They've Got it On Lock: Monster High Skulltimate Secrets Series 2 "Fearidescent" by Mattel

I've been open-minded about Monster High G3, and I've gotten a few dolls. Some have impressed me, some have disappointed me quite a bit.

I've found the G3 aesthetic to trend too bright and not nearly as dramatic and creepy as the style that made MH famous in the first place. While there were some  aspects of G1 that bore changing, like dated visuals or more reasonably tamed down clothing, the moodiness and freaky factor have dipped in G3 and overall, the dolls haven't struck me as visual stunners in the same way. 

Until now, because holy crap. 

Often, there are toys in my collections that I instantly know I need from the first glimpse of them. Top-tier designs that are exciting, cohesive, and visually fascinating to me in a way that rockets them to the top of my list. G1 MH had quite a few. G3 had dolls I felt I could negotiate, or dolls that grew on me. But Skulltimate Secrets Series 2 Frankie blew me completely away. What was Mattel doing? Who was this Frankie? They didn't look like they were even from the same doll line as their series 1 counterpart!

Look at it! Fearidescent Frankie is pretty much all blue, black, and white, with a fashion setup and an understated faceup that feels so runway- and so horror-chic that they nearly feel collector-tier! Mattel can still give us muted high-drama palettes on their mainline dolls! Thank goodness the kids are still getting this type of design. G3 Frankie's normal palette is quite saturated and colorful, and while I like that they use colors G1 Frankie had used while also reframing the pink, blue, and white to connect to to the trans pride colors, I can find their multiple bright tones to feel more toylike. But as long as we get the occasional restrained look, the standard G3 Frankie colors aren't an issue and serve their purpose wonderfully.

I never bothered taking photos for a full review of G3 signature Frankie. I'd written a lot about how great and also how flawed I found their gender representation to be, but it was a little bloated, and while I ultimately enjoyed their G3 signature doll more than others, it wasn't enough to write super passionately about it as a toy, and I didn't have much to add that TBP Emily's review hadn't covered. The basic long and short of my thoughts were was that I was pleasantly shocked by Frankie's genderqueer representation but unhappy with how their pronouns weren't declared on the doll packaging since the doll is the entry-level engagement most people are going to have with Frankie, a nonbinary character who can easily be visually read as a girl. I also didn't like how the half-shaved hair from the TV show, a great feature, wasn't represented, and so I took steps to create that look myself.

The white bolt streak is not true to their official looks, but I thought
it fit and spiced it up.

Even though that doll didn't garner a full review, they fed my Frankie collection...and so does this look for the monster! Why do G1 Frankie and G3 Frankie have so many good dolls across her and their incarnations???

The Skulltimate Secrets line cashes in on the blind-package "multiple surprises" doll format spearheaded and dominated by MGA, where, inspired by "unboxing" social media trends, unpackaging the doll and all of their pieces is made more elaborate with each step being another thing to open and reveal. I really don't think Mattel had to cow to this trend, especially since their packaging here covers the dolls' faces and they can't be quality-checked on a store shelf. Still, I will give Mattel credit that their Skulltimate Secrets dolls are sold with reusable plastic carry cases that look nice and offer practical storage for the doll and their pieces so the owner can store them and re-stage the opening experience to some degree. I also like the theming as a coffin locker with keys. I find boxes very satisfying and fun to play with, particularly with keys involved. Blind-packaged faces aside, this packaging system and unboxing is fun, practical, repeatable and creates very little waste at the end. Still, I can't help but be struck by the fact that these monsters being shoved into lockers sounds like eighties bullying cliches!

Series 1 of Skulltimate Secrets lacked a subtitle or a specific gimmick beyond the unboxing (and presence of headwear?) while Series 2 is "Fearidescent" and features iridescent pieces on each doll as well as some more restrained color palettes. The line has a slight icy motif to it as well, with crystalline boxes, iced dessert snacks for everybody in the line, translucent boots, fur wraps, earmuffs for Draculaura, and monotone color palettes with a cooler vibe for a few characters. (The characters I chose do not feel particularly wintry, though.) Series 3, "Neon Frights", will have themed hoodies (I wonder if it's a rework of the unreleased G2 Howlin' Hoodies theme) and (presumably colorful) glow-in-the dark items. Fittingly, the series includes a Twyla, and both she and Ghoulia in Neon Frights look like they might be better dolls, at least marginally, than their first G3 releases. I'll probably end up with both, but it'll be some months before I could potentially review them since they won't be out for a bit.

