Throwback Thursday review: Irwin Sailor Mercury

HEADS UP:  I've been having some computer woes and my tablet won't do Photoshop.  Hence the lighting in these pictures will thus be all over the board.  I apologize in advance for any ill-lit photography.

I'm not a hardcore anime fan yet, though I do enjoy it.  The doll that I'm reviewing for Throwback Thursday is a member of Sailor Moon, an anime that I've been working through over the past months.  For those that are uninitiated, Sailor Moon is another magical girl anime, based on a group of teenage girls from Tokyo who have to protect their world from a race of evil aliens.  I have a lot to say about the DiC dub of Sailor Moon and not all my opinions are positive, but let's not open up that discussion here.  Regarding the doll, Sailor Mercury would not have been my first choice, given what I know now about the characters.  Had I been able to afford a Sailor Jupiter doll she would've been the one I chose.  She's sort of redheaded and she wears green, a combination that is dear to my heart, and she is tough as nails.  But for some strange reason Sailor Jupiter dolls are hard to find at a price I can currently afford.  My next choice would've been Sailor Venus because she's got a cute personality, but she's blonde and I've already got too many blonde dolls.  So I settled for this very cute Sailor Mercury doll.

Her real name is Ami Mizuno, or "Amy Anderson" in the DiC dub.  Apparently the surname "Anderson" was only used in one episode, after which the surname "Mizuno" was returned.  "Anderson," continues to stick in some circles, however.  The name "Ami" can mean either "Asian beauty" or "second beauty," while the last name "Mizuno" contains a kanji relating to water.  Both of these names make sense, as Ami is the second main character introduced, and because her sailor attacks are based on water and ice.  Personality-wise Ami is depicted as a quiet, sweet, extremely intelligent transfer student with a knack for technology and a fondness for swimming.  Her signature color is blue, and her attacks are based on technology and music in addition to water and ice.  The DiC dub depicts her as having a British accent for reasons I'll never know, though it suits her.  As always, let's start with hair.

BLACK???  Ami is supposed to have blue hair!!!  That doesn't please me one bit, because I love dolls with blue hair.  It's not nice hair either!  It's stiff and wiry like nylon.  If Ami's hair is any indication of the quality for this line, maybe it's a good thing that I was unable to land a Jupiter doll (her hair is long).  This hair is mercifully short and fairly thick.  I can see Ami's scalp right at the very top of her head where the part gaps open, but her scalp is painted black so the gap isn't terribly obvious.

In the anime Ami wears her hair parted on the left and her bangs are swept to the side.  This doll's hair is a little fluffier than Ami's should be, but other than that the style is dead on.  In spite of that I'm still mega-bummed about the hair being black.  One of my favorite things about anime is the ridiculous hair colors that crop up.  This trait is unfortunately not as prevalent in Sailor Moon as it is in other anime; out of eleven main characters, four have unnatural hair (Mercury, Saturn, Neptune, and Chibiusa), and of those four, only one (Mercury) appears in the first season.  My Ami's having black hair drops that number to three.  However, the style and the length are right, so that's a plus.

Underneath her hair Ami sports a tiny pair of ears, complete with tiny blue earrings.

In the first season of the anime these earrings are fairly important, as Ami uses one to work one of her technological gadgets.  On the doll, they're just spots of blue paint.  Nothing special, but nothing to fall off and get lost either.

Ami's other piece of jewelry is this tiara, made of gold plastic with a blue "gem" painted in.

This tiara is fairly important for the sailor senshi, because they can double as weapons when they battle, though I've only seen Sailor Moon herself do this and only during the first season.  Ami's tiara doesn't come off and it's a little crooked.  I can tolerate it being a little cockeyed if it won't fall off and get lost, but I'm not terribly tickled about that ding in the plastic.  Ami came NRFB so that had to be some sort of flub at the factory.  Nothing I can't cover with gold paint.

Ami's eyes are large like an anime character's eyes should be, and blue like her hair should be, with eyebrows in a relaxed position.

I've read online that Irwin's Sailor Moon dolls varied considerably, with some being "pretty" and some being "ugly".  The "ugly" ones have flat faces.  My Ami has a small nose that's really more of a protuberance in the vinyl than an honest-to-God and red lips that also are not molded.  Not a good sign.

These lips aren't accurate to the anime.  Sailor Moon occasionally wears makeup in the first season of the anime, and all four of the Outer Senshi wear makeup when they're in uniform, but as far as I know Sailor Mercury never does.  Nail polish, yes, but not makeup.  I love the color and shape of these lips, though.  Up close they look a little ragged, but at a normal distance they're fine.

