Barbie Extra Minis and Extra Mini Minis by Mattel

Spring is in full bloom here in New Jersey, which is always a spectacular sight to behold.  The number of flowering trees and bushes in this area is something that never ceases to amaze me.  Some days I feel like I'm walking through a fairy tale world.  The warm weather and beautiful scenery is not great for my productivity, though, since I'd almost always rather be outside!

Still, Lena insisted that I buckle down and finally write my Barbie Extra Mini review.  And she's not wrong to pester: I've been talking about this review since way back in December when I wrote about MGA's equivalent dolls, the Extra Iconic Minis.  The nice thing is, between December and now, Mattel came out with Barbie Extra Mini Minis, so I'll be able to include those dolls in today's review, too.  And before you panic, despite having a lot of miniature dolls to share with you today, I've done my best to keep this post from being insanely long.

Barbie Extra Mini doll #2 by Mattel, $16.99.

I'll start by talking about the Extra Mini dolls.  These cuties are about 5.5 inches tall, which is a size that I've been focused on a lot lately, with dolls like Penny's Box Antu and Adou, and the Bonnie series from Come4Free.

As far as I know, there are ten dolls in the Extra Minis series so far, the first eight of which are numbered.

This is number one:

Extra toppings.

There's so much going on in that outfit, with the sprinkle dress, the faux fur jacket, the mismatched shoes...and like a waffle-themed fanny pack slung around her chest??

The number two doll is the one featured in this review, so you'll see a lot more photos of her in a sec:

Extra bass.

Number three looks chilly with her ice-blue hair and purple lips, but I adore her grass-green smiley face outfit::

Extra frozen.

Number four has a relatively tame bear and bee theme:

Extra lint.

I love number five's coloring and her tie-dyed outfit.  She has one of the best promotional photos, in my opinion:

Extra shih tzu.

Number six is an explosion of rainbows and flowers!

Extra wavelengths.

I was curious about number seven's printed hair design, so I bought her, too, and will show you some pictures later in the post:

Extra hair gel.

Here's number eight:

Extra ego.

And I found two more dolls, who do not seem to be associated with a number. There's this one, who is wearing cowboy boots and carrying a milk carton:

Extra lactose.

And this one, whose leather jacket, flame dress, and fishnet stocking combo is more predictable than some of the other designs:

Extra fishy.

I really like the variety of clothing styles, hair colors, and skin tones in this group, but the $17 price tag is a lot to swallow for a small plastic doll.  

It was tricky to choose a restrained number of dolls to review, so I limited myself to characters that were on sale.  I was able to find all of my dolls for between $9 and $11, which is a good deal for this brand.

The first girl who caught my eye was number two.  I like her checkered outfit and her coloring:

The dolls come in fairly simple blister packs with no backstory or character information on display.  The cardboard areas on the package are brightly colored and appealing, though:

The back of the package pulls off very easily.  In fact, the back of this package was falling off when I first got it.

The dolls and stand are held inside molded plastic shells:

Extra plastic.

But there are also plastic ties securing various areas, including (of course) the head:

This doll, who I'll call Maria, comes with a bright blue stand, a purple boom box, and some green sunglasses:

The boombox has some molded details, including what looks like a smart phone:

I didn't realize that there were portable speakers like this with smart phone docks!  But there are:

And they even come in bright colors!

In any case, the entire back of the boombox is hollow, which looks cheap:

Extra space.

The stand came in three easy-to-assemble parts: a base, a back, and a waist grip:

The waist grip slides down easily, but the stand works.

The nice thing is, Maria doesn't need the stand for a lot of poses, since her balance is quite good:

Her hair was a little messy right out of the box, but it feels smooth and nice.

And it's long enough to touch the floor!

My first order of business was to remove the green sunglasses so that I could brush Maria's hair.  These came plastic-tied to her head:

Ouch.

