Basic (doll assortment)

"Something is lurking the halls of Monster high. Something killer. Something fierce."

- Narration in the Basic commercial.

The Basic doll line is a nameless doll line featuring the main characters in their non-themed, day-to-day outfits. The line was released mid-to-late 2010, the first of many to come. The role as core line is what causes the line's namelessness, but fans have picked up the name Basic to distinguish the line's dolls from others. The characters featured in the Basic line are Frankie Stein, Draculaura, Clawdeen Wolf, Lagoona Blue, Cleo de Nile, Deuce Gorgon, and later Ghoulia Yelps and Holt Hyde.

Potentially a source of confusion, the Basic line does not, in fact, cover all the dolls released in non-themed, day-to-day outfits. Mid-to-late 2011, the core line was extended with the releases of several new faces and several old faces in new non-themed, day-to-day outfits. Though officially the same line, even if marketed separately, fans have picked up on the name School's Out to distinguish these new dolls, particularly the clothes worn by characters appearing in both the Basic and the School's Out lines.

A way to tell which dolls belong to the Basic and which to the School's Out line is to look at the back of the box and see what other dolls are promoted on it. There are two exceptions to this method though: Holt Hyde and Toralei Stripe. Holt was the last Basic, preceding School's Out by just a few months. As such, his box originally advertised the Basic dolls, but when School's Out came around, his box was modified to advertise the School's Out dolls. Since the doll remained the same, he is considered a Basic only. As for Toralei, her box only promotes two dolls that have yet to be released, arguably making her part of a yet-to-be-defined third incarnation of the core line. For now, the wiki lists her as a Basic-by-default.

As the core line, the Basic line is what was the public's first meeting with Monster High. While the franchise did and the dolls sold exceptionally well, many adults raised complaints about the characters Basic outfits for being too skimpy. In particular Clawdeen Wolf's Basic look raised comparisons with the clothes a streetwalker would wear, harsh criticism standing in stark contrast with Clawdeen's popularity. Mattel did respond to these complaints with the School's Out line, which features more clothing on the characters. However, Monster High is still frequently decried and to prove their point, critics still always haul up a photo of Clawdeen's Basic doll.

The Basic line received two commercials: one for the first six dolls and a modified one to promote the releases of Ghoulia and Holt. In the webisodes, the Basic outfits are what the characters introduced in the line usually wear. Even now that School's Out has been released and animation models have been made to represent the new outfits, the characters still are drawn in their original outfits.