Sunday Surprise: Bitty Pop! Disney Princesses by Funko!

I'm still in the process of gradually adding links to the List of All Reviews page, which is fun because it helps me remember some of my older stuff.  There are dolls on this blog that I'd completely forgotten about over the years, like Mattel's charming Kuu Kuu Harajuku Girls (they didn't last long...) or those strangely-colored but environmentally friendly AZIAM Girlz.  A pattern that I've been noticing as I go through the list is that I used to write more Sunday Surprise posts.  Or I feel like I did, anyway.  There was a period back in 2017 where nearly every other review was a Sunday Surprise!  These days, I'm lucky if I squeeze in three or four per year.

Some of my very favorite reviews (like Sweet e.Baby and WuvLuvs) have been Sunday Surprises, so I decided that I should try to remedy this deficit by adding more surprise-themed toys to the blog.  I'm eager to review the Disney Princess Surprise Tower sets that were recommended to me a few weeks ago, and have those in the queue, but I've been looking at so many Mattel dolls lately, I need a change of pace.

So, with Disney Princesses on my mind, I went on a hunt for more surprise dolls.  And guess what?  I discovered that Funko makes mini versions of their Disney Princess characters!  Eee!  I love minis, and I love Funko and their Disney figures!  Even better, each set of tiny Princesses comes with a mystery character.  Perfect.  So, today I'll take a look at Funko's Bitty Pop! line and uncover a few adorable mystery Princesses:

Funko Pop! Cinderella 222 with a pyramid of Bitty Pop! Princesses.

I had an amazingly fun time exploring the Bitty Pop! toys online.  Not only is there a comprehensive collection of Princesses, but there are a ton of other characters, too.

For example, there are Bitty Pop! Friends:

And characters from Avatar: The Last Airbender:

That Aang looks amazing.

There are Stranger Things Bitty Pops:

And lots of Jedis (and droids) from Star Wars:

There are Harry Potter Bittys:

And Minions Bittys:

There are even random Pixar Bitty Pops:

Aw!  It's Wall-E!

The strangest ones might be the Retro Toys Bitty Pops:

Play-Doh?  Really?

I bought these Lord of the Rings Bitty Pops:

Legolas is my favorite.

And I covet this set of Game of Thrones Bitty Pops:

With a dragon!

I could go on and on.

Despite all of the temptations, I tried to restrain myself and stick with only the Disney Princesses for today.  But you can see that there's something for everybody, and it would be easy to amass a huge collection of these tiny toys.

Each Bitty Pop set costs around $15.  Some are on sale for less, and some have risen a bit in price, but I've yet to see anything over $20.

There are four Princess sets at the moment, and, predictably, I bought all of them.  Let's get things started with the group that includes my favorite funky girl--Cinderella:

Bitty Pop! Disney Princesses by Funko, $14.99.

The sets come in small cardboard boxes with a plastic window at the bottom.  The window showcases three of the Princesses, but the fourth is a mystery!

The back of the box has pictures of all sixteen Princesses.  It also advertises the inclusion of a plastic stackable display shelf:

The Princesses are: Belle (peasant), Belle (ball gown), Pocahontas, Jasmine, Cinderella, Snow White, Aurora, Ariel (mermaid), Ariel (gown), Mulan, Tiana, Rapunzel, Merida, Moana, Elsa, and Anna.

I guess Raya is the only official Princess who's missing.  And it's odd that there are some duplicates (Ariel and Belle)...and that Elsa and Anna only appear as mystery dolls, and Elsa doesn't have an ice gown version.

I want this Elsa as a mini, pretty please:

Maybe we'll see her in the future.

At first I thought that the box picture gave away which mystery Princess was in each set, since a specific mystery Bitty is aligned with each trio:

That would be lame.

Thankfully, this is just a pleasing geometric arrangement with no association implied.  The odds of getting each mystery Bitty are shown next to that Princesses' picture, and it looks like Coronation Elsa and ball gown Belle are the rarest of them all.

