Freaky Field Trip Gigi Grant and Toralei Stripe

A few weeks ago, my husband and I went to Target during their liquidation sales, and I was very pleasantly surprised to see the new Freaky Field Trip line on the shelves! I'd been looking forward to getting the Gigi from this line, so I picked her up for myself, and my husband really loved Toralei, so he grabbed her for me as a Valentine's gift. I love when he gravitates towards a doll, and those ones always join my collection! There is a third doll in this collection, Clawdeen Wolf, but I passed on her for now. She may come home with me eventually, but she didn't grab me nearly as much as these two!

This line is a great example to me of Monster High doing a budget line RIGHT. The details are creative and on-theme from top to bottom, and we even get a bunch of new accessories! I know not every budget line can have as much going on as these dolls do, and that simplified lines definitely have their place, but I appreciate this line so much for reasons that you'll see as we get into this review! As always, you can check out my video review of these two, linked in the sidebar of this blog!

Everybody have your permission slips signed? Then let's head out on our Freaky Field Trip!

I'm going to start with Gigi, because why not? This is only my second Gigi doll, so I've never reviewed her for the blog before! Gigi is going on a field trip to the planetscarium, and from head to toe, she s gorgeously designed. I also love how the backgrounds on these boxes coordinate to where they're going for their field trip. That's totally an unnecessary detail, having each character have a different box design, but once I noticed it, I really loved it. If I were an inbox collector I'd probably appreciate it even more, but as it is...the boxes, cool as they were, still got recycled.

Each of these dolls come with two accessories, in addition to their outfits, and don't come with stands or brushes. That's pretty standard for budget dolls, and I don't mind it, really. Most play dolls don't come with stands anyways, so the fact that Monster High does most of the time is a step above!

Gigi's hair is the same mix of hot pink and orange as her basic doll, only this time it's styled down and straight, with the front pulled back just to the side. There are a few creases in her hair from where it was attached to the box, but other than that, it's very smooth and sleek, and doesn't have any product in it. Yay!

I think Gigi has a very pretty face, and with her big eyes and the shape of her eyebrows, she looks very innocent. I also love the freckles across her cheeks! Her eye shadow is a mix of light blue and really shimmery gold, and it's super pretty. I love the gold especially! It's so shiny and sparkly without being glittery, and it really catches the light. Her lips are a deep pink that nearly matches her hair. Such a pretty face!

Accessory-wise, she's only wearing one, but it's a pretty major one! It's a large gold necklace made up of strands of stars and a large scorpion pendant. Scorpions are definitely a running theme throughout Gigi's outfit, which makes sense since her body has scorpion-like scales all over it, and her pet is a scorpion...plus, with her visiting the planetscarium, I'm sure she was looking for the scorpio constellation!

Speaking of constellations, the main reason I wanted this Gigi was her dress! I'm a sucker for the trend of putting galaxy print on everything, and this takes it to another level. It's a simple t-shirt style dress, with a piece of blue tulle attached just under the bust. If you lift up the tulle, it's easier to see the pattern on the dress beneath. It's blue and purple with small scattered stars as well as larger constellations all over it. I'm not sure if any of these are real constellations, but either way, I LOVE this dress and I would totally wear it!

Gigi's shoes have scorpions on the front, along with little curled up toes like "traditional" genie shoes. The heels are telescopes, and the shoes themselves are a lovely warm gold colour. These are a totally new shoe mold, and they are GREAT!

She comes with two accessories, and one of them is one of my favourite Monster High accessories EVER. It's not the telescope, though I do think the telescope is really cool. It's the same gold as her shoes, and is covered in scorpions and other designs that match her outfit. It's hollow, but I'm considering seeing about finding a rhinestone to glue in the end to mimic glass, if I can find one the right size!

The other accessory is simple, but sometimes simple is wonderful. Gigi comes with a purple sack lunch, with the Monster High logo on the front. I absolutely LOVE this accessory! It's just so perfect for the line and so adorable, and I want more of them for all my monsters. It just makes me laugh, and isn't that what toys are all about?

With the help of some rubber bands, Gigi can hold her telescope and go stargazing!