Here's the box. 

Lots of emphasis is put on the amount of stuff we're supposed to receive, as well as the high amount of permutations such items can create. Illustrated Frankie themselves looks nice, but I don't find their artwork to facially resemble the doll very much. 

Here's the back, depicting Cleo, Lagoona, Clawdeen, and Draculaura from this series and a lot of packaging jargon.

The outer layer of packaging is a shell of plastic and cardboard with interlocking tabs much like a typical doll box. 

This is the box uncovered.

The Skulltimate Secrets cases are shaped like coffins and feature doors loosely akin to school lockers. The tall compartment of the left contains the doll and the cutouts are blocked off by a cardboard insert obscuring the doll. From the outside, this insert depicts a mostly-greyscale gradient that very subtly includes pale blue just after the white. The four doors on the left are varying sizes and color-coded. Frankie's palette here is pretty much all black, white, and blue, so their case follows suit. 

Quite intriguingly, the case also features distinctive teardrop hook holes on the back which have no purpose other than to let the cases be hung on a wall for display! That's a really neat idea they built in, and it makes these boxes even more longevity-oriented. I really respect that.

Kind of would have liked one in the middle as well for a one-nail hanging option.

Opening the door on the right finally reveals Frankie. And fortunately, their face is good. But...

We'll address it. But look how cute the backdrop inside the door is! They've got a spare hand as
a jewelry stand! I could take this piece out to make the door a window, but I don't plan to.

Salon time can help, but how much?

Frankie is tagged in a few places to their own cardboard backdrop really nestled into the compartment. I had to tear it out to be sure I was getting all the tags out. I really wish this backdrop was designed to lift out smoothly to make unpackaging easier and the backdrop reusable. 

The entire contents of the compartment were Frankie in these clothing pieces, an instruction leaflet, and the first key.

The instructions inventory the contents of the package and explain how the color-reveal key gimmick works. I didn't really read them, since I figured they weren't necessary. 

I do think more of these gimmicks ought to have been clarified more on the outer packaging. The color-reveal key mechanic is depicted, but with no text, I'm not sure I'd grasp the significance of the key being swirled in a dish of water. 

The key is shaped like a slightly crystalline Skullette, and is hollow at the back and has a loop on top. It's metallic silver, though this is a temporary paint coat that will dissolve quickly in water to reveal the key's true color and which door it matches. I assume this is the exact same technology used for Mattel's Barbie Color Reveal dolls.

Let's look at Frankie themselves in their default state.

Frankie's hair is black and white with pale blue streaks underneath...and is the single biggest disappointment with this doll. 

For one, it appears to be the polypropylene fiber many G3 dolls use, and it's a horrible choice. Poly hair, as I've seen with Twyla, really feels more like plastic than hair, doesn't ever reshape the way you want it to with boiling water, and is apparently prone to melting and rotting which makes it a terrible choice for some custom modifications and makes these dolls even more prone to aging poorly than vinyl dolls already do with their lighter colors always being a yellowing risk (it's a menace and a tragedy). I don't know why this hair started appearing as a G3 thing when no dolls in MH G1 used it (no idea if G2 did), and if it's a cost-cutting measure, it's obvious and not worth it. Time will tell if this hair is prone to yellowing like other white doll hair fibers...unfortunately, maybe not a whole lot of time, judging by G3 sig. 

I was so pleased with my hairstyle modification, but their hair has already visibly yellowed.

Fortunately, there are buyers reporting on the doll hair types so you can be more informed beforehand. Some dolls I'm interested in, like Monster Ball Lagoona, seem to have been fortunately spared the curse, but apparently some dolls are variable and have been manufactured with either poly or saran or both? Mattel, here's an idea. Make it consistent! Maybe there's one easy way to do that--remove poly from the options altogether!

The other issue with Frankie's hair in specific is that it's not rooted or cut as nicely as the stock photo. Frankie's bangs are a mess. While they're product-free, they don't lay flat on their head and don't look realistic. I'm shocked given that Draculaura's more styled pointed bangs were perfectly shaped, even after being combed dry and washed. 

(Hat not included.) Nice hair fiber, nice bangs. Why can't this be across the board?

Frankie's hair streaks also seem less tidy and stark, and their bangs feel shorter than in the photo, with their eyebrows entirely uncovered. That's not a bad look, and can highlight their Frankenstein head shape the way their ears stick out and brows are exposed. But it's just not what was advertised. 

I do like their face, though. 

