By Heather Taylor, Editor-in-Chief, PopIcon
Perhaps we were too hasty to make declarations that 2025 is the year of the brand mascot. Or were we?
Not even a week after Super Bowl LIX and one day after the return of the Shamrock Shake — both brand mascot-heavy moments in the cultural zeitgeist — language education platform Duolingo announced via social media the death of their iconic brand mascot, Duo.
Is this news shocking? Of course. Are we holding space to remember the life and times of this character? Certainly. Rest in peace, Duo. Gone, but never, ever forgotten.
But do we have a suspicion that something’s not quite adding up? 100%.
The Death of Duo
We’re not strangers to the concept of a brand mascot passing away although it is fairly unusual. Most mascots are more likely to enter retirement than get phased out of their lifecycle completely.
Many may recall the death of Mr. Peanut playing out before millions during Super Bowl LIV, the legume’s rebirth as Baby Nut, and the character’s gradual growth spurt back to becoming Mr. Peanut by the end of 2020.
When Mr. Peanut was announced deceased, renowned brand mascots like Mr. Clean, the Kool-Aid Man, Nesquik Bunny, Tony the Tiger and Cheerios’ Buzz Bee all expressed their condolences on X (then Twitter) with the hashtag #RIPeanut.
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Duo’s passing has not received quite had the same turnout as Mr. Peanut. Yes, there are more than 20,000 comments on the Instagram post but we’re having a hard time tracking down responses from mascots.
At least the Celestial Seasonings’ Sleepytime Bear left an “rip bestea” comment.
This segues into Duo’s Instagram obituary and the subsequent TikTok of the funeral.
Let’s get into what makes this a marketing stunt. (Not to speak prematurely ill of the dead or anything, but c’mon… this is the advertising industry we’re talking about here.)
@duolingo RIP DUO #duolingo
1. We need to talk about the funeral procession.
Absolutely not to all of this. Duo in an open casket? Wheeled out in the back of a pickup truck? No brand mascots in attendance?! This is not the way a beloved character is memorialized.
Duo’s personality wouldn’t mesh with a stuffy funeral service, but the idea of this bird not getting a lively, affectionate tribute is truly bizarre. You can’t tell me this funeral is happening in the middle of February with no other characters in attendance. That’s just cold-hearted.
2. The Instagram obituary is strange, and that’s putting it mildly.
There’s a nod to respecting pop star Dua Lipa’s privacy (the Duo-Dua pipeline remains strong), a semi-salty sentence saying Duo’s death is the fault of Duolingo users for not completing their lessons, and something about sharing your credit card number if you share the IG post in your Stories so you can be automatically signed up for Duolingo Max. (We’re guessing that would be to Duolingo what HBO Max is to HBO.)
Again, it’s bad taste to imply a mascot’s obit is anything but authentic but the credit card aspect reads as spam, spam, spam to us.
3. The end of the TikTok insists you do a Duolingo lesson instead of sending the character flowers.
To this we cry out, STUNT! It was already bad enough watching this neon green bird who thrived during Brat summer get carted off in the back of a truck with no friends in attendance, but not to be given any flowers?! It’s giving Duo comes back as a ghost bird avatar who haunts everyone on the app.
Maybe that’s what happens when you don’t finish your lesson…
Rest in peace, Duo. We, uh, hope you don’t necessarily come back with a vengeance. But we do hope for some sort of reincarnation. Maybe you’ll take a cue from Mr. Peanut and go the Baby Duo route.
About the Author
Heather Taylor is the senior writer and editor-in-chief of PopIcon, Advertising Week’s blog about brand mascots. Got a pitch on brand mascots or want to wax nostalgic about characters? Drop her a line at howveryheather@gmail.com.
