A not-so-quick look at Sensations Bopsy

Y'all may or may not have seen this coming.  This ties in with a post I threw up...ewwww, I hate throwing up.  Anyway, I posted back in July about Barbie dolls for our various birth years.  My birth year is 1987, and my doll turned out to be Sensations Bopsy.  Since it's my birthday once again, here's my birth year Barbie.  Dig that price sticker; when's the last time y'all saw a Barbie in stores for $5.97?

If I recall correctly the 1980's saw a revival of swing dance and fifties style, and I guess Barbie and the Sensations were a reflection of that.  That would certainly explain the saddle shoes and full skirts worn in the box art.

Barbie was the lead vocalist of her group Barbie and the Sensations, and her backup singers were Christie Belinda, Kira Becky, and my doll, Midge Bopsy.  Or they were named as such in the U.S.  Abroad the line was called BiBops, Bopsy was "Becky," Becky got the dumb name "Bibi," Belinda was omitted completely, and a new guy named Bobby joined the group.  My doll is an American release and is named as such.

Poor ol' Bopsy didn't get a swirly skirt like the others did.  She's wearing a pair of capris, or "pedal-pushers," as they once were called.  Oh well, pedal-pushers/capris are comfy and never go out of style.  Besides, Bopsy does have her cute little saddle shoes in tow.  Look hard, 'cause they're there!

When's the last time y'all saw saddle shoes on a playline Barbie???  For me it's been awhile!  But shoes come later.  Here's my usual full-body shot of the doll I'm reviewing.

Surprisingly, this doll's box was...well, full of surprises.  The first one wasn't so great.

Fade marks.  I guess this wasn't much of a surprise, since for some weird reason Barbie dolls from this era can get these.  My California Dream Midge, renamed "Sophie," had bad fading too, so bad that her whole lower left leg was this weird jaundiced shade instead of the normal tan.  I ended up rebodying Sophie because some little brat chewed up her feet, so I can't show y'all how bad the fading was.  But trust me:  the fading was BAD.  Because she was in her box all this time Bopsy has been safe from the gnashers of destructive little crotch goblins, but she's not safe from the ravages of time.  Oh well, I'll just pretend that she has vitiligo like my Fashionista Chantelle does.  

Luckily the faded spots were the only bad surprise Bopsy had, and as previously stated they weren't too terribly surprising.  She came with several inserts, some made of cardboard and some made of paper.  There are these goofy-looking shapes, which I'll discuss in more detail in a bit.

She also came with a pop-out jukebox and five little records.  The box has a slot for the records to slide through.

Another of the inserts was a mail-in slip to become a Barbie Fan Club member.

That would've been fun!  Too bad this particular slip expired March 1st, 1989.  I wasn't even two then.

The back has your usual blather about warranty.

Here's Bopsy's hair.  She doesn't have as much of it as other Barbie dolls of the era did, but she's got enough!

To give y'all an idea of how big Barbie hair could be in the eighties, here's Benetton Kira's hair.  She's got a LOT of it!

Here's how Kira's mane compares to Bopsy's.  I love Kira's hair, but I prefer Bopsy's shorter style for maintenance reasons.

As I noted above, Bopsy is Barbie's requisite red-haired friend...except that her hair is not as red as Diva's or Midge's or Dance Club Kayla's was.  I'd call this color strawberry blonde.  Bopsy wears said strawberry blonde hair in two wrapped pigtails, and thank goodness for those wraps because her rubber bands are beginning to give out.

The rest of her pigtails fall in soft, loose curls.  As I said above, they don't need much maintenance.

She has fluffy bangs up front, probably the kind that would stick straight up if mishandled, like Sophie's bangs do and like Kira's would like to do.

About what I've grown to expect from eighties Barbie dolls.  Bopsy's hair is soft and a pretty color, but this is also the kind of hair that frizzes super-easily, so I'll have to be gentle with it.  Granted, keeping the frizzies away will be easier with Bopsy than it will be with Kira. 