I'm guessing that there are folks going crazy trying to get that lovely ball gown Belle, since there's only a one-in-six chance of her appearing.

This pretty much confirms that suspicion:

Yikes.

And a similar thing is true of Elsa, even without the ice gown:

!!

But, hey!  Maybe we'll get lucky.

The bottom of the box has a ton of copyright information and the like.  It also has a date, which I always appreciate:

It looks like this set is from 2023.  I can't believe these toys flew under my radar for two whole years!  Sheesh.

But that date doesn't forgive the absence of Raya.  Raya and the Last Dragon came out in 2021.  This Raya would be great as a mini:

Funko Pop! Raya 998.

Anyway, the sides of the box are decorated with more photos of the Princesses:

The right side has the three Princesses who are in this specific set:

That's just a coincidence, though.  The box design is exactly the same on all four sets.

The minis are nestled inside a molded plastic shell that pulls out of the main box:

The plastic storage shelf is packaged right above the Princesses, and is easy to miss.

The shelf is simple, with four compartments:

I'm pretty sure I have it upside-down here.  It's confusing, though: there are little plastic tabs on the top (or on the bottom in that picture) that help keep the figures in place.  These tabs don't work if they're on the bottom, though.  But the name "Funko" is molded on the side that's on top in my picture (which is why I assumed it was the top).

But let's take a look at these Princesses!  The mystery figure is nicely concealed, even when the plastic shell is pulled out:

I'll look at the three visible figures first, and save the surprise for last.

This set has Cinderella, Snow White, and Aurora:

Cinderella is a miniature of Funko Pop! Cinderella 222.  She comes in a tiny little hard plastic box with printed decorations:

Before I go any further, here's a quick word about the Funko Pop! numbering system: the way I understand it, each series of characters starts with number 01 and goes up from there.  So, for example, in the Disney line, Cinderella 222 was the 222nd figure made.  There might also be a number 222 in a different series, like Star Wars or Marvel.

The Disney line of figures includes more than just the Princesses, though, so the first figure wasn't a Princess, but was Mickey Mouse himself:

Makes sense.

The first Disney Princess was Snow White 08:

Also makes sense.

The number is specific to the mold, so dolls with the same mold but different paint variations will have the same number.  

So this is Aurora 325:

And this is also Aurora 325:

Incidentally, the Cinderella from my 2013 review, Cinderella 41, was the first Funko Pop! Cinderella ever made:

She's not valuable or anything, I just find it interesting.

But I digress.

Getting back to the Bitty Pops, the boxes are so small (about 1.25 inches tall and 1 inch wide) I had to maneuver my phone so that the lens was as close to the table as possible in order to get a fully front-on picture:

Bitty Pop! Cinderella 222.

The box is decorated on five of the six sides.  There's a little Cinderella face peeking up on the top of the box:

And the name "Cinderella" is printed in bold on the right side:

The back has a floral scroll pattern in two shades of blue, with "Disney" written in the middle and Cinderella sliding in from the left:

And the left side has the same blue pattern with a full picture of Cinderella:

The packaging does a nice job of replicating the larger version of this doll.  Here are the two together:

Funko Pop! Cinderella 222 and the Bitty Pop! miniature version.

The mini box is missing a picture of Cinderella on the right side:

And it doesn't have pictures of other minis on the back:

The tops of the boxes are very similar, though:

As are the left sides:

I think it's funny how on the larger doll's box, the nose on the cartoon Cinderella looks like a cheeky little smile:

To my delight, the Bitty Pop! figures can actually be removed from their boxes:

Yay!

Or, rather, the top of the box can be removed.  Cinderella stays attached to the bottom of the box.  This is nice, in a way, because that wide base helps with her balance.

However, if I had a super-tiny screwdriver, I'd even be able to remove Cinderella from the bottom of the box!

Incredible.