Unfortunately, due to her extremely flat profile I believe that my Ami is indeed one of the "ugly" dolls.  She doesn't look ugly to me!  The worst critique I can muster up is that all of the characters look the same:  blandly sweet.  A blandly sweet expression is alright for the nicer characters like Ami and like Sailor Moon herself, but I'd have preferred a tougher visage for dolls like Sailor Mars (who can be a bitch) or Sailor Uranus (who flat-out IS a bitch).

Like my little Mami, Ami is clad in her magical girl uniform.

In keeping with the "sailor" title, Ami's magical girl uniform is done up like the sailor fuku so common among Japanese schoolgirls.  Not all sailor fuku are one color like the one in the link is; usually the bodice and sleeves are white, while the skirt and shoulders are plaid or some solid color.  Sailor senshi uniforms appear to be based on this.  Ami's bodice is white, while her hood and skirt are royal blue.

Said skirt and hood are both folded a little from being in a box so many years.  The hems are trimmed with gold ribbon, a touch that is not found in the anime.

The skirt has a few well-placed pleats sewn in, plus a white satin band that I guess is supposed to simulate a waistband.  The pleats are hard to photograph, but they're well-executed and nicely spaced.

Underneath the skirt Ami wears a pair of white skivvies and a white extension of the bodice that keeps her skirt in place.  Nice and modest.

Both the white and the blue fabric are knitted.  The bodice is very closely fitted to Ami's body but stretches a bit, while the blue fabric doesn't stretch at all.  The dress fastens in the back with old-style Velcro.

The bodice is trimmed with a crookedly-sewn pale blue bow and a royal blue button...

...and a matching bow in back.

I have to be extra careful with the Velcro here, as it has grabbed the bow and snagged it a bit in the past.  The ends are finished so the ribbon won't unravel completely.

The button on the front bow is a bit interesting, as in the anime this button can be either round or heart-shaped.  Either one is right, apparently.  A similar discrepancy can be found in Ami's choker, which I forgot to photograph.

It's just a simple strip of royal blue fabric.  It can be either plain or adorned with a star; again, either one is right.

All the senshi wear gloves of varying lengths, with Ami's coming to the elbow.

These are made of the same fabric as the dress and have some stretch.  The hands look more like mittens than honest-to-God gloves.  I know why the gloves are done like this, but I still think it looks clunky.

Topping off the look are these blue boots.

All of the senshi wear shoes that match or coordinate with their uniforms and inexplicably, most of the shoes have...high heels???  As active as these girls are that's hardly practical, but that's what they wear.  Ami's shoes are no exception.

The upper cuffs are painted white, and the rest of the shoe is unpainted blue plastic.

These shoes have no slit cut down the back, which is somewhat problematic for reasons that will soon be revealed.

Overall I'm mostly pleased with the way my Ami is dressed.  She's accurate to the anime and her clothes are reasonably well constructed.  The back bow can snag if treated carelessly and the front bow is crooked, but otherwise the outfit is alright.

Alright...with clothes out of the way let's take a look at this body.  This...body!!!

This is the absolute last type of body I'd expect for Sailor Mercury.  It's trim but very athletic, more like a body I'd expect Uranus or Jupiter to have.  Ami's arms and legs are much thicker than a Barbie's...

...and her feet are very big, almost as big as Monster High feet.  Thus why removing those boots is tricky without a slit.

Ami's body is very muscular in appearance, but she does have some bone structure visible.  Her chest has sculpted clavicles.

Thick vinyl limbs usually indicate stiff joints, and indeed Ami's mobility is mediocre.  She has rotating joints at her shoulders, hips, and neck, plus internal click knees, but the range of motion isn't great.  Ami's neck can only rotate.  I wish it could tip too, but it doesn't.

Being thick vinyl against hard plastic, the hip joints have a lot of friction.  Ami can get into positions that my other dolls can, like so...

...but I have a very hard time getting her hips to cooperate.  The knees are not particularly flexible either; this is the extent of their mobility.

Two clicks.  Not great, but better than no joint at all.

Ami's torso is smaller than the average Barbie body so I have my doubts about clothes sharing.  But just for the heck of it I'm going to try it anyway.  I'll start with the outfit that my Fashion Fever doll was wearing.

