Factory Blythe review, or Moony's a big fat liar

Remember when I said I wouldn't bother with a factory Blythe doll?  Yeah, that turned out to be untrue.  I've learned that while they are indeed fake, factory Blythe dolls are not on the same level as recast ball-jointed dolls.  Apparently these factory dolls are of better quality than other clone dolls, and buying one is a great way to start the hobby and cut one's customizing teeth, so I reneged on my claim and bought one.  Meet Jaylin, a name that apparently means "jaybird."

I was expecting everyone to hate Jaylin since most folks are not used to the wide-eyed, big-headed visage of a Blythe doll, but she's made lots of friends already.  My mother even likes her, more so than she does Emerald, which shocked me since Mama's reception to Emerald's online pics was warmer than her reaction to Jaylin's.  Anyway, the name/word "blythe" is an alternate spelling of the word "blithe," which can mean "happy and joyful," ironic considering that these dolls wear rather somber expressions.  The word can also mean "casual indifference," which is a slightly better fit.  Regardless of the name, Blythe dolls got their first taste of daylight back in 1972, and they were the third member of a trio that I call the "Odd Three."  I said yesterday that I think Emerald the Enchanting Witch would've found her place had she been a product of a later decade, but critics of Blythe had a leg to stand on, as the commercials were a little on the creepy side.  And let's be honest...Blythe can be creepy on her own, without that commercial and without a ton of modifications.  All it took to make Miss Emily's lovely Phoebe Maybe creepy was a head-rub and an eye change.

So that was in 1972.  Kenner did their best with Blythe, producing a dozen outfits, four splashy wigs with sunglasses, and even a carrying case.  Unfortunately the doll frightened more children than she charmed, and Blythe was here and gone before the year was out.  Two decades later a photographer named Gina Garan found the doll as a suitable photography subject and compiled her images into a book, which helped Blythe find a better following.  With Kenner dolls being both hard to find and expensive, Ashton-Drake picked up the slack with a line of reproductions.  These repros were produced for a three-year period during my adolescence, and the advertisements in TV Guide were how I learned Blythe's name.  I'd seen a couple as models in Barbie Bazaar and was intrigued by their wide-eyed gaze, but since that was a Barbie magazine they never named Blythe as Blythe.  Takara makes these dolls now, and they come in three sizes:  Neo (eleven inches), Middie (eight inches), and Petite (four inches).  Oh yeah, there were also those Littlest Pet Shop sets (also four inches), but I never did find a ladybug set with eyes that were straight.  Most Blythe dolls have some sort of eye gimmick; the Neo dolls have the famous (infamous?) color-change feature, Middies have eyes that move from side to side, Petites have sleep eyes, and LPS dolls...stand there and look cute.  Jaylin is Neo-sized like the past two Takara dolls I've wanted (Orange and Spice and UFO a Go-Go), but unlike the two of them I can attempt some modifications without risking a terribly expensive doll.  Oh sure, Jaylin cost enough, but she still cost significantly less than UFO a Go-Go does.  Anyway I want to modify Jaylin so that she can hold her eyes closed, I want to modify her existing pull chain (and the new one too) to make it look a little...well, cuter, and I want to change her eye chips so that she's more unique.  I've already got two charms to tip the ends of the eye chains; one is a mochi rabbit and the other is a hanami dango, both courtesy of Mariposa Miniatures on Etsy.

Indeed, I've already tipped Jaylin's existing pull chain with one of these, plus some beads.

This newly modded pull chain looks cute when slung over Jaylin's shoulder, by the way.

Fooling around over, let's look at Jaylin.  She's eleven inches from head to toe, very close to Barbie in height (doll shown is Mara), though most of that height comes from the huge size of Jaylin's noggin.  If the head were smaller she'd be about the same size as Licca-chan.  The picture below shows one of the biggest problems with Jaylin, by the way; we'll discuss that in a bit.

She looms over yesterday's doll, Emerald.

Even though Blythe is dominantly an entity for adult collectors nowadays, I can still see her possible influence in the design of playline dolls like Cutie Pops and La Dee Da.  Jaylin is taller than my La Dee Da dolls and shorter than Candi, my Cutie Pops doll, but the aesthetic is there.