I don't even know where to find a screwdriver that small, though.  Maybe in an eyeglasses kit?  I don't have one of those lying around.

Let's take a closer look at Cinderella:

Like the larger doll, she's posed holding her skirt out as though she's dancing.  There's some nice molded detail in the folds of the skirt, too.  I also like how the hairstyle makes it so that only one eyebrow is visible.

From the back, the dress has a few flounces, and the hair is pulled up into a neat bun:

The paint job is okay, especially for such a small figure.  I like how the dress is multicolored, and there are even matching earrings.  However, there are also some obvious paint defects, like a chunk of missing blue paint on Cinderella's headband:

This is especially obvious on the right side:

For some size context, these toys are just a bit too large to be 1:6 scale, which is unfortunate.  They'd make great collectibles for Lena and her friends:

Barbie Signature Looks Petra holding Bitty Pop! Cinderella.

For those familiar with the larger Funko figures, I'd say that these minis are about twelve times smaller:

Regular Funko Pop! Cinderella and Bitty Pop! Cinderella.

There's a difference in construction between the Bitty Pops and the larger Pops, too.  For example, the larger Cinderella's dress is made out of blue and white vinyl, so only the light blue accents are painted:

I also believe that the hair is painted, although it's done so well that it looks like yellow vinyl:

Another difference is that the larger Cinderella can move her head from side to side:

The smaller Pops don't have any points of articulation.

Now that you've seen Bitty Cinderella in detail, let's take a look at the variety in these packs!  The next figure in Cinderella's set is Snow White 339:

Most of the Bittys have the same basic box design as Cinderella, with that plain blue background.  But a few dolls have more elaborate designs, like this pretty scene on Snow White's box:

It looks like a forest location, perhaps with Snow White's cottage in the background?

Before we look at the Bitty, here's a promotional photo of Funko Pop! Snow White 339:

I love the little bird!

And now here's the mini version:

This figure is really cute, and she even has a bird perching on her arm, which is remarkable, but my doll has bad face paint.  Several areas of skin-colored paint are rubbed away or cracked, leaving behind dark spots and lines that don't look very healthy.

Unlike the larger dolls, whose heads are flesh-toned with painted hair, the minis appear to have heads the color of their hair, with painted faces.  So for a doll like Snow White who has pitch black hair, any defect in the pale face paint will be ultra-obvious.

She looks better from the back:

I wanted to try and get a good look at that tiny bird, but it's hard to see in profile:

You can see him peeking out from under her big head here:

But I had to tip her backwards to get a really good view:

He has a little painted beak and two big eyes!  The paint is messy, but it's impossible to see that without the help of a camera's magnification.

Snow White is my least favorite Disney movie, by far, so it's hard to get excited about this character.  I haven't even seen the new live action Snow White movie yet.  I'm tempted, mostly because of Rachel Zegler, but it's not like Cinderella or The Little Mermaid where I have a strong connection to the original movie or character.  Have any of you seen the new Snow White movie?  Is it good?

Anyway, the third doll in this set is Aurora 325:

Her box has the same background design as Cinderella's, but it's done in a purple color.

For reference, here's the regular Funko Pop! Aurora 325:

I love the swirling shape of her hair, and how she's holding her dress out to one side.  I can practically hear those petticoats swish!

Now here's the mini:

She's really cute.  There's not quite as much flowing asymmetry in her hair, and many of the dress details are lost, but the basic idea is there.

Here she is from the back:

And from the side:

I like the little golden tiara a lot.  It's a great detail, and is painted well.

I put Cinderella, Aurora, and Snow White into their plastic display:

Now it's time to reveal the mystery doll!

The black sleeve prolongs the mystery to some extent, but because there's a picture of the doll on top of the box, the secret is revealed pretty quickly.  Maybe you can already see who it is from this picture?

If not, all I have to do is tilt the camera a little bit:

It's Coronation Elsa!

