The Baby of the Bunch

aka: Baby Of The Bunch

Affectionate gestures to the head are common.

Max: The Von Trapp Family Singers. Here are your names [from eldest to youngest]: Liesl, Friedrich, Louisa, Brigitta, Kurt, Marta and Gretl.
Gretl: Why am I always last?
Max: Because you are the most important.

— The Sound of Music

Being the youngest of your group typically comes with some perks and challenges. On one side you're probably the cutest, have a pass to act immature, people like taking care of you, and you can embrace your fun side, knowing that the elders are there to handle the serious stuff. And if there's anything you're naïve about, you have plenty of others to give you the realest unfiltered advice without the generational gap and detachment that your parents or the Old Master have.

On the other end, sometimes people don't take you seriously. There you're kinda stuck because no matter how old you get, you'll always be "the baby" in their eyes.

Embrace the fun side too much and expect a lecture about growing up. Even worse, "acting your age" if you're an adult.

This role is usually played up in Sibling Team dynamics, and musical groups. Compare Middle Child Syndrome and other Sibling Tropes that can conflate with this.

According to The Birth Order Book: Why You Are the Way You Are, Dr. Kevin Lenman describes the last-born children as "social and outgoing" but also the "most financially irresponsible of all birth orders". He also commented that they have the potential to be manipulative as well as charming, and, finally, be sometimes prone to Never My Fault and Attention Whore moments.

Contrast Tag Along Kid, who is usually literally a child, rather than this character who is metaphorically a baby. For reference, the baby is usually at the youngest end of their group's Competence Zone. The kid is young enough to be outside of the zone, and under normal circumstances wouldn't be expected to even be on the team. Contrast Team Dad and Team Mom, who are characterized by their maturity within a minor age range.

Tends to overlap with Kid-Appeal Character and The Cutie. Sometimes rendered as a Token Mini-Moe. Compare New Meat and Young Gun in professional settings. Occasionally can be seen as a supertrope to The Runt at the End and Youngest Child Wins as the baby tends to favored by characters, writers or fans in real life. Everyone's Baby Sister is this trope used as a plot device to motivate other characters to protect them. Likely to be one of the Team Kids.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• In The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You, Chiyo and Matsuri are the youngest of Rentarou's girlfriends, both being first-years in middle school (while Kusuri spends most of her time in an eight-year-old body and Yaku looks like an eight-year-old all the time, they're really eighteen and eighty-nine, respectively). For over a hundred chapters, it was Chiyo alone, and she tended to have Rentarou and the older girlfriends watch out for her because she took on so much responsibility for her age.
• The main heroine of Aoharu × Machinegun is the youngest among the eight main characters. She is only a 16-year-old teenager while the others are adults in their 20s. While she is not given a special treatment, she is noticeably more naive and innocent than the others.
• BanG Dream!: There are numerous bands, and more than a few of them have a member who is The Baby of the Bunch.
  • Roselia has Ako, who is still in middle school when she joins the band, and something of a Chuunibyou, but who also proves to be the sort of passionate and skilled drummer that Yukina was looking for for the band. She's also the younger sister of Afterglow's Tomoe, who once consoled her sister when their two bands were having a spat that being sisters came first and foremost.
  • In Afterglow, while Tomoe is the Cool Big Sis and Ran is the band leader, sweet, reliable Tsugumi is the baby of Afterglow, whose collapse from exhaustion once had the entire band in a panic.
• Berserk:
  • Guts was probably the youngest mercenary in Midland starting at the tender age of 6 and got his first kill when he was 10. Also unfortunately due to setting he got no special treatment and was subject to the worst possible.
  • Ricket is the youngest member of the Band of Hawk and is one who is more frequently protected by the likes of Pippin and Guts. Ricket is also looked down upon by the likes of Corkus for his innocence and naïveté, even Guts claims Ricket could never truly hate Griffith like he does.
  • It seemed prior to Ricket, Casca was this being a young girl by the time Griffith saved her from a rapey nobleman, with Judeau, Pippin and Corkus already part of the Band as teenagers. However a databook would retcon Casca’s age being the same as Griffith and Gut’s, so this trope is averted.
  • Among Guts’s new companions Schierke is the youngest and most looked after, as seen when one drunk spilled beer on her pretty new dress and Guts punched his lights out. Ironically however being a witch Schierke is more capable than lot of the party and has a mature personality for her age.
    • However Schierke is usurped by The Moonlight Boy who is a toddler and gets the most coddling in the group.
• Noelle Silva in Black Clover is the youngest member of the Black Bulls, with Asta slightly older than her, and her squadmates all act as a loving, surrogate family for Noelle, in contrast to her older siblings who tormented her growing up.
• Played for laughs in Delicious in Dungeon. Chilchuck, a half-foot, is treated this way by the rest of the party because of how young he appears, much to his annoyance. In reality he's 29 years old, making him actually older than the human party leader Laios and middle-aged for a half-foot, though the dwarf Senshi and the elf Marcille still consider him a baby because of the long lifespans of their respective species. Senshi even tries to give him “the talk” at one point, unaware that Chilchuck is married with three children already.
• In Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Muichiro Tokito became a Hashira ranked slayer when he was 12 year old, quite younger than all his Hashira colleagues who are all between 18 years old to their early twenties; his prodigy status is also coupled with his little and soft appearance, making him very cute-looking as his Hashira colleague Mitsuri Kanroji can attest to.
• Dragon Ball:
  • In Z, kid Gohan exemplified this being a small boy among muscle bound martial artist powerhouses. Gohan of course got special treatment in Z-Fighters at times with his father Goku and Piccolo being Papa Wolf over him and he would get into goofy antics with Krillin. However worth noting Gohan despite his age was not exempt from the brutal violence in the series, seen in one moment from Namek where Vegeta comes across Gohan and is initially very friendly to him, even giving Gohan a pat on the head... before grabbing his hair and kneeing poor Gohan in the stomach and leaving him in agony.
  • Even post timeskip, Gohan takes on the trope in a different way as he never commands the same respect on the battlefield as the other veteran Super Saiyans. People keep making references to how he was stronger and more reliable as a child than as an adult, keep pushing him to take fighting more seriously, and continue to make fun of his childish Toku-inspired Saiyaman identity. He goes through several rounds of retraining with Piccolo in Super and continues to have to prove himself to Goku and Vegeta, whose relentless training schedules have far outpaced Gohan's innate potential. Even Future Trunks was shocked to see him in his current state, but eventually realized that the goal of fighting for peace is so that not everyone has to live their lives as a grizzled soldier like he and his universe's Gohan were. Despite being treated as an immature fighter, he's arguably the most mature Z Fighter outside of battle, as a successful scholar, and responsible husband and father.
  • In Dragon Ball Super the meek Kale takes on this role for Universe 6, being under the protection of the rougher Caulifla. She eventually breaks out of it when she masters her Legendary Super Saiyan form without going into berserker mode, and can stand on her own as a fighter.
  • Pan was this in Dragon Ball GT though she failed as a Kid-Appeal Character despite being cute at times due being quite annoying and rude to her grandfather Goku. Played Straight in Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero as she’s an adorable and powerful little Tag Along Kid with no real obnoxious traits.
• Gangsta. has Nina, Doctor Theo’s 12-year-old assistant and the youngest of the main characters who gets Papa Wolf from Nic and occasionally coddled by Alex. Averted by Loretta who is Young and in Charge. On the villain’s side there's Mikhail who's 10 and an adorable little mass murderer.
• In Hellsing, Seras Victoria is the youngest at 19 years old and most childish of the main characters despite being the second most powerful next to her sire Alucard. Seras is also the Token Good Teammate of the Hellsing organisation being according to the author “a light shining in darkness”.
• Lucky Star:
  • Tsukasa Hiiragi is this trope within her family. The most coddled character out of anyone, innocent, not very brave or bright, and rarely taken seriously.
  • Yutaka Kobayakawa, living with Konata and Soujiro Izumi. She is short, childlike, and innocent, even for the show's standards in general.
• Moriarty the Patriot: The youngest member of William's crew is Fred, who starts the series already a well-trusted and loyal member of the organization at just nineteen, and while he's entirely competent in his role and trusted, he's also the only character consistently referred to by everyone by his first name with no honorific—even by Louis who Prefers Proper Names. Alongside his nature as The Quiet One, Moran calls him a little brother and frequently gives him advice, and he struggles a bit to voice his own opinions alongside the more seasoned members.
• Shoto from My Hero Academia is the youngest child in the Todoroki family. He has two older brothers, Natsuo and Toya, and one older sister called Fuyumi.
• Naruto: Gaara is the youngest of the Five Kages during the meeting of the Allied Shinobu Forces. This earns him some hostility from the Third Tsuchikage, Onoki. Eventually, Gaara does gain Onoki's respect.
• Nijyon Animation: Episode 9 has Kasumi hosting a competition for the school idol club to Invoked this trop, particularly to make herself the club little sister since little sisters relate to cuteness, which means being the club's little sister means being the cutest idol in her eyes. Shizuka (a first-year and one of the youngest students), Shioriko and Mia (the latter two already little sisters), and Ai (who has a little sister dynamic with her Cool Big Sis figure Misato) are also considered candidates. It's ultimately Rina who's picked as the club's little sister when she wins them over all of them (including Kasumi) with two pairs of Puppy-Dog Eyes.
  • For the R3BIRTH trio, Lanzhu considers Shioriko and Mia her little sisters, but the younger girls see her as the little sister that's always a handful.
• One Piece:
  • Tony Tony Chopper is the youngest member of the Straw Hats, being 15 when he first joined and is subsequently coddled by Nami and Robin (even getting to bathe with them) as well getting shoulder rides and head pats from Zoro and Sanji. Despite this, Chopper is against being babied and strives to “be a man” even if he lacks the emotional fortitude. Lampshaded in one Advertising crossover with Dragon Ball as Chopper is paired with the aforementioned kid Gohan.
  • Technically, Vivi predates Chopper as the youngest member (albeit temporary) of the crew, being 16 when she joined. Nami in particular would often play being Cool Big Sis to her.
  • Luffy became this for Ace and Sabo in his youth, though they wanted nothing to do with him at first. Ace in particular developed a Big Brother Instinct over him. Luffy is this again in the omake Family Time, being the youngest child of the Mugiwara family.
  • Momonosuke usurps Chopper when it comes to this trope, being only 8 and getting special attention from Nami and Robin. Though the subversion is that he’s a Dirty Kid and later Young and in Charge as the heir to Kozuki clan.
  • Played straighter with Tama and Toko from the Wano arc, who are much cuter and more innocent than Momonosuke, as well as being fiercely protected by the Straw Hats and others.
• Todomatsu, AKA Totty, is the youngest of the Osomatsu-san sextuplets. He has quirks such as shiny eyes and a cat smile, still needing to be walked to the bathroom at night, being a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing, and being the last for things.
• Pretty Cure:
  • Yes! Pretty Cure 5: 13 year old Urara is the baby of the Yes! 5 Cures, against 14 year old Nozomi and Rin and 15 year old Komachi and Karen.
  • Suite Pretty Cure ♪: 9 year old Ako is the baby of the Suite Cures, against 14 year old Hibiki, Kanade, and Ellen.
  • Toyed with in Doki Doki! PreCure; in their civilian forms, 10 year Aguri is the baby of the Doki Doki Cures, but because her Cure form, Cure Ace, allows her to age up 6 years, she is simultaneously the oldest and youngest in the group. Early in the series, the Cures also gain a mascot Ai-chan, who is a literal Baby of the Bunch.
  • Maho Girls Pretty Cure!: Ha-chan is born near the beginning of the series, and eventually becomes Cure Felice, making her the literal baby of the Maho Cures, against 13 year old Mirai, Riko, and Mofurun.
  • ''HuGtto! Pretty Cure: 9/10 year old Emiru is the baby of the Hugtto Cures, against 14 year old Hana, Saaya, Homare, and Ruru. In a more literal sense, their mascot Hugtan is an actual baby.
  • Healin' Good♡Pretty Cure: Another odd example: Asumi/Cure is born in the middle half of the series, but in the body of an adult, making her both the oldest and youngest.
  • Hirogaru Sky! Pretty Cure: 12 year old Tsubasa is the youngest of the Hirogaru Sky Cures, against 14 year old Sora and Mashiro and 18 year old Ageha. Like Ai-chan and Hugtan above, they have a literal baby mascot, 1 year old Elle-chan.
• The Quintessential Quintuplets: Itsuki is the youngest of the Nakano quintuplets. She is also very prone to childish sulking and pouting when displaying her Tsundere behavior.
• Saber Marionette R: Lime is the youngest marionette of the main three, and is treated as such by the others. Junior even says at one point that she's practically a baby.
• Tama & Friends: The kitten, Koma, is the youngest, as well as the smallest, in Tama's gang.
• Tentomushi no Uta: Hiyoko is the youngest of the seven Isshuu siblings at the age of five.
• Trapped in a Dating Sim: The World of Otome Games is Tough for Mobs: After being upgraded by Luxion, Arroganz is the most child-like and babyish of all the A.I.
• Val × Love: Kururi is the youngest of the Saotome sisters, to the point where they don't even consider her when discussing who gets to date Takuma next.
• Wolf's Rain: Toboe is the youngest and smallest of the four (later five) wolves in the group.
• Yuri!!! on Ice: Yuri "Yurio" Plisetsky, the youngest of the current Men's Skaters at the age of 15, averts this; he's a Type A Tsundere with a Hair-Trigger Temper and certainly isn't babied by anybody. Plus, while he can be immature, he certainly isn't the most naive character on the show.
• Zombie Land Saga: Lily Hoshikawa is a starry-eyed Child Popstar and the youngest member of Franchouchou, an idol group comprised of zombies, having died the earliest in her life and at the most recent time than the others.

