Monster high is a fashion doll brand and multimedia franchise originally designed by Garrett Sander at Mattel. After it launched in 2010, Monster High was an immediate hit with both children and adults. Similar to My Little Pony, the brand been rebooted many times. Each "Generation" has its own dolls and media. Generation 3 is currently ongoing and actively releasing playline dolls alongside a line Generation 1 dolls aimed at adult collectors.
Monster High features the teenage children of famous horror, science fiction, mythological, folklore, and pop culture monsters who attend a highschool that accepts all monsters. The franchise is known for its themes of acceptance, equality, diversity, lgbt+, and disability positivity.
The franchise also makes heavy use of horror themed puns and alternative words and locations such as "ghouls" for girls (now used gender neutrally), "iCoffins" for iPhones, "fangtastic" for fantastic, and more!
Monster High means a lot to me! This doll line got me into art, fashion, and doll collecting, stuff I had near zero interest in as a kid until then. Playing on the website, watching the webisodes, and awaiting the next movie and doll to come out was one of my few happy hobbies I had during a pretty bad time in my life. It was also one of the few interests my mom and I shared at the time!
Today I still collect Monster High dolls of all generations and frequently watch the movies and webisodes when I'm feeling down. I have so much lore and random facts about the franchise in my brain. I consider it a special interest and I doubt it'll ever leave me. As a fat, disabled, queer person its representation in Generation 3 means a lot to me as well.
The rest of this page is my personal thoughts and ramblings about the franchise! It is mostly focused on Generation 1, but may include snippets from generations 2 and 3.
The characters of Monster High are iconic today, especially fan favorites Draculaura and Clawdeen Wolf. Monster High includes a lot of representation in its characters, most of the characters are from all over the world with different ethnicites and nationalities. In later generations, many characters are canonically LGBT+ and disabled! My favorite main ghouls are Lagoona Blue and Toralei Stripe!
Over the years, Monster High greatly expanded its cast with new reoccuring and one-off characters. Many were introduced in 3D movies and their accompaning doll lines, which felt like a big event. Every year or so, my mom and I would check for new dolls and movies at walmart like it was an upcoming event.
Speaking of the media, Monster High released a TON of complimentary media in the form of flash animated webisodes, direct-to-DVD 3D animated movies, books, video games, live-action musical films, and a TV animated series. My favorites are the generation 1 websiodes and the 3D movies, I'm particularly fond of the first 2 of volumes of the webisodes, Friday Night Frights, and Frights, Camera, Action!.
A LOT of popular headcanons from fans of generation 1 later became canon in generation 3! Notable examples include nonbinary Frankie Stein, pansexual Cleo De Nile, autistic Twyla Boogeymann, plus size Abbey Bominable and Catty Noir, and lesbian Clawdeen Wolf. I think thats so cool!
Monster High's doll line is famous for featuring unnatural skin tones and monsterous traits such as animal ears, tails, reptialian scales, fins, horns, bone, and more. Each character has their own head and body sculpt, and most of their outfits are heavily themed to them. Compared to other dolls like Barbie and Bratz, Monster High was extremely unique for its time and still to this day.
In generation 1, there were only 3 body types: tall, standard, and short. My favorite is the shorter sculpt. In generation 3, there are tons of different body types from thin, curvy, fat, hourglass, pear, tall, short, and different combinations. I love Venus Mcflytrap's combo of the tall/hourglass and Catty Noir's standard height/fat body types. Generation 1 had the standard 13 points of articulation, and later generation 3 added a chest joint for even more posability.
Monster High doll's monster features vary, but some of my absolute favorites are Skelita Calaveras, a skeleton, Avea Trotter, a centaur hybrid with black iridecent wings, and Peri and Pearl Serpentine, a two headed doll of twin sisters sharing a serpent-like mermaid body. The Serpentine twins even got a styling head playset, which is a super unique toy in my opinion.
Monster High's gothic inspired fashion is also known for its complex patterns and chunky detailed shoe sculpts. Many shoe sculpts are extremely character specific and made to look like they are a non-shoe objects, like chalk pastels, masks, cobblestone walls, and even a ship figurehead!
I've been collecting Monster High dolls since my birthday in 2011, when my mom gifted me classroom Lagoona and later that year I got Dawn of the Dance dolls for xmas. Into my teens, I thought I was too old for them and pretended not to be interested, so I missed out on a lot of dolls I actually loved. Eventually, I got back into collecting in my twenties and have sense quadrupled my collection.
My favorite monster high dolls are Lorna Mcnessie, Honey Swamp, Catrine Demew, Venus Mcflytrap (G3), Purrsephone and Meowlody (G3), and Mouscedes King! I tend to prefer to collect the one off most unique monster high dolls like the Serpentine twins, Elle Eedee, and Avea Trotter, but I also have a soft spot for any Lagoona Blue, Toralei Stripe, and Cleo De Nile (G3) dolls. Here are some of my own dolls from my collection!
