Studio blind boxes are simply not worth it, particularly since not all of the bags are created equal. I'll pay $10 for a box, but I don't want that cost be filled out with a drawstring pouch no one needs and a useless, arrogant certificate of authenticity...especially since the main bag could either be exceptional or just standard. Give me more actual substance--two bags or a bag paired with a set of decent unique accessories! Or cut the price down, take out the padding and just sell a bag. 

Now, there's the other loose end of curiosity we need to tie up. Throughout these reviews, there was one SH character I wanted, yet who never made the cut even as I expanded to include three more dolls than I had planned to. And it simply wasn't fair to her at all for how much I was drawn to her design. I stand by the pool of six I examined for my deep-dive overview, but it's only correct for me to make this my lucky seventh. 

I give you Monique Verbena.

Monique probably holds the title right now for the most vibrant Shadow High character. Zooey's pretty saturated and the Neon Shadow trio and Lola Wilde have bright colors, but Monique is all-over saturated and vivid and she's so appealing for it. I don't totally understand the concept of her design (heck, Monique looked more sci-fi to me than Zooey from the first glimpse of her!) but I loved her look and I couldn't leave her out of my collection for long at all. 

Monique's box has the same back art as Karla, making this the first wave 2 redundant box art I've collected.

Monique's seal is nothing to report on.

Like Karla, though, I can accept generic fashion design as her study focus. I can't really pick out anything more specific (or non-fashion-related) from her doll that she would be majoring in instead. Maybe folklore/mythological studies? (You'll see.)

Here's everything unboxed, with Monique holding a couple of her accessories. Her stand and comb are more reddish purple, while her hangers are more indigo, with a few shades of difference.

Monique cannot use a comb with the hair she was given. Or, I mean, she can, but she shouldn't. This piece is wasting space with her, as it did for Rexx.

Monique's accessories are similar to Karla's, though she has no hand fan (I think MGA got that in by treating it more as a part of Karla's outfit) and her makeup palette is a different piece. 

First is her phone. The screen shows an incoming call from "Team Anti-Sparkle", which doesn't clarify at all who Monique will be talking to if she answers. Is she affiliated with the RH/SH Anti-Sparkle Club fashion brand? It doesn't make sense as a nickname for a friend if the ID names a collective, but MGA tosses the phrase "Anti-Sparkle" around so much that I have no idea what it refers to half of the time.

Like Karla and Zooey, she's missed a call and email and it's 10:10 o'clock.
...I think they just reused the same interface graphics for the phones.

The phone case is purple with a silver line graphic of a crested serpent. I wasn't able to identify what this refers to--it looks mythical, but nothing I found felt concrete. There is an Aboriginal Australian deity called the Rainbow Serpent which can be depicted with a crest, and that would make nominal sense for a Rainbow High product...but Monique herself is a Texan American, so I don't know if it makes any sense for her if that's the reference going on. Right now, I don't know what this motif references.

Monique's makeup set is similar to Karla's, but the brush handles and lipstick are magenta and she has a different palette altogether.

While Karla's cosmetics included all of the makeup colors she was wearing, Monique's lipstick is clearly not the shade she has on her face. Furthermore, what she's wearing looks better than this lipstick would! That bugs me a little. It should have matched what she has on. 

Monique's palette is a small square shape with a chunky pearl purple case. The eyeshadow pans are represented by four squares broken into four shades, and the sticker is metallic, indicating that her makeup is as well. 

The top of her case is great, as it has a wait-is-this-blatant-infringement-MGA? Versace Medusa head on the top. This could be another point toward interpreting Monique as a mythology girl!

I don't buy into designer culture, but I love Medusa.

The palette clicks shut with a tab on the front that slides over a bump on the lower half, and I found it very difficult to pry the palette open again after it was closed. I don't think the click closed was needed--a simple hinge would have been enough. It seems like Rainbow High's Michelle St. Charles in wave 5, which is that brand's most recent series, has the same sculpts for her makeup palette.