Asian Animation

• In Simple Samosa, Vada is the youngest of the four main characters. He seems to be too young to understand the difference between fiction and reality, taking all of Samosa's exaggerated stories literally, and is also young enough that he's too short to go on any rides at the carnival as shown in the episode "Carnival Chaos".
• In Yamucha's-Kung Fu Academy, Jubby is literally a baby and the youngest out of the three main characters.

Comic Books

• Peter Parker is usually this in The Avengers or most hero team-ups, due to his wide-eyed optimism/goofiness and idealistic yet self-deprecating personality, always making jokes and being a bit annoying to his older peers. As Peter grew older his position as this among the Avengers would be usurped by Kamala Khan who gets babied by most of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. Then there’s Brandy Selby from The Avengers (Jason Aaron) who was a literal baby when she was first introduced.
• Among the Bat-Family Child Prodigy Tim Drake aka Robin had this role, being youngest and coddled by Dick and Barbara who were trying to make up for not being more involved with the then recently murdered Jason, but then the actual youngest Damian was introduced and took Tim's place. Unlike Tim, Damian is rarely cute, being quite the Jerkass.
• Johnny Storm was in the early Fantastic Four comics being the most immature of the group, and even coddled by Sue his sister and mentored by Reed. However as comics went on, Johnny's "youngest" position was taken by Franklin and then Valeria.
• Among the Justice League of America Wally West and Kyle Rayner were this (especially in the Grant Morrison tenure) being the youngest of the group and seen as naive by the more mature members compared to their predecessors Barry and Hal. Later comics (such as New 52) put Cyborg or Captain Marvel aka Shazam (who to be fair is an actual kid) into this role. Also if any of sidekicks such as Robin, Supergirl, Wonder Girl or any Teen Titans and Young Justice members show up in JL comics you bet your ass they are gonna be coddled as the Baby of the Bunch by the older league members.
• In the comic Rocketship Rodents, one of the titular rodents is the youngest of the group, being 21. He often mentions he's "of age" when dismissed as a kid.
• The Snow Cat Prince: Syv is the youngest of seven cat princes.
• Tailgate for the Lost Light crew in The Transformers: More than Meets the Eye. Technically speaking he's older than most of the crew combined, but he spent millions of years trapped in stasis in a cavern on Cybertron, meaning that mentally he's still quite young. At first he tries to avoid this by pretending to be older than he is, but once the truth comes out he starts acting his age, doing things like getting piggyback rides or asking for curly straws.
• Wonder Woman is traditionally viewed as a sort of daughter by all the Amazons, as when she was brought to life she was the first child, let alone infant, any of them had seen or gotten to watch and help grow up in centuries and there were no other children on the island while she was growing up.
• X-Men:
  • Iceman started off at the youngest of the team, and tended to act the most immature. Even after character development, he still acts like this from time to time.
  • Kitty Pryde was the poster girl for this back in the 80s, being a Tag Along Kid whom Storm would coddle fiercely and who Wolverine would be Papa Wolf over. Subverted though as Professor X would eventually take her off the team due to her age, Kitty was very upset over this.
  • Jubilee stole Kitty's position as this in the 90s (since Kitty was Put on a Bus to England). Jubilee was very immature compared to her older teammates and often got special treatment i.e. coddled by Jean, Storm, and Rogue as well as being frequently rescued by Wolverine and Gambit. Unlike Kitty, Jubilee has never truly outgrown this trope (despite several attempts), still being treated like this in Excalibur (2019) despite being a mother herself.
  • X-23, being only 14 when she was introduced definitely a downplayed version of this, Wolverine and Gambit would play at being her father figure and even Jubilee would act as Cool Big Sis to her. Though given X-23’s past and personality she's hardly innocent. Played straighter with X-23's younger sister Gabby who is very childish.
  • Cable at one point (albeit sadly briefly) was a literal example of this being the X-Men's first baby and youngest Mutant. Then he was taken to the Bad Future and came back as the grizzled manly Anti-Hero we know today.

