Mattel’s Barbie Doll is a sensational icon. The doll has had an immense amount of production, houses (remember the dreamhouses?) and plenty of animated movies to always keep it in trend and children hooked to the blue-eyed blonde model. And now, we have the first live-action film made on the doll ever. How cool is that, right?
A fantasy comedy film, Barbie is directed by Greta Gerwig, who wrote the screenplay for this movie with her longtime partner, Noah Baumbach. The cinematography is by Rodrigo Prieto with the runtime being 144 minutes.
Margot Robbie stars in the titular role of this film along with Ryan Gosling as Ken. The film has an ensemble cast featuring America Ferrera as Gloria, Rhea Perlman as Ruth Handler, Will Ferrell as the CEO of Mattel, John Cena as Kenmaid, Helen Mirren as the narrator, Michael Cera as Allan, Ariana Greenblatt as Sasha, Jamie Demetriou as a Mattel employee and Connor Swindells as Aaron Dinkins. We will see various versions of Barbie played by Kate McKinnon, Issa Rae, Hari Nef, Alexandra Shipp, Emma Mackey, Sharon Rooney, Dua Lipa, Nicola Coughlan, Ana Cruz Kayne and Ritu Arya. Kingsley Ben-Adir, Simu Liu, Scott Evans and Ncuti Gatwa will play different variations of Ken.
However, Barbie has not always been the star of the news. There have been moments in the past and present where the doll has been criticized for certain things- such as the stereotyping of beauty standards, inducing the concept of eating disorders and more. Here we bring to you six controversial moments of Mattel’s Barbie Doll.
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All the Controversies Surrounding the Barbie Doll Over the Years
The Escort Origins
As iconic as Barbie is, she isn’t quite an original creation. Mattel’s Ruth Handler, the creator of the doll tried her best to make it her own which includes naming the doll after her daughter- Barbara. But, she could not escape the lawsuit that showed the world the true origin of the doll. Handler modelled her creation after the German, high-end escort doll called Bild Lilli. This resulted in Greiner & Hausser, Bild Lilli’s creation company suing Mattel for copying their design. The case was ultimately settled with Mattel buying Greiner & Hausser’s copyright and patent rights for Bild Lilli.
Body Image Issues and Eating Disorders
The Barbie Doll echoed femininity and steadily became a model for girls. Everyone wanted to be Barbie! This meant a slim waist, saucy eyes and a full face of makeup and white skin, all of this showed inclusivity being tossed out of the window and the doll setting unreal body shape and look standards that resulted in body image issues for years in young girls. Moreover, Mattel really contributed to the eating disorder induction world when they introduced their dolls with cookbooks titled ‘Don’t Eat’- a really cruel move.
Puberty and Pregnancy
Mattel tried to up their game by making their dolls puberty and pregnancy friendly and that is the only way we can put it across. The Growing Up Skipper and Growing Up Ginger dolls both stirred a lot of controversy by letting kids make their dolls hit puberty by rotating their arms which made their breasts and height grow.
The company did not stop there as soon came the Family Version of Midge, where Barbie’s redhead friend was found pregnant. You could remove her belly cover and actually see a baby toy rolled up inside. Both of these versions of dolls were too far-fetched and uncomfortable for the people and were discontinued.
Inclusivity Gone Wrong
Don’t get us wrong, Mattel did try to make their Barbie Doll inclusive as much as possible but, things just went too offbeat for them. There was Becky, Barbie’s paraplegic friend in a wheelchair. Unfortunately, much thought was not given to developing this doll as it could not even fit in the Dreamhouse, making the company discontinue it (they could have just rectified the doll or the Dreamhouse instead, in all honesty).
Additionally, there was a Hijab Barbie, a Blonde AA Barbie and Oreo Barbie, who all failed to represent inclusivity in society and were known for being mocking and disrespectful creations by Mattel. Of course, things have changed a lot over the years for the company to understand what to put out there.
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Why Barbie Bimbo
Yes, Barbie went to Space before women could own credit cards. She has over 200 careers and has run for president four times! Yet Mattel just couldn’t make the doll tech-savvy, sigh. In the 2010 sticker book titled Barbie: I Can Be a Computer Engineer, Mattel goes on to show how incompetent the doll is as she ends up making all the boys do the ‘tech’ work around her. This was, of course, not the first time as the Teen Talk Barbie of 1992 had the recording which went: “Math class is tough”, discouraging young girls to try out the subject.
We totally support Aqua’s parody song on the doll. No doubt Mattel lost that lawsuit!
Barbie Trailer
Barbie is now streaming in theatres near you. So go and check it out! To read our review of the latest film, click here.
Meanwhile, let us know what you think of the movies and the controversies surrounding the doll. Are there more controversies you are aware of? Drop your comments down below!