The Merida Talking Doll from The Disney Store

I have already reviewed the original 12" Merida doll from the Disney store (love her) and took an in-box look at the first 17" collector's edition Merida doll, but I couldn't resist ordering a third Merida--the 17" talking play doll version ($29.50).  Having never owned a singing Disney doll before, I wondered if these princesses might offer a nice middle ground between the small inexpensive play dolls and the larger limited editions.

Even before I got her out of the box, I could tell that this doll has struck another important balance.  She is not quite as serious as the limited edition doll, and not quite as goofy as the play doll.  She has her own look:

Merida talking doll from the Disney Store.

Because the singing dolls were on sale right before Christmas, I also ordered Ariel and (of course) Cinderella.  When my box of dolls arrived in the mail, Ariel was singing.  Not just when I picked up the box or bumped it or something, but singing all of the time.  She'd belt out, I WANT TO BE WHERE THE PEOPLE ARE, I WANT TO SEE... and then she'd stop.  Two minutes later, she'd start up again--the same partial verse, over and over again.  I can't imagine what the poor UPS worker had to endure, but I'm glad I didn't have to look him in the eye that day.  The girl was relentless.  I thought it was hysterically funny at first, but as the afternoon wore on, and Ariel kept bursting into song at random times, I got a little jumpy.  My weary brain was desperately trying to finish the verse for her.  Towards the end of the day, Ariel fell quiet and I assumed her batteries were dead.  I stored her carefully away and have not taken another peek at her until now.

In this review, I will focus on the talking Merida, but I will also show you Cinderella and the irrepressible Ariel.

Merida comes in a plastic display box with a cardboard back.  There is a hole in the front of the box so that you can touch the activation point on Merida's right hand. There are a series of holes in the back of the box to allow the sound of her voice to be heard clearly.  Unlike Ariel, Merida was quiet until I touched her hand.  Her Scottish accent is wonderful.  You can hear it at the end of the review.

Inside the box is a sky blue cardboard backdrop with Merida firmly attached:

She comes with a plastic bow and one arrow:

Her red hair looks vibrant against the blue cardboard:

Merida is secured to the cardboard in several locations. From the back, it looks like she is held in place primarily with two wire ties and some red thread for her hair:

The wire ties come undone in no time, and once the thread is cut, the hair can be freed pretty easily...with a bit of tugging.

Ouch.

The hardest part of getting her out of the box was releasing all of the tiny threads and plastic ties that hold her clothes in place.  The cape and dress were tacked down in at least six locations, and these all really needed to be identified and snipped to avoid holes and rips in the fabric.  The black thread that held the cape in place was particularly hard to find:

Here she is, free from her box:

She has a wonderful face.  As I mentioned before, I think this version of Merida offers a nice composite of the dramatic and the goofy sides of this character's personality.  She has teal blue side-glancing eyes, a sparse spray of freckles and the hint of a smile in her lips.  I love freckles, but these seem a bit dark.  I don't think Merida even has freckles, does she?

Her eyes are slightly wonky, but she'll look at the camera pretty convincingly:

She has a huge, poofy mass of red curls.  All of her curls are approximately the same size, and while I'd love to see a mix of different curl sizes (like in the movie), the overall effect is sufficiently dramatic:

The rooting is thick enough that it takes some work to see a large chunk of scalp.  The scalp is painted orange to make it even less noticeable:

This hair feels nice and is fun to play with.  It bounces and springs around exactly like I hoped it would.

To get a good look at Merida's features, I had to pull her substantial mane away from her face.  She looks a little funny like this:

My doll has a few facial flaws.  She has a small green spot on her nose and two shiny spots--probably drops of hair styling product.  The shiny spots washed away, but the green dot on her nose is there for good.  

Even though she is smiling, I think this doll's upper lip is a bit skinny in comparison to her very full lower lip.  In the movie, Merida's upper and lower lip are similar in fullness.

Merida has sandy brown painted eyebrows and lashes, and just a hint of coral pink eyeshadow.  Her eyes are two shades of blue with a yellow accent in the center.  Her blue irises have very faint red lines radiating out from the pupil.  While her eyes are wide and full of character, they aren't quite as round or pale as the animated Merida's eyes.  

When her hair is pulled back, Merida's large ears become quite noticeable.  Her ears have a simple shape, but add a lot of character to her face:

Merida has an exaggerated profile--the most distinctive feature being the prominent bridge of her otherwise tiny (and very low-set) nose.

