Elizabeth Swan

I recently got one of the dolls I have been wanting most badly all year, Tonner's Elizabeth Swann in Court Gown. The doll has a new head sculpt that is "an authorized likeness of Kiera Knightley.” Like so many celebrity likeness dolls, I find there to be something slightly caricatured about her features, but I think there is a definite resemblance to Kiera Knightley.

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The hair style is not quite accurate to the movie -- instead of having those weird oversized, loose tendril-curl things that seem to come out of nowhere above her hairline, she just had some pieces of hair along her hairline curled into fairly tight, small ringlets (the hairstyle in the photo of Kiera Knightley above wasn't the same as in the movie either).

By far, my biggest complaint about the doll is the hairline. I don't know what possessed them to give her a widow's peak -- Kiera sure doesn't have one, and the prototype versions had the right hairline. So why the change? I actually think the hairline detracts from the likeness, it gives her face a different shape. When I cover it up, I think the doll looks much more like Kiera, but maybe that's just me.

And unfortunately, it's pretty hard to get rid of the widow's peak. I suppose I could take her hair down, remove the plugs in the widow's peak and root the correct hairline in, then fill in the holes, get a paint that is a perfect skin tone match and cover the filled in holes, and restyle the hair...but that's a lot of work and I'm not confident in my ability to pull it off.

She is on the standard articulated Tonner body. The smaller-bust body would have been more accurate for Ms. Knightley, but I guess Tonner Co. had a reason for using the body they did.

The gold gown from POTC is one of my favorite costumes ever. So on some level, I won't be satisfied with anything less than an exact, miniaturized replica, and unfortunately that's not what the doll has. I won't go into all the ways the doll's costume differs from the gold gown in the movie, because that would probably be boring for everybody. To be fair to Tonner, most of the changes were probably due to available materials and the need to simplify the costume construction to mass produce it for a 16" doll. Taking that into consideration, I would say that they did an ok job.

Here's the real gown side-by-side with Tonner’s version so you can see that there are some differences in terms of color, construction (compare the sleeves, for example), and detail.

The gown has a very tight fitting bodice and closes in the back with snaps. In fact, mine is perhaps a little too tight fitting below the bust. You can see that it's pulling at the snaps and the center back seams.

There are a lot of fine details in the original gown that were lost on the doll, but I felt the Tonner co. did a decent job scaling down some of the details.

The stomacher has lace overlay on the top part to give it a bit more detail and texture. A little beading would have been nice, though (since the original gown has pearls sewn to the stomacher). Something else I like is the trim along the front edge of the gown. It's the wrong color -- should be beige/light brown -- and out-of-scale, but the effect of the trim used on the doll is similar to the

original, which has small bows

all along the length of the trim.

If only the doll's trim were

beige or light brown or a

similar color!

The underskirt isn't a

separate piece, but

rather a sewn-in

inset and the

overskirt is turned

back into a deep

pleat so it

overlaps it and

looks like a

separate skirt.

The quality of fabrics for the doll's costume is good. The gown itself seems to be a brocaded silk that has a slight texture like dupioni beneath the stripes and floral brocaded pattern. I think the stomacher and "underskirt" are a synthetic jacquard, but not totally sure. The entire gown is fully lined with an ivory lining.

Under the gown, she wears a white petticoat with a kind of ruffle at the top sides and back to help shape the gown. The petticoat is white but the lighting was bad in this shot, it came out too dark. Beneath this, she has nude panty hose (white would have been preferable). The underpinnings are not remotely close to movie-accurate... but I'm sure they weren't intended to be.

My favorite accessory is the shoes. They are quite cute! The shoes are made of the same brocade as the gown. What I like the best about them is, they have little latchets, like 18th century shoes. (Latchets were the strips of leather or fabric that came across the instep; the shoe buckles were put through the latchets and that was how they fastened them). Ok, she has no buckles...and as far as replicas of the original shoes they're not perfect...but I feel like Tonner did a nice job with these shoes regarless, especially considering they don't show beneath her gown. They could have just given us some plain gold pumps or something (Femme d'Intrigue Gene, with your strappy sandals, I'm looking at you!). So these exceeded my expectations. My only gripe is they are a bit of a tight fit over her hose.

She also comes with a gold necklace, and earrings adorned with pearl drops. Again, they're not exact replicas, but they do a decent job approximating the look of the original.

In the movie, she also carried a fan and had a white hat. I wish she came with these accessories as well -- especially the hat, so I could use it to help hide that blasted hairline. Oh well. Maybe I'll make one for her.

Well, what's the final verdict?

If they hadn't effed up the hairline, she would probably be my favorite doll of the year. But as it is, she is a slight disappointment. The costume isn't a perfect replica, but it is recognizable, and the quality of the materials is good. I'm looking forward to future dolls in the series. I also think I read an interview with Robert Tonner where he discussed plans to do other Elizabeths as well. I think they've got a good sculpt here, I just hope they give her the right hairline next time!