Metallic silver and glitter appear on their eyeshadow and lips as well as their eyebrow piercing. The latter is especially welcome since their signature doll's ring was so poorly-printed on mine that I had to fill it in with grey paint. This Frankie's ring is well-painted and the sparkle added works great. The eye makeup being mixes of blue is also nice, and their green eye really pops on this doll since the color appears nowhere else in their paint or stock. 

Frankie's first clothing piece in this configuration is a blouse with sheer long sleeves, a vintage black collar, and a marbled blue pattern. I really like the old-fashioned look of this piece and how the neckline falls just below their neck stitching. 

It's a great new take on the "Frankenstein school-femme" look and I'm surprised by how well this top works to make this feel like a complete look, even without all of the accessories. 

Frankie's skirt is their "Fearidescent" piece, and...it's kind of a weak gimmick to me. Yay, iridescent fabric pieces. 

..Is this really a showstopper? Monique Verbena can afford a fully-iridescent petal puff dress!

This is a showstopper.

I really like the darker desaturated palette of this Frankie, but the skirt is not one of the pieces I wanted them for. It's still an okay piece. It's elasticated (but not really very stretchy or easy to pull up) and has a strap in the middle to keep it from riding up.

Frankie's footwear here are a pair of strapped shoes that feature a gradient color transition. Each Fearidescent doll has something similar. 

The shoes feature rivets, lightning bolts, and straps to serve laboratory imagery, and the heels are bolts, but they're warped. 

These were not the shoes on the design I fell in love with, so these won't be part of the final look. 

From the waist up, I really like this ensemble for Frankie. Let's look at that key so we can see what else they've got. I filled a small tub with a little water and put the key in and rocked it around (probably an instinct from the photography-class

darkroom that never left me). The color started coming off quickly. 

It's the darkest blue color, meaning it corresponds to the highest door on the right of the case. 

The hollow back of the key had some residual silver paint that was resistant to dissolving and washing off. I kind of wish the keys had flat backs to prevent paint from getting into crevices like that. 

Then I started wondering if there had been some accounting for vision issues in matching the keys to the doors. While the Fearidescent doors are all one color family, I still wondered if people might have differences in vision that made it harder to tell the difference. I took a photo of the locker and removed the saturation to see if value would be enough to distinguish them under certain impairments, and it looks like the doors are distinctive enough in tone.

I'd soon discover that this experience is really just a performance you have to play into, so this concern is kind of unfounded. More on that soon. 

Frankie got involved in opening the first locked door.

Inside the door was a package far more colorful than anything else about the doll. 

The package is paper, has easy-tear notches along the edge, and features Franken-hearts relevant to the doll as well as Skullette question marks which are confusingly backward.

Inside are a faux-fur...piece with houndstooth lining, a vinyl tank with optical lightning-bolt patterns, a black plaid skirt with a fake zipper accent, and the next key. 

The skirt surprised me because it velcros all the way down the back. That's very uncommon for MH skirts. The plastic zipper accent appears to be the same mold as signature Ghoulia's. 

My camera continues to love turning black to purple. I promise you, the skirt is colorless. 

Since I want to try redressing Frankie in the contents of door 2, I had a chance to look at their body and unique prosthetic coloration.

Fearidescent Frankie's body seems subtly bluer to me than signature's, and the colors of the pieces seem to match better. 

Frankie's body sculpt is feminine and tall, with longer legs than the standard G3 femme body height. It makes sense to me that the child of Frankenstein's monster would be similarly imposing. Frankie is shorter than G3 Abbey Bominable, who (finally) has a lot of stature as the daughter of a yeti. Abbey is currently the tallest G3 femme doll, and unless we get another full-blown giant like Gooliope or Treesa, I don't expect anybody taller to beat that record.

Frankie lacks the bolts of previous incarnations, and their scars are only stitched, not stapled. Paired with their blue skin, it seems like Mattel got nervous about referencing the famous licensed Universal design for the Monster as directly as they had been before. Maybe actually making licensed dolls of the Monster and his Bride had something to do with it, like they didn't think they could get away with being so direct with Frankie after having to interact with the Universal Frankenstein copyright holders? G1 Frankie's design is copyrighted and remains grandfathered in for legacy dolls, of course, but Mattel might have thought they'd be pushing their luck to continue being so direct and copyrighting a new G3 design so similar to the Universal character.

Fearidescent's prosthetic leg is the first iteration to be different from other G3 Frankies. It's the same mold with staples, rivets, and gears, but is now cast in a translucent glittery white color and does not feature any of their doodles. 