This is one of the rare dolls, which is exciting!

I still wish it was Elsa with her ice dress.

This box has a unique design, with flowers and an ice-like pattern:

Frozen fractals all around.

There's a similar pattern on the side:

The regular-size Coronation Elsa 118 looks like this:

There's not a lot of drama with this doll, and the hair seems very tame for the Elsa character, but I like her fancy crown, and all of the details in the dress.

Here's the mini version:

She's a good replica, but the details in the dress are missing...which makes sense given the size.  I like how the mini Elsa's arms are out to the side.  This looks more expressive than the original.

From the back, Elsa's hair is tied up into a swirled bun that looks like candy:

The best hair detail is along the left side, where there's a thick twist or braid running over Elsa's ear:

Now I have a complete set of four!

This is a nice collection of Princesses, too.  Snow White is the weak link for me, especially because of her bad face paint.

However, I was charmed enough by the first group to quickly rip open a second box!

As I mentioned before, the packaging is exactly the same on all of these boxes, with the same pictures on the back and sides.

This group includes mermaid Ariel, Mulan, and Tiana:

There's a nice assortment of colors and box designs in this trio!

First up is Ariel:

She has a lovely purple castle scene on the back of her box:

The regular Funko Pop! Ariel 563 is mounted on a clear blue stand so that it looks like she's swimming:

The mini has a different tail shape.  She's not elevated by a stand, but looks like she's kneeling on the sea floor:

I like that mini Ariel is holding her bag, but the paint in this area is pretty messed up.  The flesh color from her right hand is bleeding onto the strap of the bag, and the paint from the bag is encroaching on the top of Ariel's fin.  And that purple bikini top looks more like a bowtie.

Also, while Ariel's face paint is uniform, there's a chunk of something just above her nose that got trapped in the paint.

Her hair is a bold red color, with minimal molded texture:

The next character is Mulan 166:

I haven't seen the Mulan live-action remake either.  Maybe I'm just over Disney remakes.  Ask me again when live action Tangled comes out.

Mulan's box has a purple theme with a firework design:

Regular Mulan 166 has a long, thin body and Shan Yu's jagged sword:

This figure has a stoic, serious look, which is a strange thing to say given that all of the mouthless, wide-eyed Funko character look pretty serious.

Here's mini Mulan:

I like the overall look of this figure a lot, but she's not long and thin like her larger counterpart.  And her complexion is notably different.

The paint on her outfit is a bit of a mess, too, with the blue from her sleeves going everywhere, and not enough red in her belt:

From the back, you can see the red of the belt:

The third character in this set is Tiana 224:

The box has the same generic blue pattern as Cinderella's box.

This version of Tiana is wearing her blue masquerade dress, which I think is really beautiful.  Here's the regular version of the doll:

There's also a Funko Pop! Tiana wearing the classic green dress:

But I have to say, I prefer the blue dress.  Maybe because it reminds me of Cinderella?

Anyway, the mini version is great:

I don't see too many paint defects, and I love the shape of the dress and the position of the arms.

The hairstyle and tiara look good, too, especially from the back, where there's a delicate blue ribbon adorning Tiana's bun:

Okay!  It's time for another surprise!

I was hoping to avoid a repeat, but that seemed unlikely given the rarity of Coronation Elsa.

Can you make any guesses based on this next picture?

I see brown hair, not blonde, so it's not a repeat!

Here's a better look:

Oooh, no, that's red hair!

Indeed, it's the human form of Ariel:

Once again, this box has the same blue pattern as Cinderella's box.

The regular Ariel 220 is lovely, with graceful arms and a swishing dress in two shades of pink:

Her left arm is so elegant and graceful.

The mini doll's dress is great, but her arms are in a different position:

Her left arm is trying to swim.

Poor Ariel, though.  Her face is plagued with little spots of missing paint:

Could we call those freckles?

Keep in mind, though, that defects like this are nearly imperceptible to the naked eye.