Other dolls that appear to have been influenced by Blythe are What's Her Face's Fab Faces, Monster High's Inner Monsters (reviews here and here), Pullip (reviews here, here, and here) and Tangkou (reviews here and here), all of which have eyes that shift color, expression, position, or all of the above.  The mechanism is different, as Blythe is the only one to feature a pull string (the rest have push buttons).

Now...regarding hair, Jaylin wears hers in a shoulder-length bob with bangs in front.  The fibers were relatively straight when I first got her out of the package, but they've since proven to be quite wavy.

Most of the factory Blythe dolls on eBay have long hair, long enough that keeping it maintained could potentially be a pain in the butt, so I chose a doll with short hair.  I was also drawn to the color; on eBay it looks silver and light blue, and indeed it is in real life as well.

Having watched a few too many videos on YouTube, I get the impression that most (but not all) factory dolls have thick hair.  In terms of "haves" and "have not's" Jaylin is certainly a "have," as her root job is a thick one.  Also notice that her scalp has been painted blue.

These fibers are extremely soft and smooth, but they can have a mind of their own.  See how they catch in her long eyelashes? 

Easy fix.  I found a pale blue ribbon in my roll-top desk, so I use that to keep Jaylin's hair out of her eyes.  It also matches Jaylin's pale blue tresses quite nicely.

Now to the face.  That iconic Blythe face, eyebrowless and with huge eyes...but without the shiny complexion.  She's extremely pale, to the point that it's hard to incorporate Jaylin into a group photo, as the pictures above will attest (notice that Mara and Candi both ended up underexposed).

Real Blythe dolls almost always come with shiny faces for reasons I'll never know, and as a result the majority of factory dolls do too...but Jaylin does not, something that surprised me when I opened up her package.  I don't mind shiny Blythe faces, particularly since it's usually a characteristic of these dolls, but I have to say that I prefer Jaylin's matte face...right now, anyway.  If I had a doll with a shiny face I'd be able to voice my preference more convincingly.  I do know that shiny plastic tends to throw glares and light clusters, especially when all one has to take pictures with is a cell phone, so I'm glad Jaylin's face is matte.

Eyebrows are another story.  No Blythe (factory or brand-name) has eyebrows unless she's been customized, and yet I can't name a doll that needs eyebrows worse than Blythe does.  I've never understood why eyebrows are always omitted, as it's this feature that I think helped contribute to the original Blythe's creepiness.  It also contributed to the massive fivehead that Blythe dolls have when they don't wear bangs.  Not a forehead, mind you, but a fivehead like this!

Orange and Spice also has a prominent fivehead, as do nearly all of the other dolls without bangs, and the lack of eyebrows only exacerbates this.  Jaylin's fivehead is not as noticeable since she has bangs, but if I push back the bangs it's possible to see.  At least Jaylin is not alone at Camp Fivehead.  Emerald is there too...and for that matter, so am I!

It's really not a huge deal since eyebrows can be readily painted on, and no one would see Jaylin's eyebrows if she had any anyway since I don't normally tie her bangs back.  But some collectors do prefer their girls with eyebrows, as a Google search will confirm.  I may paint some on in the future if I can find the right shade of pale blue...and maybe I won't.  After all, Jaylin does have bangs that lessen the impact of her huge forehead.  Besides, maybe eyebrows would've directed attention away from the eyes, Blythe's big selling point.  Yes, the eyes.  Blythe's claim to fame...or infamy, take your pick.   Jaylin does not disappoint, as she possesses a bit of saffron-colored eyeshadow for each eye, plus the big, shifting, blinking eyes.

Eyeshadow does not usually cover a Blythe doll's whole eyelid, by the way.  Jaylin has shadow ABOVE her eye sockets, but none on her lids.  This is normal.  Notice her angled eyelashes, by the way, another hallmark of a factory doll; real Blythe dolls usually have them cut straight across (see examples here, here, and here).