Fan Works

• Tao Kaka in BlazBlue Alternative: Remnant is the newest and youngest member of the Happy Huntresses, being 19 on a team comprised of people well into adulthood. She's also shown to be treated as the chirpy, happy-go-lucky little sister of the group, and acts the part too.
• Boldores and Boomsticks: Whisper hatched from her egg during the events of the story, making her the youngest member of the team. The others tend to be very forgiving of her because she's less than a year old.
• 'Checkmate (Anla'Shok)'': Phoenix, the youngest of the "family" of District 2 victors, is also described as being the most chipper and "offensively sane" (she rarely directly interacts with a POV character) and spends a lot of time playing music on a flute she carved or making snow angels in the winter.
• Fate/Harem Antics: Shielder complains that even though she was a fully-fledged Knight of the Round Table, she still got constantly treated as a kid. It was a consequence of her father being one of the other Knights.
• Several in the Octonauts fanfic Junior Officers:
  • Of the Junior Officers: Deborah (eighteen) in Season 1, Sarabi (eighteen^note Sarabi is two months younger than Deborah) from Season 2 onwards.
  • Of the full-fledged Octonauts: Shellington (twenty).
  • As shown in the Whole Episode Flashback "The Short-Nosed Sea Snake", back when the Octonauts were first formed, Barnacles was the youngest at eighteen.
• Marc in Marc Being In A Gang Rights is seen as the "little brother" to the rest of his gang (literally, in the case of one of the other members) to the point where after their first date, Nathaniel gets snatched in an alleyway and held at knife point just so one of them could give him the "if you hurt him" speech.
• Our New Sister: Chuck is the youngest of three triplets, and when Glargg takes in Chickpea, even she is older than him. He is disappointed when he finds out he has a third older sibling.
• RainbowDoubleDash's Lunaverse: Even with Vague Age going around, Raindrops is the youngest of the Element Bearers (though Lyra tends to be the one who acts the youngest). It doesn't tend to come up much, but she does angst about it a little when she's seduced by Kindle.
• Spontaneous Earth: Ratbat is much younger than the other Decepticons, having only been created during their time on Earth. Soundwave keeps Ratbat away from battles for his own safety, his voice is described as sounding similar to a toy piano, and he runs away from home to ask Spike to switch sides so he won't have to be the youngest Decepticon anymore.
• This is discussed in The Second Choice, where Ruby tells Jaune and Ciel how much of a detriment being the youngest leader is, since it prevents Blake and Yang from taking her seriously (Yang moreso, due to being her older sister). The only one who even makes an effort to treat Ruby with any form of respect as a leader regardless of her age is Weiss.
• This And That: Powder is this to the Patron Librarians by a wide margin. She is seventeen by the time she is officially made Patron Librarian of the Floor of Psychology. Compared to Roland, who is 33 when he is made the Patron Librarian of the Floor of General Works. Meanwhile, Malkuth, Yesod, Netzach, Hod, Tiphereth, Gebura, Chesed, Hokma, Binah are all over ten thousand years old due to the Time Loop they were subjected to during the events of Lobotomy Corporation.
• Waiting is worth it: Midoriya is flat out referred to as "the baby of the class" in Chapter 15.

Films — Animation

• Barbie in the 12 Dancing Princesses: Lacey is one of three triplets who are the youngest of twelve. Not only that, she's the youngest triplet, the clumsiest, and the one who has the most trouble keeping up with her sisters.
• Coco: Downplayed with Miguel. He's not the youngest Rivera at the time the film takes place, but is the youngest of the older children. As a result, he tends to get treated as such, with his family members referring to him as mijo or "my son" as a sign of affection. His abuelita takes this further, referring to him as Mijito Chiquito Miguelito, or roughly, "My dearest, sweetest, tiny son Miguel". Héctor also begins referring to Miguel as mijo ("my son") rather than chamaco or muchacho ("boy" or "kid") after learning that they're related.
• Despicable Me: At 5 (later 6) years old, Agnes is the youngest of the three girls that Gru adopts. She's cute, sweet, innocent, a little odd, and has little impulse control. The others readily indulge her flights of fancy, knowing that she doesn't know any better, and find it very tough to say "no" to her or disappoint her in any way.
• Encanto: Antonio is the youngest Madrigal by over a decade; the story begins on his fifth birthday, while his cousin Mirabel and brother Camilo are already fifteen.
• The Incredibles: Literally - Jack-Jack, between one and two years old, is the youngest member of the Parr family.
• The Little Mermaid: Ariel is the youngest of her seven sisters, and is the most curious. She's also generally considered flighty and silly, and in serious need of some stern discipline.
• Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: Dopey is this within the dwarf clan: the youngest and sillest, viewing everything as a chance for fun. He doesn't even speak, because "he never tried." Less pleasantly, the other dwarfs view him as expendable: he's the one who is sent to explore the bedroom where "the monster" (actually Snow White) is sleeping.
• Turning Red:
  • The creators have confirmed that Tae Young is the youngest member of 4*Town. He acts the most childish of the five which can be seen during Panda Ming's rampage at the concert, with him sucking his thumb while dangling from the ceiling by his harness in the fetal position.
  • In both appearance and attitude, Abby is the youngest of Mei's circle of friends. Physically she looks like a toddler: much shorter than the others, with a relatively large body and short stout limbs. Personality-wise, she's the most energetic and has the least emotional control. Mei, Miriam, and Priya are all clearly aware of this, and it colors their attitude toward Abby. When she's begging Mei to transform because "a dose of panda" will help her think, all three of them react like she's a much-loved younger sibling who is being exceptionally childlike.