The glasses are made out of plastic, with ear pieces that do not move.  There are slits in the plastic instead of lenses:

The glasses fit over Maria's ears nicely, and she looks cool:

Extra 80s.

These dolls have large, circular heads that remind me a little of Mattel's Ever After High or Enchantimal heads:

I think all of the Extra Mini dolls have the same face mold, with a closed mouth, a tiny nose, and painted eyes and eyebrows

I like Maria's thick brows, with their four little hair lines.  Her eyes are detailed, too, with what looks like glitter sprinkled over the iris and pupil:

I like the design of Maria's eyelashes.  Both the upper and the lower lashes have varied lengths and thicknesses, although this effect is more obvious on the upper lashes since they're larger and darker.

Maria has small ears with huge earrings:

I was eager to take the earrings out, because their intricate gemstone shape was getting tangled in the hair and making it hard to brush.  Unfortunately, the earrings are not removable.  I tugged pretty hard and they do not come out.

So, I left the earrings in place and checked out Maria's rooting pattern:

The hair is well-rooted, especially for a 5-inch doll.  I'm not sure why the scalp has skin-colored lines on it, though.  It would have looked better if the whole back of the head had been painted black:

I did my best to brush Maria's hair and get it untangled from her earrings:

The hair is mostly black, but there are platinum streaks that hang down from either side of the rooted center part.

I tied the long hair back into a ponytail so that it would stop getting caught in the earrings, and so that we could see Maria's outfit more clearly.

She's wearing a jumble of items, none of which really goes with any of the others.  For example, her earrings are silver, but her necklace is gold.  Also, her jacket is blue, white, and green, but the underlaying layer is pink.  It's all over the map:

The top layer is a boxy, blue and white checkered jacket with green stitching:

The jacket fabric is stiff, but feels durable:

For some reason the sides of the jacket came cinched together with plastic ties.  These were easy to snip out, but I have no idea why they were necessary:

Extra plastic ties.

The stitching is neat overall, but there are a few messy areas on the inside and none of the fabric edges are reinforced:

Underneath the jacket, Maria is wearing a pink and white checkered tank top with matching shorts.  On top of this, she has a gold plastic necklace that's rubber-banded to her body:

The necklace has a molded chain design with a music note pendant:

The knitted pink tank and shorts look cute, although a small piece of the tank top's hem is hanging down and unraveling:

Here's the outfit from the back:

The tank top opens in back with velcro and is easy to use.  You can see why part of the hem was unraveling, though; the seam allowances are super-small and uneven:

The shorts have an elastic waist and are also easy to get on and off.  These look more durable than the tank top:

A pair of white plastic high-heeled boots completes the look:

These boots do not have much detail, but they slide on and off without any trouble:

Maria has fashion feet, so she's unable to balance without her boots.  I took this opportunity to test out the stand:

The stand is fine, but the pole and grip are set at the very back of the base, so the whole thing is prone to falling over backwards:

Maria has a dense, all-plastic body with nine points of articulation.  From the back, you can see her molded heart underpants and a few copyright marks:

Her neck is a simple rotating joint, so she can only look from side to side, not up and down:

Her shoulders are rotating hinges that allow her arms to lift straight up away from her body to about shoulder height:

She can also spin her arms around...although those earrings get in the way and have to be moved!

Maybe I should count the earrings as separate points of articulation??

Her elbows are also rotating hinges, and they can bend to about 90 degrees:

Even though she does not have any wrist articulation, Maria can easily touch her face:

She can even whisper secrets!

Her hips are rotating hinges, but they don't allow her legs to move very much from side to side:

Her front-to-back splits are not complete, either, but they're close:

She can sit on the ground with her legs together:

And she can kneel on two knees (with some balance challenges):

Or on one knee:

She can sit in a chair well, too, and can even cross her legs in this position:

And with the stand in play, she can strike some action poses:

I'm pleased with Maria's articulation.  She may not have the flexibility of a doll like Street Series Adou, but in the spectrum of Mattel's play dolls, she's near the top of the pack.  She certainly has better articulation than a standard Chelsea doll.

