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alt title(s): Twenty Five Year Old Woman
Buying a cake for Christmas is a Japanese tradition. Unfortunately, no matter how tasty a Christmas cake is, no one wants it after December 25th. And no matter how attractive a woman is, no Japanese male will want to marry her after she's 25. Thus, "Christmas Cake" is used as a metaphor term for what Western audiences might call an "old maid." While attitudes have started to somewhat change, it is still a common trope for a character to at least be surprised that another isn't married yet by this age. Even when the writers are sympathetic to the character, nagging to marry will still come from someone, usually her parents.
A Cool Big Sis may be one, or heading there, usually with extreme annoyance; referring to this character as Oba-san is about as tactful as referring to someone as Ma'am and is likely to induce a rage. Sometimes this is just a device to explain them hanging around other characters younger than them.
On the antagonistic side, a Punch Clock Villain is often a Christmas Cake. She tends to be very attractive but is relegated to cake status by annoying habits. The other problem occurs if she's also stuck in a Pink Bishoujo Ghetto or any such place usual men are slim pickings. The Competence Zone might force her to hang around and even fawn over men much younger than her.
Interestingly, the more unexpected the presence of the Christmas Cake is, the more likely her being one is emphasized as being attractive point.
See also Hot Shounen Mom, and Maiden Aunt for the much older Western equivalent. Contrast with Cake Eater. Not to be confused with Fruit Cake. Compare and contrast with Stacys Mom, an older character who has an excess of younger suitors.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
- Presented very literally in Karin, which features the pastries being sold roughly a week before Christmas at a restaurant/bakery by the titular mutant vampire protagonist. As the trope demands, we never hear about them once the overtime bonuses are paid.
- Taeko Yasuko of Area 88, Ryoko's loyal secretary. She is very sensitive about her age and exploded when someone hit on her since she thought he was making fun of her.
- Minamo "Nyamo" Kurosawa (Azumanga Daioh: nagged by mom and frequently teased by Yukari, despite the latter being a "cake" herself)
- Linna Yamazaki in Bubblegum Crisis 2040 has to deal with her parents who not only nag, but set up meetings (omiai) for her with potential partners.
- Emu Hino, the female lead from Crying Freeman. She was in her late 20's and a virgin by the time she met Yoh Hinomura and was set up for death. So, she asked the handsome and gentlemanly Yoh to take her virginity before killing her... which partially breaks Yoh's conditioning and makes him fall for her, thus he decides to make her his partner instead.
- Mitsuka Yoshimine from DearS. Her age is never specified but she sure looks like she's at least 25, and despite the ridiculously stripperiffic costumes she routinely wears (and/or strips out of) while teaching a high school class (presumably full of horny high school age boys), plus the fact that pretty much everything that comes out of her mouth is suggestive or overtly about sex... Nobody pays any attention to her. At all. Her love life is deader than a doornail.
- Subverted in Detective Conan. Detective Satou was offered a matchup by her mother since she looked as if she Must Have Lots Of Free Time, and hence, would become a Christmas cake. Which turned out to cause a Wedding Deadline-like moment for her boyfriend.
- Mika-sensei from Doki Doki School Hours is 27 and still lives with her parents. She doesn't mind though, since she loves to be spoiled by her father and cares mostly for good food. Her mother is worried though and sets her up for a date for an Arranged Marriage, which doesn't turn out too well.
- Miz Mishtal in El Hazard is another example of this; her first appearance shows her negative reaction to a letter from one her old (and married) schoolmate.
- Mayuko-sensei from Fruits Basket. In the manga, however, she ends up with Hatori.
- Yura Kawada from Futari Ecchi, before she meets her match in the equally cute and even-then-not-taken Makoto. Her cousin-in-law/neighbor/counselor Kyouko also fits in, until she gets married as well.
- Rena from Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni seems to end this way in the epilogue to "The Atonement" chapter. She's in her late 30's, and she seems to be single. Though, this probably has something to do with her traumatizing teenagehood.
- Namiko-sensei from Kashimashi Girl Meets Girl has gone without a boyfriend for thirty-five years. Or so she says all the time. She also tends to fall into holes.
- Shirai-sensei from Kodomo No Jikan bounces back and forth between being proud of her independent, unmarried life in her thirties and regretting it.
- Sawako Yamanaka from K-On!
- Haruka Urashima (Love Hina: reminded of single status and called "Oba-san")
- Nanako Kuroi (Lucky Star), 27 and still single. After hearing her students discuss the christmas cake/unmarried woman metaphor earlier in the episode she actually buys a Christmas cake after the 25th and proclaims (as she walks into the sunset) "You are wanted".
