Doll Review: Slo Mo

Sloman “Slo Mo” Mortavitch is the latest Monster High male doll; he’s part of the slim box Ghoul Spirit line, and is currently quite hard to find.

This doll has had a weird history already – Mandy85’s Monster High release list on the MHArena tells us:

Earlier Slo Mo dolls have been erroneously found with clawed fingers, like Clawd Wolf, while more recent finds have been corrected to feature more “basic” male hands, as seen in his promo picture.  As only a small number of Slo Mo dolls have been found since the release of the Ghoul Spirit line, it’s rumored that the delay in distribution may have to do with the correction of his hand mold, though no official statement has been made to explain his initial scarcity.

I’m lucky in that once Slo Mo started showing up in stores again after he apparently got pulled from the cases and then put back in, he came to Canada before the US.  He’s still very hard to find here though, and has barely made it to the States yet.  Even here, I’ve only seen him the one time – I must have been at the store right after they stocked the shelves the day I found him.

Slo Mo is a character that has been showing up in the Monster High webisodes pretty much since the beginning (his original name was given as “Slow Moe Deadovitch,” but that changed later with the final trademark).  He’s mostly the typical zombie archetype – slow, lazy-eyed and seemingly stupid, often seen staring blankly into space – but apparently he has represented the school in a championship chess match, and as he wears a varsity jacket he must be Varsity level at something.  He also plays “casketball,” which I don’t understand since he is definitely not very quick or agile.  His bio, which has not appeared yet on the official website, says:

• Parents: The Zombies
• Age: 17
• Killer Style: I have to spend so much of my undead life making decisions that I don’t like to spend any time choosing what I’m going to wear. My killer style is plain and simple: jeans, T-shirts, trainers and my sports team jacket. This gives me all the more time for the really important decisions. Where I’m going to meet up with Ghoulia, for example.
• Freaky Flaw: I always take an unusually long time to think about things. I have to make enquiries and gather all the facts I need before I can say “Yes” or “No”. I don’t know if that’s a typical zombie flaw or if it’s all down to me. In any case, what Ghoulia says is that I’m spontaneous as a glacier.
• Pet: I need to do a lot more research before I can make a decision about picking a pet.
• Favorite Activity: There are two things- casketball and chess. I can’t decide which one I like best and I will not be making up my mind anytime soon.
• Biggest Pet Peeve: Monsters who don’t understand my sense of humour. I hate having to explain the punchline- it ruins the whole joke.
• Favorite School Subject: Advanced maths, even when it’s deliciously difficult. I think calculus is amazingly interesting.
• Least Favorite School Subject: Rhetoric- or, more strictly speaking, having to talk spontaneously in front on other people. I need time to prepare.
• Favorite Color: Purple
• Favorite food: Grave flakes with milk- it’s my best choice!
• BFF’s: Ghoulia Yelps and Deuce Gorgon

I’m sure one of the reasons they made Slo Mo into a doll is that he is shown as being Ghoulia Yelp’s love interest in the webisodes.  They’re not coupled up in every episode, but he’s a frequently reoccurring character and there’ve been a few webisodes where the zombie romance is the main plot – there’s one where Slo Mo takes a potion to make himself smarter so that Ghoulia will like him more (’cause she’s the smartest ghoul in school), and there’s another episode where Slo Mo and “Don of the Dead” fight over Ghoulia.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Slo Mo’s doll is part of the slim box “Ghoul Spirit” line – for more about that you can read my review of Ghoul Spirit Frankie Stein here.  This isn’t the first time a male Monster High doll has been released singly in a budget line, but it seems like most often they’ve been part of multi-packs, at least lately.

Slo Mo’s doll doesn’t look quite as much like the webisode character as some people may have liked.  The doll has the correct Lurch-like facial structure and partially shaved head with the blue hair, but he’s missing the wide body and signature uneven, wall-eyed stare of webisode Slo Mo; the sculptors made his face very symmetrical and actually rather intelligent looking.  One could speculate that Mattel’s people were concerned that Slo Mo’s derpyness might attract censure.  The box art for the doll tries to bridge the gap with a design that’s halfway between webisode and doll versions.

Speaking of the box art, Slo Mo has his own skullette now, which has sideswept hair and one smaller eye, both being features of the webisode character they did not carry over to the doll.  Ironic.