Here's a close-up of the face.  I can already tell y'all that I'm gonna have fun with this one!

Bopsy has the Diva head, which was named after Bopsy's predecessor Diva, a member of Barbie and the Rockers.  The Diva head saw heavy usage during the eighties and nineties, being utilized by Diva, by Bopsy, by Kayla, by Midge, and by Barbie herself on more than one occasion.  I'm not a huge fan of the face, as it can look sullen or grumpy from certain angles, and also because I sometimes mistake it for the Mackie face, which has a warmer smile.  But the Diva face can also look adorable too, depending on the paint job and how the head itself is tilted.  In Bopsy's case I don't pay much attention to her expression because I keep focusing on her eyes.  Her neon green eyes, which make me think of Alice Cooper's "Poison" rather than the Stray Cats' "Stray Cat Strut."

Yep, poison green eyes, with a lot of blue eyeshadow, no less.  The Sensations aren't as heavily made-up as the first line of Rockers, which suits me just fine since Diva and Barbie went just a bit overboard with their eyeshadow.  For that matter, my old friend Dee Dee did too, but I like Dee Dee's makeup because it looks like flames.  Diva and Barbie toned it down for the second Rockers wave, so that's saying something.  Anyway, Bopsy's unnatural eye color reminds me a lot of Wild Hair Sindy's and Jewel's, even though Sindy and Jewel have lavender eyes rather than poison green.  One thing's for sure, these eyes leave no question that this doll is Bopsy and not some other doll.  In the past I've had questions about an eighties doll's identity, and the eyes were the only way to tell, kinda like these two.

I was only able to identify them as Western Fun Nia (left) and Animal Lovin' Nikki due to their distinctive eyeshadow.  Since their hair and their lips are the same, the eyes were the only way to tell.  I don't know where I'm really going with this rabbit trail, but keep makeup style and eye color in mind if you're trying to ID an eighties-era Barbie doll.

Since Bopsy has such unusual eyes it's probably just as well that she went for a simple pink with her lip color.  Kattis Dolls calls this shade raspberry, which is a fitting label. 

Attention-grabbing, but not ridiculous.  I like it.  I also have always liked the fact that the Diva mold has big, pretty lips, even if they can look grouchy at times.

"Diva" truly is a fitting name for this head mold!  I'll never be as smitten with it as I am with my beloved Steffie mold, but I do love the attitude it portrays.

Nearly all Barbie dolls wore earrings (usually huge ones) during this era, but I want to point Bopsy's earrings out.  They are blue disc-shaped studs with cardboard music notes.

CARDBOARD???  Y'all know how well cardboard holds up in the hands of kids, so why do it?  The answer lies with that set of pop-out shapes that I mentioned above and didn't discuss fully.

These came with a slip of paper that advertises Bopsy's removable earrings.

In a deviation from the eighties norm, Bopsy's earrings can come out, and one can switch the cardboard shapes that are attached to her studs, like so.

That's pretty clever, though I'll bet plenty of kids lost or swallowed Bopsy's studs as time went by.  My sister was notorious for putting things like this in her mouth, for example, and one day she even swallowed a pony bead, much to the chagrin of our parents.  As I've discussed in the past she also liked to strip Barbie dolls, so if Bopsy had been around my house back then these earrings would've been lost toot-sweet.

Bopsy has the old TNT body that Barbie lovers know, so on to clothes.  As is typical with eighties fashion there's a lot of loud colors at play here.

Brings to mind that old Totally Hair outfit that I reviewed a few years back.  Same color scheme and everything.  I'll start with the glasses, which are simple pink cat-eye frames with black rims.

A number of Barbie dolls had this style of glasses during the later part of the millennium, and some of the glasses had OPAQUE LENSES!!!  Bopsy can at least see through her lenses.

Now the jacket...were jackets like this all the rage in the eighties???  Hot Looks Sachi has a jacket like this, and the Hot Looks were supposed to be stylish.  Anyway, Bopsy's jacket is made of blue sateen and has a sparkly stand-up collar.

