All The Tropes

Little Boy Seeks Big Girl

For every main girl character, there will usually be a boy in her Three Amigos friendship, or a little brother who doesn't give a dang about her. Conversely, there is often a young boy who has a big crush on either the friend's BFF, the female 'character of the day', or a recurring female character. This is a case of Little Boy Seeks Big Girl, which is usually Played for Laughs; for the girl's part, she is often at least unaware of his advances. Bonus points if the older gal in question is their babysitter.

You can definitely see in his face that he's right where he wants to be.

The average case is mostly "Precocious Crush meets someone who like older women", with the girl being no older than 25. Sometimes, it might go as far as Stalker with a Crush; other times the girl may even return his feelings, which can lead to less-than-kind implications on the show's part, depending on her age and the gap between their ages. In some instances, reality may ensue, with the situation being treated as creepy in-universe or else played for drama.

Though this happens often in preteen-aimed shows with female main characters, it may also occur in other setups: for example, the male best friend is younger like her, the boy is a child and the main title character, or the lead is a teen girl and the boy seeking said big girl is her little brother.

Has nothing to do with Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy or Tiny Guy, Huge Girl (which inspired the trope's original title).

NOTE: When adding examples, please remember that nobody has read or seen every work in existence - context is requested.

No real life examples, please; All The Tropes is not a gossip site.

Examples of Little Boy Seeks Big Girl include:

Anime and Manga

  • In Axis Powers Hetalia, Romano used to have a crush on Belgium while he was living in Spain's house.
  • In Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi, 12-year old Sasshi is this way toward fanservice girl Mune-Mune, which is ironic considering she's really his grandmother, who looks perpetually like her 19-year old self, thanks to a time paradox!
  • Naota develops a crush on Haruko in FLCL. It's implied that he's around 12 years old, and she's 21.

Film

  • Nine-year-old Anakin and 14-year-old Padme in The Phantom Menace.
  • Crazy Stupid Love: Middle schooler Robbie has a longstanding crush on Jessica, his 17-year-old babysitter, when he's no older than 12.
  • Done in an inadvertently disturbing manner in Blank Check. The 12-year-old Preston tricks a 30-year-old bank teller Shay into going on a date with him. Later, she even kisses him on the lips after agreeing to wait a few years. This, along with other behaviors that are blatantly (but not nearly as disturbingly) unchildlike, was noted by Siskel and Ebert as one of the movie's major pitfalls.
  • In the Adam Sandler film That's My Boy, Donny Berger has a crush on his hot teacher Miss McGarricle - but it turns out she is actually a pedophile, and she begins a sexual relationship with Donny. This results in her getting pregnant and being sent to a woman's prison.
  • In the horror film The Witch, Caleb show signs of one of the Seven Deadly Sins -- "Lust" -- when he starts to eye his older sister Thomasin. One of the titular witches later uses this to seduce Caleb with the guise of an attractive red-hooded women, only to grab and kidnap him. Caleb later appears outdoors naked in the rain that night. He is eventually possessed and ends up dead.
  • In Agent Cody Banks, Cody tried to peek at his adult handler Ronica's breasts with his X-Ray glasses, causing her to quickly cover them. His glasses were later "censored" because he was staring at girls when he arrived at Natalie's party.
  • Mikey is a 1992 horror/slasher flick starring the titular nine-year-old, a rather unsettling child and abuse victim who desperately wants a loving family. This leads him to develop a disturbing crush on his best friend Ben's older sister, Jessie. Mikey goes as far as framing her boyfriend, David, for killing her cat, causing them to break up temporarily. Once they later get back together, Mikey tricks Jessie into leaving David by himself. He then kills David while the latter's in the bathtub by shoving in a nearby stereo. While attempting to "comfort" the grieving Jessie, Mikey tells her "Now you can just love me", which is the first hint to Jessie that something is horribly wrong.

