Cartoon mascots are everywhere. From cereal boxes, to fast food companies, to battery packs, and, of course, the Roman Catholic Church.
…wait, what?
You heard (read) that right. On the 28th of October, the Vatican revealed there would be a mascot for the upcoming Holy Year (a year centered around the forgiveness of sin). Meet Luce (‘light’ in Italian). Luce is meant to represent a pilgrim, holding a pilgrim’s staff and wearing muddied boots to represent a long journey. She wears a yellow raincoat, symbolizing “journeying through life’s storms” while invoking the Vatican flag’s color scheme. Luce also has three friends – Fe, Xin, and Sky– who also wear raincoats, boots, and rosaries.
Luce was present at Lucca Comics & Games, which is a comic convention, and will be present at the 2025 Expo in Japan. While further appearances and plans are yet to be announced, it has been stated that Luce was created with the intentions of furthering the Catholic Church’s desire to “live even within the pop culture so beloved by our youth”, which would serve to evangelize younger generations. But how would this work?
From Tokidoki to Labubu
Luce was designed by Italian artist Simone Legno, who is the creator of Tokidoki. Tokidoki is an art brand heavily inspired by Japanese culture as well as street art and graffiti. The company produces a wide range of products, with different styles of characters. I remember watching YouTubers unbox their line of ‘Unicorno’ vinyl figure blind-boxes, and seeing proud Instagram users post their complete collection. While I haven’t heard much about the brand in recent years, Tokidoki’s popularity is not a one-off thing.
A currently popular company which I believe fills the same niche when it comes to supplying collectible figurines is Pop Mart. Pop Mart predominantly sells blind-boxes and vinyl figurines. These are based on a range of different characters, notably including ‘Labubu’. Labubu is an interesting case in my opinion because of their road to popularity.
Originally, Labubu was not one of Pop Mart’s bestselling collections. That is, until kpop group Blackpink’s Lisa was spotted with one hanging from her bag. This naturally meant that a lot of Lisa’s fans wanted a Labubu of their own, and so the hype began to spread. Labubus went from being considered ugly to so-ugly-its-kinda-cute. But the hype kept growing as more and more people started posting about them.
These days, people line up outside of Pop Mart stores in the hopes of getting their hands on a Labubu before they sell out, and the reseller market is charging astronomical prices for a single toy. Some people even buy protective cases for their plush Labubus, preventing them from getting dirty or stolen.
https://www.tiktok.com/@yunovaa/video/7428197441645628690 (issues with embedding). CAPTION: TikTok user’s experience queuing for a Labubu.
What’s next for Luce?
As these two examples illustrate, social media attention plays a big role in creating hype for ‘cute’, but otherwise functionless, items. I believe the same could happen to Luce. Many works of fanart were created right after the announcement, like the one below. Luce’s announcement was entirely unexpected, and I think that’s why it caught on as it did. While she has the potential to become fairly popular, I don’t think her fanbase would translate into people joining the Roman Catholic church (at least, those who hadn’t considered it before). Most people seem to be taking it as a joke, and I have unfortunately stumbled upon some suggestive drawings.
Regardless, if we’re talking purely about reach, it would be a missed opportunity to not create an online presence for Luce; perhaps an animated show? Kid-friendly shows are often a hit with teens and young adults as well. The Holy Year doesn’t start until the 24th of December, so we’ll have to wait and see.
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