WWE Superstars Eva Marie by Mattel

Well, I'm back in business with a new camera, thanks to my mom and a gorgeous little Cannon she didn't need anymore.  Thank you, Mom!  I'm still experimenting with settings, so these pictures are a bit flaky.  For example, the doll I'm looking at today, WWE Superstars Eva Marie, is not quite as much of a fiery redhead as she looks in many of my pictures (it's a bit more orange-tinged in reality) but she's every bit as fierce:

WWE Superstars Eva Marie by Mattel, $14.99.

The WWE Superstars fashion dolls came up in conversation back when I reviewed Mattel's Wonder Woman dolls, since Battle Ready Wonder Woman and Diana Prince have very similar bodies to the WWE Superstars.  I bought a few of the WWE dolls shortly after that review and--of course--it's taken me this long to get around to de-boxing them.  Better late than never though, right?  I'll focus mostly on Eva Marie in this review, but I'll also show you two of the other characters I bought.

The nice thing about my procrastination is that many of the WWE dolls are significantly discounted at this point.  For example, I paid $14.99 for Eva Marie at Target, but she's only $8.99 at Amazon now.  I'm not sure if the lowered prices are because the line isn't very popular, or if perhaps Mattel is just getting ready to release a new wave.

I chose my first doll, Eva Marie, for one fairly obvious reason:

She has red hair.

I actually found it difficult to pick which character to buy, though.  I couldn't simply pick my favorite competitor because I'm not at all familiar with the world of professional wrestling.  I did watch one WWE match back in my childhood, but I only watched because Cyndi Lauper was slated to make an appearance (I was obsessed with her back then).  Rowdy Roddy Piper actually attacked Cyndi Lauper during that show, and all of my friends and I screamed and threw stuff at the TV.  Good times.

Anyway, each doll has a photograph of the wrestler they're depicting on their box.  Here's what the real Eva Marie looks like:

Sassy!

Another reason I had a hard time picking a doll is that there are so many of them!

Every time I went out to buy one of these dolls, I'd look at each character that was in stock, but I'd also check the backs of all the boxes, looking for photos of additional dolls that might be available online.  Each doll seems to have a completely different group of other dolls on the back of her box, so I got quickly overwhelmed by the options.  There are a lot of subgroups in this collection that don't make any sense to me as a WWE know-nothing.

Here's the back of Eva Marie's box:

The other two dolls advertised on her box are Charlotte Flair and Becky Lynch (another redhead!).

I've counted at least 20 different dolls in the whole WWE fashion doll collection, and there might be more than that.  I've yet to find all of them nicely listed in one place.

The last reason I had a hard time choosing a doll is that, at least to me, many of them have unattractive faces.  The tough, sassy, over-the-top personalities of these wrestling celebrities don't always translate well into a doll face.

I like Eva Marie's face, though.  Here she is right out of the box:

She stands on her own, but tilts fairly significantly to her right side:

Her hair was a little messy at first (with a plastic tie stuck in the middle!) but this is a fairly accurate capture of her hair color:

Bright red with a hint of orange.

 Eva Marie's face looks a bit like a Barbie face, but the contours are more angular:

The angularity is most obvious in partial or full profile:

A little side note: you might have noticed that my doll has a black mark across her left shoulder that won't come off.  Here's a better look:

I'll pretend it's a tattoo.

Eva has a strong chin and a long, straight nose.  There's also something in the set of her smile that makes her slightly edgier than most Barbie dolls.

Incidentally, though, her mouth is not molded into a smile.  The smile is painted on.  It's a little hard to show this in photographs, but here are two versions of the same picture, one in which I've shaded the contours of the molded mouth:

I tied Eva's hair back to get a better look at her face:

Her eyes are light brown with tan highlights along the bottom of each iris:

The screening of the eyes is good, but the cheeks are not painted as nicely.  At first, I thought that Eva's left cheek had a paint defect:

The blush is in an awkward half-circle shape with some smudging off to one side.  However, the right cheek isn't any better:

It looks like the blush was meant to be applied as a faint red circle (bad idea) but neither side got the full application of paint.

There's also a molding defect along the right side of Eva's nose.  I'll pretend that's a scar.

Eva Marie comes wearing a black fitted tank top with the slogan "All Red Everything" applied in red lettering across the chest:

The tank has some messy stitching in the back where the sleeves attach:

A full velcro seam makes the tank easy to use, though, and all of the edges are finished:

Eva's pants are stretchy gold leggings with a black elastic waistband:

There are decorative pocket lines stitched on each side:

I like these pants a lot.  They're simple, but they're fun and really easy to put on.

Eva is wearing simple black vinyl sandals with no painted detail:

The clothing is simple, but it's reasonably well-made and easy to use.  I might try to remove the lettering from Eva's shirt, since I'm not a wrestling fan and I think the outfit would look great with a plain black tank.