Shadowless eyelids are the norm for Blythe dolls, both real and factory, and the lashes are par for the course with factory girls, but Jaylin's eyes do NOT fall into the Blythe norm, factory or brand-name!  The original Blythe dolls had four eye colors, listed in the commercial as "bouncy brown," "green-eyed 'n groovy," "purple-pretty-as-you-please," and "beautiful blue."  The brown eyes sometimes took on an orange or pink hue and can either be beautiful or disturbing depending on the lighting.  Takara's current dolls deviate from the blue/green/purple/brown pattern on a regular basis, with different-colored eyes being labeled as "special."  Here's a short list of the eyes on some of my favorite Blythe dolls, to give y'all an idea of what their color combos are like.

ORIGINAL BLYTHE:  blue, green, purple, brown
ASHTON-DRAKE BLYTHE:  blue, green, amber, pink
PHOEBE MAYBE:  pink, blue, brown, olive green
UFO A GO-GO:  light blue, blue, pink, light gray
ORANGE AND SPICE:  pink, orange, green, dark blue
JOANNA GENTIANA:  olive green, blue, pink, green
DEVI DELACOUR:  light blue, pink, yellow, gray
SIMPLY THUMPTY THUMP:  blue, lilac, green, pink

Alrighty, point made.  Modern-day Blythe eyes can vary a lot.  I'm not sure how much factory doll eyes vary, but I think it would be reasonable to assume that they can vary a lot too.  When I was trying to pick a my favorite doll on eBay Jaylin had two competitors, one with apple green hair and one with royal blue hair.  Both the green doll and the royal blue doll had the usual four different eye colors, but to my great surprise Jaylin's eye chips are all silver-gray.  The pupils differ in size and I think that's a cute touch, since neither Kenner's Blythe nor the Takara dolls have pupils that change in size.  As seen below, Jaylin's left-facing eyes and one centered pair have dilated pupils...

...while the right-facing eyes and the other centered pair have normal-for-Blythe pupils.

I like silver-eyed dolls, as past dolls like Cami, Johnny, and Raya will attest, but I may want to mod some of these eye chips.  I haven't decided yet; Etsy has some cute options, and the color-changing feature is part of why I wanted a Blythe doll in the first place, but Jaylin's eyes are awfully pretty as they are, and I detect no cracks or signs of damage (factory dolls can have damaged eye chips).  Besides, if I want to play around with eye color I still have Hailey and my ball-jointed dolls...and Xenia, who is still waiting to have her eye transplant.  As an aside, I've learned that with these fake dolls it's possible to see all the way inside her head through those huge sockets.  So I can with Jaylin.  It's possible to see inside a real Blythe's head too, but this doll's sockets are not gaping like Jaylin's are.

Now let's go behind and briefly discuss the eye mechanism.  I've seen Blythe dolls that were activated by the push of a button (I think the Ashton-Drake reissue was like that), but the original Kenner dolls, the Takara releases, and the factory girls are all activated by a pull cord.  This cord is made up of a length of nylon string, similar to what one sees on mini blind pull chains, with a flesh-colored plastic ring at the end.  Jaylin's original pull ring is no longer attached, but I saved it anyway.

The cord is long, falling to Jaylin's calves without the dangle and to her ankles with the dangle.  Pull on the cord and Jaylin's eyes change expression.  They would've changed color too, if all her eye chips weren't gray.  The cord inserts through a hole in the back of Jaylin's head.  The other hole anchors the spring that allows Jaylin's eyes to open back up again; this second hole is where the cord for her eye-closing function will insert if I choose to go that route.

Wait a minute, does that mark say HASBRO???

Yep, it sure does, and Tomy too!  Tomy makes sense since they're affiliated with Takara, but I had no idea Hasbro had anything to do with Blythe dolls.  LPS Blythe, yes, but these larger dolls, no.  And yet there Hasbro's name is!  EDIT:  Hasbro bought Kenner out, hence why Blythe would have Hasbro's name on the back.  Also of note are the screws.  I don't see screws too often on dolls, but Jaylin and her Blythe sisters need these screws to hold her head together.  Undo those screws, and it's possible to pry her head open at this seam here.  The scalp is also a separate piece, so Jaylin has a grand total of three head pieces.  Notice that Jaylin's ears are pierced, by the way, perfect for customizing some earrings.