Here's an ear up close:

I like photographing Merida with a little bit of her ear showing:

Here is my limited edition Merida so you can see her face in comparison:

Her irises are small and pale and she has lightly painted eyelashes and eyebrows.  One of her eyebrows is slightly raised, and she doesn't have quite as much of a smile in her lips.  

I assumed that the two dolls would share a face, but side-by-side, the differences are striking:

I am all but positive that they have the same head mold, but the differences in painting have a huge impact.  I like the limited edition doll's lips, faint freckles, and skeptical expression, but I like the talking doll's wide eyes and mischievous smile:

I no longer have my 12" Merida (she lives with my niece) but I simply adore her quirky, happy expression.  This is probably my favorite Merida face of all, but I think the talking doll does a nice job of bringing some of this spunk into the 17" doll's more serious visage.

Merida is wearing her traditional teal dress and a black cape.  The dress is covered in glitter, and some combination of the fabric types and all of that glitter cause the cape to stick to the dress like velcro.  At first, I assumed I must have forgotten to snip a few of the threads that held the cape in place, but it's just that the cape plasters itself to the dress with some crazy-powerful static.  It's hard to show this in pictures, but wherever the cape goes, the dress will follow.

As you can see, even when the cape is pulled (ripped!) away from the gown, a lot of the glitter stays firmly stuck to the cape:

The cape is a medium weight synthetic fabric that resembles a textured cotton.  It would drape nicely if it weren't for the insane static.  The cape fastens in front with a small square of velcro and is ornamented with a large bear button:

The dress has a nice sheen to it--more like the pale blue dress from the movie.  It closes down the back with two separate pieces of black velcro.

The dress has gold-trimmed tulle accents at the neck, elbows and wrists:

The shape and stitching of the dress look lovely, but my dress has a small hole starting on one side that makes me uneasy about the long-term durability of this garment:

Update 2/27/13: I discovered another (larger) hole in the dress:

This doll is missing the archer's glove that accompanied both the 12" Merida and the limited edition doll.  Merida's bow is the exact same bow that comes with the limited edition doll.  It is made out of plastic and white string.  

As my eldest son discovered, it actually works:

*No small dogs were harmed in the making of this blog.

There are some painted details in the arrow's fletching and on the limbs of the bow.

There's a hand grip so that Merida can hold the bow, but I had to enlist the help of some transparent rubber bands in order to get anything even close to a realistic archery pose:

Underneath her green gown, Merida is wearing brown shoes...and tissue paper:

Merida's Secret?

Her shoes are very plain brown slippers with slits down the back for easy removal:

The shoes have a molded canvas texture and a very simple design:

This doll does not share a body with the 17" limited edition dolls.  Although I have never de-boxed any of my limited editions, I can tell that they have articulated wrists and ankles.  This doll has only 9 points of articulation (neck, shoulders, elbows, hips and knees):

I find the lack of wrist articulation particularly disappointing.  The smaller dolls are so nicely articulated, it's puzzling that Disney would drop the ball on this.  I guess maybe it's hard to have arm articulation when the voice activation point is on the hand?  If so, why not move the voice activation somewhere else?

The knees have somewhat clunky-looking hinged articulation.  There is no rotational movement in these joints.

Merida can strike quite a few interesting poses, but to me, her stiff wrists make every pose look slightly awkward.  What makes the problem worse is that there's no rotational movement in Merida's elbows, so she simply can't move her hands into certain positions.  At all.  

She sits pretty well--better than her 12" relatives with hinged knees, anyway.

The doll has a small speaker on her back, decorated with a swirly heart pattern.  Underneath the speaker, there's a battery compartment that holds 3 tiny AG13/LR44 button cell batteries.

There's a small on/off switch on the doll's left side.  This discovery made my photo session a lot quieter.

The plastic body has a few defects.  There are some faint teal stains in several locations, most of them on the doll's back.  One arm has a deformed joint that is difficult to move:

The right hand has a small metal voice activation site, which is normal, but further up on the wrist, there's a small slit in the vinyl and part of a wire showing through:

Too creepy for a caption.

