L.O.L. Surprise! is a doll line by MGA Entertainment that is based on the unboxing trend on online video sites that debuted in December of 2016. Each doll comes with 7 or more layers of surprises hidden inside each product, with the doll itself having an additional water surprise. All of the characters except for the pets are depicted as babies and toddlers. Each doll is grouped into a certain club, with the Glitterati reserved for rare, glitter-covered dolls.
There are multiple different series of the dolls, with at least 2 different series being released every year. Beginning with Series 3, the series were named after a special gimmick (Confetti Pop for the ball being themed after a confetti ball for Series 3, Eye Spy for the secret messages hidden within the Season 4 products, and Makeover Series for Season 5's dolls, which have real hair). The brand has quickly become of the top-selling toys in the United States.
The doll line has also spun off pets and two series of fashion dolls: O.M.G. (Outrageous Millennial Girls/Guys) which are adult reinterpretations of the babies, and Be Tweens, which are tween interpretations. The taller dolls are advertised as the big brothers and sisters of the toddlers.
A special based on the line, Winter Disco, premiered on Amazon Prime, Google Play and iTunes in 2019, followed by an All-CGI Cartoon Movie on Netflix during Fall 2021.
The L.O.L. Surprise! toys contain the following tropes:
- Early-Installment Weirdness: Earlier lines and tie-ins were more overt with the whole "baby/toddler" motif.
- Fun with Acronyms:
- Mythology Gag: A number of characters
borrow color palettes from the characters of Lalaloopsy, one of MGA Entertainment’s previous lines. - No Celebrities Were Harmed:
- Oops Baby and her OMG Sister Fly Gurl are spoofs of Britney Spears.
- Queen Bee and her OMG Sister Royal Bee take their names from Beyoncé.
- It Baby's design is a clear homage to Audrey Hepburn's iconic look from Breakfast at Tiffany's.
- It Baby's brother It Boy's design is quite transparently based on Karl Lagerfeld
- Leading Baby is heavily inspired on Marilyn Monroe in her Signature Outfit. Her big sister Marilyn Star is also heavily inspired by Monroe, both in appearance and name.
- Glamour Queen and Agent Glamour take after yet another iconic Monroe Look, the pink gown from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
- The Queen and her OMG Sister Jukebox BB are both very straightforward tributes to The King Himself.
- Public Domain Character: It's the whole point of the Storybook Club.
- Curious QT channels Alice from Alice in Wonderland
- Heartbreaker and Troublemaker are based the Queen Of Hearts and the Cheshire Cat respectively
- Shout-Out : Plenty of dolls based on broader spectra pop-culture references and characters, rather than specific celebrities. Or, you know. Characters that are not public domain.
- “Purple Tears” is a parody of “Purple Rain”.
- Dusk’s outfit resembles Wednesday Addams’s signature dress.
- Witchay Babay seems to be inspired on the Netflix Series' iteration of Sabrina the Teenage Witch
- Spin-Offspring: Inverted with the OMG fashion doll series, which focuses on the characters' older sisters.
- The One Guy: Male LOL Surprise dolls were introduced in Series 3, so they're not as numerous as the girl dolls. They later get their own line (LOL Surprise Boys).
- Before Cool Lev was introduced, there's only one OMG Boy, Rocker Boi.
- The Tweens group introduced their first male Tween in their Masquerade Party line: Max Wonder (Curious Q.T.'s older brother).
- Three-Month-Old Newborn: Many of the "Little Sisters", who are supposedly baby versions of the main toddler/baby cast, have an identical hairstyle to their older siblings.
- Vague Age: Some of characters are constantly referred to as "babies" and one line is called "Tweens" but beyond that is anybody's guess.
