You may not know this, but Bonobo monkeys really do "make love not war" - when a group of them happens upon some food, or any other resource, which might in another species provoke a competition to see who gets dibs on the good stuff, the Bonobos just strip off (figuratively) and make out en masse; afterwards they're all nice and content in the afterglow, and the resource gets shared around in a calm and easy manner,
without any squabbling or nuclear warfare. Bonobos are about 95% genetically identical to us - that last 5% is a real bugger.
Some hippies get the wrong idea about this, and hang around fields growing unkempt beards in an effort to look like monkeys - luckily our subject today, Kylie Ireland, manages to hit the nail on the head, avoiding the simian slouch and prolific body hair, and just going straight for the group sex. There are worse things you could do with your time, let's be honest. A quick browse of IMDb turns up 221 films - it's amazing the filmography you can amass when production only takes three-and-a-half days - including, for those followers of goofy parody porn titles, Beauty and the Bitch, Laura Crotch: Tomb Raider, and Never Say Never, Again, which doesn't really make sense, but bless 'em for trying. And she was one of the first porn stars to embrace the internet as a sales venue, which - by the conventional wisdom that porn leads the way in any media-related technology - means she was in the vanguard of the vanguard of the internet boom. Yay for her. I'm waffling, I know, but I haven't seen any of her movies so I can't offer an informed commentary on her. Must see if I can find that Tomb Raider one, though.
Kylie in her Plastic Fantasy form is decked out as a hot hippie chick - that's where the opening paragraph comes from, as you'd have guessed - in denim cutoffs, fringed bikini top, and flowery headband. That wardrobe isn't ideal for this line, with its soft plastic clothes, but the sculpt does the best it can to represent the fine detail of the bikini's fringe and the shorts' frayed edges, with both choosing to sculpt for effect, rather than trying for pure realism; the fringe, for instance, is a two-layered effect with some prominent strips giving the impression of a fringe, rather than trying to individually sculpt every strip. The shorts get by mostly by managing a slightly rough texture on the flat areas - the sculpt of the details is adequate, but I don't think it'd sell the effect by itself without the texture there to fool the eye.
The paintwork on the clothing is as elaborate as I've seen on any of these figures, with the belt,
buckle, and several sewn-on patches on the shorts, and the flower print on the bikini. The latter, sad to say, is a bit ho-hum, since they evidently didn't want to go for a paint-intensive effect like tie-dye, or anything hugely complex in terms of multiple colours that'd look nice and psychedelic. The flowers (painted rather amateurishly, it must be said) are restrained in colour - probably a good decision, since going for strong contrasts may well have just wound up looking ugly, but it's more a case of "dull" being the lesser of two evils against "garish." The shorts are better - there's no lightening on the frayed edge, which is a bit of a shame, but the patches are picked out cleanly, and benefit from the sculpt pitching in with sewn edges and lines between colours.
The rest of her body - and the clothes cover precious little, so there's a lot still to go - is fairly impressive, and I'm saying that despite Plastic Fantasy doing pretty well on average in any case. Sceptical as I am about just how influential the "laser body scan"
element was in creating the final figure, there's no denying that Kylie's figure is markedly different to the norm, with curvy active-looking legs and a toned midriff the main attractions. She sports a tattoo on her right ankle, just above the '60s-style heels, and otherwise is finished in the same soft, even flesh tone as the majority of her sisters in yummy sin, aside from fingernails and toenails, and a little dot of silver around her navel, which I assume is meant to represent a piercing; that would've been better had the sculpt pitched in as well. Her arms are designed to be raised - one holding up her placard, the other giving the peace sign - which makes the shoulder articulation a little more visible than usual, but the shoulder sockets are slanted inwards to help offset the effect as best they can. She stands 7½" tall to the top of her head - a bit above the usual for this line, due to her straighter stance - and the sign tops out at about 10" in a casual pose, though it can go higher if you raise her arm specifically for height, or get her holding it further down the handle.