Films — Live-Action

• Lana from DISCO (2017) is youngest of the three and seems to be the one who constantly gets into trouble — usually involving drugs — and has Emily and Crystal bail her out if she ever gets into trouble. Crystal even says that their parents would let her get away with anything because of this.
• Forrest Warrior: Logan is the youngest of the five kids (being the younger brother of one of the others) and is being taken up to the mountains and the tree house for the first time at the beginning of the film.
• The Grizzlies: Tanner is much younger and shorter than his lacrosse teammates and is one of the less jaded characters.
• In The Hobbit Ori, who got an Age Lift from the book, is the youngest member of Thorin’s party in the movie. Ori gets babied by his oldest brother Dori and the other dwarves. In the book, Fíli and Kíli were the youngest and far more cheerful than their more stoic brethren.
• This is the motivation behind the attack on Davey that starts the plot of I'll Sleep When I'm Dead.
• Flash in Justice League (2017) (similar to MCU Spider-Man) is the youngest hero and most naive one at that and most immature. Barry is mentored and encouraged into heroics by Batman throughout the movie.
  • Also in Zack Snyder's Justice League, but with the goofiness and naivety being toned down a great deal compared to the theatrical version. He also doesn't need mentoring there.
• In The Lord of the Rings Pippin is this for the Fellowship being youngest and by far most foolish often dipping into The Load before he gets better. In the book Elrond is explicitly against Pippin being in the party fearing it would be too much for him. This is ironic as in the movie Pippin’s actor Billy Boyd was older than Elijah Wood who played Frodo.
• Olive in Little Miss Sunshine, as while the Hoover family are very much a Dysfunctional Family at the start, they still make the trip to the pageant to make Olive happy and become furious when anybody upsets her.
• Mad Max: Fury Road: Cheedo the Fragile is the youngest and most naive and fearful of the wives (Even being considered too young to breed by Immortan Joe) and she is consistently clinging to the other wives for protection (Most notably The Dag), also to note her actress was 16 during filming, compared to the other wives actresses who were in their early to mid 20s
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • In Captain America: Civil War, Wanda Maximoff for Team Cap (and the Avengers as a whole) and Spider-Man for Team Iron Man. Wanda is the youngest human Avenger and has the least amount of combat experience, and her teammates often take a protective or quasi-parental attitude toward her, while Spider-Man is still a teenager. Averted with Vision, whose behavior is (usually) quite mature despite being only a few months old.
  • As of Avengers: Infinity War Spider-Man is made an Avenger by Tony Stark, making him the youngest human on the team at sixteen/seventeen.
  • In Spider-Man: No Way Home, Peter Parker once again falls into this role as he's considerably younger than the alternate Peters from the Raimi and Webb continuites. Despite being the youngest, MCU Peter ends up acting as the leader as he's the only one of them that has experience working in a team thanks to his time with the Avengers.
  • Baby Groot from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is naturally this, interestingly while he gets coddled by the Guardians they still take him on along on often highly dangerous missions. Though they do give him music to listen to and keep him out of the conflict.
• Season of Miracles has Richard Powell, aka Little Richard. While most of the Robins look about 13, Richard looks like he's still in elementary school.
• Space Jam has Nawt the Nerdluck. His small nature and high-pitched voice give this sort of impression. Even in Monstar form, he has the height of a teenager.
• Ensign Pavel Chekov in Star Trek (2009) is only 17, already having his commission by virtue of being a "Russian whiz-kid". Being a live-action Moe certainly helps.
• Jason in Us is the youngest member of the family and cast, and has certain behavioral quirks that make him appear weird to other kids, too, so his mom Adelaide is extra protective.
• Wonder Woman (2017): Diana is the youngest Amazon and the only one born on Themiscyra, so she is largely treated as a child by the other Amazons even after she becomes an adult. Since she is the only Amazon who never saw the world outside the island, she has a naïveté that they do not share.

Literature

• Pippa in Absolutely Truly is the youngest child of the Lovejoy family.
• Fritz from the All American Pups series is at least one of the younger members. He is somewhat klutzy, reluctant to be too far from home, and a self-admitted Lovable Coward. He tends to be seen as the baby of the group by humans, the other pups, and himself.
• In The Bad Guys series, as revealed in "The Baddest Day Ever", Mr. Piranha is the youngest out of 900,543 older brothers and cousins. His father treats him a bit less seriously than the others thanks to this.
• A Christmas Carol: Bob Cratchit's youngest child, "Tiny" Tim, is sweet, loving, and the poster child for Too Good for This Sinful Earth kids in British literature. Scrooge takes a shine to this gentle, kindhearted child and the reveal that his parents can't pay for his medical care, and that he dies in the Bad Future that will happen if Scrooge doesn't change his ways, is one of the great tear jerkers in Charles Dickens' canon.
• In Jeramey Kraatz's The Cloak Society, Misty, at ten, is two years younger than the rest. She insists on being treated like a team member and even objects that she's used primarily to transport them to and from fights.
• Brand, from The Crush, is the youngest member on his squad. The others make a habit of correcting him and constantly treating him as the new guy, while also taking care of him like a younger sibling.
• The Dresden Files: Inari Raith is this to her older siblings Thomas and Lara. The Raiths are part of the White Court of vampires and essentially semi-demonic Emotion Eaters that feed on lust. The Raiths are also a Big, Screwed-Up Family, with their father's crimes against his family starting at rampant sexual abuse. Thomas and Lara have more or less come to terms with their nature and found survival mechanisms to cope. Inari, on the other hand, is shielded from her father by her older siblings, and is completely unaware of her vampiric nature. She works as a PA, is happily in love with her boyfriend and wears "Winnie the Pooh"-pyjamas. Thomas and Lara don't see eye to eye on a lot of things, but will put everything aside to protect Inari's innocence. Inari is one of the few people in the Dresdenverse to get an unambiguously happy ending. She quells her demon with The Power of Love, escapes her less savory family members and moves to California with her True Love, who is the aforementioned boyfriend.
• Ginny Weasley in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix lampshaded during the battle in the Department of Secrets as the Ax-Crazy Bellatrix Lestrange threatens to “torture the youngest,” at which Harry and the others instinctively crowd around Ginny. Among the DA aka Dumbledore’s Army Colin and Dennis Creevey are ( or were in Colin’s case) the youngest members.
• In The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles, Lindy is the youngest of the three siblings. She has the most fertile imagination, which is a valuable attribute in the context, and the most trusting nature, which can be good or bad depending.
• In Renegades, Nova is the youngest of the Anarchists, having been brought into their group by her uncle when she was six. This makes her the most suitable spy, as it means the Renegades don't have her name and face in their files.
• The first part of the historical novel The Sunne in Splendour has Richard of Gloucester and Anne Neville as the youngest in their respective families. Richard is doted on by his mother and older brother, King Edward IV while Anne is somewhat neglected by her ambitious parents. The two are betrothed, unbetrothed and their Childhood Friend Romance is a key early storyline. The second part of the book sees Richard and Anne raising their own child Edward, along with Richard's two older illegitimate children Johnny and Kathryn with little Edward being the much loved baby of the bunch.
• In the first Wings of Fire series, Sunny's idealism and simple outlook means that her friends (despite being the same age) often discount her opinions. Sunny is aware of this, and hates it.
  "They'll give me that look I always get, the one that says: 'Oh, silly little Sunny and her crazy dreams, isn't she cute and harmless.'"
• In Wise Child, Wise Child was treated as such by her eight cousins during their childhood, due to her being the youngest and smallest. They were generally patient with her, but a notable time when they weren't was what led to her first meeting with Juniper: they left her behind on a walk home from picking blackberries to teach her a lesson when she refused to walk and wanted to continue being carried, but Juniper found her and took her to them.