- Further joked about when Nanako meets Kona's cousin Yui and assumes because she is alone at a festival that she is also unmarried at an advanced age. Yui however is married, but with a husband seems to always be off at work and offscreen. Everyone but Nanako just finds it embarrassing.
- Mari Iijima (voice actress for Minmay in Macross) mentions this trope by name in the DVD commentary for Macross episode 9, on the ADV release. "We are like Christmas Cakes"
- Mahoromatic turns the idea into a gag, where a much older Suguru is shocked to find his old boy-chasing teacher looking exactly the same.
- Touko Kuzunoha of Mahou Sensei Negima is the calm and composed Shinmeiryuu mentor of Setsuna. At least, she's calm and composed most of the time. When the scheme of the Big Bad in the Mahora Festival Story Arc went off without a hitch, ruining her love life, and leaving her a future where she'll remain an unmarried 30-something, she snapped.
- Shizune, as shown in one of Naruto Shippuden's omakes.
- The current Mizukage is apparently one as well; one of her body guards makes a comment about the other, which she somehow misconstrues as meaning she is too old to get married. She then promptly threatens to kill him if he won't shut up, while still maintaining a smile on her face. The way she treats her younger bodyguard and her comments about Gaara and Sasuke have some fans joking that she fits the "fawning over younger men" part of the trope as well.
- The fact that she called Sasuke attractive before trying to melt him doesn't help at all. For some it might however, and you know who you are.
- Misato Katsuragi of Neon Genesis Evangelion makes this one of the few tropes the show plays straight. She's also possibly a Shotacon, with her affection directed towards Shinji, so it may be justified.
- Mostly because of the really tasteless joke she makes during the phone conversation with Ritsuko about Shinji living with her. Otherwise it's mostly "Mother Surrogate" as opposed to "Shotacon". But the scene where she dies in End of Evangelion, yeah, Your Mileage May Vary.
- OL (Oruchuban Ebichu, aka Ebichu Minds The House)
- Robin from One Piece, as a 28 year old unmarried woman, qualifies for this trope, except that that fact doesn't seem to matter at all in that universe.
- Boa Hancock, who's around Robin's age or older, would also qualify, except women in Amazon Lily do not seem to take husbands. She does appear to be infatuated with Luffy, but she presumably will never get together with him.
- Yomiko Readman of Read Or Die is 25 years old and lives by herself in an apartment full of used books. She used to have a boyfriend/lover in Donnie Nakajima, but he died ...and it turns out that Yomiko was the one who sent him to his end in the manga. In the anime, it's implied Joker killed him off, though it's never explained what happened. Though, the manga clarifies that it's both. Joker arranged for Yomiko to be forced to kill Donnie. When Yomiko found out at the end of the manga, the events of the anime backstory happen.
- Megumi Takani from Rurouni Kenshin. She's more exactly 23 years old, but Sanosuke pretty much calls her Christmas cake to her face after Kenshin tells his friends about Enishi and Tomoe.
- Dominura (Simoun, unusually old for a Sibylla).
- Marie Mjolnir from Soul Eater. In her introductory scene she's freaking out, because she wanted to have been married and retired by now. Declaring that she wants to marry the toilet. Later things look up for her. She is about to get back together with her old boyfriend, and then he's murdered on the way to their reunion date.
- Yuri-sensei from Toradora, to the point that she talks about it to herself constantly, and nearly acts like a zombie.
- Sumire from Tramps Like Us is viewed by her coworkers with a mixture of awe and hostility for being a 28-year-old working single woman whose high education and intelligence scares away men. She does find a patient boyfriend in her first crush, Hatsumi, but in the end goes the Cake Eater route and hooks up with Takeshi who is 8 years her junior.
- Mai Valentine in Yu-Gi-Oh: doesn't really seem to want to get married (one of her duels actually was against her "fiancée", the actor Jean-Paul), as her tastes may point to younger men, AKA Joey (despite Word Of God from Takahashi himself) or possibly Varon. This would explain what an adult woman is doing on an island playing children card games with children. (She's not the only adult, but most of the people are children.) Then again, card games are a Serious Business, and she does state she just wants the outrageously large prize money.
- Ayako, the Shrine Maiden in Ghost Hunt. Naru teases that she's a bit old to be an unspoilt virgin.
- Hikaru's older sister Kei in the (rather explicit but romantic h-manga) Take On Me once gave Tsuda a kick to the face when he mistook her for still being in middle school. Then again, if you're 26 years old and look half your age, who wouldn't say that (and get kicked)?
- Despite her wealth, beauty and artistic talent, 29-years-old Emu Hino from Crying Freeman is this. Until she falls for the aforementioned "Freeman", that is.
Film
- This, more or less, is not an issue in Logans Run. Considering nobody lives past 30.
- Or, in the book, eighteen.
