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He created quite a sensation when Ringdoll released Senkai in the summer of 2017. The head was both designed and sculpted by Ringdoll’s foremost doll artist Huang Shan. Senkai was the first doll from the company released in wheat skin resin. For me, it was love at first sight! I had to have him.
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Eventually, my Senkai arrived in a purple company box inside a packing box. When the lid was lifted off, the doll was completely obscured by his accouterments along with his certificate of authenticity and various paper items.
One interesting booklet caught my eye. It shows illustrations for some future Ringdoll releases.
Putting those items aside, I had my first look at Senkai, carefully protected by plastic, bubble wrap and tape.
Here he is, fresh out of his head wrappings and with his face-up protection mask removed.
I then removed his head easily and placed it next to the head of my other Ring Grown boy, Sol, which I acquired back in 2012. (Sol’s sculpt has since been retired by the company.) The difference in the face-ups is readily apparent. Senkai is contour blushed and much of the face’s surface is painted, while Sol’s face-up paint is confined to the eye areas and the mouth.
There was a lot of tape around the bubble wrap encircling his limbs, but with some careful work with some scissors, I was finally able to view Senkai in his entirety. I placed him next to Sol to compare them further.
Sol has the RGM-1 body which is still available. As you can see, he is muscular but slim. The dolls are about the same height. (They are not perfectly aligned in the photo.) Senkai has wider shoulders and his legs and arms are more muscular.
There are quite a few additional differences. The hands are similarly detailed, but Senkai has bent fingers on the right that can be used to hold items. When he was unpacked, a piece of foam was placed in his palm to help protect the fingers from breaking in shipping. (He is holding it here.)
Both the Grown version-1 and -3 bodies have a double elbow joint. Due to the -3’s broader shoulders and tighter stringing, the arms were less able to hold a specific pose. For example, in the first photo below, Sol has his hand lightly touching his cheek while Senkai’s hand is propped against his. As the elastic relaxes, the posing should become more accurate.
The feet are much more lifelike on the RGM-3 body. Senkai has two sets of feet, the regular ones attached for shipping, and a pair of Japanese geta feet with toe spacing.
Like Senkai, my Grown line girl Aya has a face-up with similarly painted contouring. Both also have painted teeth and open mouths.
Here are all three dolls together. Aya is normal skin resin which is paler in tone.
Before getting further into his posing, I thought I would try a few wigs in different styles and colors on Senkai to see how they looked on him. The white one (top left) is the wig that came with his full-set. He looks good in all of the colors. The top right wig is Sol’s original wig. That one and all of the others were loose on Senkai’s head, but I wrapped a rubber band around his pate which kept the wigs from slipping.
Here are a few long wigs too.
So now, onto the legs! As you can see, their double joints are very different. Senkai has much more detailed legs and a more defined kneecap. He also holds his leg poses a little better than Sol.
Both also have a split thigh that allows the leg to move around and also be pulled out to allow the thigh to be pulled near the chest. The hip socket joint on Senkai extends out a little further and is easier to set up in this pose. In addition, unlike Sol’s thigh joint, Senkai’s only spins part-way when standing which keeps the leg from accidentally slipping and causing the doll to fall down when in a standing pose.
Due to his muscular build, Senkai’s torso is not very flexible. It does move forward and back a little, There is a shelf built into the lower torso part to keep the upper chest in place when extended.
The side-to-side movement is a little better.
The Senkai full-set came with an amazing amount of stuff! Below are photos of all the paper items, the costume, and accessories. The tassels on the costume were wrapped to keep them neat.
The full-set outfit is sold separately. Here are a few photos of mine below with most of the accouterments. I tried to dress Senkai in some other outfits I own that fit Sol, but they did not fit Senkai. He is too muscular in the legs and too wide in the waist for the trousers to fit. Ringdoll’s own outfits are made in all of the different body sizes to fit each of them perfectly.
I still love my Sol and the RGM-1 body is very nice. It is a standard size, poses nicely and looks good. The RGM-3 body is beautifully sculpted, and while the arm stringing is a little tight on mine, it will probably improve once they loosen a bit. The lower legs hold poses very well. I love Senkai’s head sculpt and the face-up is excellent. If you want a beautiful bishonen with a bit more muscle, I highly recommend both Senkai and the RGM-3 body.
