Baby New Year is the Anthropomorphic Personification of the new year. This also makes him the Holiday Personification of New Year's Eve and/or New Year's Day by default. He also more generally symbolizes rebirth (i.e. the "birth" of a new year and the "death" of the old one).
Baby New Year is almost always depicted as a baby boy wearing nothing but a top hat, a diaper, and a sash across his chest displaying either the words "Happy New Year" or the year he represents. He also sometimes holds an hourglass or noisemaker. Oftentimes, he's not a genuine newborn and instead more closely resembles a toddler due to frequently standing on his own (as opposed to crawling or just barely walking) and having a small amount of scalp hair. Sometimes, especially in older depictions, he will be portrayed arriving by Delivery Stork.
Sub-Trope of Holiday Personification. Compare and contrast Father Time, with whom Baby New Year is commonly associated. In some works, Time may actually be New Year's literal father.
Examples:
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Asian Animation
- Pucca: In "No Year's Eve," it's shown that every New Year's Eve, a new Baby New Year (who resembles an owl) replaces the old Baby New Year, and their first word will be what the year is named after. Muji has his goons steal the newest Baby New Year so that his mustache will not turn gray, but Pucca saves him. Baby New Year's first word turns out to be Pucca's name, so Master Soo declares it "the Year of the Pucca".
Comic Strips
- Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!: Father Time's infant son represents the New Year and is who Time passes his mantle on to.
- Garfield: One Sunday strip showed Garfield dressed up as Baby New Year as he boots out Odie, who's wearing a sash with the previous year on it (and a long beard on his face).
Film — Animation
- Rudolph's Shiny New Year: Baby New Year, here simply named "Happy," goes missing. Father Time sends Rudolph to search for the infant. Several secondary characters are shown, the personifications of years past, former Baby New Years who grew up and grew old over one year before retiring to the Archipelago of Last Years to an island themed around their year.
Film — Live Action
- In Holiday Inn, Mamie's children appear in the New Year's Eve show, with the older one dressed as Father Time and the younger one as Baby New Year.
Literature
- Black Lagoon Adventures: The cover to the 14th book The New Year's Eve Sleepover from the Black Lagoon featured a creepy-looking Baby New Year.
Theme Parks
- Halloween Horror Nights: The haunted maze Holidayz in Hell has an evil version of the New Year's Baby who appears in the maze alongside Father Time and the Thanksgiving Turkey.
Video Games
- The Sims 2: The player can throw a new year's bash at any time. Father Time might turn up uninvited, and if he does, he'll turn into Toddler New Year at midnight.
Web Comics
- A yearly staple of Sinfest is the arrival of baby new year and the death of the now-elderly previous year.
Western Animation
- Arthur: During the episode "Arthur's New Year's Eve", Binky claims that there's an annual New Year's Eve wrestling match between an old man with last year's date on him (likely Father Time) and a baby wearing a diaper and sash with the new year's date. If the baby wins, the new year begins. If the old man wins, the baby has to live with a groundhog, and there will be six more weeks of winter.
- The Critic: Played with in one episode where Franklin Sherman, being a middle-aged man, poses as a New Year Baby from 1937, with him wearing a diaper and a banner reading "1937." He even dances around.
- The Fairly OddParents!: Baby New Year is one of the Holiday Mascots. However, instead of being a normal-sized baby or toddler, New Year is a giant, due to the upcoming year being "a big year". He doesn't speak except for the occasional deep-voiced "Goo." In addition to his normal diaper and sash, this version of New Year carries a large rattle. He also wears a blue bonnet in place of a top hat.
- The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy: Baby New Year, here called "Happy New Year" appears alongside Father Time in the episode "Halls of Time".
- Histeria!: "Big Fat Baby," a parody of Baby New Year, is the egg-shaped sidekick of Father Time. BFB is known for the foul odor he emits, caused by constant defecation in his diaper, which is constantly stated to have been unchanged since ancient times. BFB is also accident prone, often falling down steps or off of high places. There seem to be multiple BFBs, including some female versions with a single strand of hair and bow.
- House of Mouse: The short "Babysitters" has Mickey, Donald and Goofy being called in by Mother Time (Mrs. Turtle) to watch over her newest baby (Baby Shelby), warning them to get him to the big New Year's Eve party by midnight, or else "there'll be no next year." After several escapades, they get him to the party, but he suddenly comes down with a cold, so the trio get sent out in his place wearing nothing but diapers.
- How Murray Saved Christmas: Baby New Year is one of the many Holiday Personifications featured in the special. He also turns out to have been the Narrator All Along.
- Looney Tunes: The 1940 short Holiday Highlights opens with an appearance by Baby New Year. When the narrator asks him if he has anything to say to the audience, the baby (in the familiar bellow of Mel Blanc) screams "HAPPY NEW YEAR!!"
- Ned's Newt: In the episode "New Year's Ned," it's revealed that Ned's birthday is New Year's Day. According to Friendly Falls tradition, whoever is born on that date is made the town's New Year's Baby, who is to appear dressed as such at the town's New Year's Eve festival every year...no matter how old they get. Ned says he enjoyed it when he was two, but it just becomes humiliating as the New Year's baby gets older.
Ned: The guy before me had to do it 'till he was 28! When I was born, he wept with joy and bought my parents a car!
- Robot Chicken: Baby New Year literally assassinates anyone who fails to uphold their New Year's Resolution. He lets Daniel off for breaking his resolution not to masturbate cause choking him just turned him on more.
- "Baby New Year, Resolution Enforcer!"
- The Simpsons:
- In the episode "Strong Arms of the Ma", a Kwik-E-Mart play is performed at the eponymous family's house to try and cure Marge's agoraphobia. This goes wrong due to Milhouse playing a robber, further upsetting Marge. Homer then cancels the play, causing a despaired Grampa Simpson to walk in dressed as Baby New Year. Why he's dressed as Baby New Year in a play that simulates a convenience store is not explained, but it is still Played for Laughs.
- Several HD episodes have a gag appearing in the title screen that references this, with Maggie representing the new year being parachuted down to Earth while a diapered Grampa representing the old year is lifted into the sky by a pulley. This has typically been done with the first or second episode to air in an even-numbered year from 2012 to 2020. Which ones? This gag was inverted in the title screen gag of "Warrin' Priests (Part One)" (aired April 2020), with Grampa 2019 being lifted down remarking "They want me back?" as Maggie 2020 is returned to the heavens, referencing many people's dissatisfaction with the year 2020 due to several catastrophic events including the COVID-19 Pandemic.