Monique's hair is kind of new to me, since she's my first doll with hair that features any microbraids, and her hair is nothing but them! All-microbraid hair was previously done in these brands with the Rainbow High character Vanessa Tempo, who doesn't fall into my interests. 

Monique's box art gives the pigtails quite an exaggerated swoop, but illustrates that she has center-parted hair with long pigtails that are wrapped around with their own hair so they stand up a little with some perk. Uh...my Monique has not that.

She has a little fraying on some of her braids, and her pigtails are very lethargic. Once again, MGA doesn't manufacture hair to be tied really tight, and her pigtail wrap section on the left was also loose and uneven. Monique wasn't packaged to suit the structure and tightness of the hair in her artwork, but even so, this seems loose. The pigtail wraps were multiple sections of braids with tiny elastics, and the short ends tried to blend into the longer pigtails. It didn't work for me, so I undid the wraps, tightened the base elastics, and re-wrapped the hair. Here's one side fixed up--left is restyled, right is as packaged.

What a difference.

I'm pleased that I was able to actually fix this styling, and even more so that I found a way to make it simpler. The next pigtail was photographed to show my steps. I just took a large section of braids to be the wrap and banded it together at the end...

The wrap lock sectioned out and banded.

I wrapped it around a few times, sliding the band down when I needed more length to make sure it wrapped more than once and the end of the wrap was at the rear...

And when it was wrapped tight and on the back of her pigtail, I took another elastic and wrapped it around both the pigtail and the tail of the wrap, making sure the end of the wrap with the elastic was coming out of the elastic wrapping the whole thing. I tightened that elastic and tucked it down under the wrap so it would be as hidden as I could get it. The hair was tight and the wrap's tail blended in much easier with the pigtail, with it all being done with fewer sections and ties, and being a more structured hairstyle with a confident silhouette that matches the art better! It was very fiddly to achieve this, but it worked! I'm surprised I managed to make this more functional and attractive while simplifying it so much. 

The tail of her left hair wrap piece...

...blending much better into the pigtails!

This is the point where I fell absolutely in love with Monique and lost most of my critical objectivity, because with her hair being tight and tidy, she immediately skyrocketed to being maybe my single favorite Shadow High design so far. 

Just look at her! I mean, WOW.

With her hair fixed and looking fantastic, let's talk about it more. The hair is entirely microbraided, and the colors are black, teal, purple, lavender, and royal blue which are rooted and braided in multiple combinations. The only braids to feature in single colors are royal blue. Monique also has baby hairs on her forehead with multiple colors painting them.

Monique's braids and baby hairs code her quite clearly as Black. I like this for two reasons--it's good and probably even necessary for there to be a clearly Black Shadow High character who isn't stark black as a skin color, and it's also always nice to see dolls with uniquely Black hair types and styles. 

I also think the hair being all tied up is a smart choice, since microbraided doll rooting can, by necessity, look a little gappier and sparser if the hair is loose. I'm not sure how doll microbraids are produced and kept in shape in manufacturing, but the braids that had fraying were seemingly a bit messy in assembly, and not because they were coming undone. I think you could probably unravel Monique's braids if you wanted to, but I don't think they're at risk of losing their weaving by themselves. If you're careful, there won't be an issue. Overall, I'm disappointed with the way the factory assembled Monique's hairstyle, but it's fixable and so worth it when it's done.

Monique's face gave me pause in person, because I had expected it to have a sharper, fiercer quality and she looked very round and wide-eyed in the box. Fortunately, I found that her personality just has multiple modes depending on the forward angle of her head. When she tilts up, she's sweeter...

And when she tilts down, she can harness the fierceness I wanted.

And here she is between, with her head level facing forward.

Her multiple moods are a result of her sharp makeup, with huge wings of black above the eye, and white undereye makeup cutting a diagonal that complements the black. The makeup looks sharper when her head is turned down, and that gives her a lot of fun attitude. 

Monique's earrings are silver hoops that pierce purple tri-petaled flowers with yellow markings and white edges. They look more like unusual pansies than verbenas to me, but they're very pretty.