Literature
- Subverted believably in the Napoleonic era, by Captain Jane Roland in Temeraire, a single mother and dragon rider who refuses to marry a man whom she's about as fond of as she can be of anyone not her daughter or her dragon—partially because of the norms of the day, as she outranks him and she certainly couldn't take a vow to obey him, but also because she's not really interested, though she is flattered.
- Bridget Jones considers herself one.
- Alix Crown in Quills Window is an especially blatant example, as she is attractive and wealthy in addition to being single at twenty five. Incidentally, she does have a good reason for this, as legally she would stand to lose many of her legal rights if she were to get married. There's also the whole Unresolved Sexual Tension thing she has going on with her childhood friend David Strong.
Live Action TV
- Some Doctor Who fans consider the vaguely Bridget Jones-esque Donna as an example of this trope.
- She was going to get married right before The Doctor poofed into her life, however. Literally, it's her wedding day.
- The unbelievably stunning Joan in Mad Men would nevertheless appear to be headed this way, judging by the reaction in a recent episode when an ex-boyfriend distributed a photocopy of her driver's license with the birthdate circled; she's 31, which is pretty far along for a single girl in 1962 Perhaps in panic, she found a nice doctor a year or so later and is (as of season 2) engaged. No more waiting for her MUCH older lover to divorce his wife.
- Fran Fine from The Nanny is an occidental example of this trope, especially during the early seasons of the series. C.C. Babock is a more subdued version.
- Deanna Troi on Star Trek The Next Generation, at least as far as her mother is concerned. Notable in that Lwaxana never thought being married should restrict her activities except for who she slept with, and holds the same views with regards to her daughter; she just wishes her daughter would hurry up and get hitched.
- Which she does, to a human Starfleet Officer (Riker); following in her mother's footsteps.
- A male example of this trope crops up from time-to-time on NCIS. Tony DiNozzo is occasionally twitted as being "too old" for women in their twenties. He is usually rebuffed when he makes passes at them, too, on similar grounds, despite the fact that he's not really all that old.
Music
- Rilo Kiley's song "XMas Cake" appears to be about this trope. The lyrics tell the story of a woman who is "twenty-five years old (with) a bachelor's degree" but has no job prospects and already looks "old and defeated" without her makeup on.
Theater
- Katisha in Gilbert And Sullivan's The Mikado pursues the much younger Nanki-Poo as a lover despite his vehement protests (he even runs away just to avoid her) though she's mostly played sympathetically and ends up with someone her own age at the end.
- G & S loved this trope. The shows are crawling with older unmarried women (often teased/mocked in verse).
Video Games
- Muffy from the Harvest Moon series; she's always lamenting her failure with men, and in the Japanese version of Harvest Moon DS, her parents even try to arrange a marriage for her! (In the American version, they just try setting her up on a blind date.) She's also one of the available marriage candidates in Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life and Harvest Moon DS—in DS, she'll also eventually end up marrying Griffin if the player doesn't marry her, though in A Wonderful Life, she and Griffin will merely remain in a state of perpetual UST.
- Tesla Magnets in Megaman NT Warrior is not only a Christmas Cake but obsesses over it. Just to give you an idea, she hijacks a robot named Thirty and goes on a rampage. And if she's ever especially angry, expect a backdrop covered in "30" to appear.
- Ms. Kashiwagi from Persona 4, who is immediately fingered as one of these in her introduction and later is so delusional about her looks that she competes in a high school beauty contest and genuinely acts surprised at her loss.
- The basis behind a joke in Super Robot Wars Original Generation 2, where Aguija is called an "Old Hag" by the teenaged Lune Zoldark. She takes particular offense to this, saying that she's still in her 20's. Bottle Fairy Excellen (23) then gets into it, pointing out that all the females in their team are still younger than her, drawing a few uncomfortable laughs from Katina and Rhada, who at ages 25 and 27, are only just.
- In MX, Aqua Centrum has this stigma as she is among the oldest pilots in the game, older than her copilot Hugo by a few years and significantly older than the various pilots from series such as Gundam and Dragoner.
- Raine Sage of Tales Of Symphonia isn't quite to this point yet, but she does make more than one reference to worrying about her age. All the more ridiculous because, as an elf or half-elf she'll live for about a thousand years. She can, indeed, pursue romantic involvement with the much younger main character.
- Reina Mayuzumi of Trauma Center Under The Knife 2, also The Vamp, is 35, single, and constantly tries to sex up Derek, after which Angie furiously complains that she has to be much older than she looks. Her ultimate fate is related to this trope.
- Liliana spends most of Princess Waltz pretending to be a middleschooler, yet rather pointedly asks Arata if he likes 'older women'. His mother on the other hand outright accuses her of being a cradle-snatcher.
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