Signature Frankie's leg.

The lack of doodles is disappointing to me, since I thought they gave Frankie a lot of personality and visual impact, as well as showing a sweet ownership of their identity with the name signature, which was also placed really cleverly to indicate they drew it onto themselves while the leg was attached. Still, I appreciate that we're getting a little bit of variance, since Frankie in the cartoon is known to have several spare limb parts, both organic and bionic, to swap out, and it'd have been a shame for their dolls to never explore that across their releases.

This does not mean the doll's leg physically detaches, though! While Frankie is the second prosthetic user in the brand, only the first, G1's pirate ghost Vandala Doubloons, has the prosthetic leg as a piece that can pop out. (Vandala used a Create-a-Monster joint there.)

Mattel stock photo of Vandala Doubloons.

I think a Frankie playset with a doll whose limbs allowed for a swappable-prostheses mechanic would be a great idea.

Here's Frankie dressed up in the new assortment. I left their hands off because I don't intend to keep them like this. I couldn't for the life of me figure out a good way to display the fur piece. Towel? Clothing? I dunno. I don't get why the Fearidescents and Abbey have them. 

The skirt is the best piece of door 2, but the top is pretty nice as well. 

The second key uncovered turned out to be for the door second-highest on the right side of the case, so we're going entirely linear down the locker. I think it'd have been more fun if each doll had their doors in a different opening sequence. 

It also turns out the keys are absolutely identical in sculpt, and thus, that the step-by-step process of unboxing, from color-matching to opening the doors in sequence, is entirely play-along in nature. One key can open all of the doors...or even your fingers can turn the key hubs to dispense with the keys altogether. I guess it's cost-effective to make the keys all the same shape, and collectors entirely uninterested in the gimmick can find themselves opening the dolls faster from the start, but I can't say I'm not disappointed that the system isn't as directed and meaningful as it looks. 

I'm kind of fascinated by the ontology of this--these keys could be said not be fully keys because they aren't unique or required for their mechanism. Technically, they're physical suggestions or guidelines more than they are mechanical keys! 

Here's me participating anyway.

Second key in.

At this point, I also found out the paper packages are all essentially the same in design. That's perfectly fine, though.

This package contained Frankie's jewelry and the next key.

All silver!

I like these pieces a lot. The spiked crown headband feels artsy, edgy, and runway, the collar necklace is elaborate and tough, and the earrings say "ZIP" and "ZAP" to play into G3 Frankie's unique fashion signature--graphic text.

The earrings were a little tricky to push in, though, 

As expected, the next key matches the next door down.

The package this time contained the keyring and Frankie's other shoes.

The keyring closes with a pin and loop at the top and is shaped like a studded Skullette. The keys thread onto it pretty easily. 

The shoes were exciting to me. They're translucent glittery black with white lightning bolts painted on, but most importantly, they're black stompy Frankenstein boots like Frankie absolutely deserves to have. 

These are such a good translation of the Frankenstein costume, and I think they're going to look amazing on my final look for Frankie. The weird thing about these shoes, though, is that they can slide too far onto Frankie's feet and not be level, and you have to pull them around a little. I still don't think they're shaped perfectly and Fearidescent in these isn't nearly as stable as signature Frankie with their high-tops. 

I was concerned because I couldn't find a key for the final door, but it was stuck inside the paper package. Since there's obviously no point in color-revealing the final key, this one was packaged loose inside the paper with no silver paint over it. 

And here's the last door ready.

The final package contains Frankie's accessories-- an ice pop, a bag, a makeup palette, and an eyeshadow brush.

The ice pop is a cute coffin-shaped Frankenmonster face with lightning-bolt accents. The colors have little to do with the rest of the doll, though.

While it's unpainted, the way the rear side is molded also looks like a face--and a face I like even more!

I think this piece works better with signature Frankie.

Fearidescent Frankie's bag is a small translucent blue piece shaped like a hex bolt and designed to hang around their wrist--you'd have to pop their hand off to achieve this.

The bag opens and closes on a hinge of folded plastic.

Frankie's makeup consists of a small opening coffin-shaped black palette and a dark blue brush.

The palette contains all of the colors they're wearing, and a few they aren't. The lid has a grey graphic to depict a mirror. 

I was pleased to see the makeup fits in the bag neatly!

The ice pop can't join them...but what reasonable person would 
put an unwrapped frozen dessert in their purse anyway?