That's not a very promising start!  The shirt fits, but the jeans are too tight.  They almost made it all the way up, but when one's drawers are peeking out almost doesn't cut the mustard.  So my Barbie jeans and pants are out.  Good thing I have tons of dresses!  This one is from Olivia's Doll Closet.

This one is loose around the waist, but it fits Ami without a fuss.  Much to my chagrin the seams are beginning to pull apart in places.

This next dress is one I use a lot for dolls that have little to wear.  Right now one of my old Starr dolls is using it, but she's willing to let Ami borrow it.

Okay, I lied.  It's really a skirt and top, not a dress.  It fits Ami pretty well, though.  The black tube top underneath was a bit of a squeeze, but the skirt and outer top were no trouble at all.

Starr's friend Kelley usually wears this next outfit.

This too fits without a lot of problems, though the sleeves are a bit tight.  The skirt, by contrast, is a little loose at the waist but not ridiculously so.

Last dress for the time being is an Etsy find, one that I usually put on Princess Tiana.

Ami rocks it just like Tiana does!  It's a little loose around the shoulders, but not terribly so.  If I'm ever in the mood to redress Ami she'll probably get this.  All she needs are shoes.

Oh yes, shoes!  I was worried about shoes for Ami since such a highly arched foot can look a little silly without shoes.  Monster High to the rescue.

I don't know if all MH shoes will fit Ami, but Operetta's mules are a near-perfect fit.  So we've established that Ami can wear some clothes intended for other dolls.  Unfortunately the opposite is not true.  Barbie and Tiana couldn't wear Ami's uniform, and neither could Starr or her friend Kelley.  It was too tight for all of them.

Just for kicks, here's how Ami compares visually to my other anime doll, Mami.  It's Tokyo versus Mitakihara City!

Needless to say these two will not be swapping uniforms.  According to their respective wiki pages, Mami should be about 5'1" and aged fifteen, while Ami should be about 5'2" and aged fourteen.  When I pair these two together Ami towers over Mami.  They make a visually interesting pair though, with one being dominantly blue and the other being dominantly yellow.

Time to sum it up now!

BAD
*Hair is low-quality, thin around the part, and the wrong friggin' color.  Ami's hair is supposed to be blue.  Not black, blue.  BLUE, BLUE, BLUE!!!
*Tiara is off-center and missing paint
*Front bow is crooked
*Both bows can snag on the Velcro if not treated with care.
*Shoes are hard to get off.
*Stiff body

GOOD
*Accurate portrayal of the character.  Sailor Moon fans can tell at a glance that this is Sailor Mercury.
*Hair may not be the right color, but it IS the right style.
*Cute face
*Clothing is well-constructed and attractive
*Shoes don't fall off.
*This doll can stand on her own if balanced properly.  I forgot to mention that above.
*Can wear some clothes and shoes meant for other dolls.

I'll admit it:  reviewing Ami wasn't as fun as reviewing Lime Chiffon was last week.  That's not to say that it's not fun owning Ami.  On the contrary, I love having this bookish little sailor senshi around!  Ami is cute and mostly accurate for the anime, and her clothes are well-made.  Redressing her WAS fun; I always enjoy playing Dolly Dress Shuffle.  However, I wish her hair were blue.  I don't know if a reroot is possible with these dolls but if it is then that may be in my girl's future.  Also, Ami is very, VERY stiff.  Her hips joints are hard to manipulate, her knees have a poor range of motion, and her arms only rotate at the shoulder.  Now that I think about it, I realize that the jointing is what bothers me the most about Ami; she's a sailor senshi, and sailor senshi are very active.  Thus I'd expect a doll based on an active character to have more joints so she can strike more poses.  It would've been great if this doll had had enough joints to strike her...well, I call it her attack pose, the pose each girl strikes when her transformation from regular girl to magical girl is complete.  This is what Ami's attack pose looks like.

My stiff little doll has no hope of striking this pose and I think that's a shame, but in my Ami's defense, very few of my other dolls can strike that pose.  My Monster High dolls probably could, and my Made to Move Barbie definitely could, but that's it!  So I should probably cut Ami some slack.  She looks cute with Mami, even if the two are massively out of scale.  And I love having a doll that looks like one of my favorite senshi!  

