Review: Skultimate Roller Maze Frankie Stein

Skultimate Roller Maze is an interesting line. Based on the price point and accessories it seems to be a "budget" line, a la the beachwear lines. SRM obviously isn't a beachwear line so I guess it fills the same slot Dead Tired did last year. If this is true it looks as though Mattel will be releasing two Monster High budget lines each year, a beach line and then a second one that will vary it's theme. I like this since it means an even wider variety of dolls, and keeps Mattel on it's creative toes. And while I don't always love the outfits and accessories within these lines the dolls themselves are another story. The doll I'll be covering in just a little bit, Skultimate Roller Maze Frankie Stein, is a perfect example of this.

Spoiler alert: this is gonna be a positive review.

There are five dolls in the line. Frankie, Lagoona Blue, Operetta, and Ghoulia Yelps are wide releases that are sold individually. Abbey Bominable is also available but only as a K-Mart exclusive (packaged with the Ghoulia doll). When the line was first announced I wasn't that excited about it; the only doll I planned on getting was Operetta. But when I saw the dolls in person I fell in love with them and now I have them all (yes, I have a MH addiction). While I'm not that into the outfits, and I don't even use the helmets and knee pads on the dolls, I adore their colorful faces and streaked hair. Frankie is my favorite of the five.

John is my fanboy.

This Frankie doesn't stray from the established template of her dolls -- her motif is lightning bolts and her signifying color is blue. Her helmet is solid electric blue with a lightning bolt molded into each side. It has a strap that can be fastened and unfastened on one side. She has electric blue knee pads with a skullette molded into the front of each one. Her roller skates are once again electric blue with little bolts molded into the sides of each one. The soles are solid black and use a jagged bolt as the heel. Each skate has two sets of working wheels, one green and one yellow. The skates are really cool. They are very pliable and incredibly easy to slide on and off. I wondered if the dolls would stay put on their stands since they are on wheels -- they do. In fact, if you balance the weight just right, the dolls can stand on their own in the skates.

Even though I don't particularly love the dresses on these dolls I have to say I think Frankie's is one of the better ones of the line. It's a one piece dress that goes about halfway down her thighs (it's pretty short). It's solid black with a print of small gears in magenta, electric blue, and neon green. It only has one strap, on her left, but there's a strap made of electric blue mesh sewed onto the other side. The side seams have a satin-esque detailing over them, light pink on her left, neon green on her right. It's a simple dress but it gets the job done. She doesn't have earrings or a necklace and bracelet. Let's take off that helmet and take a closer look at her face and hair.

Helmet hair

Her face is beautiful. She has neon green eyeshadow the goes around her entire eye in a thin strip. Above it is a strip of pink that goes partway to her eyebrows. The rest is filled in with an extremely light layer of silver, so light you can only see it from certain angles. Her lips are a very bright neon green. Reaction to it in the fan community has been pretty mixed, but I absolutely love it. This is a colorful, fun, youthful faceup for Frankie.

The base color for this Frankie's hair is white. The black streaks are a bit thinner than usual. Mixed in with them are neon green streaks. Of all the dolls I feel the green streaks look the best on Frankie, mostly because the neon is simply a better match with the black and white than it is with the other dolls' haircolors. I love her hairstyle. She has a sidepart and her bangs are sideswept. The hair goes about halfway down her back, too long to be considered short, but a little shorter than usual for Frankie. There is a very mild wave at her neckline. It's a loose, laidback hairstyle and I'm in love with it.

She comes with a neon green stand and collector's card featuring a drawing of her in her helmet. There's no brush or anything else in the way of extras. It seems the budget for accessories went to the helmet and knee pads, which makes sense, but is kind of a bummer for someone like me who isn't into the theme and doesn't use the skate gear.

Overall grade: A The only drawback is that I don't love the dress and skate gear. That's not a knock on their quality or design, it's more that the theme simply doesn't appeal much to me. The doll itself is amazing! She has a beautiful face and the hairstyle really appeals to me. It's also pretty unique among Frankie's dolls. This simple, carefree style of doll generally appeals to me more than the fussiness of the Ghouls Rule and Sweet 1600 type dolls.

All images: yours truly.