With everything unpacked, I tried to re-create the ensemble from the photo I fell in love with. I hadn't even realized before doing this that they're wearing the vinyl top layered over the blouse there! That was slightly tricky to achieve. 

The result was not stunning. Thanks, hair.

While I had low hopes for taming poly, I knew I needed to try, so I took Frankie to be boiled so their bangs would at least lie less horrendously. Here's that result.

Eh?

It's better, but with the way the doll was actually produced hair-wise, this ensemble does not strike me as a complete look. For that, I needed a piece I had already planned to get for this doll, but now knew wasn't optional--Skulltimate Secrets Series 1 Frankie's black-and-white houndstooth jacket. I knew that piece would look great with this doll and fulfill the Frankenmonster costume homage even more, and with the state of Frankie here, I knew it was going to be vital to pulling things together.

I also decided to swap my two G3 Frankies' heads. I felt that the silver doodled-on prosthetic would suit a more desaturated high-contrast Frankie more, particularly since their look has so much silver in it. Conversely, I thought signature Frankie would wear the clear leg better because their look emphasizes white and the clear plastic feels more like modern prosthetics. The metal leg feels more vintage and punk and in tune with the Fearidescent outfit, particularly with the punchy doodles, and as my favorite element of G3 Frankie, I thought that leg design belonged on my favorite styling for them thus far. The swap went pretty well. No hair melted, though the top of signature Frankie's neck peg broke off because their head wasn't heated enough, and the piece got stuck inside their head. It can stay there. Whatever. I don't think I'd be able to remove it without damaging them, and I certainly don't want to do that, especially not after all the work I did to modify this head already!

I'm not sure what I'll do with the locker. While I praised the case for not creating waste, the downside to the Skulltimate Secrets line is that it can instead saddle someone with unwanted clutter if they decide they don't need the locker box or never wanted it to begin with. I will not be remotely surprised to see Skulltimate Secrets lockers in yard sales or community rummage sales in the future, and I will definitely have to think about what to do with the boxes I get from Series 3.

One locker doesn't fit all of my loose doll clothes because a couple of the doors are too small to meaningfully store some accessories and shoes, and even the large door is stuffed full with clothes. I have no plans to set up two nails to hang the box on a wall, either. However, I think it's actually a pretty useful custom-project hauling box. An 11-inch (or smaller) doll I'm working on obviously fits in the left compartment, and their clothes and pieces can be stored in the doors on the right, making it easy to haul the whole doll around and keep the pieces all together while customizing or doing salon work. I have stock boxes I've designated from previous packages which I've used to store clothing for dolls I'm reviewing or who are arriving imminently, but the locker, with its multiple compartments on the right, can store multiple dolls' stock when I have more projects going simultaneously, and the door on the left can hold two dolls if I don't want to close it up.

The jacket arrived fairly late, but the seller did throw in a nice G1 Frankie sticker!

The jacket has a black body and puffed houndstooth sleeves with a lapel-less collar and no simulated buttons or closure. I had to cut the sheer sleeves off Frankie's blouse to use this piece, but that's well worth it to me. Here's how that looks.

I think the jacket is perfect for this doll design, and it's a great way to further their Frankenstein fashion sense. However, I feel like the outfit is sorely lacking a belt...and I don't have one to spare that suits them.

Still, I think this ensemble for G3 Frankie would have made for an extremely strong signature look. It's a different vibe from signature G1 Frankie almost entirely, but I think this look could have been G3's answer to the same assignment of "preppy goth Frankenmonster serving as an academic-themed monster design to broadcast the theme of the franchise". 

I'm always struck by how much more realistic G3 Frankie's facial proportions are. 
Despite G3 having mostly more cartoonish faces and ears, Frankie comes out feeling more 
real!

I then put the vinyl top on over the blouse and added the crown, and I think this is an improvement. The optical designs on the tank add to the high-contrast theme and make the blue more prominent in a good way. I think the crown is optional, but effective. 

Please ignore the fact that I put their hands in backward before I took this photo.

Maybe it makes sense that Fearidescent Frankie needed three layers of torso clothing, since their signature doll also has three. However, for Fearidescent, I find it necessary, while signature keeps their jacket off. 

Then I tried to take Frankie for a photoshoot. 

I actually found it pretty difficult to take a satisfying art photo of this Frankie. They're so artsy and high-contrast on their own that using contrast with the camera bled their visuals out, and I didn't have any background that felt dramatic enough for them! But I finally found something great when I decided to layer color and black-and-white versions of the same picture with a punk cutout style in MS Paint, something I thought was perfectly matched to their monster type, fashion, and emphasis on graphic text. This is an art photo suited to this doll!