Love,

RagingMoon1987 

Across the other pond, part 2: Takara Liccarize Mami Tomoe review

Second installment, first doll, and I dedicate this post to Presto, who has shown a fondness for this doll.  I've had this review in Draft Limbo for awhile and since I've now got some similar dolls to compare her to I thought I'd just make this part of the series.    It's not uncommon to find Licca-chan dolls dressed up as popular anime characters; in the short time that I've been following her I've seen her as characters from Hatsune Miku, Tokyo Mew-Mew, and Cardcaptor Sakura, to name a few.  I haven't seen any of those animes yet, which may have influenced my decision not to get any of those dolls.  The Sakura doll is a tad problematic, for reasons that I'll reveal shortly.  Anywho, my doll is a character from an anime that I do pay fairly close attention to.  I haven't been particularly vocal about my fondness for Puella Magi Madoka Magica (also known as Maho Shojo Madoka Magica), but I thoroughly enjoyed the anime.  My first doll is Mami Tomoe, one of Madoka's friends.

My Mami looks more like an Azone figurine than she does your everyday Takara doll.  Her box did say "Liccarize" on it, and that was what threw me off.  Apparently the "Liccarize" line is a line of dolls similar in size to Licca-chan, but have been tweaked to look like anime and literary figures.  There's an Anne of Green Gables in the bunch, along with Cardcaptor Sakura, Kiki from Kiki's Delivery Service, and Mami's friends Madoka and Homura.  Hmm...now that I think of it, maybe Mami and Homura weren't friends after all.  Either way, the other two characters in the Madoka series, Sayaka and Kyoko, apparently got left out.  I can't say that I miss Sayaka's presence too terribly, but Kyoko and I are so much alike!  She's got a big mouth and constantly eats junk food, just like me.  It would be terrific if I could find a doll like her...at least, one that wouldn't bust my bank.  Anywho, I turned out to be wrong when I thought I was getting an honest-to-God Licca-chan doll, but no biggie.  I eventually found my Licca-chan, as you'll soon see.

Alrighty, that's MORE than enough information!  My Mami is a small doll; online information states that she's nine inches tall.  She's of a comparable height to my Girls of Many Lands doll, Kathleen.

Oh, if only Kathleen's clothes came off!  She couldn't squeeze into Mami's skinny little sleeves, but imagine how her green dress would look with Mami's yellow hair!  That's right, yellow! 

If you're familiar with anime then you're probably aware that some characters have unnatural hair colors; Madoka's hair is pink, for example.  Mami is on the fringe of being unnatural; I think in the show she's supposed to be a blonde, but her hair is more of a sunshine yellow than blonde.  It's a rooted job, parted on the left, and the part extends all the way through to the bangs.

As a doll Mami's hair is styled in two sausage curls, while in the anime Mami's curls are spiral curls.  Again, that probably would've been hard to replicate on a scale like this.  I HAVE seen more accurate hairstyles on figures...but in those cases Mami's whole head was plastic.  I like the rooted hair much better.  It's soft and it holds its style pretty well, and yet if I wanted to I could restyle it.  Tied to the left curl is this gold flower.

Flowers are important to girly-girl Mami.  When she's in her school uniform both curls sport a single small flower like this, and her magical girl uniform incorporates a variation of this style, as we'll soon see.  But first, the face.

Very anime-ish.  Very manga-ish too.  Mami's got all the features that your everyday anime character has.  Her eyes are large and match her hair color, as anime eyes often do.  Her cheeks are ever so slightly blushed, her nose is dinky, and her mouth is painted in a gentle, girly smile.  Takara Tomy caught Mami's personality perfectly in this doll.  Mami's head is a different make from most of the dolls I own, by the way.  If you've handled a Barbie then you know that her head is soft and a little on the squishy side...unless it's filled with glue (grrr).  Mami's head is not squishy at all.  It's vinyl, but it feels like it may be thicker or of higher quality or...I don't know.  It's just not soft like Barbie's head.  Considering Mami's fate in the anime, that may be a good thing.

Now, clothes.  The magical girls in Puella Magi Madoka Magica had two main outfits.  Since they were all school-age girls all had a school uniform.  Okay, take that back.  Kyoko didn't wear a uniform, not in the anime, anyway.  In the "Rebellion" movie she could be seen in a school uniform, but in the anime she wore cutoff jeans and a green hoodie.  That makes me wonder if Kyoko even bothered with school at all!  The other four girls had a school uniform, though.  In addition to that, each girl had their personal magical girl uniforms, which they could transform into at will.  That is what my Mami is wearing.  The Madoka wiki suggests a western influence in Mami's uniform as opposed to the overtly Japanese aesthetic of the other girls.  In discussing this the wiki points to Mami's cap.