Live-Action TV

• In the original Blackadder, Prince Edmund is the younger son of King Richard IV, and is persistently annoyed by the fact that older brother Harry tends to get all the good jobs and titles while he is perpetually stuck with the task of managing the privies.
• Jamie Reagan is Frank's youngest child on Blue Bloods. His By-the-Book Cop demeanor eventually gets him promoted to Sergeant, whereas big brother Danny remains a Detective First Grade. This change in position eventually has them butting heads for a while.
• Lance Sweets on Bones. His genius intellect got him through college and into the FBI at just 23 and he’s often thought of as a kid by others, especially Booth. He gets referred to as the 12 year old at times and is dubbed the “baby duck” in one episode. Booth is a bit shocked when he learns Sweets endured childhood abuse and that his life hasn’t been as innocent as Booth thinks.
• In The Brady Bunch Reunion Show A Very Brady Christmas, Cindy, the youngest of the original bunch and who is now 19, resents the fact that since she's the youngest they rest of her family all treat her like a baby. At Christmas she's still seated at the "kids table" along with the offspring of her siblings while those same siblings (including Bobby who is only a year or so older than her) are all seated at the adults table.
• In the final season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dawn, Buffy's little sister, complains that everyone treats her like a baby to be protected when she's now older than Buffy was when she [Buffy] started her slaying career.
• Dr Spencer Reid from Criminal Minds. He turned 24 early in Season 1, which made him the youngest of the BAU by almost a decade and the rest of his team (read: Morgan) never lets him forget it. On the plus side, it also tends to evoke Big Brother Instinct in some teammates and Like a Son to Me in others, and lets him get away with his more childish quirks like an over-enthusiasm for Halloween and firing off "physics rockets" in the bullpen.
• The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance: As the youngest of her sisters Brea has more freedom, but is not always taken seriously.
• Empire: Hakeem Lyon is the youngest child and appropriately the most reckless and immature. He wants to prove himself a man to his father, but is quick to run to his older brothers to bail him out. He was also too young to remember his mother before she got locked up for 17 years and has no respect for her.
• In The Haunting of Hill House (2018), Nell is the youngest Crain sibling and The Heart.
• Heure is the youngest of Time Jackers, the villainous group from Kamen Rider Zi-O. He is treated as Annoying Younger Sibling at very best and hates it despite being as immature as everyone thinks he is.
• Lost Love in Times: Yuan Li is the youngest of the emperor's sons. He's a bit of an idiot when not being a Royal Brat, but his father and most of his older brothers spoil him and let him get away with his behaviour.
• Grogu aka The Child from The Mandalorian is quite a literal example being a baby among a cast of adults. Though technically he is older than his surrogate father Mando at 50-years-old, but since he’s still a infant by his species standards, the trope still works.
• M*A*S*H. Radar is 18, while most of the other camp personnel's ages range from late 20s (Hawkeye, Trapper, and B.J.) to 60s (Potter's presumed age). After characterization marched on, Radar become an increasingly childlike and naive character, as reflected in many facets of his personality, such as sleeping with a teddy bear, reading comic books, sneaking copies of National Geographic (for nude pictures), and being unfamiliar with subjects related to sex. The fact that he's also short (only 5′5″) didn't help him out much, either, and he was consistently teased about his height—or lack thereof.
• Money Heist: Rio is the youngest of the thieves and the most boyish and naive. His older and more hardened girlfriend Tokyo notes in his introduction that he's a whiz with tech but is hopeless in every other aspect of life.
• Money Heist: Korea - Joint Economic Area: Rio is the maknae (youngest) of the group, and the most romantic of them.
• The Other Two is about what happens to the older siblings when their little brother becomes a superstar. Chase, the family baby who becomes a youtube sensation, is portrayed as a decent, innocent kid brother even as he is thrust into the world of fame.
• Power Rangers: Most series avert this by giving everyone on the team similar ages or maturity levels, but a few examples stand out:
  • Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers: Corcus of the Aquitian Rangers. His actor theorized that he's the youngest of the team who learns by silently mimicking his teammates instead of asking questions. A relative lack of maturity could explain why he's such a hothead in battle.
  • Power Rangers Turbo: Justin Stewart. He is only twelve years old while his teammates are in their late teens, and even though he's The Smart Guy who skipped multiple grades, he's still very much a child.
  • Power Rangers Wild Force: Max Cooper. He appears to be the sole teenager in a group of early twenty-somethings. Because of his age and playfulness, the others call him a kid and treat him like one too. An ongoing theme in the series is his frustration with this and a desire to be treated more like an equal.
  • Power Rangers Dino Fury: Izzy Garcia. Again, she is the youngest of the Rangers, being a teen in high school, while the others are young adults.
• Dr Julian Bashir of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine begins as a fresh-faced officer straight out of the Academy in his mid-20s, and manages to get off on the wrong foot with most of the cast due to his unconscious arrogance before his Character Development sets in.
• Played literally in Star Trek: Voyager when an evil alien momentarily turns Harry Kim into a squalling baby, lampshading how he hates being treated like the baby of the crew.
• On Succession, Cousin Greg is the youngest and least wealthy of the main characters, as well as a Naïve Newcomer to the family drama. His age, status and good-natured demeanor all ensure that nobody takes him seriously or perceives him as a threat.
• At age 22, during season 1 of Supernatural, Sam Winchester is the baby of his crew which initially begins with Sam, his older brother, his father, and an older family friend and eventually expands to include several nigh immortal creatures such angle, demons, and witches. Sam is the youngest human until the next generation of hunters begin to emerge in season 8.
• Liam Dunbar in the fourth season of Teen Wolf. Stiles even calls him a little runt. Eventually, he is joined by Mason, Hayden, and Corey.
• Victorious: Cat fills this role, being the most childish of the group. The rest of the gang often have to protect her when she's in tough situations. Even Jade once comforted her when she started crying.
• What We Do in the Shadows (2019): It doesn't come up often, but Laszlo is the youngest of the three undead vampires (not counting the mortal psychic vampire Colin). Nandor is from medieval times, Nadja is at least 200 years younger, and Laszlo was turned by her in the 1700's. And he just so happens to be the most impetuous and exuberant of the group.
• The White Queen: Anne Neville and Richard of Gloucester are the "babies" within their families, plus they are each The Cutie at the start of the show. Anne is her father Lord Warwick's favourite child, and Richard is loved by his eldest brother King Edward IV more than their middle brother George of Clarence.
• Women's Murder Club: Cindy is the youngest member of the group, being far more aware of things like pulp culture, sports, and places people might hang out, and is often mistaken for an actual teenager. She is also far more innocent and is repeatedly called cute by the others. The others, particularly Lindsay, are shown to also be extremely protective of Cindy due to her younger age.

Music

• Although Alvin and the Chipmunks are triplets, their birth order is Alvin, Simon, and Theodore. Compared to Alvin and Simon, Theodore is notably more bright-eyed and naive, and often looks to his brothers for advice and guidance. At one point during the 1980s series, and carried over into the two Universal movies, both Alvin and Simon had begun to wear regular pajamas while Theodore still wore his onesies to bed.
• The Jackson 5: Michael Jackson, the youngest brother and interestingly enough the lead singer and The Face of the band for both his talent and cuteness as a child. He started a solo career as a teenager.
• Gorillaz: Noodle was just ten years old when she joined the band, while the others were in their 20s, or thirties in Murdoc's case.
• *NSYNC: Justin Timberlake was 14 when the group started and has an Odd Friendship with eldest member Chris Kirkpatrick, who is 10 years his senior.
• Spice Girls: Emma Bunton AKA Baby Spice for the iconic girl group. She's the youngest of the group (by less than a year) but accentuated by long blond hair in pigtails, baby-doll dresses, innocent smile, and Girly Girl personality in the marketing.
• The Sugarhill Gang: Master Gee invokes the trope by name for himself during his verse in "Rapper's Delight."
  Now, I'm not as tall as the rest of the gang
  But I rap to the beat just the same
  I got a little face and a pair of brown eyes
  All I'm here to do ladies is hypnotize…
  I guess by now you can take a hunch
  And find that I am the baby of the bunch
• Nicola Roberts references her time as one of the youngest contestants on Popstars: The Rivals on her solo single "Beat of My Drum":
  Once upon a time I pressed rewind
  Two left feet, I had no beat
  Baby in the corner learning quick
  Keep up, keep up, keep up
• In Korean Pop Music, the youngest person in a group is referred to as the maknae. While not an official performative position, the age-based hierarchy of South Korean culture makes it a point to identify the youngest. It's worth noting that despite its fame as a "K-pop term", it's not unique nor original to K-pop - it refers to the youngest in any kind of group in Korea, though it's become better known in the West through its use within idol groups. Famous maknaes include Jungkook of BTS, Lisa of BLACKPINK, and Tzuyu of TWICE.

Podcasts

• In Past Division, most of the party consists of young adults, with the exception of Lucky Twice, who is seventeen years old and the Only Sane Man. She's still treated as the least competent, though.

Puppet Shows

• The Muppets: Robin the Frog, Kermit's bright-eyed and baby-voiced nephew who gets the spotlight whenever The Muppet Show is in need of some wholesome, sentimental moments. Naturally, he plays Tiny Tim, one of the most famous babies of the bunch in literary history, in The Muppet Christmas Carol.
• Squacky is the youngest of The Pajanimals. "I Was a Baby?" is about him being upset because he can't do some of the big kid things that the other Pajanimals can do, like reading, or tying his shoes, or drawing a decent picture.
• On Sesame Street, Elmo is 3 1/2 years old, putting him close to the age of the show's target audience. As the youngest and most vulnerable character, Elmo appears often in outreach videos to teach kids in sensitive situations that they aren't alone and their loved ones will be there for them. He's been at the center of the episode addressing the trauma of the September 11 attacks, the death of a family member, befriending a girl whose mother is dealing with an opioid addiction, and having a parent in the armed forces.

