Who’s Afraid of Mickey Mouse?
At Shanghai Disney Resort, which opened in 2016, the longest meet-and-greet lines are not for Mickey Mouse or Winnie the Pooh, but for LinaBell, a pink fox. At 7:53 am on a rainy summer’s day, an influencer named Yiwan was already queuing to meet her. The 20-something recorded her wait, showing the hours pass by on her phone as the rain continued to pour down. “Has anyone else tried this hard for LinaBell?” she asked in one of the segments. Finally, at 3:34 pm, there she was in all her pink glory: Shanghai Disneyland’s most popular attraction, LinaBell the fox.
LinaBell made her first appearance at Shanghai Disneyland in late 2021. Unlike other Disney characters, she has no back story, no plot arc. She does, however, have a mercurial temper. She’s bubbly and she loves to dance. She covers visitors’ faces with kisses. She plays with the tails of her friends and then runs away. There’s arguably a less Disney side to her as well. She can storm off and pretend to throw someone into a pond nearby. She can scrunch herself up as if controlling her anger. She shakes her paw indignantly and then almost immediately calms herself down.
Yiwan, dressed in pink to match LinaBell, whipped out a pink fake diamond ring, the rock as big as a toddler’s palm, and tried to slide it over a finger on one of LinaBell’s paws. It didn’t fit, but that didn’t matter: Yiwan had also brought a bigger ring, with a diamond almost as big as her fist. This one fit. LinaBell hugged Yiwan; they air-kissed; Yiwan pressed her face into LinaBell’s pink fur head.
