Mascara: L'Oreal Telescopic Explosion

I do apologize for the lack of posting over the last week, life in Sirvinya Land has been very busy. It's times like these that I'm grateful that I keep a folder of edited photos on my laptop, ready for when I've got 10 minutes or so to write up a blog post. So it's for that reason that you're getting another mascara review tonight. Before you ask, I will be recording this for my YouTube channel.

This is L'Oreal's version of the Givenchy spikey ball thing. This one is a lot cheaper, being available for about £8.99 from the usual places you can buy L'Oreal. I think I got mine from Tesco. It's sometimes on offer. Don't bother buying it.


The packaging is cute, I like the red and black, and the fact it's shaped like a telescope (well, it is part of the Telescopic line). The concept behind this mascara is pretty neat. The spikey ball should allow you to coat even the tiny lashes at the edges of your lash line. Let's talk about why this mascara fails.

Firstly, the name. I seriously have to go "wtf?" over this. I'm putting this right near my eye ball. Why have you called it "explosion"? Who thought that would work as a mascara name? We'll ignore the fact it looks like something the Witchking of Angmar would use on the battlefield (after all, the Givenchy one is apparently fantastic) and just wtf at the name. Seriously, "explosion"?

Secondly, the formula of the mascara is completely wrong for the type of wand. It's far too wet and gloopy. If you look at the wand photo, you'll see the wand looks gross. Really gross. It's covered in an absolute mess of mascara. This gloopiness transfers over to the lashes. When I apply this, I get thick, crusty, stuck together lashes. The do look quite a bit longer and this mascara does create a large amount of volume on my lashes. This mascara is really sticky and it takes quite a long time to dry. Blink and you'll get lash patterns all over your eye area.


Now, the application isn't the easiest which I expected with the unusual wand shape. You do have to work slowly and carefully. This isn't a mascara for when you are in a hurry. You need to take your time over this. I've used this mascara a lot and it does coat even those tiny hairs right at the edges of the lash line. I just can't stand the stickiness. Even combing out the mascara after use is pointless, my lashes will restick to each other.

Overall, I hate this. Shame really as L'Oreal have produced (and then discontinued) my favourite mascara to date. I'm not giving up on L'Oreal, clearly they can make fantastic mascara. This is not one of them.

Oh, and I know some of you get all defensive when I don't like a mascara that you love. Do I really have to point out that it's not a personal attack? Seriously, you'd be surprised at some of the messages I've had from when I've not liked a mascara. Although, if you're active in the blogging and YT world, you've probably already had similar.