As an aside, notice that Jaylin's scalp piece doesn't line up perfectly with her faceplate.  I don't know if this is a side effect of being a factory doll or if all Blythe dolls are like this, but it makes placing Jaylin's ribbon a pain in the butt sometimes.

Prying the head open is only necessary for modifications or any repairs that might be needed...and since I want to give Jaylin a sleep-eye option, I'll have to learn to take her apart and put her back together again.  Jaylin's eye mechanism is extremely tight, by the way; I have to get a good grip on that cord and pull hard to get it to work.  Some kind of bobble at the end is definitely a must-have in order to get a good handhold, particularly if one has small hands like I do.

I'm not done with the face, believe it or not!!!  The rest of Jaylin's face is typical of factory dolls, except for being matte.

She has slightly blushed cheeks and the Mona Lisa smile that nearly all Blythe dolls do, except with a different paint job.  Most of the Kenner Blythes that I've seen have lips that are painted some shade of pink, but Jaylin's lips are brick red (which I much prefer).  She has a flat philtrum and an ever-so-slight cleft chin, something that I don't often see on dolls.  I particularly like Jaylin's nose; it has a narrow, gracefully curved bridge and comes to a moderately sharp point, like so.

Factory dolls almost always come naked, so on to the body we go.  Factory Blythe dolls are supposedly made of cast-off Takara body parts, so Jaylin may have the same body as my little Licca-chan.  Key word:  may.  Even these factory dolls have bodies that vary widely in terms of shape and structure.  Let's see how Jaylin's body compares to Licca's.

I wish Jaylin and Licca could tip their heads to look at each other a bit more convincingly, but neither of them can do that.  The shape of the bodies is similar up close...but not the same.  Jaylin's hands are bigger than Licca's...

...but strangely, her feet are smaller.

The torsos look the same at first glance, but they're not.  Jaylin has a longer torso with bigger breasts, and her nether region is flatter than Licca's.

At first glance the jointing is the same too.  Jaylin has a waist joint, a neck joint, hip joints, and shoulder joints, and she can move in most of the ways that Licca can.  Key word:  most.  Jaylin's waist joint does not turn, and her large head unsurprisingly interferes with certain motions.

Getting Jaylin to sit can be a pain in the butt too, again due to her large head, but splits are not a problem.  Like I'd want to pose her in a split for an extended period.  LOL, notice again how easy it is to see inside Jaylin's eye sockets here.

Jaylin's neck does not tip as I noted above, but it does turn with some effort.  Seriously, I have to grab her head in one hand, grab her body in the other, and TWIST to get this head moved.  It DOES turn from side to side, though.  Notice in the picture above that she is looking ever so slightly to her right, and it's not just the eyes either.  Regarding legs, I saw some complaints on Amazon about some of the brand-name Blythe dolls not having bending knees even though the picture clearly shows the doll with bending knees.  I was thus hesitant to try and flex Jaylin's legs, but I got over it and I was rewarded with...bending knees!

Jaylin's knees don't bend like Licca's do, though.  Licca's knees are internally wired and don't look the most natural, while Jaylin's have a click joint like Barbie once did.

Interestingly, Jaylin's arms don't bend at all, while Licca's do...or they're supposed to.  My Licca only has one arm that can bend.  Is it just me, or does Jaylin look a little bummed that she can't bend her arms?

After seeing how different these dolls' knees are, seeing different arms doesn't surprise me much.  So this body's not high and not low; it serves it's purpose and it feels nice in my hands, but some poses are a little stilted.  It's also hard to get Jaylin balanced for certain poses due to her huge head.  Here's an outtake.

Poor Licca!  Good thing I've got a stand on its way!  In response to posing, I've heard that Blythe dolls (real and knockoff) can wear Azone Pure Neemo bodies of a certain size, but I've also seen dolls whose heads flopped around on an Azone body without any sort of control, so I don't think I'm going to try the Pure Neemo route with Jaylin.  At least not yet; I've been admiring Azone's dolls from afar for quite some time now, and a certain red-haired magical girl may one day make their debut here in the form of an Azone figure.  I may also buy one of the bodies ahead of time so I know what I'm getting myself into.  Stay tuned...