 Frankie may not take a perfect art photo, but they definitely let me make one.

By the end, this Frankie is really locked into one*ish permutations (crown/no crown is the only aspect I think can be changed) to really feel complete and stunning...but those one*ish permutations are really really nice. This is the design for G3 Frankie to beat. It's edgy, dramatic, beautiful, and spooky. An electric work of art, indeed.

And since I was intrigued by Fearidescent Cleo and liked her parts, plus I thought a second locker may be useful to have (and I had gotten some generous gift cards from a family friend), I decided to get her for a briefer overview. 

Here's the front of her packaging. 

And the locker underneath. The gold tones are exceptionally pretty to me. 

And here's a practical demonstration of how completely the box sequence of a Skulltimate Secrets doll can be broken. Every locked door unboxed before the doll is, without using a single one of the keys. 

Cleo's paper packages feature bandaged hearts and the same backward question marks.

The packages were also packed in the same top-to-bottom order- second outfit with fur piece on top, headwear and jewelry in the second door, shoes and keyring in the third door, and accessories in the fourth door. This must be the same for every Skulltimate Secrets character and doll.

However. I noticed immediately that there was a whole different unboxing order here because the glittery unpainted final key was in the top door's loot! Intrigued, I boxed everything back up and started over with the key in Cleo's compartment to play the color-reveal game and retrace her sequence. 

Cleo's starting key is pale yellow, the color of the third door down! That gives you the keyring and second shoes.

The key in this compartment is pearl gold, leading to the next door up. This gives you the headwear and jewelry.

And of course, the key here is orange, which opens the top door to the second outfit and fur piece, and that door has the glitter key for the final accessories door. 

Here's the stuff arranged in order with the keys that opened their doors.

So these dolls do have variable unboxing sequences! I just happened to select the doll in this series with the most linear one first, making me think the unboxing idea was too simplistic even when buying into its theater in good faith. 

Small sample sizes are dangerous! 

It must be the case that every character in a series has their own unlocking sequence, but it's the same for each copy. Randomizing wouldn't work out since the glitter door appears to be reserved for last across the board for all of these dolls, and randomized key distribution in the factory could result often in any or all of the keys being locked behind their own doors. It's easier for Mattel to select a sequence for each character in a Skulltimate Secrets series and fix that to all copies. 

This isn't a full review of this doll, but I do like what's going on here, and it gives me a good chance to discuss and praise Cleo's G3 designs.

Fearidescent Cleo uses a pretty strong mix of warm gold, orange, and yellow that flatters her rich skin tone, while contrasting it against bright electric blue with the hair color, unseen on previous Cleos, and certainly not for her whole head. I've heard that some think Fearidescent Cleo's hair reads too much like a Nefera look (Ra forbid!), but this is clearly blue to me and Nefera has always been greenish teal. G1 Cleos came closer to Nefera because several editions had heavy proportions of the exact same teal as her sister!

Yellow/blue contrast like this always works for me, and it's nice to see, like Frankie, that Cleo's Fearidescent doll is really unique and unmistakable for any other release. I really enjoy Cleo's weird Fearidescent yellow pants, which work despite everything about them feeling like they shouldn't. I don't know if they'll stay on Cleo, but they're a fascinating piece.

Cleo's hair is a mix of polypropylene and tinsel...so which material is worse, am I right?

It's not hideously awful, though, since her style and rooting is simple enough that the poly's quality deficits don't interfere with it. Poly is worst for waves and bangs, and Cleo has neither. And since Cleo is more of a casual treat doll and a curiosity investigation, I'm not too disappointed by her hair. 

Cleo's face is very pretty, and features distinctly side-glancing eyes, which are uncommon for MH. Her makeup reflects Egyptian kohl, and G3 Cleo consistently features an Eye of Horus design in her left eye's makeup, something she sported before as a one-off in her G1 Boo York doll.

