Not being a single-party, notionally communist dictatorship may be helping with the image too? I don't know, spitballing here.

I think the default approach in the West - and that's not a US-specific thing - is to treat exotic faraway lands with a mix of curiosity and awe. But China is a geopolitical rival with a political system that rightly makes many Westerners queasy, so it doesn't benefit from that anymore.