Theater

• In Annie, six-year-old Molly is the youngest, cutest and most vulnerable of Annie's friends at the orphanage. In the opening scene she wakes up crying from a nightmare about her Missing Mom and needs Team Mom Annie to comfort her.
• In The Sound of Music, as shown in the page quote, five-year-old Gretl is the adorable youngest of the seven von Trapp children.
• In West Side Story, Baby John is the youngest member of the Jets, with an innocent, vulnerable personalty unsuited to the gang and who mainly goes along with the others due to peer pressure. In the film version he even gets beaten up by the Sharks in the opening scene and is later shown crying Tender Tears after the deaths of Riff and Bernardo. Worst of all, the other Jets eventually try to force him to rape Anita.
• In The Wiz, the Scarecrow was only sewn together two days before Dorothy meets him, making him literally the youngest of her three friends, and he's usually cast as a young man too, while the Tin Man and Cowardly Lion tend to be cast older. Hinton Battle was only nineteen when he created the role on Broadway, as was Michael Jackson in the film version, while Elijah Kelley was twenty-nine (and still much younger than the Tin Man and the Lion) in the 2015 live TV version.

Toys

• Transformers: Bumblebee is already the Trope Codifier for Kid-Appeal Character, has a youthful, friendly design with Innocent Blue Eyes^note Although all Autobots have blue eyes, Bumblebee's stand out as this thanks to his baby-faced appearance, is the youngest of Optimus Prime's troop who wants to prove himself to his more seasoned allies, and empathizes with the Puny Earthlings. One story (in The Transformers: Last Stand of the Wreckers collection) has Roadbuster mention it's hard not to want to pat him on the head just seeing him.
• BIONICLE: Lewa came off as this to the Toa Mata, even though they were all the same age, due to his tendency for reckless adventure. Character Development eventually wizened him up, though.
• From The Grossery Gang, Rotten Egg was the last one to expire, so he was the last one to turn into a Grossery, making him the youngest, where all the others treat him like a little brother, even though they also spend no spare time mocking him like an older sibling would, too.
• Barbie has an extensive cast of friends and family, including her toddler sister Kelly (renamed Chelsea in 2010). In Barbie's massive library of Direct to Video movies, Kelly is often cast in this role:
  • Movies like Nutcracker, Rapunzel, Swan Lake, and A Christmas Carol have a Framing Device where Barbie is telling the story to impart some bit of wisdom on the younger girl.
  • Barbie in the 12 Dancing Princesses: Kelly appears as the youngest of the sisters, Lacey. The girl is clumsy and has low self-esteem, but her sisters (especially Genevieve) encourage her. In the end, she saves the King's life using the magical water she discovered after skinning her knee.
  • Barbie in A Christmas Carol: Kelly is cast a gender-flipped Tiny Tim, who opens Eden Starling's eyes to the beauty of Christmas and the horror of not giving to those in need.
• With the Disney Princesses finally allowed to be depicted as friends who hang out together, beginning with the 2021 "Ultimate Princess Celebration" line, Snow White often takes on this role in official crossover artwork. For just one example, one piece of promotional art shows her energetically swinging her broom in imitation of Mulan's sword while Merida looks on encouragingly.

Video Games

• Crescent Prism: According to the RPGMaker.net character page, Maru is 4 months old in Chapter 1, making him the youngest party member by a large margin.
• Ayane from Dead or Alive is this when teaming with her siblings due to being their baby sister. Though this doesn't at all mean she gets any special consideration and treatment. Is she injured? She can walk.
• Bethany Hawke in Dragon Age II is the youngest of the three Hawke siblings, albeit only by a few minutes. Because of her magical abilities, the entire family is extremely protective of her. If she survives the prologue, she becomes Everyone's Baby Sister to Hawke's entire party.
• Subverted by the Elf in Dragon's Crown. Next to the "walking wall of steel" Fighter, the positively ripped Amazon, a Dwarf wider than he is tall, the mature prettyboy Wizard, and incredibly curvaceous Sorceress, the short, Token Wholesome Elf certainly looks the part. She's actually the oldest of them all at about 100 and nobody has any trouble taking her seriously.
• Final Fantasy:
  • Rydia from Final Fantasy IV being a child is this for the party for a good deal of the game, before getting a Plot-Relevant Age-Up into a grown woman. There’s also brother and sister Palom and Porom who are both young children and mostly treated as such by the party despite their magical talents.
  • Relm Arrowny and Gau from Final Fantasy VI being a 10 year old girl and a 13 year old wild boy are naturally treated like this within the Returners. Sabin the Hot-Blooded martial artist even scoffs at the idea of Relm joining them on their dangerous journey and most adults in party tend to baby them, despite both Gau and Relm being extremely capable. Prior to the kids joining, Terra fulfilled this position being naive and relatively helpless before revealing her Esper Super Mode.
  • Marlene Wallace in Final Fantasy VII being Barret’s adorable adoptive daughter and Everyone's Baby Sister is this for Avalanche and being far younger than the previous examples at age 4 obviously doesn’t do any fighting at all, just coddled and protected while her father is out on missions. After leaving Midgar optional party member Yuffie Kisaragi falls squarely into this role as despite being pretty capable as a Kunoichi, none of the party takes her seriously and she spends a lot of cutscenes goofing around and getting motion sickness.
    • Remake emphasises Jessie and Wedge as this among Avalanche, being the most naive and in need of rescuing from Cloud. Later in the game Aerith is treated as this in the main party, despite her not actually being the youngest member (which is Tifa) and her incredible magical prowess, as Cloud and Tifa go out of their way to protect Aerith as best they can when combat gets particularly intense.
    • Among SOLDIER Cloud as seen in Crisis Core was definitely this being treated as a naive kid brother by 1st Class SOLDIERS like Zack, Angeal and Sephiroth. Making Cloud’s defeat of Sephiroth in Nibel Reactor even more shocking and impressive.
  • Rikku from Final Fantasy X is treated as this among Yuna’s Guardians, even more so than Tidus who is pretty immature himself. At one point during the Thunder Plains the pilgrimage is halted due to Rikku being terrified of lightning, much to the annoyance of Team Dad Auron who eventually gets stern with her after she puts up enough of a fuss.
  • Prompto from Final Fantasy XV, being the most immature of the quartet who often gets on the nerves of Gladiolus and Ignis. His Character Development (as especially seen in his DLC) is him learning to stand on his own two feet.
• Fire Emblem: Three Houses:
  • The Black Eagles has Petra at 15, although she's never treated as a child or anything less than an equal. Rather, the 17-year-old Bernadetta seems to fulfill this role.
  • The Blue Lions have Ashe, although like Petra, he's never treated as a child due to his maturity. There's also Felix of the childhood friends (himself, Ingrid, Sylvain, and Dimitri), and while he's prickly in the present, Sylvain recalls that Felix Used to Be a Sweet Kid.
  • The Golden Deer have Lysithea. Claude teases her about this for his amusement, although he takes her seriously when it comes to tactics.
• In Hades, the Olympians aren't terribly fond of their titular chthonic Black Sheep. But then they discover that he's been hiding a charming young son, Zagreus, from them this whole time, and are so elated to fawn over their newfound cousin/nephew that they immediately break from their policy of not interfering with Underworld matters and begin aiding his escape from it so they can properly adopt him into the Olympian pantheon. Most of them even begin competing with each other to become Zagreus's favorite, to the point that they react... violently should he spurn them in favor of one of their siblings or cousins.
• In I Was a Teenage Exocolonist, Utopia is the youngest among the known adults and the first and "for a while" the only kid in the creche growing up in the Stratospheric. Even in adulthood, she'll always be known as their "Little Baby Pia".
• Mass Effect has interesting subversions.
  • Despite clearly being The Leader, Shepard is likely actually the youngest member of the true companion crew who appear in all three games, except for Joker who is a few months younger, and Ashley and Tali, who are both a few years younger. Because of the strength of his/her personality, s/he comes across as older but is only 29 in the first installment, several years younger than the rest of the crew save Ashley and hundreds of years younger than some of the allies s/he eventually makes.
  • If Shepard does not romance Tali, Tali will be treated like a kid sibling. Starting the series at twenty-two, Tali is tied with Jack as the youngest of Shepard's squadmates.
  • From Mass Effect: Andromeda, Cora Harper will mention she used to be the team baby in her old commando unit, since everyone else was an asari. The next youngest teammate was a mere two hundred, and relieved that there was finally someone else to be "the kid".
• Axl from Mega Man X 7 onward is a newer member of the Maverick Hunters and is characterized as a Young Gun who's more impulsive and eager than the veterans X and Zero. Axl acts immature and thinks of everything like a game.
• In Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater Naked Snake (yes Big Boss himself) was this for the Cobra Unit aka Sons of The Boss being the youngest and newest member. Team Mom The Boss even repeatedly claims to Volgin and others Snake is “just a child” considering she’s referring to a 30-something bearded man in full combat gear, this is unintentionally hilarious.
• Mighty No. 2 Cryosphere from Mighty No. 9 is the smallest of the nine Mighty Numbers, and is designed with a baby aesthetic in mind, complete with a childlike personality.
• In Octopath Traveler, Tressa is the youngest of the eight playable characters and is frequently teased by the other party members for her youth. In fact, one party banter cutscene between her and Primrose reveals that she doesn't even know what a brothel is.
• D. Va from Overwatch is a 19-year-old professional human Gamer Chick riding a Chicken Walker, in a setting where you'd have to be at least in your mid-twenties to be called 'young'. Because of this, she retains quite a lot of childish cockiness that comes from a competitive gamer of that age.
  • Then she's surpassed by Orisa, an Omnic designed to be the protector of Numbani, who's only 1 month old by the time of the game. Her creator, Efi Oladele isn't any better; she's 11.
• Pokémon Scarlet and Violet has two examples of this trope.
  • The villanous team of this game, Team Star, is commanded by five leaders. Four of them look to be from mid-to-late teens, while the youngest, Ortega, seems to be a preteen, causing the other leaders to tower over him.
  • The Elite Four has an even more extreme example, as all of them are adults... except for Poppy, who is at the very least half the age of the protagonist.
• Rave Heart: Zazir is the youngest party member at 8 and knows little of life outside of the labs he was confined in.
• Resident Evil has Rebecca Chambers the youngest member of S.T.A.R.S at 18 years old, though background information states she’s a Teen Genius though that doesn’t stop her from being The Load in RE1. Also in the RE0’s novelisation Rebecca is annoyed at her teammates babying her so much and in game she gets ticked off at Billy patronising her.
  • Leon Kennedy in RE2 was the youngest police officer in Raccoon City at 21 years old and is especially treated as such by his superior Marvin Branagh. Leon is also the most naive officer too being completely unaware of how corrupt Chief Irons is and hesitant to release Ben Bertolucci from his cell, even during the Zombie Apocalypse.
• Azami Mochizuki from Sakura Wars (2019) is the youngest member of the Imperial Combat Revue, while Seijuro Kamiyama and most of its members are young adults.
• In South Park: The Stick of Truth as well as Fractured But Whole and Phone Destroyer, The New Kid tends to take this trope from Butters, as they're already established as being a year younger than the other fourth graders and sometimes tend to be treated as a raw rookie in whatever game they're playing. Heck, Butters even briefly takes up being the New Kid's mentor in the first and third games.
• Street Fighter Ibuki took this role in Shadowfalls. Being the youngest fighter of any group the older Mika and Karin both protect specifically her at certain points. She also seems to be expected to fight less during danger and only has one battle where she can't avoid it.
• In Team Fortress 2, all of the mercenaries are grown men...and then there's Scout, who is so short and skinny that he is often mistaken for a teenager by fans.
• Yes, Your Grace: Cedani, the youngest princess, is the only child with a major role, is more often seen playing than doing anything else, and generally brings out the caring side of older characters who interact with her.