The cuffs of her sleeves also sparkle, as does the waistband.

On the front of the jacket are two sparkly saxophones and some music notes.  Oh, how I used to loathe the saxophone!  I changed my tune after I heard "Baker Street" for the first time, but for most of my childhood I hated the sax.

The decals feel nice and thick, and they show no signs of peeling off.  Unfortunately, there's no design on the back of the jacket.  That's a bummer.

The peeling bit can't be said for the sleeves.  They're my old friend pleather, and they're flaking and sticky to the touch.  All the more to hate pleather with, my dears.

Pleather, or no, I wish this jacket came in my size, since it looks so nice and roomy.  Underneath the jacket Bopsy wears...a jumpsuit!

I thought it was a top and a pair of capris, but it's not!  The waist is concealed by this big, fancy belt.  

It looks like it would be a separate piece, but it's permanently attached. 

Looks a little like those dumb belts that boxers and wrestlers fight for.  This is made of plastic, the kind that could probably warp if not properly cared for, but there's no warpage here!  Now to the jumpsuit itself.  It's...a chartreuse sateen jumpsuit with cropped pantslegs and strappy sleeves.

The legs don't cover all of Bopsy's fade spots, but they do a better job than a short skirt would've.

Notice that the fabric of the bodice doesn't exactly match the fabric of the bottom part.  They're both chartreuse and they're both sateen, but the texture is different.

Maybe those bottoms are polyester rather than sateen.  I have a hard time telling sometimes.

Oh yeah, the jumpsuit closes with snaps.

Most of my Barbie dolls don't wear hosiery of any sort, but Bopsy makes an exception with satiny white lace-cuffed socks.

These can be annoying, since the lace likes to curl under and stick straight up and look stupid, and also since Bopsy's shoes don't fit properly over them.

Bopsy's shoes are the aforementioned saddle shoes.  Their laces are molded, but other than that they're just your typical plastic Barbie shoes.  

They are the same mold as Kira's shoes, but slightly smaller.

I won't need to play Dolly Dress Shuffle with Bopsy since I know she could share clothes with Kira, Claudette, and any similar doll.  Thus, time to do good stuff and bad stuff.

BAD
*Rubber bands are crumbling.  This is age-related and can be fixed.

*Sleeves of the jacket are also crumbling.  This too is age-related, but I don't know how to fix this.

*Shoes don't fit well over the socks.  This too is common.

*The legs are faded in spots.  Once again this is age-related.  I wish I knew why Barbie dolls of this era get faded spots like this.

GOOD
*LOL, I just like her!

No joke, Bopsy is a good doll.  She maybe wasn't my favorite doll on Country Living's list; no, that title would go to the elusive Color Magic Barbie, who represented 1966.  But Bopsy is a perfectly fine little doll in her own right.  She's not as expensive as Color Magic is, and she represents a lot of what the eighties got right.  Her theme is kid-friendly (what little kid doesn't love music?), and her clothes are colorful, well-made, and the good kind of tacky.  Hmmm...maybe "tacky" isn't the right term.  "Tacky" is how Madonna dressed in the eighties...and the nineties...and now.  "Cheesy" isn't the term I'm looking for either.  "Dated," maybe???  Yes, I think that's the word, because Bopsy's style screams late eighties.  It's in a good way, though, not like those hideous Frankie Goes to Hollywood shirts that were all the rage back then.  Regarding my doll specifically, she's got fade marks on her legs, and her rubber bands are breaking, and her sleeves are peeling and sticky, but none of that bothers me much.  I'm most bothered by her shoes refusing to stay on, but that's to be expected when one has a Barbie with thick socks and small shoes.  Indeed, Kira's shoes fall off a lot too.

Don't they look cute together?

Bright and comfortable, perfect for the cooler days ahead!  Bopsy is a welcome addition to my already large Barbie doll collection.

Happy birthday (once again) to me,
RagingMoon1987