Hardly possible to abridge this article, sorry – it’s that good:Barbie has called in lawyers for a legal catfight with her arch-rivals, Bratz, the hip-hop-loving dolls with a racy fashion sense who appear to have sent Barbie's popularity crashing. In a 58-page lawsuit, Mattel, the company that makes Barbie, accuses MGA Entertainment of stealing its "intellectual infrastructure", including company secrets, business plans and 25 members of staff, and using it to build the Bratz empire.
Credit for the Bratz girls - Sasha, Yasmin, Chloe, Jade and friends — rightfully belongs to Barbie, Mattel suggests. The showdown is the biggest upset in the toy world since Barbie dumped Ken, her boyfriend of 45 years, and embarked on a summer romance with an Australian surf dude named Blaine.
Mattel says it owns the rights to Bratz, because they were conceived by one of its own designers who then defected to MGA in 2000. It is suing the designer and has now expanded its complaint to include MGA and its chief executive, Isaac Larian, accusing them of copyright infringement, misappropriation of trade secrets and racketeering.
Mr Larian said: "It's more than sour grapes, it's an absolute pure act of desperation. Mattel lives in a fantasy land. They don't own Bratz and they know it. It's all fabricated paranoia from a company that's lost its leadership. "Barbie, I think, has been around for too long. Kids have been looking for something new and different. It's time for Barbie to retire."
MGA also claims that Mattel, desperate to save its ageing beauty queen's honour amid dwindling sales, copied some of Bratz's beauty secrets and funky fashion in order to jazz up her looks and create a new line of dolls, known as My Scene. MGA claims in court papers that Mattel resorted to "serial copycatting" and used intimidation, coercion and threats against distributors and retailers to try to stifle Bratz's success as it attempted to rescue Barbie from a career crisis.
Barbie — full name: Barbara Millicent Roberts — made her debut at the American International Toy Fair on March 9, 1959, a date now celebrated by fans as her "birthday". She became a worldwide phenomenon, selling at the rate of three a second at her peak.
In 2001, Barbie's sugar-coated world was shattered by the arrival of the multi-ethnic Bratz. With their penchant for heavy make-up, risque fashion, plumped-up lips and cleavage-baring, belly-revealing outfits, they made 47-year-old Barbie seem positively demure.
Bratz – the perfect new-age way to turn your little daughter into a ---- [well, I’m not going to say it]. I know I’ll also get short shrift for saying the following from all you new age, reconstructed gen x parents but look at the naivety in Barbie, then look at these – well – Bratz and compare. Has society improved, in your opinion?
Of course society has improved. Barbie was a repressed housewife with a horse fetish. Now we have Bratz, cooly dressed and full of gilr-power.
ReplyDeleteCityunslicker is right, Barbie was yesterday's woman, today's is much more feisty like Bratz. I wonder who will take over from Ken?
ReplyDeleteA friend of mine treasures a memory of one family Christmas when she returned to the wilds of rural Norfolk to discover that her beloved 7-year-old niece was distraught because Mum, my friend's sister, would buy her a Barbie doll for Christmas because of gender stereotyping and all that. Can't have little girls playing with dolls, and so on.
ReplyDelete'Balls!' says my friend, who's not having her niece's Christmas spoiled because of her mum's political views, and sets off to try and find a suitable doll for the little girl. Unfortunately, it is rather close to Christmas and the choice of remaining Barbie dolls in that part of Norfolk is rather restricted, so my chum eventually returns home with a black Barbie doll, which is all the shop had left.
Christmas Day: the little girl's delighted and mum's furious with her sister for introducing this instrument of patriarchal conditioning into her daughter's life. Mum's eventually calmed down by being consoled that it is, at least, an anti-racist Barbie doll.
Boxing Day: several neighbours drop round for drinks and ask the little girl what Santa brought her. The child proudly announces, to her mother's utter fury and humiliation, that 'And this is my favourite present, from Auntie Judith. I know she's not a proper Barbie doll because she's the wrong colour, but it's not her fault she's black and I love her all the same'.
That was sweet, Notsaussure - who said men are all brute beasts? Makes a chap wish, as PG Wodehouse said, he had a heart or something.
ReplyDeleteCityunslicker and Ellee - good luck with the new woman. At least we won't be competing.
I always hated Barbie although I was too old for dolls by the time she came along! This may have something to do with the fact that my chief rival at work looked exactly like her. Bratz seem much more fun! Too old for dolls? ... I still have my china doll called Mary and she doesn't have a trendy wardrobe and can't do anything except say "Mamma" but I can still see my Dad's delighted face the day he bought her for me and so she remains. [I'm just a sentimental Welsh gal at heart...]
ReplyDeleteYes, I was never much into them, to be honest. The real thing always seemed infinitely better.
ReplyDeleteMy wife and my daughter (and Granny) are died in the wool Barbie Gals. We have about 50. Having made the bonding with Barbie, Bratz hasn't really had a look in, although there are one or two. The cutest thing about Bratz Dolls is the way that the feet come off. With Barbie, you change the shoes, with Bratz, you have interchangeable feet, complete with shoes.
ReplyDelete..The cutest thing about Bratz Dolls is the way that the feet come off...
ReplyDeleteDismembering has to be way cool, Colin. Good to see you're a man of many parts. Sadly, I missed out on all the fun. I had to be satisfied with rotten old cricket bats and footballs.