Bad Practice: Living Dead Dolls Exclusive Dr. Dedwin and Nurse Necro by Mezco Toyz

These guys are going to come in handy.

Warning for bloody and gory imagery in a horror medical setting.

Dr. Dedwin and Nurse Necro are among the earlier LDD doll characters and some of the earlier exclusives as well. They capitalize on a horror-hospital theme which is ubiquitous and deserved LDD representation, though it's hard to say what their impact in the brand was. They got Minis adaptations, but never got Resurrected, and Dedwin got a second doll in the Oz line, but Necro stayed at just the one character design.

LDD would have been remiss to not do a doctor/nurse duo, and I think the characters prove useful for multiple other characters who cross into the medical sphere. LDD themselves indulged in crossover by attributing Dedwin as the surgeon who oversaw Madame Dysmorphic (Series 7's Vanity) and performed the cosmetic surgeries which killed her, and I got the duo when I did because I wanted to capitalize on their potential for staging future doll acquisitions' stories as much as possible. All the same, I was wondering if these dolls were a little lacking in realized potential, or if their charm would carry them through.

I held off on publishing this review for a while because I felt like my photo session was incomplete, but I've gotten antsy with other things not being ready, so I can make a bonus-photoshoot post with these dolls later, or incorporate some of the ideas into shoots with future "patients".

My dolls came sealed in their double coffin and looked good in the photos. Necro makes me very nervous as a doll that exists in the throes of linear time because she has a plastic-fabric smock and I've seen a copy where her headband was very yellowed, but this copy seemed to have aged well.

By the time they arrived, Dedwin's mirror had fallen over his eyes and Necro's headband cap was all the way off her head by her feet.

I was able to slightly tidy them before unboxing.

I know Dedwin and Necro would have released after Series 4 because Necro is wearing the sandals that debuted then, but their chipboard indicates it was very shortly after Series 4 because it feels transitional in style. The board uses the specific text style and background/border of the Series 1-4 chipboards, but has photographic portraits of the dolls rather than hand-drawn illustrations in the S1-4 style.

Here's a Series 1 board.

Series 5 was also transitional, as it aesthetically flowed from the Series 1 style, but didn't have character portraits and introduced the first themed-series chipboard design with its studio clapboard.

Series 6 was the first numbered-series chipboard design with none of the Series 1 DNA. 

Dedwin and Necro's exclusive retail source is attributed to be "Previews", and like Hemlock and Honey's Marz Distribution carrier, it's another brand I've never heard of. Turns out, Previews was a catalog magazine for selling wares, published by Diamond Comics Distributors, and it's apparently still going, to some capacity? The more you know.

The chipboard poem says:

With an evil prognosis they want to penetrate

Their only diagnosis is to slowly amputate.

I think they got the words in the wrong order. "Prognosis" is "what will happen to you going forward" and "diagnosis" is "identification of the problem". An evil diagnosis would make them want to use recklessly invasive/traumatic procedures, though "prognosis" wouldn't be quite right as a word for the action plan either.

How about:

Each and every diagnosis

Written purely by psychosis

Dedwin and his faithful nurse

Soon met with a grim prognosis

Like all two-packs, the duo have a shared death certificate and are given the same death date of October 23, 1993. I couldn't identify any significance behind this date. 

While duos almost always share a death date in LDD, it makes you wonder what the Watsonian explanation in the fiction would be for each case. Here, it makes me think of some disaster surgery that could have ended in both of their deaths. It reminds me of the story of Dr. Robert Liston, the "surgeon with the 300 percent mortality rate"--during one procedure, he accidentally cut off an assistant's fingers, who died in the hospital, and the incident caused a bystander to be startled and die of shock...and the actual patient also died in hospital later too.

Both chipboard and certificate spell out "Doctor" in full, which is a little antiquated for the dolls' design aesthetic, though in the certificate poem, it stands out less because you couldn't replace the usage with the abbreviated "Dr." and have it look good.