Merida is significantly larger than the classic 12" Disney Store play dolls:

Merida is also quite a bit taller than a Moxie Teenz doll.  She's similar in scale to a 16" Tonner doll:

Tonner's "Holiday Spark" Stella, Merida, Moxie Teenz Melrose

Here's Merida with Stella and one of my Cami dolls (Cami uses the slimmer "Antoinette" body):

Merida's dress fits the standard Tonner Tyler body pretty well.  Stella has no trouble getting into this gown, and it looks surprisingly nice on her:

The closure in back is a bit tight in the chest, but the close fit is barely noticeable:

I couldn't even get Cami into the dress because her hands are too wide.  Her splayed fingers were threatening to put a hole in the elbow of Merida's dress, so I gave up half way.  The dress was looking loose in the bodice anyway.

This is the new style.  Really.

Here's Merida next to Tonner's City Girl, Astor:

Astor has a much more slender frame, and so it's no surprise that the two dolls can't share clothes.  Merida's dress is loose on Astor and way too long in the arms, Astor's clothes are very tight on Merida and extremely short in the arms.

Not ideal for galloping through the woods.

I'll quickly show you my other two singing princesses.  They all share the same body and have similar overall construction quality.  Merida is the only doll who comes with an accessory and a two-piece outfit.

I love the different face styles that Disney offers.  Cinderella is from the 1950s, back when Disney animation was very realistic.  Ariel displays the more exaggerated animation style of the late 80s and Merida is a Pixar creation with a style all her own:

 

Ariel has a wedge-shaped face, huge eyes and flame red hair.  She has pierced ears and shell-shaped earrings.

Singing Cinderella has the same face as the limited edition Cinderella, but she's much more modestly made up.  Frankly, she makes the limited edition doll look a bit ridiculous.  Like Snooki-rella:

Singing Cinderella has an elaborate up-do hairstyle that I'm dying to take down.  I am so curious about how it would look.  It probably won't look very good down, though, and I don't want to ruin her.  I don't have the best luck with doll hair.

So, after all of this chat about these singing and talking dolls, it's about time I address the actual singing and talking, don't you think?  Cinderella and Ariel each sing a song from their movie--Cinderella sings A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes (in three separate--looooong-- sections).  Ariel sings Part of Your World...I think.  She sang that first verse like a champ when she first arrived, but when I got her out of the box, she would only stutter and say "I want to be..."  I'm guessing she sings her song in three sections, too, batteries permitting.  Merida, on the other hand, has a repertoire of seven different quotes from the movie, all in Kelly Macdonald's delightful Scottish brogue.  

Cinderella: Your hair is so swell, Merida.
Ariel: Yeah, totally bitchin'

You really need to hear these chatty dolls for yourselves.  I interviewed them for you:

Here are a few more shots of Merida in her favorite poses:

Botom line?  I love the Merida character, and I am a big fan of Disney Store dolls.  I was looking for this particular doll to be a compromise between the inexpensive 12" play dolls and the larger, pricier limited edition dolls. Basically, I was hoping for a play version of my limited edition Merida doll.  I am disappointed by a few things about this doll, but other features are better than I had hoped.  Here's the breakdown:

Disappointments:

Articulation.  Articulation is always high on my priority list.  This doll is missing wrist articulation, and her elbow joints don't rotate to compensate.  That's a double whammy in my book.  Also, I got a doll with a defective elbow joint.  I don't really like the articulation in this doll.

Clothes:  The outfit is very attractive with nice details, but the construction is a bit flimsy.  My Merida's dress already has two holes.   Also, the static connection between the cape and the dress is bizarre and distracting.  The clothing quality is probably comparable to that of the 12" outfits, but perhaps when scaled to this larger size, the shortcuts are more obvious.

Pleasant Surprises:

Talking: I love Merida's voice!  It is so fun to have a doll that speaks so many lines from the movie.  What I thought would be a dismissible gimmick is actually one of the doll's best features.

Face: This doll has a great face.  It might not be my absolute favorite Merida face (I still prefer the quirky 12" face), but I like how the serious limited edition face mold has been re-painted with a different personality.

Hair:  Merida's hair should be great, and this is pretty great hair.  I am a bit on the fence here, because Merida's hair should probably be spectacular, but I am happy with the hair, and I think most kids would find it a delightful, fun feature that bounces and moves like the hair in the movie.

So, I'm very glad I have the talking Merida doll, but I will not be that eager to plunk down $30 for any more of the singing princesses.  Disney does such a wonderful job presenting their beloved characters in the traditional 12" line.  The smaller dolls offer great play quality, a high level of articulation, and a surprisingly affordable price.  I wonder why I was looking for anything else in the first place.