Mami is the only one of the five girls to wear a hat of any sort.  In the anime it's brown, but this fabric looks...well, in certain lights it looks almost dark purple!  This particular hat attaches with a rubber band, and my doll's rubber band broke as soon as I tried to put the hat on!  I was able to knot the elastic back together, but if you get this doll keep that in mind.  Attached to the right side of the hat is this clump of fake fur, meant to simulate a plume of feathers, and another much larger flower.

The center of this flower is painted shiny yellow-orange to simulate Mami's soul gem.  Yep, soul gem!  Mami wears it on her hat, in the shape of one of her flower clips.  To me this seems like a dangerous place to wear a soul gem, but it worked out reasonably well for Mami...I guess.  The soul gem is where magical girls get their magic, and where they "live," more or less.  Their shape and color both vary, usually to match the personality of the magical girl.  Placement on the body varies as well.  If the soul gem breaks, the magical girl dies.  If the soul gem's limited source of magic becomes depleted then the soul gem becomes black and...well, watch Sayaka very closely and you'll see what happens!  Any questions?  No???  Good!  Let's move on.  Mami's dress is all one piece, but it's been carefully designed to look like she's wearing layers.

Normally I prefer layers, but imagine how bulky that would be on such a small doll!  Even without layers there's still quite a bit to talk about, though.  The top part of Mami's uniform consists of this white blouse.  It looks like she's wearing long sleeves, but in truth she's got short puffed sleeves with detachable longer parts.

Underneath the sleeves are these little brown pleather gauntlets.

I hate putting these on her, by the way.  They are so soft that they bunch up around the cuffs of the sleeves, and they also feel like they'll tear if I get too ham-handed.  When I dressed Mami the first time I ended up having to use a blunt nail file to push these into place.  The rest of of Mami's blouse is white.  It has a mandarin collar with a yellow ribbon at the neck.

Yellow ribbons are a big deal for Mami; she uses these for a number of things when she battles.  The yellow ribbon extends downward, connecting the blouse to the...corset?  Bustier?  Whatever it is, Mami wears one.  It's got three little "buttons" down the front, with three corresponding attachments.

This goes all the way around Mami's waist and is trimmed with yellow and white ribbons along the top, bottom, and sides.  The bottom ribbon ties in back, creating this nice big bow.

Actually the back fastens with Velcro, but this ribbon is supposed to simulate a tie so that's what I'm going to call it.  Rounding out the bottom part of the dress is this yellow circle skirt.  LOL, bad pun!

This part is pretty plain, as it is in the actual program.  It's mustard yellow with a printed brown hem.

The actual hem itself is not finished at all, and if you look closely you can see that it's a tiny bit ragged.  The brown stripe feels like it's reinforced with some sort of fray-stop, so I shouldn't have to worry about Mami's skirt coming apart.  The material is too light and stiff for this skirt to hang properly, so the sides pop up.  If you look just right you can see Mami's skivvies underneath!  Luckily Mami does have a pair of white skivvies underneath.  This is a good thing, because if I bend her over she moons the world!  Once again, I could easily picture Kyoko mooning the world, but not Mami.  Overall I like this dress, but I wish the skirt were a little heavier.  Mami is a very lively character in the anime, and I can't help but wonder if a thicker material would look more like her swirling anime skirt.  Still, it's not bad.

On her feet Mami wears a thick pair of thigh-high stockings.  These are brown with cream stripes, and like the hat they look slightly purplish.

Topping it all off are these boots.

These are soft brown vinyl with mustard gold accents painted on.  They are NOT slit up the back, making them different from most of my other doll shoes.  While I appreciate this lack of a slit for aesthetic reasons, I dreaded having to shove those boots onto Mami's feet.  Luckily they went on with ease, thanks largely to her thick socks.  I did have to push a little, but not hard.

I consider myself fortunate that I didn't have to push hard on Mami's shoes, because she herself would've been no help.  I haven't reviewed Licca-chan yet, but I think she and Mami share a body.  We'll find out for sure when I review Licca.  I got a bit of a shock when I pulled Mami's dress off.  Her blouse is padded!  I don't know why that surprised me, but it did.

In the anime Mami is depicted as having a fairly large bust, so I understand why this was done.  I'm just not used to seeing dolls with stuffed blouses.  Apparently this is common with dolls that are supposed to be dressed like Mami.  LOL, anyway, underneath the clothes and the stuffing Mami has...I think this is the body that most Licca-chan dolls use, but I've not looked at my Licca-chan yet so I can't say for sure.  Anyway, here's what the body looks like.