The certificate poem says:

Always in trouble for playing their game

Doctor, nurse, and the devil to blame

Now that they are dead it is no longer a sin

For down here in hell the doctor is in

All of these lines feel vague and incoherent as a group, but I think I got the spirit. How about:

None of their patients would leave with their life

Nurse wheeled them in under Doctor's best knife

With Satan's approval, their practice is booming

And every sick soul is a soul that they're dooming

Here they are unboxed.

These dolls are old and they show it, but I already like them. Doc first.

As mentioned, this is Dedwin's second appearance here on the blog, but this debut doll is quite different, showing him in his natural state as LDD's resident M.D. supreme. In the role of the Wizard of Oz, he was an old-timey mad scientist and a fantasy character.

His name being a morbid pun on the name "Edwin" suggests that "Dedwin" is a first name rather than a surname. This is unusual, since the "Dr." honorific is almost always paired with a surname unless the doctor is appealing to a child to sound more friendly, like a pediatrician calling herself "Dr. Amy"...or is an established media personality going by their first name with their credentials attached for more appealing branding. While it's not impossible for "Edwin" to be a last name, there's certainly no notable precedent of this happening, unlike other names which can be either first or last. Under the lens of these being literal dolls twisting the aesthetics of children's toys, then "Dr. Dedwin" makes sense as the name a kid would give the evil doll.

Dr. Dedwin is styled in bloody mint surgeon's scrubs since the operating room is the most visceral and anxious setting of a medical practice. I noted back with the Wizard doll that the two Dedwins subtly swapped color balances, as debut Dedwin has white skin and mint scrubs, while the Wizard has mint skin and a white coat.

Dedwin's first piece is his doctor's mirror, which is an obsolete piece, and doesn't make much sense for a surgical kit (he's not doing diagnosis in the O.R.), but it's an identifiable "doctor" cliché that looks really fun and iconographic, and the pieces continue to be used in the design of caricatured doctor figures. You don't see doctor's play kits for kids with them, though, at least not today.

The purpose of these mirrors was to have them over the eye and look through the hole in the middle. Light in the room would reflect off the dish and illuminate the patient's face, ears, or throat nicely. This mirror has a hole in the middle, but the construction of the bracket and strap means it doesn't go all the way through the back.

The dish and bracket are one piece of metallic-painted plastic that's nowhere near mirror-reflective, but it looks good. The strap is sturdy rubber that doesn't look at all aged or decayed. The strap is optimized to fit around the extra width of Dedwin's cap, but he can get it on his bare head, and turning the strap diagonal like an eyepatch gets it easily over his eye. When testing this out later, it looked great, but I also discovered the rubber left black marks on Dedwin's head. I looked into a Ken doll mirror as a potential replacement. I can keep the factory mirror in the coffin, but I don't want to use it as a dynamic accessory if I have to clean off the doll's vinyl every time.

Dedwin's surgical cap is a really nice piece that looks, feels, and sits just like the full-size. It's held on just by elastication inside that sits snug on his head.

This is the only piece of his scrubs with no bloodstains.

Under the cap , Dedwin's head is bald and has no hidden detail. It would have been really fun if LDD had conceived of Purdy's brain gimmick earlier and used it for Dedwin, with his surgical cap covering a missing dome and exposed removable brain. Or else, just paint some surgical scar on his scalp. (Resurrection Sybil does the latter.)

I don't mind the simplicity, though. These two dolls have a very retro, toylike feel I adore. I think the white skin harmonizes with the sterile hospital aesthetic perfectly while also being otherworldly and spooky.

Over his face, Dedwin wears a white surgical mask piece with blood stains on it. The lower edge is more curved. 

The piece has two parallel fabric-elastic straps, with one over his ears in tension holding the piece in place, and the one below the ears being looser but completing the look.

Only one other LDD would have a similar piece, with Resurrection-variant Maggot having a black mesh face mask over her, but despite her being very diseased, her mask is more manga-punk and "fashion" than functional.

