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Favorite
Scene
The part where Seara tried to fix up Shuhei's
little sister, Koharu, to a classmate she's attracted to. It was funny
why Seara made the effort to get the two of them together: It's Seara's
philosophy to make Koharu happy because she's her future sister-in-law
^_^
I
happened on this half-hour OAV with a vague idea that it's all about puppy
love. And I was right. Anime often have titles that are misleading, and
to find one that has a plot true to the title is somewhat disconcerting.
Baby Love also has the everyday story of childhood crushes, so it was a surprise for me when I saw no website paying tribute to this sweet but short anime. Unless you count this one Russian site, or the sites that include Baby Love in their list of trades. It's really too bad, because this is one short shoujo that is really nice but actually overlooked.
Synopsis
Seara and her parents visited
the Seto family when she was young. Then she saw Shuhei, the Setos' eldest
child. It was love at first sight for Seara, and she would follow "Shu-chan"
everywhere, even professing her love for him. Shuhei, to get rid of Seara
and appease her at the same time, told her that he'll return her love
once she grew up. To this Seara drank lots of milk and nutritional supplements,
believing that Shuhei would be true to his word.
Four years after, Seara's parents went to the United States. Seara opted to stay behind with the Seto family, setting her plan into action: to make Shuhei notice her. The thing is, it didn't occur to Shuhei that the little runt who pestered him four years ago is now this cute elementary student who is still madly in love with him. He also thinks of Seara, who is of the same age as his younger sibling, Koharu, as nothing more than a little sister.
As for Seara, she was determined to make Shuhei see her in a different light. She devised ways for him to notice her: make him go with her to an amusement park in the guise of him as a chaperone, buy a "breast massager" to make her breasts larger (Shuhei likes, ehrrrm, well-endowed girls), go with him to a skating rink (unfortunately unwanted guests tagged along ^_^).
But things weren't going along as Seara had planned. Shuhei seems to be hung-up on Ayano, his very beautiful classmate. Ayano seems to like Shuhei just as much. Then there's Rai, Shuhei's classmate who find Seara very cute...
Review
To sum up Baby Love in one word:
Sweet. There. I'm done with my review ^_^
Baby Love has almost all the ingredients of a good, short, shoujo anime. The plot is light with no convoluted love triangles that would make your head ache (Marmalade Boy anyone?). The story is straight-forward: Seara wanted Shuhei to love her back, marry her, and live happily ever after. It's short; at approximately 30 minutes, you've watched something pleasant that would make you smile for a couple of hours. The artwork is nice with generous use of bright colors.
My only grumble about Baby Love is the ending. While Shuhei realized that Seara has come to mean so much to him--he felt stirrings of jealousy when he saw her with Rai--there wasn't any vocal acknowledgement of love here. Nothing explicit. It's up to the viewer to decide what happens next, although it's very obvious that they did end up together. Still, it's better to have seen what did happen to them in color, frame by frame.
To sum up Baby Love in one word: Sweet. There. I'm done with my review ^_^