I think Mami is silently plotting my death for making her pose naked.  She's usually nice in the anime, but she can have a temper!  As you can see, though, this body is fairly well-developed, so I can't help wondering if that stuffing was necessary.  Overall the body is trim but not overly sexualized.  Her arms and legs are slim and fairly shapeless, but her hands are cute.  Very tiny, and yet very detailed!

It's hard to photograph these hands clearly, but trust me.  They've got five little fingers and five little fingernails.  The vinyl is very flexible here, which made putting Mami's gauntlets on that much harder.  Still, these are adorable little hands.  The feet are dainty as well.

Not quite as well molded, but they're definitely functional feet with five toes and a bit of an elevated heel.  While the flexibility of Mami's hands was a bit of a curse, her equally bendy feet are a blessing.  It's much easier to shove her boots on.  It's a bit tricky to get those socks back on her legs after undressing, though!

Mami's body (Licca's body?) is not the most poseable in the world, but it does have all the joints that a doll body should.  The arms swivel around the shoulder sockets, but have no lateral movement.

The arms make up somewhat for the lack in lateral movement by bending just above the elbow.

It's not a lot of movement, but probably that's a good thing since wires that are too flexible have a nasty habit of breaking.  For a doll like Mami, that would be a bad thing.  The picture above also shows how the elbows flatten out when they're bent.  This isn't a big deal for short-term projects like what I'm doing, but if Mami's arms were bent for too long odds are that they'd stay squashed like that.  Food for thought.

Mami's legs bend in a similar fashion, though the knees don't squash flat when bent.

The legs also rotate at the hips.  Mami can do front-to-back splits...

...and she can sit.

Mami is not very steady in a seated position position, so I usually don't seat her at all.  I just use her stand.

Mami's stand is clear plastic, and I love it.  I wonder if all dolls in the Liccarize series have these?  I certainly hope so, because these dolls can't stand alone!  I have to bend Mami's knees a bit in order to keep her from pitching forward, but otherwise she stands in this like a champ.

I don't see dolls with bodies like this too often.  Before I started collecting these Asian dolls the only one with joints like this was Penny Brite, who can bend both her arms and her legs in this manner.  I think Penny has let this magical girl thing go to her head a little.

"I want to be a magical girl too!"
"No you don't."

Since Mami's outfit is a pain in the butt to put back on I'm going to wait until Licca's review to discuss what these dolls can wear.  I did order one thing specifically for Mami, though.  Something that I ordered long before Licca came.  This dress is a Blythe dress.

Gotta have yellow!  The aged look was achieved with coffee, so the dress smells nice.  It looks good on Mami from the front, but from the side it's clear that the fit isn't great.

It's easy to ignore this loose fit since it looks so nice with Mami's hair, but nevertheless I'm itching to try this on Licca-chan and Jenny.  Now I'd best put Mami back in her magical girl garb and be done with all this undressing, lest I fall victim to Tiro Finale. 

I can't think of anything else I want to say, so good stuff/bad stuff time.

BAD

*Not versatile.  This doll is meant to portray one character, and one character only.

*Easy to undress, but hard to redress.  I suspect that this doll was not meant for redressing.

*Rubber band on the hat broke, like rubber bands love to do.

*Hairstyle would be difficult to replicate if messed up.

*Skirt not hemmed, though that won't be too much of an issue.

GOOD

*Accurate portrayal of the character.  The box and advertisements say she's supposed to be Mami Tomoe, and she definitely is.

*Well-painted.

*Hair is soft and not easily mussed, which is a good thing considering the style.

*Clothing is detailed and accurate to the anime.  

*She came with a stand that functions well.

*Very detailed.  The only thing Mami lacks that I wish she had is her gun.  Otherwise she's got everything.  Soul gem, hair flowers, everything that makes her identifiable.

*Shoes stay on when put on, but are still easy to get off. 

*Most of the flaws listed above are easily rectifiable.  The broken rubber band was fixable, and the unhemmed skirt is painted so it won't ravel.

I really had to nitpick to find flaws with Miss Mami.  She is a very delightful doll and would make a good buy for fans of Licca-chan and of the Madoka series.  She's also an affordable substitute for an Azone doll.  While not as flexible or as detailed as an Azone, Mami does have the look.  Here's what her Azone self looks like; the two aren't exactly the same, but they're not far off.  In short, I love this little doll.  She'll make a superb shelfmate for my Licca.

Speaking of Licca, her review is coming up next so stay tuned!

Best wishes to all,

RagingMoon1987