Visual Novels

• Ace Attorney:
  • Pearl Fey in the Fey Clan combines this with Token Mini-Moe; her mother and cousin dote over her very much.
  • Defied with Franziska Von Karma. She is the youngest of the von Karmas and is the youngest prosecutor in the original trilogy, but she refuses to act like it — instead, she's got an abrasive, cold personality. She even refers to Edgeworth as her younger brother despite being seven years his junior.
• Eroge! Sex and Games Make Sexy Games: This trope gets Zigzagged; Nene is this in appearance and behavior only (in fact, she's the eldest at 32!); Momoka, a Does Not Like Men Tsundere, is actually the youngest one in the group (at the age of 20).
• In ClockUp's Euphoria, we have Token Mini-Moe Spoiled Brat Rika... who's just one year younger than the other teenagers. She often uses her charming cuteness to get herself out of trouble.
• Morenatsu: If you don't count Soutarou, Shun is this in the main group. Shun is also the most cheerful, sensitive, energetic, and child-like of the group.
• Konomi Yanase in Princess Evangile is the youngest of the main cast, and the youngest potential love interest for Masaya. As such, she has to be constantly lectured on how love and relationships really work whenever they bring it up in front of her.

Web Animation

• Chikn Nuggit: Sody Pop's the youngest named character of the main cast at 8 years old (and also the only one with a known age).
• hololive has an informal subgroup known as the HoloBabies due to the members' relative immaturity, at least in terms of how they act in streams.
  • Luna Himemori is stated to be zero years old in her lore, which she shows with her voice affectation and childish behavior.
  • Sakura Miko is an adult but is nonetheless considered to be this given her womanchild tendencies and distinctively childish voice.
  • The ID branch's Kobo Kaneru claims to be legal in her debut profile, but a later stream has her guess her age to be just 6 or 7 and at any rate basically all of the other members of Hololive treat her like a child, with the EN HoloMyth's Team Dad Calliope Mori and Team Mom Kiara Takanashi both claiming Kobo to be their child in particular and Kobo reciprocating by calling them Dad and Mom, respectively. Kobo's childlike voice and constant childish behavior across streams only further cements her identity here, along with an incident where she wandered into a host club with Calli's credit card and Calli had to retrieve her, acting like a disappointed parent while Kobo whined and complained about not being treated like an adult.
  • Though usually not considered a HoloBaby, Gawr Gura fills the trope role within EN's HoloMyth generation between her short stature, acting like a Deliberately Cute Child ("You can't be mad at me — I'm cute!"), relatively high-pitched voice, and her Book Dumb tendencies (especially at arithmetic).
  • Despite being neither the youngest nor shortest in her generation, Todoroki Hajime of ReGLOSS is frequently babied by her fellow idols due to her childlike demeanor and voice. In fact, she's often lumped together with other such "babies" like Miko and Luna due to the same reason.
• RWBY: Marrow is the rookie of the team and is teased a lot by his teammates for being more brash and emotional than thoughtful and for pretending to not care when he does. He looks up to Clover and, when they leave the mine after defeating the Petra Gigas, attempts to adopt Clover's stride and stern expression.

Web Comics

• Zala'ess Vel'Sharen of Drowtales is the youngest of her five sisters, and a major motivation for her is to make herself the most powerful to make up for all the times they talked down to her and took her less than seriously due to her age. As a result she has the largest family and the most political connections of any of them.
• Errant Story: Poor Misa is this for the entire elven species. Since they're immortal but slowly became sterile over the millennia, she's literally the youngest elf in existence, and there's no chance of another being born. This means that she's still treated as a baby despite being almost fifteen hundred years old.
• Magical Island: Mai, Blossom and Melantha. Mai is the youngest of her team and family. Melantha act like the baby on the villains' side (even though she's more than one thousand years old.)and Blossom is the shortest and youngest of the entire cast.
• Mob Psycho 100: The Body Improvement Club consists entirely of burly Lovable Jocks... and Mob. Despite the fact that Mob is anemic and thus can't run a mile before passing out—or maybe even because of it—the other club members are very affectionate and supportive of him, joyfully celebrating even the tiniest of progress he makes and even fighting off literal supervillains just to protect him.
• The Order of the Stick: Elan is the youngest member of the overall Order, as evidenced by Belkar calling him "kid". The only reason Durkon and Belkar are smaller than him is because they are a dwarf and halfing, respectively.
• Pocket Princesses depicts Snow White in this manner. She's canonically the youngest Disney Princess at only 14-years-old, and the most innocent and pure-hearted, which combined with Character Exaggeration makes her into a happy-go-lucky Kindhearted Simpleton.
• Stand Still, Stay Silent: Reynir is this to his family, thanks to both being the youngest and the only one to not be The Immune among his siblings. It's to the point that at age twenty, his parents were still exaggerating how dangerous the world is outside the farm, while his older siblings are implied to all have military jobs. He's also this in the Death World exploration crew to which he's a Little Stowaway to an extent, being an untrained civilian making up for the fact that strictly speaking, he's the third youngest out of six behind a couple of military-trained nineteen year olds.