Slo Mo’s skullette appears twice on the back of the box, once at the top of the lined paper next to a gavel, and also at the bottom of the note next to a basketball.  We know he plays casketball, but wtf with the gavel – does he aspire to become a judge?

Moving on to the toy itself, the Slo Mo doll has the standard MH boy body, which is quite slim and jointed similarly to the female Monster high dolls, though the boys have an additional articulation point at the ankle (they have to in order to get clothing off and on their lower body).  His skin is an even gray color with a bluish undertone.

Monster High male dolls have roughly the same flexibility as the female dolls, though some of the joints don’t bend quite as far due to the male sculpt being a little bulkier, and the guys aren’t so great at doing the splits.

Slo Mo comes dressed in navy blue shorts, black & white high-top sneakers, and a purple t-shirt that’s screenprinted with the Monster High logo dripping black goo.  His only accessory is a pink plastic MH pennant flag.

They basically gave him his webisode outfit but with shorts instead of pants, the logo added to the shirt, and he’s missing his ever-present varsity jacket.  All of the items are very simple – this is a budget doll after all, but considering that he comes with no accessories, it would have been really nice if they’d stepped up the level of detail on his outfit just a tad – maybe painted more detail on his shoes or given him real trousers or the jacket.  But I shouldn’t complain – we got a single-packed, new male doll, and he’s my girl Ghoulia’s love interest at that.

The shoes do have sculpted soles, which is a cool detail I always enjoy on the Monster High dolls; Slo Mo’s shoes have a brain pattern on them:

His hair is a heavily gelled bright blue flat-top, and the sides and back of his head are flocked with a medium brownish-gray color; the flocking on the back is a little bit ugly from where it was pressed against the box, but that’s probably unavoidable.  He’s sculpted with a sort of half smile and for some reason they gave him semi-pointed ears like an orc or something.  His eyes, eyelids, and lips are ice blue, and he’s got a ring of greenish-grey around his eyes like eyeshadow.

This is the one Monster High doll that I would actually have preferred to have wonky eyes, and of course the one I found has, like, the most perfect facial screening I’ve ever seen on a MH doll.

He’s a very cool doll, but he’s not Slo Mo to me; he’s more like Slo Mo’s ideal of himself or something.  He gets along great with Ghoulia though.

Interestingly, despite them both being zombies and having the same skintone in the webisodes, the dolls’ colors are very different; Ghoulia has a much yellower cast to her skin, whereas Slo Mo is very blueish.  Slo Mo looks more like he has hypothermia than zombie-ism to me.

Slo Mo is really fun to play with though, and he looks great redressed, if you have/can find clothes that fit.  The best fitting pre-made clothes for MH boys seem to be Liv and Barbie clothes (the female ones – their boys’ clothes are too big), and some Bratz Boyz shirts and shorts (pants are too short); as for footwear, Ken shoes are the only ones I’m aware of that work on MH boys.  If you’re the sewing type, DG Requiem has some great-looking patterns for MH male clothes in her etsy shop.

Ladies love a zombie with mad guitar skills.

Braaaaaiiinnnsss…

pew pew pew

While there are some things I would have liked to see a little different about him, overall I am freaking ecstatic to have found a Slo Mo doll and am just thrilled to have him in my collection.The doll doesn’t match the webisode character quite enough for my tastes, but the MH boy dolls are often bad for that, and this is a really cool doll regardless.  I am a little worried about how much handling all that flocking on his head can take, and it makes it suck extra hard that he’s so hard to find, because I am worried about playing with him and messing up a potentially very rare doll (though he hasn’t been fully distributed yet, so we’ll see).  He’s so fun to play around with and photograph though, and is surprisingly versatile depending on how he’s dressed.

It’s so fantastic to see a new male doll added to the Monster High lineup, and Ghoulia’s zombie love interest at that.  We’ve seen so few dolls of Ghoulia in the last year and there aren’t any lined up for 2014, so it’s nice to see a doll that’s kind of related to her get released; it gives hope that we’ll see more of her in the future.

Good luck to everyone that’s looking for their own Slo Mo doll right now; here’s hoping that he will end up being common enough to land in the hands of all those who want him!