Ever since the Panda Express rolled through town in 2020, we've had to get used to some things changing. Besides supply chain issues and worker shortages, it seems like everything takes so much longer to arrive than it used to. I got used to the glory days of Amazon Prime where 2 days really meant 2 days, but even then it felt like indie orders would show up much faster than they do nowadays.
I was so excited by all of the spooky ooky releases that brands had for/around Halloween this year, and one of the highlights was the Scooby Doo collection from Glamlite. Not a Halloween release per se, this still came out during spooky season, and I was super excited to get the products in for a review. Unfortunately, took a while to arrive and I wasn't able to include them with any of my Halloween-themed content, either here or on my channel. And I'm having the same experience with the newest collab from the brand, the Strawberry Shortcake collection. I ordered it over the Black Friday weekend when it launched; as I'm writing this, it's two days before Christmas and it still hasn't arrived.
I'm sympathetic to the pressures that brands are under, and the world has literally been on fire for the last few years so there are much bigger things to worry about than when I'll be getting EVEN MORE MAKEUP into my collection. But as a content creator, it does make me less enthusiastic to purchase from smaller brands if I don't absolutely love the collection. I mean, I was going to buy that whole Strawberry Shortcake collection no matter what: I love green, I love the 80s nostalgia, and that collection was the perfect collection of coordinated products. Even if I never spoke to another soul about any of it, I was going to own it.
But for collections where I'm not as eager for the products and am just thinking about picking them up for a review, it's getting harder to justify it. After all, the people who got it in PR have done their videos ages ago, and this collection is pretty much old news. I'm still going to review it, but I know that it's not going to have the same audience as it would have had if it came in a few weeks ago. People say that they want to see reviews that aren't all PR, but that never seems to translate to the actual numbers.
Anyway, I just had to get that off my chest because the rest of this post is going to be pretty upbeat. Why? Because the Glamlite and Scooby Doo collection is easily one of the best releases of 2022!
The collection includes two 10-pan paletts, three lipsticks, a highlighter duo, a mascara, an eyeliner, and a set of lashes. I've worn the lashes in several videos and they are the same amazing quality that I've come to expect from Glamlite (their Double Cheeseburger lashes are my absolute go to!). The Bat Eyes eyeliner is a great black potted liner, nice and dark and paints on smooth. The only thing I would say about it is that it's a little hard to wash off. I used an oil cleanser and makeup wipes with micellar water, and I still had some black staining around my eyes when I used it.
The only dud in the collection is the Batscara. I only use mascara to darken my lashes before I put falsies on, so the bar is set pretty low, but this barely even stuck to my lashes, and I didn't notice any real lengthening or volumizing. It just sort of painted the lashes I had a dull, inconsistent black. I'm not sure what happened here, but when I think about this collection, I often forget that was even a part of it because everything else is so stupid good!
First up is the Ruh Roh Raggy palette, a collection of 5 stunning shimmers and 5 gorgeous mattes. These shimmers are pretty consistent with what Glamlite has done in the past, on par with some of their better palettes like the Ice Cream Dreams and the Cake palettes. The shades don't have names (which is a bummer) but the performance is absolutely gorgeous.
As usual, all of my swatches are done over the Ulta Matte eye primer with a finger on the left and a brush on the right, top photo without flash and bottom photo with. I'm not sure why the teal swatched so terribly here. I was very concerned when I saw this (the periwinkle was also a little dodgy), but I've used all of these shades on the eyes since and they apply and blend beautifully. They can be a little sheer at first, but I had no problem building them up, and there was none of the patchiness I see in the swatches. That's how it goes sometimes; no matter how much you work to make the swatch application similar to actual use, sometimes it just isn't representative of what it does on the eyes.
The Creeps and Crawls palette leans much more into the purple teal realm, and while it's a gorgeous complement to the other palette (and I do generally use them together), it's got a great color story all on its own. These shades are also creamy and metallic and have beautiful performance.
Again, these mattes look a little weak in the swatches, and I didn't feel like these were as good as the mattes in the other palette, they are still pretty good. Sometimes things just don't swatch well, they don't like the primer, etc. These blend out beautifully and I love that you get a nice range of deep, dark shades.
Both of the highlighters in the duo look like duochromes in the pan, though one applies definitely more pinky purple and the other one applies more green/turquoise. They have a white base to them, but not so much that you should get a bad cast in photos, and they do blend out nicely.
With the green shade, you can sort of see some of the pinky tones on the extreme edges of the swatch, and you definitely get a little bit of a cast with this in the more built up swatch, but it also blends out really nicely and has a great glitter sparkle.
The lipsticks are a gorgeous, creamy formula with a satin, slightly shiny application. These shades actually have names! Ruh Roh is a sandy peach, Zoinks is a deep berry red, and Jeepers is a dusty rose pink. They are all gorgeous, but if I had one complaint about them, it's that they are all too neutral. Sure, these are great wearable shades for a lot of people, but they are in a collection with greens and purples and teals! I would have loved just one shade that was wild and wacky to go along with the overall story of the collection.
Overall, when I think of this collection, I have little nit-picky things about it that I can criticize. if you're going to do an IP collab, why not have shade names? That's a big part of the fun, getting all of the little references. The lipsticks are a little boring, even if they do perform well. The mascara was a total letdown, and the eyeliner, while good, was a little too aggressive when it came time to remove it. But when I think back over the year and try to put my finger on some of the best products of the year, this collection just keeps coming back to mind! The packaging is absolute perfection, and the colors of the palettes were perfect for the theme while also just being really lovely color stories (I would have bought them from the regular line as well!). The lipsticks are creamy and wear really nicely on the lips, and the highlighters are glittery and colorful while also blending out into the perfect shine without going overboard.
This is just a solid collection. I hope to be able to say the same thing about Strawberry Shortcake...someday.