I'm hugely appreciative of the fact that with each successive generation, Cleo has become progressively more undead in her portrayal. Not only does that run delightfully counter to the general softening from G1 that G2 and G3 both display, but it rectifies the biggest problem with G1 Cleo--the fact that a nude doll of her just looked like a living human with Egyptian style. In G2, Cleo got sculpted-on bandages, which follow from the G1 CAM doll and Cleolei, and that's a feature G3 Cleo has as well, seemingly with the same placement on her body as G2. But G3 Cleo adds two new details--in the fiction, it's shown she's been fully embalmed, so her organs are stored in canopic jars, still alive outside her body, and her dolls have blue pupils to visually deaden her eyes and make her look just a touch more mummified and spooky. It's a detail I wish carried into the live-action films and cartoon, and it's maybe the only case in G3 where the doll depiction of a monster has a feature I find lacking in the cartoon! I look forward to Nefera getting a G3 doll so she can benefit from dead eyes and sculpted bandages. Her only G2 doll was clearly a delayed G1 release in full G1 style (alongside an Amanita who was just the same), so Nefera never benefited from the mummy upgrades Cleo got. And while the G1 Nefera was an irredeemable monster, she deserved more than only three dolls. 

Also, Cleo's skintone has deepened to a rich reddish brown color. In G1, her color was paler and more yellowish. I think G2 had some subtly darker skin than G1, but of the three, G3 Cleo is the most unambiguously brown, and she's evidently got a supermodel-level skincare routine since she boasts a shimmery face and a pearlescent body that shines. Her doll really conveys the skin glow that many real people would envy! Her skin is gorgeous and I appreciate her more distinct tone. Ancient Egyptian people essentially ran the whole spectrum of skintones, and Cleo's namesake Cleopatra was a Greek woman by birth, so it wasn't incorrect or offensive for Cleo to have been paler before, but changing her skin tone to be darker makes for more variety and diversity, and the execution of the plastic and its color and shine makes her absolutely stunning. I think Cleo's skintone change might be a nice sign of growing acceptance for diversity-- G1 Cleo may have been paler because it was deemed at the time that she wouldn't have been as successful as a staple doll with darker skin than she had. And coming out of the 2000s...I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case. In portrayal, she's also improved by being voiced and portrayed by brown actresses. G1 Cleo and Clawdeen, a brown Egyptian and a Black American, were both voiced by the same white actress. 

G3 Cleo has no jewel on her cheek, which I'm totally fine with. The idea of a jewel beauty mark was interesting but never looked fabulous as a printed graphic on her face. At worst, on her Student Disembodied Council doll, the gem was yellow and so hard to read it honestly looked like she had a banana slice on her face!

Cleo's turban was the most intriguing piece to me. 

It fits tightly on her head, which is great, and its color is distinctly metallic and feels more aged and greenish, rather than being a flat pearl gold. It's very pretty and matches her makeup precisely.

We haven't seen something like it from MH before and I think it's the doll's highlight. Still, I've heard reasonable objections, because turbans are from many cultures except Egypt, where it had no historical cultural hold, and the piece may create a conflation of cultures by depicting the Egyptian ghoul with it. I'd say it's not implausible, though. Cleo is always at the peak of high fashion, and this seems like a fashion/status-based take on a turban. Even though it's not Egyptian, it doesn't seem to be treading on turban styles that are more culturally deep or spiritual and which would be unequivocally inappropriate to put on Cleo. Perhaps, as a member of an Egyptian royal family, it could be that foreign emissaries and traders would bring her items from their own cultures, and this could be one of them...or that Cleo used her heaps of money to participate in trade with foreign cultures who made beautiful things she wanted to enjoy. I trust that Cleo would be wearing a turban out of appreciation, and that the person who made it would have been happy to share it with her. I also imagine the piece was conceived more on the theme of what a turban physically is (a wrapped piece of fabric) connecting to Cleo's monster type, rather than its cultural background having been thought out as much. But again, this type of turban seems to reflect ornamental status clothing, so I think she's okay to model it. 

My verdict is not and cannot be final. You may do or dispense with the turban as you wish.

Here's Cleo's second outfit. It's not as yellow, but it's very pretty, and the necklace works best with this look.

I love the fringe on her top!

I really love how post-G1 Cleo has really leaned into rich colors with medium tones in deep saturation. It feels very pretty and authentic to Egyptian art and jewelry. G1 Cleo used a lot of jewel tones and light turquoise, and the occasional lime green, and her palette could be hit-or-miss from doll to doll. The colors of Cleos in G2 and G3 have been especially delightful to me, and this particular doll is a feast for a color lover like myself. 

Cleo is the median G3 height, and her torso is about the median size, but her hips are larger and curvier than the median proportions.

Cleo has some nice accessories. I love her opening black-cat lipstick.

And her eye purse is great. I'd have considered modifying it for Scarah, who needs more banshee theming, but it's too pretty, too art-deco, and too Egyptian.