Monique's necklace is wide and silver, and is shaped to look like two crested serpents framed around a translucent purple orb. 

Monique's dress is the only layer of clothing she wears, but I can understand why she only has one cloth piece because this is just spectacular. It's all ruffles and all iridescent, and makes her presence ostentatious, colorful, unusual, and big. It makes sense that she's got a big look and a big personality-- she's from Texas!

There are four types of fabric interplaying here--the white-edged heavily-textured ruffles, the more iridescent looser ruffles, purple tulle hidden between some ruffles, and a metallic dark purple fabric used for the bodice you don't really see and a small underskirt you also don't see. There are two tiny tie tags pinning together two of the ruffles around her bust, but they come out easily.

The hidden bodice.

The hidden underskirt.

It's such a big and bold and unusual and colorful piece. You get what I mean when I say I thought Monique had an alien theme too, right? Zooey is the space girl with Novi Stars graphics all over her, but Monique looks way more like an actual Novi Star to me. That's not a bad thing at all, though I know it's not her intent.

Her belt is a clip-on piece that's iridescent silver with a purple jewel in the middle.

Like Karla, Monique has fingerless gloves, which, also like Karla, allow her to be displayed holding her makeup brushes. Monique's gloves are also imitation leather, but they're a dark indigo with small black plastic SH logos on the backs of the palms. 

Monique's shoes are slide heels with crested serpents matching her necklace on the straps, and the heels themselves are black and flare out to a wider shape at the bottom.

Forgive the elastic bands being in these photos.

Since Monique's outfit does not offer optional cloth pieces or permutations, I didn't have any cause to undress the doll, but her hands seem to work well. Her left knee had a stiff upper half of the joint, but I was eventually able to get it to bend completely without heating or breaking the doll. 

So that's Monique. She had iffy hair out of the box, and her outfit is limiting...but I simply do not care. I am blown away by this doll. She's beyond stunning.

Also, I decided Monique could have the Paris bucket bag. It's muted, but she's the only SH doll I have who can play it off even a little, and she doesn't look bad with it. It also helps, since her outfit is pocketless and the bag can hold all of her makeup and her phone. 

With her hair fixed up, she's an amazing presence and gorgeous design, and she's incredibly photogenic. Her dress and hair and head perfectly complement each other proportionally to make her walk the ideal line of glamor and cartoonish caricature. It's a gorgeous design with perfect visual balance to make it super fun. I kept taking pictures of her because I was just so dazzled. She looks great innocent...

She looks so amazing posed fierce...

She can stretch out and model beautifully...

She can hide in your dark closet run run run

Boo! (Very indirect lighting caused just her white accents to stand out...
but even as a cursed image, she looks good!)

And she can model nicely with a spotlight as well.

I think Monique is one of those designs that feels quintessentially MGA...or quintessentially my favorite kind of MGA. She's all of the attitude, fashion, personality, craft, and avant-garde weirdness that feel familiar to me from all of the MGA dolls that appealed to me across the years. She's artsy, vibrant, poppy, fun, and edgy in the best of ways and is absolutely gorgeous and hard to look away from. While the brand often has shallow and consumerist dolls, sometimes it goes wacky and chic in a way that takes my breath away, and Monique is one of those dolls. If you think you can tackle her pigtails in a bad-hair situation, I strongly recommend Monique Verbena. She's a design so good the flaws mean absolutely nothing to me. She's amazing, and an easy high point in the Shadow High brand. These dolls are high-risk...but Monique is the highest reward I've seen yet. This is the one to beat, wave 3.

...Okay, I was wrong about being totally done with Heather (I'm sorry!), because I discovered ways to accessorize her with makeup tools and props!

I decided to add a couple more things to Heather to complete her. I kept the eye I removed from Helen, and since I got rid of the broken Heather hand, I stole Karma's left hand so Heather would have a couple of makeup body parts. I also cut a piece of vinyl from one of my blank doll heads (a section containing a hairline seam) and painted stitches on it to create a scarred-skin application piece. 

Karma's left hand didn't have a longer peg like the SH girls have had.