Maria has a good amount of detail in her tiny hands and feet, too, although I wish that the shape of her hands was slightly more expressive:

Extra claps.

For some reason I find her feet ridiculously cute, with those little raised arches:

At 5.5 inches tall, Maria is about the same height as a Chelsea doll or my Street Series Adou:

From left: Barbie Chelsea, Barbie Extra Mini, and Street Series Adou from Penny's Box.

This Chelsea (the Cutie Reveal toucan) has similar articulation to Maria, but you can see that Maria's hair is nicer.

These little dolls can all share some items of clothing.  For example, here's Adou wearing Maria's tank and shorts:

The jacket is a little big, but it's meant to be boxy:

And Maria can wear some of the Penny's Box clothing, like this bear dress from my Natural Wonderland Antu:

That bear dress is a very different look for Maria!  And it's nice that underneath all of the exuberant clothing, she's a versatile little doll...if only those earrings could come out.

Maria is quite a bit shorter than an MGA Extra Iconic Mini, and she has a much larger head:

Barbie Extra Mini (left) and MGA's Extra Iconic Mini (right).

Still, the torso shapes of these two dolls are not that different, so Maria is able to wear Ella's outfit:

The shoes don't fit, but everything else works:

And Ella can wear Maria's outfit, too (again--excluding the shoes):

Last of all, here's Maria next to a standard Barbie doll, my patient assistant, Lena:

Don't you mean extra patient, Emily?

I enjoyed playing with Maria.  I wish I still had some Ever After High dolls hanging around (I might?  I haven't found them yet), because I think these Extra Minis could make cute little sisters for those dolls.

Almost nothing about Maria's outfit matches, and the only cohesive theme is the checkered pattern.  That kind of thing usually bothers me, but I understand that these little dolls are meant to be over-the-top, and so it works.

When I was looking at the Extra Minis dolls online and in stores, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to relate to the large heads and slightly blank faces, but I found myself quite engaged with Maria.  Sometimes she looks serious to me, and other times I feel like I can see her smiling:

And while I often set smaller accessories like necklaces or sunglasses aside and forget about them, I feel like Maria should be wearing her full, extra look:

The second doll that I purchased is number seven.  I really like her outfit, and I wanted to investigate the text that's printed on her bangs:

I named this doll Jola, which means "violet flower."  She comes with a bright green stand, black sunglasses, and a teddy bear backpack.  She also has a white headband that's plastic-tied to her head:

Jola herself has pretty good balance, although not as good as Maria.  She has a dark skin tone that often gets overexposed in my photos, and bright purple hair:

Her bangs are plastered into a stiff sheet, and the words "extra cute" are painted across them in dark blue:

The back of her hair is layered and shorter than Maria's hair, with some silver tinsel strands scattered throughout:

Jola's outfit is basically an oversized sweatshirt dress, made in a patchwork of bright colors.  I love the yellow pull ties at the neck (even though they're only decorative), the rib knit trim at the bottom, and the fact that Jola can tuck her hands into the front pocket!

The whole dress opens down the back with velcro, so it's easy to use:

Jola's boots are more detailed than Maria's boots, and she has mismatched leg warmers on top of them:

The sweatshirt dress has a large orange hood in the back:

I tried to pull the hood up over Jola's head, but her earrings and long hair made this a challenge:

Extra uncomfortable.

I really wanted to yank these earrings!  But something was keeping them from coming all of the way out:

You know me, I can't leave stuff like this alone.  So, after I was done with most of the photos for this review, I went back and heated Jola's head to see if I could pry the earrings out that way.

And, sure enough!  With a little heat, this earring pulled right out:

The earring post has a flared barb at the end that was keeping it securely inside the head.  This is a great safety feature for young kids (and a way to avoid lost earrings) but I love that the earrings can be removed with no harm to the earring or the ear:

Completely unscathed.