Right then, back to Jaylin.  Clothing...well, the ease with which one can clothe a Blythe doll depends on the size.  Etsy is crawling with things, but most of said things appear to be sized for Neo Blythe dolls.  No biggie for me since Jaylin is Neo-sized, but if anyone out there has a Petite or a Middie your search might be a little trickier.  For me though, the Etsy finds are quite nice.  Jaylin has no reservations about wearing white after Labor Day (nor do I), so her dress is white.  This came from a shop in Bangkok called the Hand Flower and has lots of cute things.  This dress is made out of lace and sateen, and is very nice.

Well...the outside looks nice.  The inner seams look like butt, and there are those filmy little loose threads that love to catch on doll hands.

Please ignore my book, which was the only suitable thing I had for a background at the time I took those pictures.  Anyway, I was expecting the dress, which is clearly shown in the sales picture...but I was NOT expecting those tights, which weren't shown in the picture!  I'm glad to get a pair of tights, but they may have just rendered my next purchase moot!  Yep, I bought some stockings from the Daughter Who Sews, and now they'll end up being spares...or winter socks, take your pick.  I call these "Beetlejuice" stockings due to those stripes.

These are simple little stockings, but very soft and stretchy.  They go up to Jaylin's hips and are thus more like tights than honest-to-God socks.  Since fishnet tights are not the warmest garments in the world, I usually layer these OVER Jaylin's fishnets.

Then there's these drawers.  Hey, who wants to wear a dress without something covering their butt in case the wind gets frisky???  

These came from Blythe Happy and are simple little white panties with Jaylin's name embroidered on them and a bit of Velcro in the back.  The customer service from this shop was delightful, by the way.  She'll do just about any name in just about any color, and if monograms aren't your style then there are other designs to choose from.  Jaylin also came with a pair of pink satin panties, which I wasn't expecting since these dolls usually come nekkid...

..but so far I haven't put these on Jaylin yet.  I may give them to Licca-chan instead since she wears a lot of dresses and doesn't have any skivvies.

Topping off Jaylin's basic look are these shoes, black high-top Dr. Marten-style shoes.  These come from I Sew For Doll, a shop that has tons of little trinkets for anyone who wants to try sewing their own doll clothes.  I dearly love this style of shoe in real life, and thus my dolls wear a lot of boots, as the group picture I took of my ball-jointed dolls during the last cold snap will attest (Hailey was the only one NOT wearing boots, in fact).  Jaylin will be no exception.

Like real boots, these have to be laced up.  Many a doll owner is fumble-fingered enough for such a task to be tricky, so these boots have LOOOOOOONG laces!  These look a little silly, but thanks to the laces I can loosen these boots enough to fit them over those thick stockings.  That's a big benefit, as doll shoes are notoriously tricky to fit over socks or tights.  Oh, and check out these treads!

That's quite an accomplishment, especially for such a small shoe.  These shoes are bigger than the average Barbie shoe, but they're still smaller than a Jem shoe so that puts these in the "small doll shoe" category.

Okay, the basic layer is complete, but since it's late in the year I've also got some outerwear.  I originally wanted a coat...but the coat I wanted cost over seventy bucks!  I'm used to seeing those kinds of prices for limited-edition BJD clothes, but not for a doll as small-bodied as Blythe is.  With the coat I wanted out of reach and no other coats with sleeves wide enough to accommodate the sleeves on Jaylin's dress, I chose a poncho instead.  A simple crocheted poncho that goes with everything.

Okay, the poncho was what I ordered.  The little headband came as a nice freebie, as folks on Etsy often do.  Doll's Paradise made this; she's based out of Barcelona, Spain and offers four different options for this poncho.  Two are striped and I was sorely tempted by one of those, but I wanted something simple for Jaylin so I just picked one in solid red.  This is crocheted, by the way; some ponchos are knitted but this one is definitely crocheted and it's done very well.  The stitches are firm without being stiff, a problem that I sometimes run into myself.

Lastly, I wanted a hat, and finding one proved to be very easy as Etsy is crawling with Blythe hats.  Indeed, about half of the cute Blythe things I have favorited on my Etsy page ARE hats, but for Jaylin's first hat I chose this, from ClubCotton.