From the back, the hair is almost identical to mermaid Ariel's hair, but there are cute little pink bows on either side:

I like this set almost as much as the first one, but of course nobody can replace Cinderella in my heart.  I particularly like the bookend Ariels in this group:

And I like the land-dwelling Ariel better than the mermaid, which feels wrong.  But I guess Ariel prefers that version of herself, too, so it's fine.

After two boxes and $30, I have a pretty good collection of mini Princesses!

I'm not mad about spending $30 for these dolls, although perhaps it's a little high.  On the other hand, if Elsa alone can sell on eBay for $30, then I'm money ahead.

My favorites so far are Cinderella, Tiana, Aurora, and land Ariel.  My least favorite is Snow White--mostly because of her bad face paint defects.

Let's see if the third group can measure up! 

This set includes peasant Belle, Pocahontas, and Jasmine.

First up is Peasant Belle, or Belle 90:

Her box is decorated in green, with the firework pattern.

There are lots of larger Funko Pop! Belle dolls on the market.  My favorites are probably the ball gown versions, like 221:

Or 242:

The rare Bitty Pop! is a mini of Belle 242.

I also really like the winter Belle, 1137, with her tiny red bird:

There are several peasant Belle dolls, too, the most interesting of which is 1132, where she's holding up the mirror with Beast's face:

She looks fierce!

The least interesting (but most traditional) is the one that the mini is based on, Belle 90:

Let's see how the mini compares!

This is a really nice replica, I think in part because the original doll is so simple.  The hands are in a slightly different position, with both of them grasping the basket in front, but the paint is good and the colors in the dress are bright and clear.

I also like how the hair is tied back with a blue bow:

Very cute.

The second doll in this set is Jasmine 326:

The larger Jasmine 326 is really fun.  She has an interesting shape to her long hair, and her arms are extended beautifully--almost like she's dancing:

The outfit is also nicely done, with a bare midriff and little jewels accenting the waist and neckline.  Also, somehow that overskirt is painted to look translucent, which is cool.

The mini captures some of these features:

No translucent skirt, though.

There's a remarkable amount of detail in the outfit, with little gold accents and everything:

I think the gold part at the bottom is meant to be a foot, which is a little awkward.  But everything else looks good.

And I love the shape of the hair:

The third doll in this set is Pocahontas:

This box is purple, with the firework pattern.

I haven't see the Pocahontas movie in over 30 years.  I wonder how it holds up?  I've karaoked Colors of the Wind many times, though, and that holds up just fine.

This Bitty is based on Pocahontas 197, who is really cute:

I love her bare feet.

The mini is a decent replica, but her arms are in a different position, and she's wearing shoes!

But the paint job is good, and I actually like that more dynamic arm pose.

Here she is from the back:

This set came with a plastic display shelf, but it's not quite the same as the others.  There aren't any tabs on top to help keep the dolls in place:

Smooth sides all around.

Also, this shape doesn't stack onto the other shelves very well.

But never mind that, we have a mystery doll to uncover!

This doll was packaged slightly differently.  Rather than a loose plastic sleeve, she came shrink-wrapped in dark plastic:

This makes it harder to sneak a peek at which doll it is from the side...

But it's still pretty obvious from the top:

Yep.  It's another Coronation Elsa:

She doesn't feel very rare to me right now!

The great thing about this is that it gives us an opportunity to compare two versions of the same Princess:

They're very similar, but the newer Elsa, on the left, has heavier and brighter eye makeup, and her head is tilted a bit to one side.

Here's my growing collection:

Jasmine has joined my list of favorites now.  I just wish I could stack all of the shelves in a secure way.

Okay, this is it!  The final box:

I'm very excited about this group because it includes Rapunzel, Merida, and Moana.

I'll look at Rapunzel 223 first:

The larger Rapunzel 223 is fantastic.  I actually bought her because of this mini:

I love all of the flowers in her hair, and her bare feet, too!