This means that earrings could be swapped between dolls, too, if you have the patience and time to heat up a lot of heads.

Anyway, back to Jola's outfit.

I gathered her hair into a ponytail, and this made it easier to manage the hood:

There's a hole in the back of the hood to accommodate the hair:

Extra room!

With the hair under control, I decided to try out the backpack accessory.  It's made out of translucent blue vinyl and has super-long straps and a bear-like face painted on the front:

The pack is a little stiff, and the length is very strange, but it's easy to get on and off:

Extra long.

I took the hood off and let Jola's hair back down so that I could brush it.  I used a small plastic comb to loosen the styling gel in the bangs:

After a few minutes of brushing, the words that were written in the hair all but disappeared:

With a quick rinse, I suspect the rest of the lettering would wash away. 

I tested out Jola's oversized sunglasses, which fit well, but don't allow her to see anything:

These are made out of solid black plastic:

And they have a molded pattern on the ear pieces:

Jola is a cute doll.  I like her outfit a lot, but I'm not a fan of heavy bangs or purple lips, so she's not quite my style.

Here are my two Extra Mini dolls together:

I really like Jola's detailed, colorful sweatshirt dress, and those mismatched leg warmers are a fun accent.  However, I prefer Maria's hair and face, and I don't mind her wacky, mismatched checkered clothing.

I'll confess that I also purchased a third one of these dolls.  Her color scheme grabbed my attention when I was shopping in person at Target.  I bought her after I'd already taken the photos for (and started writing) this review, so she doesn't really fit with the overall flow, but I figured I could show you a few quick pictures anyway.

This is number five, who I call Summer:

My extra, Extra Mini.

This is one of the more cohesive dolls in the collection, and I like her mix of warm, summery colors.  I especially love her brown and orange hair:

She looks ready for the beach, too, with her gold sunglasses and pineapple purse:

Those glasses are crazy reflective!

Summer's other accessories include a pair of green gemstone earrings:

And a gold plastic necklace with a simple (locket-like) pendant:

Her outfit is really great.  She's wearing a tie-dyed jean jacket with matching shorts, both of which have a lot of stitched detail and a cheerful mix of blue, yellow, orange, and a hint of green:

She's also wearing fringed turquoise cowboy boots with a lot of molded details:

The boots and earrings feel out-of-place with this outfit, but hey--that's the idea of this line, I think: start with an outfit that makes sense, and then keep adding stuff until it stops making sense.

The boots look sturdy, but they're actually bad at allowing Summer to balance on her own.  I had to enlist the help of the bright orange stand:

Underneath the jacket, Summer is wearing a simple knit tank top with clear vinyl straps.

Anyway, she arrived too late on the scene to be fully-incorporated into this review, but she's probably my favorite of the three Extra Minis I bought, so I wanted to show her to you.

I was charmed by the Barbie Extra Minis, but they're not miniatures of a larger doll.  In other words, they don't look like mini versions of regular-sized Barbie Extra dolls or anything like that--they have their own unique look.

The great thing is, there are now miniature versions of the Barbie Extra Minis!  These are called, predictably, the Barbie Extra Mini Minis.  This is such a fun idea, and it took me about 90 seconds from when I learned about the Mini Minis until I had two of them in my shopping cart.

There's a good variety of Extra Mini Minis already, but I've only seen three of them at my local stores.  As far as I know, there are six dolls in the original release:

That alien dress in the upper left corner is everything.

And then I've seen two more girls available for pre-order.  This rainbow-clad brunette:

Extra bow.

And this flower-themed cutie:

Extra boring.

One of the dolls that I found at my local Target is the blond girl from the first release:

Barbie Extra Mini Mini, $6.99.

I call her Elle because she reminds me of Legally Blonde.

Elle was packaged in a small blister pack with a bunch of text on the back:

Each Mini Mini doll comes with a small accessory and a stand.  The stands are adorable!

