Also worth noting that Universal has done "animatronic" (as in, people playing them) characters before, namely the bungee clown that "fell" on guests in Carnival Graveyard in 2018, and then the other animatronic clown at the entrance to Ho1kC the following year.
Worth noting how just damn convincing the former was, for me at least. Took me a good while to tell if it was real or not.