Eva stands 11.5 inches tall and has eleven points of articulation:

Her torso has prominent shoulder joints and muscular arms and abs:

She has a exaggerated arch in her back:

With molded, flesh-toned underwear:

Her knee joints are especially obvious from the back:

This is partly because my doll has some whitening in the plastic around those joints:

She has a few other defects, too, like a black stain on her thigh:

And the all-too-common mottling in the texture of her legs:

Ramp up the quality control just a bit, Mattel, please!!

Her head can tip from side-to-side:

And she can also look up and down:

Eva's arms are made out of plastic but her hands are soft vinyl:  

Her shoulders, elbows, and wrists are all rotating hinge joints with a good range of motion:

Eva's hip joints are more limited in their mobility.  She can do only partial splits in both directions:

But she can sit in a chair nicely:

And the rotation in her knees almost allows her to cross her legs!

This rotating movement is stiff and feels forced, though, in part because of the overhanging shape of the kneecap.  It's almost like the knees aren't meant to allow rotation of the lower leg:

Eva has fashion-heeled feet with a cute little space in between the big toe and the second toe:

Maybe she can wear flip flops!

She also has two large holes on the bottoms of her feet:

Maybe she can drink through her feet..?

Eva's body is almost identical to Mattel's Battle Ready Wonder Woman and Diana Prince play dolls, with a few small exceptions:

WWE Superstars (left) and Diana Prince (right).

First of all, Eva has a different underwear pattern.  She also has more molded definition in her abdominal muscles:

WWE Superstars (left) and Diana Prince (right).

The Diana Prince doll has no wrist articulation (left, below) while Eva Marie has articulated wrists and soft vinyl hands (right, below):

The hand molds are the same.

The knee joints are not exactly the same in these dolls, either.  Notice how Eva's knees have more of the joint visible, and the shape of the upper leg is slightly different:

The dolls are similar enough that they can share clothing, though, which is fun:

Diana Prince wearing WWE Superstars outfit.

They also have a similar ferocity in their facial expressions:

Or at least similarly severe eyebrows.

I also compared Eva Marie to another Mattel Wonder Woman doll (the DC Super Hero Girls Wonder Woman) although these two have much less in common:

DC Super Hero Girls (left) and WWE Superstars (right).

Mattel's Black Label Wonder Woman, even with her more muscular arm molds, isn't much like the WWE dolls, either...

...which is a comparison I basically did back when I was reviewing the Battle Ready doll:

Before I redressed Eva Marie, I brushed her hair and took a closer look at the rooting:

The hair fiber seems prone to mats and tangles, but it's densely-rooted and looks full and lovely when it's freshly brushed!

I wanted to pose Eva Marie in some action shots (she's a professional wrestler, after all!), but she can't strike too many such poses, and she can balance on her own in even fewer.  This was the best I could do:

And the only other action shot I managed was this "light jog:"

Eva is pretty good at glamorous poses, though, like this:

And this:

And this!

She's actually quite a striking doll who was very fun to photograph.

I bought a second WWE Superstars doll because I wanted to investigate the more deluxe ($19.99) dolls in the line.  The only difference between these dolls and the $14.99 basics are that the deluxe dolls come with one extra outfit.

I chose Niki Bella this time because I thought she had a pleasant face and an elegant extra outfit:

The back of Nikki's box advertises three more of these deluxe dolls:

I really like Sasha Banks' green dress, too, but I never found her in the store to get a good look at her face.

Part of Nikki's outfit is a cute vinyl baseball cap, but it came plastic tied to her head in three places:

I carefully cut the ties off, but they still left three holes in the cap:

If they had just lined up the ties with the holes that are actually supposed to be in Nikki's hat, it would have been so much better!

Nikki comes wearing a red tank top, red shorts, black knee-high socks, and white vinyl sneakers:

She has a bit more of a smile on her face than Eva Marie does:

Her hair is a nice highlighted brown color, although the highlights are only rooted along the part, so the distribution is uneven:

Nikki has the same face mold as Eva, but her smile, her eye makeup, and her arched eyebrows make her look quite different:

Because the face mold doesn't actually have a smiling mouth, the more smiley the doll's painted lips are, the stranger the mouth looks up close.

I like how this doll has a slightly lopsided smile.  I'm not sure if it's a defect or if it's intentional, but it adds a lot of character.

Nikki has a band of eyeshadow over her brown eyes, and her blush looks a little better than Eva's, although it still ends abruptly on that outside edge:

I like Eva Marie more than Nikki, but Nikki is a more realistically-colored, friendlier-looking doll overall.  Here are a few pictures of her in her wrestling costume:

Her black knee-high socks have a band of vinyl at the top that prevents the socks from falling down.  This is a nice feature.  Also, the socks didn't stain Nikki's vinyl at all:

The extra outfit in this set is a black stretch knit dress with an accented neckline.  The trim on the neckline is ragged at the edges, though, which takes away some of the elegance of the dress:

Here's Nikki wearing the dress and the plastic high-heeled pumps that go with it:

I like how the shoes coordinate with Nikki's bright lips.