Like Frankie's, the bag holds all of her cosmetics, easily storing her lipstick and makeup pencil. 

And I had to get in a couple of glamor shots for such a glamorous doll. I found the fur blanket/towel/wrap made way more sense on a luxuriant Egyptian princess than it did on a punk Frankenmonster.

This feels like it a classic oil portrait composition! Johannes Vampeer, perhaps?

I'm very impressed with the translation and reinvention in G3 Cleo's character designs, which seem to grab the best of both her G1 and G2 selves while adding some new monster edge and visual richness. G2 Cleo wasn't a total improvement over G1, but she brought a lot to the table, and Cleo de Nile is for sure the character whose design genuinely benefited the most from both reboots. I can even confidently say I prefer G3 Cleo over her original incarnation. Nonetheless, of the G3 characters, she's maybe the most visually consistent with her previous incarnations...and that means she's fabulously beautiful all the time. This doll might have just convinced me to shortlist her signature doll...fingers crossed on the hair quality!

I'd selected these two dolls because I liked them a lot visually, but they have some special resonance together as well. Cleo and Frankie represent a pairing of silver and gold, and these two characters have also been shown to have some romantic interest in each other! 

The ice pops and towels actually make pretty good props to put these two on a date!

While I mourn the thematic resonance of the Cleo/Deuce pairing (going on associations of snakes and Egypt, Cleopatra and Greece, and snakes and Cleopatra), I think the dynamic of G3 Cleo/Frankie is very meaningful. It's so welcome compared to G1, where every boy existed as a girl's love interest and no queer relationships were even suggested. I'm also glad MH has committed to higher queer visibility. Frankie being a nonbinary core character was already big, but they didn't stop there, since they've also shown Frankie in a queer romance, made Deuce the child of two women, and featured a drag-queen character portrayed by a professional drag queen! All of this representation is sweet and good to see, and is sadly politically important in a world where many governments are becoming increasingly transparent in their aims of pushing legal systems to see how much they can help them stamp out queer people's rights. I have a lot of affection and respect for G3 Monster High advancing its representation so far and making itself a loving advocate for queerness. Acceptance was always the core of MH's commentary, so seeing more overt, literal, and bold representation across the board in G3 is the brand taking the shroud off and standing for something more seriously and honestly in an admirable way. 

Mattel wants money first and foremost. But its diverse representation just doesn't feel hollow and cynical to me. And that's very cheering. 

I had a lot of cultural commentary to discuss with Cleo; wow!

But my takeaway on Skulltimate Secrets and these dolls?

Skulltimate Secrets is one of the least offensive unboxing-trend doll concepts I've seen, from some points of view. The packages are minimal in waste by giving you a reusable and fun plastic box, and they even foresaw display applications and accounted for it with hook holes! However, the Skulltimate Secrets experience can be let down by the fact that it's mechanically all theater. Color-matching the keys or using the keys at all is never necessary to open the entire package, and while that can be an upside for adult collectors, I can imagine the spell being shattered for any kid who realizes the step-by-step process is all a performance they have to buy into...and at that point, why not just sell these dolls for a little cheaper without all the mystery? And for someone who never wanted the box or can't find a good way to repurpose it, a fully disposable one-time package would be by far the better option.

But the dolls are beautiful. I'm delighted G3 MH is hitting a point where the doll designs are genuinely elegant and gorgeous in the ways G1 excelled at. Signature dolls are more casual, colorful, and softened, but dark glamor is being retained fabulously through alternate and specialty releases. Skulltimate Secrets may not be a gimmick anybody needs after two characters...but dang, the dolls seem to be consistently strong designs to get you to buy in anyway. I might end up getting Twyla, Ghoulia and Toralei from Neon Frights--they all look so promising!

The factory execution leaves some to be desired. Polypropylene hair is a bad idea Mattel ought to throw out, and it's especially unsuited for dolls with bangs or curls. This is a G3-wide issue, but I think I'm still going to have to face it in the future with Neon Frights Twyla, based on how bad her bangs look from a photo of an in-person one. I also find some of the unifying gimmicks of the Skulltimate series to be weak or confusing. Iridescent clothes and furry towels aren't exactly attractive themes to me, and certainly not in conjunction. 

Ultimately...I'm just a sucker for artistic dolls, and I'll accept a plastic locker and poly hair to get one. I think MH has finally gone from feeling like it's simply returned to feeling like, in some way, it's back. These are the kinds of looks G1 fans were missing.

They're just two too fab-boo.