For a bag to keep them in, I ordered a purse off the aftermarket from Dia de los Muertos RH collector doll Maria Garcia. Her bag is a quite large plastic skull with a hinge lid and plenty of space, and I figured with the long chain strap removed so it just had a top handle, plus a new body color, it'd make a great goth makeup kit! 

The bag in-person is awesome, but less deluxe than I had expected. 

The handles on the lid are not separate pieces and are not fabric and metal--the entire lid is one static piece of solid vinyl, making it softer than the body of the bag, but it's still firm enough to click closed well and work with its hinge. The tassel on the side chain is also plastic, which surprised me. I could have seen it being tiny suede strips from photos. The chain is largely metal, though, and the bag is well painted.

The purse appealed to me visually, but I knew I needed it largely for its being...large!

This means it's quite spacious inside. 

It very easily holds a hand (I swapped Zooey I's in because it looks more spooky), an eye, and the scar patch, plus a brush from Karla and the palette from Monique. Rainbow High Michelle's orange version of the same palette would work well with Heather's eyes, but since the bag's interior will need to stay purple for the lid to close properly, the palette being purple is acceptable and works with the nonspecific Shadow High palette anyway. The size is ideal because it fits in the purse, but the Medusa on the lid also aligns nicely with Heather's snake motif.

All of this stuff goes in the skull without trouble!

The bag has an engraved RH insignia on the back painted in with gold, which I neglected to photograph. I sanded it down as much as I could before repainting, at least enough so it wouldn't be legible as a logo for the wrong brand.

To repaint, I sprayed the skull black with the lid closed. Then, I added white paint for glam makeup effects, a plastic jewel in orange for a single eye that matched my Heather, and bone-white paint for the leather handle and heart clasp to match her outfit and body more, giving it visual variety while making the piece more specific to her colors. I cut off the side loops and long strap, since it feels more like a makeup case without it.

The paint is a fun reversal--a girl who puts 
monster makeup on glamorous people has
a monster bag with glamorous makeup!

Heather looks great with it.

The makeup brush fits in her bag, but on her person, it can tuck into the 
buckle loops on her jacket. 

I love this result, and with the eyes, bag, and accessories, Heather is now a strong contender for one of my favorite SH dolls, right alongside Monique. The eyes gave Heather a pop and cohesion she didn't have for me before, giving her that perfect MGA essence, and the bag looks awesome and allowed me to explore her fantastic SFX makeup characterization--a discipline I admire a lot and which I love to see represented in a toy! It might not be much of a compliment to say Heather's a favorite after I put a lot of work in, but I don't think her original design is bad. I just brought out aspects that appealed to me more with how I worked with her.

So now, at the end, finally, here's how things stand for the grand Shadow High Deep Dive.

• Rexx was flawed but I'm okay with him because he looks great regardless.
• Shanelle was pretty flawless but she's great without being my favorite.
• Zooey is now a wonderful doll and very appealing with the superior factory's edition.
• Heather needed a working hand, and I wanted an eye swap and accessories for her, but those all made her one of my top favorites. 
• Karla gave me the best consumer experience and is also a really pretty doll.
• Natasha is flawed but I'm okay with her because she can look great and complements the others.
• Monique is incredibly stunning if you can make her hair work. A phenomenal presence. 
• I love my Left Out Dolls turning the castoffs into something stronger than they were, with some tongue-in-cheek goth throwback tastelessness.

I'm still not done with Shadow High, but this series of investigative posts is now officially concluded. This brand has secured itself in my interests and in the pool of potential reviews to look out for. I can't help but love the craft and artsy charm of these weirdos. I never thought I'd be loyal to more brands than Monster High, but MGA won me over here. I don't think I'm apt to enter heavy customization with this brand (beyond making more Left Out Dolls if I end up with further incomplete or crappy ones...or--gasp--Rainbow High dolls!), but maybe Shadow High will be the brand I primarily collect for what is, while MH has shifted into a brand I heavily modify for projects. Who knows. All I can say is, welcome, Shadow High. You got me in deep.