Mattel Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Playset > Reviews (4)

Last year my 2 year old Daughter dumped her yearlong obsession of Peppa Pig to Disney’s Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. So, as her toy box consisted of various Peppa Pig items, by Christmas, I had a new character to shop around for.

For those of you who don’t know what Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is, it’s the channel Disney Junior’s number one show. It features all the classic Mickey Mouse associated characters, including Minnie, Donald, Daisy, Goofy, Pluto, Pete, Clarabelle and Chip n Dale. They have a task to complete in every episode, where they call upon Toodles to give them 4 handy ‘mousekatools’ to help them along the way. A very educational TV show, which helps with counting, colours, numbers, problem solving, puzzles and many other educational topics aimed at 2 to 5 year olds.

I only came across the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse by actually searching on Toys’r’Us for Mickey Mouse items. As soon as I saw it, I knew that she would enjoy it as she has a really good imagination and knew that this toy would keep her entertained role-playing and making up her own little stories.

WHAT DO YOU GET

In the box, you get the actual Clubhouse, a telescope to add to one of the balconies, a settee, hot air balloon, Toodles with 2 extra ‘faces’, Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse figurines.

WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE

The clubhouse is all put together when you take it out of the box; the only thing you have to assemble is the slide on the side of the Clubhouse, which just clips onto the Clubhouse quite easily. The clubhouse is identical to the one on the TV show. When closed, it has a red rounded base which looks like shoulders. It has a Mickey Mouse head shaped top, where each of the ears slide open to reveal little pots in which you can store the Mickey and Minnie figurines very easily. The door to the clubhouse is on a yellow shoe on the side of the Clubhouse, and then the large blue slide on the side of the house.

When you open up the clubhouse, you have 2 small balconies which slide out underneath the ‘ears’. One consists of Mickey’s bed, and the other is the observation tower, where the telescope goes. The observation tower is also where the hot air balloon which the characters use in the show lands when they go off on a balloon ride. In between the balconies is the lift which transports the characters from the ground, up to the balconies. The inside of the clubhouse features a small kitchen for your child to pretend to use with the figures.

Toodles is very large, bigger than the figures, where in the show he is a lot smaller than them. I suppose this is for ease of playing. He has a red ‘glass’ front, and his 2 extra faces slip in just behind, depending which one you want to use. They all feature the mystery mousekatools, which in the show is always a special tool they use on their adventures, and the red ‘glass’ on the Toodles reveals the mystery mousekatools to the child, which is quite a good idea. The hot air balloon is also quite large, as is the settee. The Mickey and Minnie figures are good quality as they are quite solid and not flimsy little hollow things.

DURABILITY/PLAYABILITY

The Clubhouse is made of plastic, which obviously is handy for a pre-school toy. The 2 balconies are only secured on by tiny hinges, so if your child is heavy handed you can see them just snapping off. The blue slide which just clips into the side of the clubhouse is forever falling off, so my Daughter is constantly asking me to clip it back on.

The clubhouse itself compared to the extra items you get is quite flimsy. As I mentioned earlier, Toodles, the settee, hot air balloon and the figures are tough plastic and not flimsy, but I think the actual Clubhouse should be a lot more durable than it is. The lift in the middle of the clubhouse is always getting stuck also as it is quite flimsy also, so just catches on the pole that it stands on. My Daughter has a lot of trouble trying to move the lift up, and again is asking me to unstick it sometimes.

My Daughter was very excited to get this item, so obviously she had a lot of fun playing with it and role-playing. She would sing the songs from the show when using Toodles and the hot air balloon. She had a lot of fun making up little stories and hearing her make her own little Mickey Mouse adventures up when playing with the Clubhouse was nice to listen to, and just shown how much imagination comes into play.

DOWNSIDES

Inside the clubhouse is just plain red, which I would have thought there would have been a bit more décor, such as the living room wallpaper, but unfortunately it isn’t. The other side of the inside of the Clubhouse has the kitchen, which is just flat blue plastic against the red background. Now on the show the living room, kitchen etc spins around and the room turns into what room you want. I think they could have done this with this item, as all they needed to do was add a flip down of each room. I once bought my Daughter a Ben and Holly Cave which turned from clean to messy by lifing the floor up which stayed up by a small magnet. This could have added a lot more value to the toy rather than it just being empty inside.

Obviously, you are to use the area in-between the 2 sides of the Clubhouse to play, but I expected a lot more space inside the clubhouse to play. I paid £35.99 for this, and your child can’t actually play with it, apart from lifting the lift and sliding the figures down the slide, it is just more like a background item whilst they play with the figurines on the floor.

Another downside is that to buy extra characters, it costs around £9.99, depending where you shop. So, to get all the characters, which I’m sure many children would want with this item, would end up costing you £60, or maybe over that, again, depending where you shop. Luckily my Daughter already had all the characters from another play set, so I didn’t have to spend more money buying the characters, if I had, I’d have been very disappointed.

ALL IN ALL

£35.99 is a good price for the item, but I do not think it is worth it, especially if you have to buy all the figures and because the Clubhouse is flimsy, the lift sticks, the slide falls off and also it lacks a lot of features, so I'd advise to shop around.

I think £25 is more ideal rather than £35, up to £40 in some shops.

All in all it is the Clubhouse from the outside, but open it up and you’re disappointed. The only reason I’d recommend is if your child absolutely loves Mickey Mouse Clubhouse like my Daughter, then buying this not for the worthiness of the item but, as I said before, just to hear them play and role-play, it just shows that no matter what a child is playing with, it’s their imagination and what they can do with it that makes the toy a worthy buy.