I know I've been posting a lot, but this is something that intrigues me. I wrote a post about two weeks talking about Chelsea getting a good deal of focus in the franchise. One comment I got suggested that the amount of focus Chelsea gets is probably because of wanting to help the franchise appeal to younger children because of how she's imaginative and sweet. Well, I have another point for that. I think Skipper got a good deal of focus in Barbie Dreamhouse Adventures as a way to also help the franchise appeal to teenagers.
The format of Dreamhouse Adventures allows there to be various focus episodes on certain characters, with Skipper being one of the more prominent examples. The show definitely highlights how she's the oldest of Barbie's youngest sisters, and can thus act as somewhat of a mediator. She's old enough so that she can speak to Barbie on a more personal level with similar interests and tell her what's up while still being young enough to have some immature, impulsive moments and partner up with Stacie and/or Chelsea for various activities. It's also not uncommon for Skipper to try and measure herself up to Barbie.
One example I can think of is the season 1 episode "Baby Sister Babysitter". Barbie is worried about Skipper not doing well on her first babysitting job given how she takes a rather lax approach to the idea, thinking it's easy money. She gets in over her head at first, but does a better job when she remembers Barbie's advice. This eventually motivates her to start a babysitting service.
Then there's the episode (I forgot the name, but it's still in season 1) where she tries to recreate Barbie's cake for their parents' anniversary when she's away at robot con, and compares herself to her, trying to see how she would approach it. With her going to Barbie's school, especially in seasons 4-5, it allows for her to be more involved in her life.
One notable example is with the 2 part season 4 finale, "The Sportathon", where she and Barbie team up for a community service project, but she doesn't put in as much effort because of focusing more on a surfing contest. One could definitely say that she's the protagonist of this special because of how she learns to see the value of doing good for the community when an earthquake strikes.
The prime example of this is in the series finale, "Close Knit Friendship", where she gets the subplot involving a friend conflict that mirrors the conflict Barbie has with Teresa in writing a song (her plot was about the babysitting service). She even goes to Barbie at one point to talk about her problems and thinks she's got it under control she says she's in a similar situation.
Another thing with Skipper, which I did mention, but want to elaborate on, is with how she's blunt and straightforward, but is also compassionate enough with her honesty when telling the truth. There's the season 4 episode "The In Crowd", where she starts to hang out with Nikki, Renee, Teresa, and Daisy, but without Barbie, when they have a shared interest in a music group she's not a fan of.
Barbie feels jealous and tries to get her friends back, at one point, even being kind of snippy in trying to exclude. When Skipper has had enough, she confronts Barbie on it, but when she finds out why, she's able to calmly tell her that she was acting irrationally, yet also say that she liked hanging with older girls because of how much they remind her of Barbie. This then leads to her apology.
There are also some episodes where she's not the focus, but still helps the development of certain characters. For example, the subplot of "Sister Class Act" has Stacie feeling down on herself when she's constantly compared to Barbie and Skipper by Ms. Gomez, who used to be in her class. While both do try to console her, she's more straightforward in saying that she doesn't have to follow her, Barbie, or mom in coming up with a good science project to impress her.
There's also the resolution to "Three Ring Dreamhouse", where she sees that Chelsea is down, and upon finding out that Barbie was keeping the circus a secret, she's upfront, but also open hearted enough to tell Barbie that she was being somewhat ignorant of Chelsea and her feelings even if she did still have good intentions.
Probably a good example of this would be outside the show, like in the vlogs, Barbie It Takes Two, and "Barbie And Chelsea: The Lost Birthday". In the case of the latter, I want to talk about her tiger counterpart Snipper, who Chelsea directly compares to her. She's also the talking animal who gets the most notable development. She's shown being somewhat confrontational to everyone, but only because she's unsure about others liking her music. Once they do listen to her music, she becomes friendlier.
As for the vlogs, she's the only one of Barbie's sisters who can fully qualify for these three frequent things: A) Only she appears with Barbie, B) She appears with Barbie and her sisters, C) She can appear with Barbie and her friends. There are plenty of examples of A, but two I can think of are where she tells Barbie to bake a cake without a recipe, and the first short vlogs (Keep Or Toss) where she wants some of her outfits.
For B, two examples I can think of are the car karaoke vlog from December 2019 and the Valentine's Day vlog of 2020. For C), some of what she's done includes an October 2019 vlog (the one where she picks the items that Barbie and Ken have to blindly touch), the April 2021 vlog (where she's in charge of changing the backgrounds for Barbie and Daisy as they make up a story), the June 2021 vlog (where she, Barbie, and Teresa talk about how to be green), and the Earth Day vlog from last month (where she does backyard camping with Malibu and Brooklyn).
Speaking of Brooklyn, let's talk Barbie It Takes Two. While the format of the show means most of the episodes are about advancing their music career, she still gets some moments to stand out. The most notable case is the subplot of "Starting Small", where she's shown to be quite stubborn in beating Jessica and getting an old cup back from a bird. Here are priorities are skewed, but she's able to calm down when talking to both Barbies. There's also part 2 of "The Great Outdoors", where she goes with Malibu and Brooklyn to find the source of the mysterious sounds and footprints. Since she's closer in age to them, she's able to be more casual in talking to them.
And that's all I have for now. What do you think?