Ella Von Terra had a mesh mouth veil with plastic elastic loops around her ears, but it's not trying to be a lower-face mask in the same way. Only the top edge of the veil was snug, with the lower edge hanging loose.

There's not supposed to be much at all hidden under Dedwin's mask, but my copy picked up drastic stains from the blood pigment on the cloth.

Uh-oh. I'm not sure how this happened, because I wouldn't have imagined the mask stains to be done with any kind of pigment that could transfer into vinyl. This is very discouraging.

The intended paint design for the doll is simple. His eyebrows are shaped like Lottie's, but are very subtly dark brown instead of black. His eyes are classic LDD ovals with really pretty bands of yellow and olive green and white shines in the center of the pupils, and smudgy shading in olive tones surrounds the eyes. A bit more shading goes between his lips and down the corners of his mouth, and he has undereye creases as well. His face paint is all the color of illness, and this and the bloodstains on the outfit contrast perfectly against the sterile white skin and mint scrubs.

These paint details were all retained pretty faithfully for Dedwin's second doll. The eyes have a different rendering style and the brows are much steeper, but it's all there, down to the shading for the undereye creases and in the mouth corners.

Debut Dedwin's head would look so much eerier without the pigment stains from the red. I've never had any luck getting rid of them if they're from dye, but if this is paint somehow, it should go easily.

Around his neck, Dedwin is wearing a stethoscope, which is another piece that feels more suited for the clinic than the O.R., but is also too iconic for a doctor to leave out. The piece is springy plastic on the tubes that rest around the neck, and flexible on the cord that connects to the resonator. It sits a little awkwardly around his neck and can easily fall forward off it, but it feels realistic.

The stethoscope earpieces can be held in tension in the doll's ears, which is fantastic.

Then I noticed a peg on the resonator, and the bendy plastic cord easily lets it fit into either of Dedwin's palms!

The peg fits easily and tidily. This is an awesome accessory. It's only a shame Necro doesn't have a heart to hold so Dedwin can listen to it beat! 

The other Dedwin stepped in instead.

"Definitely not beating, Doctor."
"I expected as much, Doctor. They tend not to when outside the body."
"True. But it always helps to check."

These dolls don't have any organ accessories or bones or medical gore features, which is a shame. The heart, at least, existed already by their release time. Then again, Dedwin's second doll picked up the slack by having the heart and the brain as pieces of a collection gimmick where the Scarecrow and Tin Man would be completed by the pieces that came with Dedwin. (For the Lion's courage, a classy but naughty visual joke was used--a blue velvet pouch with two brass spheres inside.)

A Return LDD Dedwin could be absolutely incredible with higher articulation and all the same pieces, and for sure he'd have a second face or scalp to hide something under his cap or mask.

Dedwin's scrubs continue with a short-sleeved shirt and pants cut like they should be, and featuring more bloodstains and multiple handprints. The shirt is cut very baggy and velcros in the back, while the pants have elastic holding them up and they just slide on and off the body.

His shoes intrigued me, because I wasn't sure what mold they used. I expected they'd be the LDD male dress shoes cast in white, but the sneaker mold would make more sense...I was just pretty certain the sneakers debuted notably later. I was right about that--they are just the dress shoes in white. And they're very loose and fall off easily because he doesn't have socks.

For such a visually simple doll, Dedwin offers outstanding display value from permutations of his cap, mask, mirror, and stethoscope being used. I'm very impressed by his costume, but the mirror should have had a strap that didn't rub color around.

Now to his companion.

Nurse Necro's name isn't a pun on anything and is just the death word fragment. It's kind of hard to tell whether it's supposed to be a first name or surname because it's not punning on any recognizable real names. Nurses also get referred to by surname (e.g., Nurse Ratched), but the root "necro" isn't a complete word and functions as a prefix, so it doesn't sound like a surname. "Necro" can sound more like a first name if you take it in the vein of women's names in Antiquity which could end with an "o", like Carthaginian queen Dido, the mythic Muse Erato, or poet Sappho. "Necro" is a Greek root anyway, so it fits. 

