SHANA
Set: HOLOGRAMS
Year: 1986-7
Sold: UK, Mexico
We KNOW mexican SHANA came with the following:
~White jacket
~purple dress
~panties
~hairbow
~purple guitar
~shoes
~Cassette featuring songs "Tema De Jem", "Un Nuevo Negocio" and "Tan Cerca"
~pink stand
~comb
HYBRID mexican Shana came additionally with:
Red earrings
Existing Variations:
See the bottom of the page!!
Comments: Don't confuse the display picture above with this one and assume there is a hair variation - there is not. The one shown above is my very loved but very played with Shana who displays in Mexican gear in my collection. The one to the left came to me mint with the accessories and box and her hair is in it's original wild perm coiff. It's perhaps interesting to note that Mexican Shana's hair is a slightly paler shade of lavender, and that her face and makeup are very pale in contrast to regular Shana dolls - her eyeshadow is whiteish! She has a kinda superior, sophisticated look. She does also have a clumsy widow's peak - both my loose Mexican Pure Shanas have this feature so I believe it to be standard among Mexican Shana dolls.
Comments: This is the back of a pure Mexican Shana. As you can
clearly see, she has no stamping on her head or between her shoulderblades.
Also, her body is nice and shiny :) Please do not be confused by the apparent
hair colour in this picture - the scan has distorted it and made it and the
body look darker than it is. Mexican Shana is African American but her torso
is not as dark as a normal shana doll!! Apart from the obvious shiny
(ceramic looking, but it is NOT ceramic) body, the lines where the arms
and legs' moulds were sealed are far more defined, the hands are longer,
thinner and marked in the palm quite often with a number or letter. Mexican
hands break off VERY easily, for some reason, and are also prone to a white
speckly deterioration. Both of these things are clues to a Mexican doll. Finally
the doll has greater proportions to a normal doll - she will stand a touch
taller than your average Shana of the Holograms! This is true for BOTH Hybrid
and Pure dolls.
Comments: Pretty standard for hybrids. Shana has a normal second edition head, with her more natural skin tone, and her hair is the same as on any other second Shana doll. Note the Widow Peak and the earring - these seem to simply be second edition heads that got to the Mexican plant and got used with all the rest. Note the pallor of her body in comparison. She makes for an odd looking doll! Shana;s head is stamped on the back with the normal Hasbro stamp.
Please note she should have two earrings - mine has lost one of hers along the way :)
Comments: This photograph clearly shows the shiny
nature of Shana's Mexican body, and the lack of stamp between the shoulder
blades, but you can see her head IS stamped as a normal Hasbro head should
be! Note once more the major colour difference!!Apart from the obvious shiny (ceramic looking, but it is NOT ceramic) body, the lines where the arms and legs' moulds were sealed are far more defined, the hands are longer, thinner and marked in the palm quite often with a number or letter. Mexican hands break off VERY easily, for some reason, and are also prone to a white speckly deterioration. Both of these things are clues to a Mexican doll. Finally the doll has greater proportions to a normal doll - she will stand a touch taller than your average Aja of the Holograms! This is true for BOTH Hybrid and Pure dolls.
Comments: In the same basic pattern as Shana;s ordinary jacket, even down to the silver glittery bits on the shoulders, but made of white pleather fabric instead of silver lame, and consequently much thicker fabric. Fairly distinctive.
Comments: Easy to mistake for a normal Shana dress but there is a difference between the two when you put them side by side. Colour of the dress seems to be a shade lighter and more pinkish, and the gathers at the front are bigger and less compact than on the regular dress. Also it seems to be slightly bigger overall.
Comments: The panties are far paler and much more poorly stitched around the edges. They also seem to be a more delicate sheer fabric.
Comments: Pretty much identical to a normal Shana hairbow. May be the same. I am actually not sure but the hairtie I got with my Mexican Shana with her box and accessories is identical to that from a normal Shana and had never been removed from her head!! Looking at it, it seems a bit rougher around the edges, perhaps, than a normal bow, so maybe it is made of inferior fabric. Probably of the same fabric used for Mexican Jem's tights, which are also very close to the original first edition doll.
Comments: Darker and smaller than the second year Shana guitar, yet with the glittery style
of second year instruments. The glitter in the guitar is gold, in larger pieces
and more widely spread out than in a normal Second Shana guitar. It also
only has 4 strings (other shana guitars have five) and strap is of poorer
quality silver cord. The decal is printed on a clear label stuck to the guitar,
so I guess this is a true hybrid guitar of first and second year styles!
Aja and Roxy's Mexican guitars are the same colour.
Comments: These are Mexican Shana's shoes (for sure, they came to me with my mint with box doll and were still in the little bag with the stand grip and comb!) They are a dark plummish purple colour, unlike the lavender of the ordinary first edition or the yellow of the second. They probably are closest to normal Stormer in shade though maybe even darker. They are classic Mexican with the thick slightly curled over sides and the number/letter on the base. NOT to be confused with the shoes for European Roxy, which have letters on the base but which are far more common and far more angular!
Comments: Just like your average second edition doll, Shana comes with earrings! The earrings seem to be standard second edition doll earrings, which fits the theory that Hybrid dolls have normal second edition heads stuck on Mexican bodies!
Comments: The cassette includes the songs "Tema De Jem" (Jem Theme), "Un Nuevo Negocio" (A New Business - aka Gettin' Down To Business) and "Tan Cerca" (Too Close.)On the B side are instrumentals WITHOUT an instrument playing the vocal line, far more like second year instrumentals, but for the first year issue songs! Mexican dolls are unique in that they are the only foreign packaged dolls to come with a specific language tape. Shana's tape is also different in another way. It has no label stuck on it and the text - in dark blue and not pink - is printed directly onto the cassette itself.
Comments: Mexican Jem doll stands are distinguishable quite easily
- there are two types, Hologram and Misfits and of course, that means pink
and yellow. All of the Hologram dolls had this stand - pink, clouded like
the second year dolls, but with no TM beside the M of Jem (or anywhere else
on the stand!) This is the easiest way to tell a Mexican stand from a normal
second edition stand! (The inset shows the missing TM, that picture has
been edited in art software to make the contrast show up better and the image
clearer)
Comments: Erm, Yep. Her comb is pink too. This is the one that came with my Shana in the baggie with her shoes etc, so I know it is hers. Again it has no TM by the M of jem.
Comments: I do not have Mexican Shana Mint in Box but I do have her with her box and can describe her packaging.
The artwork and box style is the same as a normal first edition Shana box, though of course it says "Hecho In Mexico" and has the Juguetes Con Vida logo as well as the Hasbro copyright. Mexican dolls were made under licence from Hasbro by Juguetes Con Vida :)
The text beneath the cassette picture says "Incluye un cassette con los exitos "Tema De Jem", "Un Nuevo Negocio" y "Tan Cerca". (Includes a cassette with the hit songs Jem Theme, Getting Down To Business and Too Close."
Yep, fairly standard. More on this here.
PICTURE
AVAILABLE
Comments: I have no picture to prove it, but as far as I can ascertain all hybrid dolls were sold in exactly the same packaging as the pure dolls. Pranceatron's Shana certainly seems to have had the same box as my own!!