Elle's accessory is a translucent blue gummy bear purse:

The purse is solid plastic and doesn't open, but the design is really cute.

The stand has a permanently-attached waist grip and a cloud-shaped pink base:

Elle doesn't need a stand all of the time, though, since her balance is quite good:

She has long blonde hair that's cut into (messy) layers:

Her pink vinyl beret hat comes plastic-tied to her head.  In fact, there are holes punched into the hat specifically for this purpose:

Extra holes.

The holes have no use once the ties have been cut, and their presence detracts from the overall look of the hat:

It's easier to see Elle's face with the beret out of the way:

The beret left behind a dent in her hair that will probably take a while to relax:

I did my best to brush Elle's hair, but these dolls are really small, so it's hard to find a brush that will work!

The hair cut is scruffy, but the rooting pattern is good, and the scalp is nicely camouflaged:

Elle's face is an excellent miniature version of the larger Extra Mini faces, complete with thick eyebrows and differently-sized eyelashes:

And really intense eyes!

My doll has a blemish above her right eyebrow that I was not able to remove.

I was surprised and impressed by the detail in Elle's outfit.  She's wearing a skirt, a tube top, a letter jacket, and boots.  And of course she has massive earrings, too!

The jacket is pink with printed designs, including a row of hearts on the sleeves, and a bright yellow "B" on the front:

The stitching is neat, and the cuffs and bottom edge are serged for extra durability:

Underneath the jacket, Elle is wearing a white pearlescent skirt with matching top:

The tube top is so small that it curls up on itself when it's removed from the doll, but it has a little velcro closure and is actually quite easy to put on and take off.

The boots are simple and sturdy, with little slits in the back that make them easier to take off:

Underneath her impressive wardrobe, Elle has a plastic body with five points of articulation:

Her neck is a simple rotating joint, but her shoulders are rotating hinges that allow her arms to lift straight up:

Her arms can also spin around:

Her hips rotate on a peg joint, so she can't do side-to-side splits, but she can do front-to-back splits:

And she can sit on the ground:

I think her little fashion feet are dainty and adorable:

At just over three inches tall, Elle is more than two inches shorter than a regular Barbie Extra Mini doll like Maria:

Barbie Extra Mini Mini (left) and Extra Mini (right).

She's even smaller than a petite Blythe doll like this Littlest Pet Shop Blythe:

Barbie Extra MiniMini (left) and Littlest Pet Shop Blythe (right).

She's shorter than a Barbie toddler, too:

Barbie Extra Mini Mini (left) and Barbie toddler (right).

She's closest in size to a Barbie baby, like Marigold:

Barbie baby (left) and Barbie Extra Mini Mini (right).

But her features are definitely not suited to being a baby!

She makes an extra-weird baby, Emily.

I got Elle dressed again for a few more pictures:

I didn't bother to put her beret back on, since it casts shadows on her face, but I did get her to hold the gummy bear purse:

Those earrings get in the way a lot, and her hair can be messy, but Elle is a fun little doll with an impressive wardrobe and a great resemblance to the larger Extra Mini dolls. 

The second Mini Mini that I bought is this little one, who I call Rosa:

Rosa comes with purple sunglasses, a pink bow purse, and a purple-base stand:

I love her long, deep plum-colored hair!

Rosa is wearing a one-piece red dress with a lip print on it.  The dress has large ruffles at the top and bottom, but the design pales in comparison to Elle's three piece ensemble:

The dress opens all of the way down in back, and has little unfinished sleeve holes under the top ruffle:

The design of the purse is not as clever as Elle's gummy bear, but it has a lot of detail:

There are even some molded stitches and a molded zipper on the back:

Rosa's sunglasses are all purple (including the lenses) with a cat-eyed shape:

And her white sneakers are great, with a lot more detail than Elle's boots:

Rosa's sunglasses fit on her face:

But removing them from her hair messed up the smooth sides of the ponytail:

So I removed the ponytail holder, but Rosa's hair did not want to relax!