Nurse Necro is very clearly not the most realistic, professional nurse design even in a 1950s context, and the plastic fabric uniform is slightly suspect, but her design is overall more poppy and retro and leans toward a chaster pinup theme more than an outright sex nurse--thankfully. This character never had a release beyond the LDD Minis adaptation of this exclusive set, which is the same character design. (Her Mini is the more faithful one--Dedwin was apparently deemed too small to replicate his mask or mirror or stethoscope. She'd have been a lock for the perverted Fashion Victims line, but as with Eggzorcist, I'm glad for her that she was spared that doll line. This lack of reappearance makes Nurse Necro feel oddly lonely, though. I don't think any of the other exclusive duos were unevenly revived with only one half of the pair getting a second design. Then again, "conjoined twins" and "wedding couple", the concepts of the exclusive duos whose complete pairs did get revived, are pretty inseparable concepts (absolutely so on the former) while "doctor and nurse" can be broken up more easily. 

Nurse Necro's aged messiness shows at the very top, with her nurse's cap. This is actually a plastic headband with a triangular point, and it's meant to sit on her forehead. The plastic is stiff and light and makes a rattly, tinny sound when dropped. It's not the same material as the LDD Halloween masks or flocked formal hats. It's familiar to me and there's got to be a name, but I couldn't tell you what the material is right now. The Red Cross logo expected of a retro nurse has been predictably replaced with LDD's sulfur sign...which was possibly a necessity because misuse of the logo and unwanted associations are treated very seriously. They certainly wouldn't want it plastered on an undead evil nurse making medicine look scary.

I might have expected more of a modern "sans-serif" rendition of the logo for the desired hospital aesthetic. 

The piece has a crack in it visible here, but it didn't penetrate all the way through and it can't be wiggled back and forth, fortunately. The band was originally held on by a rubber elastic, but the piece had disintegrated ages ago.

The band remnants on Necro's head show where the piece would have laid originally, which is helpful. The elastic passed entirely under her hairline at the back, and all of her longer hair would have to pull through the loop of the band to put it on this way.

Necro's hair is also quite messy. It's all electric blue, and the front has two big swoopy bang sections that don't meet in the middle.

The rest of her hair was formerly tied in a half-ponytail with the front pulled up in another long-disintegrated elastic. The rest is loose.

Necro's face is very poppy and spooky with atypical colors and flat, cartoony classic-LDD rendering that fascinate me. Her eyes have olive-green sclerae and two-tone yellow irises, ringed by duller thick shading in the eye socket, and she has classic LDD harsh brows and black lips.

Her face has some similarities to S1 Sadie's, especially in the brows, but those weird green eyes are so distinct and fascinating. They shouldn't work with her bright colors of saturated red and blue, but they still somehow do.

Necro's skintone is a little greyer and greener than Dedwin's, who is going for a stark white look. I like that the two have different vinyl colors.

Necro's smock made me very nervous because I knew it was plastic, and I dreaded a vinyl fabric piece subject to cracking and peeling and getting gross and sad. I was delighted to see that Necro's costume is in perfect condition.

The costume is white with short sleeves and a shirt collar, and hangs like a minidress. The neck is wide with a deep V that would be more cheeky on a grown woman's figure, and the sulfur symbol appears again on the dress's left breast. Because of the material and sew, some positions of Necro's left arm lead to the fabric scrunching in a way where the icon isn't as legible. This dress does a good job at conveying an informal pinup feel while still feeling appropriate for the doll and her proportions. Necro seems more cute, fun, whimsical and retro than naughty or salacious, and I like that. The character is certainly a woman, but the dolls are child-shaped and this design gives her more toylike charm. The dress doesn't allow Necro to sit well, since the fabric resists her legs widening as they swivel forward and Necro is completely uncovered in front when they do.

