Gay McIcon? LGBTQ+ Fans Embrace Grimace, McDonald's Purple Mascot

McDonald's is celebrating its blobby purple character Grimace with a new milkshake, and gay fans are happily embracing his color and June birthday as evidence he's an LGBTQ+ icon, Polygon reported.

"The gimmick (or Grimmick?) is mostly to introduce a new purple shake as part of what's being sold as the limited edition 'Grimace's Birthday Meal,'" the site noted - though, it added, on social media the purple mascot has suddenly attained new status. "Some TikTokers have shown up in cursed cosplay to partake in the Grimace Birthday Meal, which was released on June 12," Polygon recounted.

@ugh_madison New mcdonalds grimace birthday meal and shake! grimace tastes so good 🥰 #mcdonalds #food ♬ birthday - multi

Others have created posts to give the big purple guy their own Pride-ful interpretation.

Comments from fans were upbeat and comical.

"I hope the creator of this campaign got a big big raise, because I am so very invested in this," one person posted.

"this is so cute + do you think grimace and the hamburglar mcxplored each others bodies?" another wrote.

"I plan on naming my future dog after you Grimace," someone else put in.

Added another: "they go to the same pride as the Babadook i think"

McDonald's celebrated the character in social media posts of its own.

"The meal features a new limited-edition purple shake, 'inspired by Grimace's iconic color and sweetness,' McDonald's said in a press release," Good Morning America relayed. "It also comes with customers' choice of a Big Mac or 10-piece Chicken McNuggets, and french fries."

GMA quoted the fast food chain's Chief Marketing and Customer Experience Officer, Tariq Hassan, as saying, "Our fans have amazing childhood memories of their birthdays at McDonald's and Grimace's Birthday is all about paying homage to the amazing, fun moments we all share."

"Grimace is the perfect lovable icon to have McDonald's meet our fans at the intersection of nostalgia and culture," Hassan went on to add.

The roughly teardrop-shaped character was said in 2021 to represent a taste bud, according to franchise manager, Brian Bates - "an enormous taste bud, but a taste bud nonetheless," as Bates put it.

"McDonald's previously claimed the friendly looking amorphous character was 'the embodiment of a milkshake' in a 2012 tweet," GMA recollected.

"'Good Morning America' did not [receive] further insight or comment on the character's identity from McDonald's," GMA added.

Grimace's "birthday" might refer to when he was first introduced. Polygon noted that "a simple Google search puts that date at 1971," and recalled that the conically shaped character had a much less friendly appearance back in the day, writing, "he had four arms and scales when he was first created, according to Insider."

"That version of him apparently terrified children," Polygon said.