Of all the hats that I could've chosen, this one won out due to its unusual shape and size.  It's big even for a Blythe hat.  Hey, Blythe dolls have big heads anyway, so why not play up the ridiculousness a bit?  I'm not sure what type of yarn this is, but it's brown with white fibers and is a little rough to the touch.  The ties are each tipped with two wooden beads...

...and the brim is trimmed with what looks like real fur.  I thought it was yarn that looked like fake fur, but this looks a lot like the real thing.  If it is, DO NOT HATE!!!

Looks like Jaylin is ready for the impending winter!

Oh yes, I got her a little camera so she can enjoy the great outdoors in more ways than one.  A strawberry camera, no less!  This is another Etsy find, from Kuloft.

I also have some spring and summer things for Jaylin, but I'll just set those aside for the glorious return of warmer weather.  Strangely, all of the dresses I've bought from Etsy are white or off-white.  Go figure on that one; maybe it's because white looks so good with her silvery blue hair.

At first glance it looks like my Cutie Pops doll Candi has a similar build to Jaylin, but let's look more closely at their bodies.

I already know that Candi can wear Jaylin's boots and stockings with no problems, because I tried that out right after the footwear came in the mail.

This somewhat punkish footwear doesn't jive with Candi's summery dress, but it's good to know that she's got something to fall back on if need be.  Now let's see how dress sharing goes.  I already know that Jaylin shouldn't be able to wear Candi's dress, because Cookie's dress didn't fit Phoebe Maybe, but Candi's dress and Cookie's are a little different so I'm going to try this anyway.

Jaylin's white dress is a little baggy on Candi, but I'd put her in it in a pinch.  As for Jaylin, she can wear Candi's shoes, but unfortunately the dress proved too small to fasten.

My other small-bodied, big-headed dolls Sloane and Cyanne probably can't wear or share Jaylin's duds as their bodies are smaller and skinnier, so I'm not going to bother.  Some Barbie clothes will fit though, like this blue and yellow dress.

This particular dress was marked for all four sizes, and it suits Jaylin pretty well.  Sure, I needed a belt to keep the dress fitted around Jaylin's waist, but no biggie.  The shoes and the wristwatch are also Barbie; certain Barbie shoes will fit Jaylin's feet, but they have to be flat shoes.  I'm pretty impressed with the fit of this dress, though; it's good to know that I won't have to pay shipping and handling every time I want something new for Jaylin.  But now I'm curious to see how petite-sized clothes will fit...and as luck would have it, one of my petite dolls (#60 "Patchwork Denim") is willing to loan out her dress.  It matches Jaylin's hair nicely, but will it fit???

Hmmm...I don't love it, but I don't hate it either.  The waistline is too low on Jaylin's shorter torso, but the belt partially covers that.  The rest of the accessories (shoes, belt, bracelet) fit well.  No, those aren't the same shoes in both Barbie dress pictures, believe it or not.  They're the same mold and the same color, but they're two separate pairs.  I should probably dig out some more of my Barbie flats and see how well they work.

Lastly, Licca-chan clothes.  This dress is the one that I usually put Kohaku in, but it was labeled a Licca-chan dress.

This is a little bit big across the shoulders and I had a hard time threading Jaylin's larger hands through those sleeves, but this is a safe option for her.  Unfortunately the cute little slingbacks that came with this dress are too big for Jaylin, and they tend to collapse and bend under the extra weight of that huge head.  Given the fact that Jaylin's feet are smaller than Licca's, I wasn't surprised by this ill fit.

There's also the yellow dress and red shoes that Licca-chan currently has on.  This dress was actually supposed to be for a Blythe doll anyway.  I bought it for Mami and unfortunately found it to be too big, which may mean that it's too big for Jaylin too.

Well, it's a TEENSY bit big, but it fits Jaylin better than it fits Licca, AND it matches Jaylin's eyeshadow, something that I didn't foresee.  Licca's red mary janes are too big, though.  I had to pay another visit to Etsy to remedy that, as red shoes add to the overall look.