Kylie's face is one of those sculpted-for-expression ones - maybe it's the degree to which the sculptor mucked around with her to get her looking like she's happily chanting peace slogans,
or maybe it's just that I don't know her face well and this expression is different to the ones she's wearing in the (free) photos online, but I don't see a strong resemblance. Regardless, she looks about as good as highly expressive faces generally do on action figures - her eyes are rather good, slightly closed as should be the case for someone singing (or shouting) out loud, but still wide enough to not look squinty, or lose the effect of the well-painted corneas. Her headband, like the bikini top, is a bit lacklustre in paintwork - basically black with a few blotches of flowers on it - and the feather hanging from it on the right side is easy to overlook against her darkish hair. Speaking of her hair, is quite a bit more glossy than I'd like, and - unless it's dyed for the "role" of hippie protestor, for some reason - isn't nearly red enough.
Her articulation is the Plastic Fantasy basics and no more: balljoint neck, swivel/pin shoulders, and that's the lot. Sadly, there's no way to turn her "V for Victory" hand around so she's giving an "up yours" salute. The head and arms detach to allow her to be stripped down to commune with nature - the bikini loops around her neck without connecting down to the back strap, so it's easily removed.
Since her thighs are so close together - the sculpted gap between them doesn't even reach all the way up - the crotch of her shorts is split in two, essentially making it a skirt, so it can be removed either way, though I'd say down is still a little easier on the amount of stretching the material goes through in the process.
Free to run naked through fields of flowers, or whatever it is hippie exhibitionists do, she's fairly striking - though if you don't find any well-built naked woman worth a glance, these aren't the figures for you anyway. She's got largish, firm-looking breasts, with the usual nipple/areola paint job - although mine has a bit of a scratch just above the right nipple, which has taken off some of the paint (no matter, I generally leave these figures clothed) - and again Google confirms that the painted division between breast and areola should be sharper; if I have one major complaint with Plastic Fantasy, it's that one. (Google also indicates that she's got pierced nipples, but they may have come later than this figure was made, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.) With her closed legs, her mons is much more defined than usual, since there's actually a crease between the mound and her thighs, and for the same reason the sculpt of her vagina is rather perfunctory, with just a single ridge representing the labia minora between her tightly closed outer lips - and another little dab of silver paint high up on the ridge, evidently a clitoral piercing. She's got more pubic hair (painted only) than usual for these girls, a full landing strip, as opposed to the far narrower Brazilian.
She's got rather a nice bottom, too - not that any of the Plastic Fantasy women are particularly wanting in that area (or any other area, generally), but again, the upright stance does wonders for a cute-looking butt, in or out of shorts.
Besides her base - the standard black box with a sticker-adorned nameplate on the front
(and no backing, since she's not part of either of the studio-based series, Vivid or Wicked) - Kylie has her sign as an accessory; not the kind of accessory she'd be used to (though if the handle is polished so there's no risk of splinters...). It's 5" tall, the sign 2½" tall by 2" wide, and since it's printed rather than painted the face is nice and sharp, with a couple of crisp flowers and the famous slogan in that equally famous swirl-adorned hippie script. Her left hand grips is fairly tightly, but the handle's not perfectly cylindrical, so there are angles where it'll hold tighter, or slip, depending on whether you hit the sweet spot or not. She's got a single peg hole in her right sole, and stands upright fairly well, though I've noticed a slight backward lean to her - I don't think she'll fall over so long as she's on her base, but if you're looking to pose her without it,
having her back against something would be a good idea.
There's a variant of her available (well, if you can find it - none of these figures are exactly common nowadays), with the flower design on her top replaced by an American flag, and a rainbow-shaded peace sign on her placard. I had the option of choosing either, but I went for this one, since with Nikita Denise around, my Plastic Fantasy shelf has all the USA it needs already.
Being brutally honest, she's not my favourite figure of the range - her stance is interesting and denim cutoffs are good anywhere, but I guess I'm just not that enamoured of the image of the hippie chick in general, no matter how attractive individual examples may be. Still, I can't say I dislike her either - she's a respectable middle ground, not great, but still very much welcome on my shelf.
-- 02/19/09
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