Also, the perfect condition of the costume has a good reason--it's not vinyl fabric! It's some kind of plastic weave, more like a waterproof tablecloth or raincoat, rather than being cotton coated in vinyl that will never last.

I checked, and this is not the same material as the torso of Gabriella's costume. Hers is durable thick plastic of comparable finish, but it isn't woven, and her sleeves are a different material that's also thick plastic and also not woven.

However, it does seem equally durable and immune to the ravages of deterioration. Thank you, Mezco! I only wish you'd done one of these plastics for Calico's dress! (I'm seriously considering trying to get a copy made from a comparable fabric with more longevity.)  Discovering Necro's dress was made of something that lasts rocketed the doll in my estimation. I had been so nervous and unhappy about the dress's prospects when I thought it was vinyl-coated fabric, but this baby will be probably be around long after I'm dead.

Necro's costume is pristine and has none of the doctor's bloodstains. It makes sense because she's not a surgeon...and also because her smock looks like it wipes clean! I can appreciate that the two dolls provide such different aesthetics while not feeling disparate or poorly-matched. 

Later on, however, the sulfur symbol printed on the costume appeared worn, with fragments of color missing and "chipping" the image, though I hadn't noticed exactly when it occurred and couldn't tell what caused it. I repaired it as best I could with some thinly-laid paint.

Nurse Necro's legs depict very whimsical candy-stripe red-and-white stockings, and they're the most dated feature of this doll design in the context of the brand's evolution. There's no getting around it--these are just red stripes painted onto her white legs, and all future LDDs with striped socks or tights did them more properly with a knitted piece of clothing. 

This shift to real stripy legwear was not too long after, as pre-Series 9 swivel dolls Jack and Jill debuted them on Jill. Afterward, variations on striped tights and socks in the same knit style would feature on many dolls in many colors. Resurrection main-edition Bride of Valentine would have tights in a wider stripe pattern like Nurse Necro's, just in different colors. 

Despite this design method looking outdated or cheap, I can't deny that these painted tights are very charming on this doll, and they give her an element of retro-toy kitsch that fabric pieces, even with equally thick stripes, wouldn't. The stripes are painted in clean continuous rings with no disjointed effect. There's some blurring on the edges, but it still looks good. The white parts of the leg are not paint, though--it's the vinyl! The design might be a loose reference to the "candy-stripe" pinafores nursing volunteers wore in hospitals, but Necro is apparently certified and her leg stripes are much thicker and not vertical. I think she looks nearly like a Dr. Seuss character in a way I enjoy.

I think Nurse Necro might be the only Living Dead Doll whose legs were cast in a different color from the rest of her body. Her legs are cast white, but the hip sections are painted in an unsuccessful attempt to match her body's skintone, giving Necro's body three colors by accident. I think the hip paint could have been left off, easily, leaving the top white, and it wouldn't have looked bad. Fortunately, the badly-colormatched hips are covered by her costume.

Another strange case, with arms cast in a different color from the rest, is Lamenta in Series 26. Both cases mimic tight clothing--stockings on Necro, black gloves on Lamenta.

Necro is wearing the LDD sandals in red, just like Viv and Calico. Concerningly, they left red marks on her feet where they had been resting. I don't know why their pigment was able to leave the shoe, but it won't matter as long as she wears them. 

Neither of Necro's hands are pierced for accessories, and she doesn't have any. While it certainly suits the lens of her character design, it really doesn't feel like Necro's nursing job involves much besides standing there and looking pretty. It sound atrocious to say so, but it is in some way enough--the doll is very charming and fun with her retro whimsical design, and her durable smock helps all the more...but there's not as much provided to stage her with and she can feel underbaked next to Dedwin with all his optional headgear and fantastic stethoscope. I don't know what unique medical accessories would suit a swivel-armed flat-handed LDD, but perhaps a syringe on a peg at the least? I also think Necro could get by with an optional apron layer for her costume when she has to step in.