Also with the help of some rubber bands, Gigi can take her lunch along with her, and eat under the stars in the planetscarium! I really love every detail on this doll, and she is one of the best budget dolls I think I've ever bought, actually.

I could show off a lot more pictures of Gigi, to be honest, I just love her so much! However, a certain werecat isn't very good at waiting her turn, so let's move on and have a look at Toralei!

Her box is just like Gigi's, except for the inside. Toralei is visiting the ascarium (sometimes the punny names get a bit far from what they're meant to be...like this one ha), which is definitely the perfect field trip for a cat!

And here is Toralei! One slightly disappointing thing about this doll is that she's missing the gold fishbone bracelet she's wearing in the box art. This seems a bit odd, as Gigi is wearing her large necklace and Clawdeen is wearing a gold arm cuff, so I'm not sure what happened to Toralei's bracelet, but I wish it was included. It's not a deal breaker by any means though, as without it, Toralei is still pretty darn awesome.

Her makeup is very bold, with shades of of blue on her eyes and red, shimmery lips. Instead of lashes on her upper lids, she has thick winged liner. As you can see, my Toralei has a few imperfections, with her right eye being a bit closer to her nose than her left, and her left eyebrow not being perfectly smooth. I know that for some people, perfection on their dolls faces is very important and I definitely understand that, but I don't think my standards are as high as others. I noticed these issues while still in the store, but I decided that I still liked her enough, and wasn't bothered. Sometimes, having a doll that's a bit imperfect is actually something I enjoy, because I feel like it makes them "mine", if that makes sense!

Her hair is cut in Toralei's signature bob, and is gelled to high heaven. Instead of the more tone-on-tone streak she usually has, this Toralei has a bright teal streak in her orange hair. I think the colour combination is awesome! In addition to the stripes she has printed on one side of her hair, she also has fish skeletons printed a little bit crookedly. These stripes look really cool, but they also kind of...annoy me, because they prevent you from washing her hair. If you wash  her hair (or even brush it vigorously) to get the gel out, the stripes disappear, so you kind of have to live with the gel if you also want to keep the stripes. This is always a problem with Toralei though, not one specific to this doll, and with my basic Toralei, I've just decided to live with the stiff, sticky hair.

Her dress is simple in style, a mock-turtleneck, sleeveless number, but like Gigi's, the interest lies in the pattern. It's red, with blue slashes and black fishbones all over. It's very Toralei, and very appropriate for a trip to the ascarium!

Toralei's shoes are AMAAAAZING. Gigi's were pretty great, but Toralei's are seriously awesome. For starters, I love the translucent shimmery aqua colour, but the design of them is really incredible. On the front, there's a fish skeleton, but if you look at the back and sides, you'll see gills, eyes and a big scary piranha mouth! Not only do they go along with the ascarium theme, but they also fit Toralei's character really well I think. Super cool!

Her first accessory is a mounted anglerfish skeleton. This is awesome, because if you ask me, the anglerfish is pretty darn close to a real-life monster! They're so spooky! She also comes with a big collector cup, made in the same colour as her shoes. The lid of the cup is a shark's head, and the body of the cup has a variety of sea creatures molded onto it. It's really hard to photograph this, but I promise, they're there and they're neat! There are jellyfish, sharks, starfish...all sorts of things!

And that's Toralei, on her trip to the ascarium! I bet that's kind of like a tease...a whole buffet that she can't eat.

But at least she can get a delicious slushie, in a super cool collector cup to take home! What flavours do you think monsters drink? Booberry? Strawscary?

I think another thing that I love about this line is how colourful they are! I mean, look at these two together. So many bright colours! I'm easily pleased when it comes to things like that, honestly, but it just makes me smile to see so many bright colours together like this, and to add such fun looking dolls to my collection!

I'm really glad I picked up these two beauties! Sometimes I overlook budget lines, because my collection is at the point where something really needs to be special and to grab my attention in order to be added to it...but these two definitely fit the bill! This is Monster High at its best for me, a lot of thought going into every detail, and dolls designed well from head to toe. Yes, they're more simple than something like Sweet Screams or even Monster Exchange, but in this case, that doesn't make them any less impressive!

What do you think of this Freaky Field Trip line? Will any of these ghouls be finding their way into your collection?