I'll have to try and fix that neckline because it really detracts from an otherwise great look.

There's some fun mixing and matching that can be done between my two dolls' outfits.  I especially like Eva with Nikki's red shorts and red shoes!

I have one more WWE Superstars doll to show you really quickly.

I bought this doll several months after I picked the first two.  I saw her on Amazon and thought she looked unique.  Also, she was only $12.

The Leaning Box of Asuka.

Her name is Asuka and she's modeled after a famous wrestler of Japanese descent.

There are three other dolls advertised on the back of Asuka's box (versions I've never seen before, of course):

I was drawn to Asuka's unique face mold, and also her bi-colored hair:

Her outfit is really simple, but I appreciate that it doesn't have any lettering on the front.  It's much more versatile than some of the other costumes.

Asuka's skin tone is lighter than Eva's and Nikki's, too, and I like this variability.

On closer inspection, I realized that Asuka does not, in fact, have a unique face mold.  It's the same as the other two.  Her eyes are set high on her face, though, and the style of her eye paint is different:

(She's also got quite a few paint smudges on her face, especially around her nose).

My new camera is not delivering on close-ups quite the way I want it to yet, so the picture of Asuka's eye isn't very good, but here's a side-by-side comparison of Asuka and Eva Marie's eyes so you can see the difference:

Asuka's eye (left) has visible dots in the texture of the paint, while Eva's eye paint is solid and bold.

Asuka's hair came with a lot of styling product in it.  I couldn't brush the stuff out, either.  It just crumbled into lots of dandruffy flakes:

The colors are great and the style is interesting.  There are wispy, angled bangs in the front, and then there's also a whole layer of shorter hair that goes all of the way around the head:

I like this doll, even with her lower-quality eye paint, smudged face, and crispy hair.

For some reason it occurred to me at this point to try the WWE Superstars clothing on one of my Curvy Barbie dolls.  

The tops are ok, but the pants and shorts are too tight at the waist and through the hips:

Curvy Barbie wearing WWE Superstars clothing.

Curvy Barbie wearing WWE Superstars clothing.

Here are a few pictures of Asuka in Nikki's black dress, which I think showcases her hair really well:

My favorite combination from the whole group of dolls and outfits is Eva Marie wearing Nikki's black dress and red shoes.  

There'd be no way to guess that this was a wrestling doll from these pictures, but maybe that's why I like the combination so much.  

Eva just looks like a striking, strong, glamorous woman with fabulous red hair:

Bottom line?  I'm not sure what the audience is for fashion doll versions of professional wrestling celebrities.  It's not a world I know anything about, so I can't even begin to gauge the scope or enthusiasm in this particular niche market.

What I can say is that the dolls have plenty of interesting characteristics, even from the perspective of someone who knows nothing about wrestling.

First of all, the dolls have a highly articulated, muscular body that makes them stand apart from Barbie dolls, Disney Store dolls, and other popular fashion dolls in this scale.  I really like the muscular body.  I find it more realistic than the skinny body of regular and Made to Move Barbie dolls (which I rarely criticize).  The articulation is also quite good, especially in the arms.  I wish that the hips were more flexible, and I also wish that rotation of the lower leg was smoother, but overall it's a nice body.

Second, because of the dramatic personas of wrestling stars, many of the dolls have unusual hair styles, colorful hair, or strong facial expressions.  While I'm not always seeking out dolls with wild coloring, I do enjoy seeing this kind of diversity on the market.  It's refreshing.  I also don't think all of the Superstars' facial expressions look very good, but many of the dolls (like Eva) strike a great balance between accessible and tough.

To me, the problem with this line (other than the overload of small manufacturing flaws) is that the dolls are being marketed exclusively towards fans of the World Wrestling Entertainment.  At Target, the Superstars are displayed far away from the other fashion dolls, mixed in with the male wrestling action figures and adjacent to movie and video game collectibles.  That's a great aisle, by the way, it's just not where I go when I'm looking for a fashion doll. Also, because the dolls come dressed in their character's distinct wrestling costume (sometimes with a slogan or a bold-lettered name dominating the design), there's not much room for kids to use the toy for more generic imaginary play.  The deluxe sets are a nice solution to this problem, but there are fewer of those than of the basic sets, and I have yet to see any stand-alone clothing packs.

I think Mattel should just add this body type to their increasingly diverse Fashionistas line-up.  I don't know what they'd call the dolls (Fit Barbie?  Athlete Barbie?  Muscular Barbie??) but I suspect they'd be reasonably popular.  I know that their wardrobe sets would fly off the shelves, many of them into the hands of WWE Superstars and Wonder Woman doll owners (like me!) who are looking for a change in style.