I covet Rapunzel 147, too, with her long, loose hair and Pascal figure:

The larger figures cost about the same as the Bitty Pop! sets, so between $12 and $20.  I have yet to see one that's dramatically increased in price, so they must be made in large editions.

I adore the Bitty Rapunzel, even though she has a few paint defects:

Her pose is great, and her hair is very pretty.  She has some globs of skin-colored paint all along her hairline, though, and the sleeves of her dress are a mess:

But the flowers in her hair are nicely done.  I just wish that the braid wasn't a separate piece of vinyl:

Here's the hair from the side:

This is probably my favorite mini of them all (sorry, Cinderella!).

Next up is Merida, and I was excited to see how her bright red curls were handled:

Even before getting her out of the box, I could see that there are some hair issues.  She seems to have a lot of skin paint in her hair.

But the full-sized Merida 324 is amazing, so I had high hopes:

I mean, she's got everything.  Her hair is great, her dress is blowing in the wind, and she's carrying her bow!  Love, love, love.  I might have to buy her, too.

The mini is underwhelming by comparison:

First of all, the hair that should be streaming out to the left of her head looks like it was chopped off.  That's no good.  Maybe it was too big for the box?  The color of the hair is wrong, too.

Here's the hair from the side:

Where did it all go?

And in addition to the globs of face paint in the hair, the outfit is a hot mess:

The bow is completely camouflaged by dress paint, and the laces on the left arm of the dress are all over the place.  Sigh.

The dress looks fine from the back, but the hair looks like a pile of leaves.  I don't see any curls:

So that was a disappointment.  Maybe Moana can make up for it?

The number on this box is really faint, but it's Moana 417:

Her box has a beautiful island scene with crashing waves in front:

This Ceremonial Moana is a strange version to choose for the mini, though.  The tuiga headdress appears only briefly in the movie, and it covers all of that beautiful hair!  Still, the detail on the larger doll is great:

Let's see how the mini compares:

Not bad!  The tuiga doesn't stick up as much as it does on the larger doll, but the painted detail is good.

And the outfit is decorated well, too, even from the back:

All right, we have only one more mystery doll to open, so I hope it's a good one!

This box came in another loose black plastic sleeve:

So I peeked over the top...

And...

This is what I found:

It's another Ariel:

That's okay, though!  I really like this version of Ariel, and the second one has a much better paint job--with no "freckles."  Here they are side-by-side:

I purchased all of my Bitty Pop! sets online, but as you can see, it would have been better to buy them in person, so I could check for little defects and find the best possible group of dolls.

Here's my full collection, with only two repeats!

This is a lot of dolls for $60...but $60 is a lot of money.  It works out to about $3.75 per mini, which I could argue is reasonable--especially given how expensive miniatures can be these days.  But I would've been more comfortable with something in the neighborhood of $2.50 per doll, especially given the frequency of the paint defects.

I also might have preferred the option to pay a bit more per doll and choose which specific ones I got, but then I'd have missed out on the fun of the mystery surprises.  And there's no denying that the sheer number of Princesses can make for some fun displays:

And all of them can dance:

Bottom line?  I love miniatures, and so these little dolls were a treat for me.  Some of the characters, like Aurora, Tiana, Ariel, and Rapunzel, are wonderful replicas of their larger counterparts, with great details and careful paint jobs.  Others, like Snow White and Merida, have paint defects or design features that make them harder to appreciate.

Regardless of their quality, all of these minis--for better or for worse--acted as highly effective advertising agents!  I've come away from this experience with at least three regular-size Funko Pop! Princesses that I'd love to own, and probably four Disney movies that it's time for me to watch or re-watch.

Overall, I'm pleased to have these minis in my collection.  They're fun to look at and barely take up any space.  I hope Funko comes out with more sets in the future.  For now, I'm left debating whether or not I should try one more time for that rare ball gown Belle.  It's tempting.