Now I'm dying to see how Shibajuku Girls' clothes would go.  I've been trying to resist buying a Shibajuku Girl on the grounds that A, they're expensive, B, they're hard to store, and C, I need one like I need a hole in the head.  Indeed, regarding B, I barely have a place to put Candi and Jaylin!  Unfortunately, even though there are separately packaged little outfits available, I've not seen a single one in stores.  Kuu Kuu Harajuku clothes, yes.  Shibajuku Girls clothes, no.  I guess patience will be the key here, and if I can hold off it may be worthwhile because it appears that Shibajuku Girls can wear Licca's clothes.  If that's true then that may mean Jaylin can wear Shibajuku things, since her body is so close in size to Licca's body.

Time to sum it up.  The "bad" list looks long, but it's not really.

BAD
*Extremely top-heavy.  This is a problem that has plagued Blythe from the word go, but it can be remedied with a good doll stand.
*Eye sockets are HUGE!  I'm not bothered by this, but I thought I'd make note of it anyway.
*Head pieces do not line up perfectly.  I don't know if this is normal or not, but it's worth noting.
*Eye mech might be fragile.  I'm not sure if it is, but there's a lot of components in there and they're all made of plastic, so better to be too careful with this mech than too rough.

GOOD
*Hair is soft, thick, and a lovely color
*Eyes, while monotonous, are a lovely shade of gray and have pupils of different sizes, something that I didn't know ever occurred.
*Face is matte, which I wasn't expecting but definitely prefer.
*Facepaint is flawless.
*Body is sturdy, not a toothpick body or cracking at the seams like some other clones.
*Can wear a surprisingly wide range of clothes.  Licca-chan and Elly-chan clothes work well, as do some Barbie clothes and flat Barbie shoes.
*If store-bought clothes aren't your thing, Etsy is loaded with cool stuff.
*Good for learning to mod, though I'm now hesitant to do much since I like Jaylin as she is.

Having read horror stories about people getting taken on eBay, I advise extreme caution when buying a factory Blythe.  If you know that you're looking for a factory doll and you see one marked as such there probably won't be much of a problem.  But if you're looking for a specific "real" Blythe, be very, VERY careful as there are folks out there who will sell a fake while labeling it as the real McCoy.  Ball-jointed doll owners will tell a newbie that if the price sounds too good to be true, it probably is, and the same rule applies to Blythe or to any doll, or indeed to ANYTHING on eBay.  So be smart and know what to look for; factory Blythe dolls usually have gaping eye holes that show more of the mech than they should, angled eyelashes, and exotic hair colors.  They may or may not be on equal footing with the real deal in terms of quality, and they may come with features that aren't found on Takara or Kenner dolls, things like a matte face or unusual eye chips (Jaylin has both of those).  That being said, I'm not sorry I went the factory route when buying my first "Blythe," as it's helped me get a feel for what the eye mech is like, and how the overall doll handles during a posing/photography session.  Jaylin is a little hard to maneuver due to her large head and stiff neck, but she's proven to be a fun subject to photograph.  Her dynamic eyes add a load of personality that most dolls don't have, and I can make her look in almost any direction that I want.  She can't look up and that's a bit of a drag, but no Blythe doll can look up unless they've been modded to do so.  She can look to the side though, and that's proven useful for pictures, especially when Jaylin's new friend Emerald wants to get in on the action.

In short, the worst thing I can summon up about Jaylin is that she's made want a Takara Blythe more than ever, just so I can compare the two.  Given the fact that I also need and want a washing machine and a dryer, that'll have to wait awhile.  But no worries, I'll just have fun with Jaylin!

As a last fun little tidbit, during one of my browsing sessions on YouTube I found a comment about the Blythe line having additional characters.  The comment included a link, and indeed I discovered that Kenner had planned four dolls with the same shifting-eye gimmick.  Each hair color had a different name:  Skye was the stereotypical blue-eyed blonde, Karess (Karess???) had purple eyes and black hair, Willow was a green-eyed redhead, and the brown-eyed brunette was the namesake of the line, Blythe.  Their eyes shifted position, but not color.  My source of this information can be found here, complete with pictures of a prototype Willow head and some other items.  It's an interesting little read for any of y'all out there that love Blythe, and I wish to extend my kudos to the Closeted Goth on YouTube for the link.  It might be nice to give Goth's YouTube channel some love, by the way; she appears to be a dolly lover like the rest of us.

Much love,
RagingMoon1987