I did try the mask on Necro, since it's the piece she'd be most likely to share with Dedwin.

I can understand why she doesn't, though, since it's a lot to wrangle around her hair and headband, and I could believe Dedwin is bald to make his mask and cap as user-friendly as possible.

Both dolls needed some cleaning. Their vinyl was sweaty and greasy, even inside the joints, so I popped them apart and cleaned them and lightly scrubbed with baking soda. I tied Necro's ponytail in fabric elastic and washed and combed her hair, clipping any fried bits at the end that were too tangled and problematic. Like many old LDDs, there's not a lot to be done for time ruining her hair texture. 

Even before the washing, I contrived a new band for Necro's nurse cap, using a stretchy white string elastic. I knotted the ends to keep the elastic in place.

String elastic is pretty uncommon for LDD, but they used it for Macumba's hat, and something like this should have been done for Necro rather than an elastic that they surely would have known was untenable. Fortunately, replacing the band was as easy as could be and you'd never know this wasn't how the headband was built before. For such a delicate plastic piece, it also did better than it had to and didn't break.

For Dedwin, I couldn't accept the red staining on his face, but it wasn't paint that could wipe off and some devilry has made pigment stains on LDD seem impossible to undo through any means. The only thing I haven't yet tried is peroxide cream for localized application and sun exposure, but I didn't want to wait for something I had little faith in right now. For Dedwin, I eventually resorted to sanding as my prime attack, and while I created a few scars and uneven patches of vinyl, and some red remains, I restored Dedwin's face 90% and I'm more than satisfied with it.

It's such a difference now that he doesn't look scribbled-on by a child. He also looks way better without the smoochy-looking lip stains. I don't think Dedwin's a kissy lippy kind of guy.

While Necro's hair was still drying, I tried swapping clothes between the Dedwins. Here's as much as the Wizard can wear. Because of his spiky vertical hair, he can't manage the mirror without popping his head out and sliding it up the bottom (not worth trying) and he can't wear the cap at all. Still, I think this looks pretty good. You can see the skintone and scrubs are not the same shade, but they work well together.

Only the right hand of the Wizard is pierced, so he can only hold the resonator in that one.

Dedwin looks great in just the base "gentleman" outfit of the Wizard! The colors work perfectly.

Here he is with the coat and goggles and heart. The goggles work better on his forehead because the swivel LDD head is a bit smaller and this one is also bald, creating no helpful tension on the band.

I like him better with the mirror the Wizard can't wear.

Here he is with the full Wizard outfit and the full Dedwin accessory kit.

This looks really good, but I can give him a pass to wear his scrubs for clinic mode. He only really needs the coat to look more suited for patient checkups.

I took a moment to photograph the two dolls undressed because these felt the starkest in difference between swivel and ball-joint LDD of the pairs I've handled. Wizard Dedwin's hair verticality contributes to the feeling that he's massively bigger.

I put the Wizard back in his costume but kept his coat off.

With the two Dedwins' stock combined as such on the original, I had a blast playing with all the display permutations!

Resonator held to the heart with putty.

This is an evil parody toy, but he's also a genuinely fun doll to play doctor with unironically thanks to his optional pieces and display permutations that change up his look a lot! In some way, I feel like the Wizard completes the main or that the two harmonize well for clothes swaps. I do feel like Mezco gave the wizard a white coat because it was the main piece the original lacked, and combining them is seamless and looks great. Not that original Dedwin has trouble displaying well on his own.

Here's both dolls fixed up. Nurse Necro's hair is fried and dry and fluffy in a way that can't be fixed because it's damaged, but the silhouette is better.