So I put the rubber band back in:

Rosa's face is a lot like Elle's, but she has baby hairs drawn around her hairline, and yellow liner around her eyes:

Her eyes look smaller and less buggy than Elle's, too, which helps focus her expression.

She has a little bit of shiny residue running down from her left eye, but this is hard to see in person.

Rosa has a lot of style and personality packed into three inches:

Here are Elle and Rosa side-by-side:

Elle's outfit and accessories are overall more interesting and intricate than Rosa's.  It's impressive to me that a three-inch doll is sporting a three-piece outfit.  However, I think Rosa's hair is prettier and easier to brush and style.  I also like the detail in Rosa's face, and feel like the extra bits of makeup give her a sassier, more expressive presence.

Neither the Extra Minis nor the Extra Mini Minis are in scale with regular Barbie dolls, and so they don't fit with that world, but they go nicely with one another.  Not only are the Mini Minis faithful miniature versions of the 5-inch dolls...

But they could even be used as big and little sister characters, assuming you don't mind a toddler dressed like a teenager.

Extra precocious.

Bottom line?  I'm glad that I waited so long to do this review, because it was fun to look at the Extra Minis and the Extra Mini Minis side-by-side.  In the end, they have a lot of the same pros and cons.

The cons are fairly uncomplicated for me.  First and foremost, the large earrings cause a lot of trouble on both sizes of doll.  I think the earrings look fun, and they add to the over-the-top fashion style inherent in this brand.  However, they get tangled in the hair way too much, and they make posing and dressing difficult, too.  Fortunately, the earrings can be removed with just a bit of dry heat applied to the dolls' vinyl heads.  The other thing about these dolls is that their stylized heads might not appeal to everyone.  They have extremely large noggins with huge eyes, and expressions that can look a little blank.  I didn't really like the look of these minis when I first saw them online, but they have grown on me a lot.  I feel like they are reminiscent of the Ever After High group, and I have a lot of affection for those characters.

There are many good things about these dolls, too.  First of all, they have great wardrobes for their size.  I'm particularly impressed with Extra Mini Summer's tie dyed jean outfit and Extra Mini Mini Elle's three-piece set.  The clothing is much better than what we're seeing these days on small dolls like Chelsea or the Barbie toddlers.  Some of the accessories are good, too, like Maria's green slit sunglasses or Elle's gummy bear purse.  I also love that all of the dolls, even the three-inch Mini Minis, come with functional stands.  And, better yet, they don't always need those stands since they have decent balance on their own.  The dolls aren't as highly articulated as the blind box BJDs that I've been looking at recently, but they have good articulation...if only their heads could look up and down!  The rotating hinge joints in the 5-inch Minis' elbows and knees add a lot of flexibility, and while the Mini Minis don't have elbow and knee joints, they do have highly-articulated shoulders, which are not commonplace among 3-inch dolls.

I also really like the variety and zaniness of this line.  The colorful hair, unconventional makeup, and outlandish clothing combinations have a joyful irreverence that makes me smile.  Some of the outfits are more cohesive than others, to be sure, but there's a wide range of styles.  I can imagine the designers throwing out most of the rules and just having a good time coming up with each doll's look.  And, as someone who often tuts and tsks about outfit and accessory pairings that don't match or coordinate effectively, in this case I find that I don't care--I'm just along for the ride.  And I'm curious to see what wacky things this brand comes up with next.

One of the reasons that I procrastinated for so long with this review was that I felt pretty sure that I wouldn't enjoy the Barbie Extra Mini dolls as much as the MGA Extra Iconic Minis.  The Extra Iconic Minis have more realistic proportions, which is something I tend to prefer.  However, now that I've de-boxed and played with both types of doll, my preference is not so clear.  I think both doll lines have a lot to offer, but the variety of choices in the Barbie Extra Mini collection, plus the added fun of the Mini Minis, gives Mattel the edge.

Extra photo.