Western Animation

• Steve Smith is the only main character in American Dad! who isn't adult, being only 14 years old. He's also frequently pushed around, mocked and babied by the other Smiths and can be extremely childish on occasion.
• Arcane: Powder is clearly the youngest of her adoptive family and struggles to keep up with her older siblings several times, causing the others to either constantly worry for her safety or dismiss her as an annoying nuisance.
• Big Blue: Bacon Berry is a fairy-like magical guardian with the personality of a toddler, serving as the baby of the surrogate family that is the Calypso crew. Her innocent nature means she often sees the good in others where her older crewmates might not.
• Captain Planet and the Planeteers: Recruited at 12, Ma-Ti is the youngest of the team and painfully aware of the limitations this can put on him. "Rain of Terror" has him struggling with a climbing wall that was presumably built with the other, teenage, Planeteers in mind. It doesn't help that the rest of the crew sometimes shows some inclinations towards babying him, which he dislikes.
• In DuckTales (2017), Louie and Webby are the babies of the bunch. Louie is the youngest of the triplets, and Webby is the youngest of the main cast of kids. In the previous generation, Fethry Duck is the youngest of his cousins.
• Ed, Edd n Eddy:
  • Jimmy, in spades. Kevin in particular will occasionally taunt Jimmy over his younger age, from him frequently carrying around stuffed animals and playing with dolls, to how accident prone he tends to be. In spite of all of this, Jimmy still hangs with the other cul-de-sac kids.
  • Averted with Sarah. She's Jimmy's age, and is Ed's baby sister, but she's incredibly aggressive, temperamental, and physically destructive to the point that most of the other characters (Ed, especially) don't even dare mess with her, lest they suffer her wrath.
  • Though Eddy usually averts this, "A Pinch to Grow an Ed" is made of this trope.
  • In the Eds' dynamic, Ed plays this role. He's simple-minded and childlike, not to mention a space case, so Edd and Eddy have to respectively be the Team Mom and the Team Dad to him.
  • May Kanker, of the Kanker sisters, perfectly fits this trope, as not only she's the youngest of them, but she also possesses a very childlike behavior, which can only be rivaled by Ed's.
• The Legend of Korra:
  • In Aang's family, Tenzin is "the baby" among his siblings, however he's also the most driven and stoic of the family, probably because he has a chip on his shoulder. He gets teased by his older brother and sister for being daddy's favorite, even as an old man.
  • Similarly, Meelo feels he has something to prove, not only as the youngest^note before Rohan is born, but also as the only male of his Tag Along Kid trio with his two older sisters. His attempts to be seen as a man are usually played for comic relief.
  • Among Team Avatar, Bolin fills this role. Mako occasionally calls attention to his age, and he embraces being the most childlike of the team.
• Lily Loud from The Loud House is a literal example, being the youngest of the family. Luan, the comedian, is also this due to being treated the least seriously and the fact that the rest of her family (yes, even Lily) groans at her antics and views her as a nuisance.
• Molly of Denali: With Molly and Tooey being preteens, Trini is the youngest of their group because she's seven (later eight). However, she is still treated as an equal.
• Monster Loving Maniacs: Bo is the youngest of the Van Alten family at a tender 5 years old, with an innocent, playful nature and a love for stuffed animals. She's also a Friend to All Living Things as a result of her personality, often befriending the monsters that the family deals with.
• The Powerpuff Girls has Bubbles. She's the cutest and friendliest of the sisters. She also has the most childlike character tics like sleeping with the lights on and carrying around a stuffed animal. Being explicitly treated as the Baby is a Berserk Button for her. As long as you don't call attention to it, she plays the role to a T.
• Mindy Melendez from Ready Jet Go! is 4 years old, and is the youngest character in the main group. However, her being 4 means she can't go to space with the older kids just yet. Eventually, she turns 5 and gets to go with them in Season 2.
• She-Ra: Princess of Power: While his actual age is never revealed, Imp tends to act in an excitable and bratty manner similar to a particularly spoiled child. He's also the member of the Horde Hordak tends to lavish affection and praise on, much to the ire of the other villains.
• She-Ra and the Princesses of Power: Princess Frosta of Castle Chill is this for the Princess Alliance. Younger and smaller than her contemporaries, she at first tries to play herself off as Wise Beyond Their Years. As the series progresses though, she lets the little kid out and tends to hero worship the older princesses.
• Sonic the Hedgehog (SatAM): Tails is doted on and fussed over by the whole team of Freedom Fighters, probably due to him being the youngest of their group.
• In South Park, Butters stands out as the only kid in his class who plays Children Are Innocent straight, for the most part at least.
• Ace Ambling in Ballmastrz: 9009 is the only kid member of the Leptons. The team refuses to socialize with him when possible due to his childish demeanor.
• Star Trek: Prodigy: Rock is an unique mix of The Baby and The Big Guy, being an alien made of rocky skin, but also being a literal eight year old girl. She's impervious to a lot of damage that would kill any of the others, but she's very tender-hearted and insecure.
• The titular character in Steven Universe, pictured above, being the youngest of the Crystal Gems, is basically this. He's starting to grow up in later episodes, though.
  • In the Whole Episode Flashback episodes set before Steven was born, Amethyst seems to have been this, acting even more childlike than she does in the present. The loss of Rose, along with Steven becoming the new "baby," seems to have matured her into more of a Cool Big Sis role.
  • Minor character Peedee Fryman also applies this, and ironically being more responsible than his dad or older brother.
  • In "Jungle Moon", Stevonnie starts Dreaming of Times Gone By while sleeping in an abandoned Gem base, and learns Pink Diamond was something like this, a Bratty Half-Pint who was much shorter than the other Diamonds and had to demand her own colony from Yellow Diamond.
  • Played more for drama in Steven Universe: Future. Despite being in his mid-teens now, the Gems still see him as the little kid he was back in the main series. This ends up being the conflict of one of the episodes, with the Gems repeating the Affectionate Gesture to the Head from the original intro (as shown in the page image); and Steven very clearly not enjoying it this time.
• Michelangelo of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. In all except the 1987 series, he's treated as the youngest turtle. Appropriately he's the least mature, easily distracted, and most energetic, but he sometimes gets miffed that no one takes him seriously. It's especially prominent in Rise, where he's only thirteen.
• Watership Down (1999): Pipkin, who is already the youngest of the Sandleford Warren rabbits in the other adaptations of the story, is portrayed as a child in the TV series.
• While Ice Bear is actually the little bro of the trio from We Bare Bears, ironically, it's the middle child Panda that's treated like the baby by his brothers and tend to coddle/overprotect him as such.
• Work It Out Wombats!: Zeke is the youngest and cutest of the wombat kids.
• Young Justice: Robin is the baby of the founding core team during season one, which becomes a plot point. Since he's been a super hero since he was 9, has the most years of experience, and probably the most grueling mentor in Batman, he was considered to be The Leader of the team. Due to his relative youth at age 13 and overall immaturity, the mantle passed to Aqualad (age 16 at the time). Appropriately, this is one of the most impish and childlike interpretations of Dick Grayson since before Batman: The Animated Series in the 1990s. After the time skip he became The Leader proper as Nightwing.

Real Life

• Some legislatures take to nickname their youngest member the Baby of the House.
• If you've got at least one sibling and are the youngest, odds are your family will always see you as this to some extent.

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