I know Necro is only taller because of her sandals, but the height dynamic is a fun visual here. I don't know what the doctor and nurse's relationship is, or precisely how unprofessional, but even if they're not a couple, I can see Necro being more idle and "useless", standing by and being a cheeky peanut gallery until she's needed to sweet-talk and deceive a prospective victim or finish off a convalescent who's getting better against the rules. I can see Necro being quite clever and wicked, but only when it interests her and she has something juicy to do. Dedwin could be more focused and brutal and unable to appeal to anybody with his cold and bloody presence, so Necro has to step in as the charm of the operation. Maybe Necro doesn't even believe in her job and understands it's all an inefficient front for killing, and is bored entertaining Dedwin's delusions of medicine, but the murder is fun enough to play along.

For Necro's benefit, I bought some striped paper to play off her legs.

And I made a 1950s print ad.

Hospital name entirely made up by me.

Then the new mirror arrived for Dedwin. As stated, it's a vintage 1960s Ken piece which the seller stated had stretched enough to fit around a Ken's neck...and then some.

I know Barbie's models have shifted over the decades, but this would be able to loop around a Ken's whole waist and still be loose. It was too loose to sit around Dedwin's bare scalp tightly. The strap looks a bit like elastic, but it has no stretch or spring to it and feels more like ribbon. Maybe it once was stretchy. The mirror is thin metal (perhaps tin?) but its finish is pristine for its age. The back has a small loop of bent metal that slides around the strap, and there's a proper hole in the middle of the dish. This mirror is accurately mounted with space for the eyehole and is not vertically centered on the band. The metal is more reflective than Dedwin's painted plastic one, but not a super sharp image even disregarding the distortion from the concave surface.

I replaced the strap with a new black elastic fabric band, and it works well on Dedwin. It's not nearly as caricatured and is possibly a bit too small for this doll's head proportions, but I love that he can actually look through it, the look feels more real and more authentic to the vintage-toy vibe this two-pack has, and anything is better than cleaning the face every time the strap touches it.

The original LDD mirror is in the coffin for posterity. But for as long as I have this doll, he's wearing the replacement.

Then I staged the duo in an O.R. with the basement floor and poster-board walls. I also made them a surgical table of wood panels painted silver.

The only proper patient I had to feasibly stage them with was Viv, but my copy is in limbo for possible custom work and will likely be replaced by a full Zombini/Viv set to have her as designed. Her halves still worked under a sheet. 

My custom doll interpreting the Series 5 certificates' unseen mortician Tinselton Stitches holds monopoly over the Series 5 dolls as patients, so I didn't reuse any of them as subjects.

I then gave Necro a fabric softener treatment for her hair and trimmed a little more off the bottom. This was helpful. The only doll whose factory hair really might be unsalvageable is my Hollywood. She'd be so much better with a new head of hair, but I think I'd need to learn rerooting for her.

I think Dr. Dedwin and Nurse Necro are an oddly charming pair of horror dolls.

Of course they're sinister and bloody, but the toys have a retro sensibility to their design and a stark, brightly-colored whimsy that almost makes them feel off the pages of a 1950s children's book. Necro is the more cute and retro doll between them, feeling a lot like other cute-retro LDDs such as Sadie and Jinx, though they feel distinctly sixties while Necro evokes the decade before. I love Dedwin's mask, stethoscope, and cap creating a good amount of permutation and displayability, and he's a far more rounded doll than he looks because of it. Necro has a huge amount of visual charm contrasting her relatively static display options. 

I did find myself enjoying Dedwin the most when bringing in his second, final, Oz design and using some of his pieces, and Necro wants for something to hold or wear as an extra. The two dolls also had glaring quality issues, most of which are easily blamed on manufacturing rather than aging. Dedwin's mask stained his face, his mirror is awkward and rubs off on his head, Necro's hair was fried, and her headband had to get a new elastic to be worn. I think different choices with higher manufacturing quality would have made 2025 doc and nurse far closer to their 2002 state.

Still, I'm happy to have them, and excited to continue working with them in the future. I think a doctor and nurse will help flesh out later dolls' sessions nicely.