Literature

Live-Action TV

  • The first episode in Season 2 of Hannah Montana has Rico crushing on Miley, even going so far to manipulate her into going out with him by blackmailing her using one of her secrets (leading her to think that he knew she was Hannah Montana).[context?] In the end, turns out that the secret was Miley still keeping her teddy bear with her, despite being in high school.
  • The Lizzie McGuire episode "Working Girl" had this in effect when Matt was depressed: he starts falling for Miranda after she gives him advice, and even went as far as asking her on a date.[context?]
  • A.N.T. Farm has Fletcher frequently and immediately flirting with Paisley whenever the latter notices him, with the image above being an example from the episode "TransplANTed"; Chyna doesn't seem to mind, and Paisley for her part entertains it "just for his adorableness".
  • The iCarly episode "iHave a Lovesick Teacher" has Freddie develop a bit of a crush on their teacher when she came to the set dressed for Spencer's date.
  • The Suite Life of Zack and Cody has this with Zack and Maddie throughout the show. By On Deck, he gets a kiss from her, and one of season's the most memorable moments is the episode "A Prom Story", where they shared a prom dance.[context?]
    • Also from On Deck, the 8-year old prince of Liechtenstein crushing on Maddie. He even got close to marrying her, too!
  • Shake It Up had this in one episode's B-plot, where Ty is teaching Flynn how to attract the girl he likes. Said girl is older than him, and is even portrayed by the same actress who plays Paisley in the A.N.T. Farm example above (Allie DeBerry).
  • On House, a young boy's overly aggressive pursuit of his crush on Cameron is yet another datum for the Case of the Week.[context?]
  • In the first episode of Modern Family, 10-year old Manny writes a love poem to a 17-year old girl.
  • British satire show Big City (a satire of American preteen shows) features Liam Youngs, an 8-year-old kid who has a huge crush on his older sister's 16-year-old friend, Mia Sanders, and tricks Mia into going on a date with him in one episode.
  • In Jessie, Luke falls in love with older girls often, including his nanny Jessie (which she finds to be very disturbing). He even implies that they'll marry each other and have kids.[context?]
    • In the sister series Bunk'd, Jorge has a similar interest in older girls.
  • In Girl Meets World, Farkle has his eyes on Riley and Maya in the first season, he even states that he'll use their hair to (possibly) create clones of them.[context?] There's also a young boy named Yogi with a teenage girlfriend, Darby, which some students consider weird.
  • Bernie from Bizaardvark had a crush on Amelia (who is older then him), though he eventually lost interest in her during the third season.
  • In the Richie Rich Netflix series, Murray has strange feelings for Richie's robot Irona[context?], as did Taj, who provides the following quote:
 

"A girl with no heart and emotions, yes please!"

 
  • In Fuller House, Jackson's friend Mankowski has a crush on DJ (which she thinks is odd and creepy). He later gets in a rivalry with Taylor's father, who also likes her.[context?]
  • On an episode of George Lopez, Max tried to have sex with a woman who was a reformed child molester before being caught by George and Angie.
  • On The New Addams Family, Pugsley had a crush on his female teacher.
  • The 15-year-old Maddy from Really Me has an 8-year-old brother, Clarke, who has a crush on her best friend Julia (who is likely around the same age as Maddy).
  • On the Henry Danger episode "My Phony Valentine", the thirteen-year-old Henry turns Gerta - the shapeshifting android that the adult tech handler Schwoz claims is his "girlfriend" - into a high schooler named Tiffany to make Bianca jealous at Club Soda.

Web Comics

  • The next-door neighbor's ten-year-old son in the webcomic Out at Home has a crush on Katie's 17-year-old best friend.

Western Animation

  • Hey Arnold! has an entire episode "Crush on Teacher". The subject of Arnold's crush on Ruth, a sixth-grader, also come up often. until he ends it because he and Ruth are too different.
    • Gerald also displays a similar crush in the episode "Sixth Grade Girls".
  • In the El Tigre: The Adventures of Manny Rivera episode "Wrong and Dance", Manny tries to take three teenage bad girls (Tattoo, Chainsaw, and Patches) to the school dance, until they reveal they prefer "bad boys" and decided to hang with Sergio instead.
  • My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic has Spike, who acts as a sort of adoptive son to Twilight Sparkle and is a major part of her social circle as a result of being her only friend initially; he went with her to Ponyville to encourage her to make some more friends, and develops a major crush on Rarity, who is in said social circle.
  • The Simpsons: Bart Simpson had a one-episode crush on his baby sitter Laura, and since then has started dating other teenage girls like Gina, Darcy, Annika and eventually Shauna (who flashed her breasts to him). He also had crushes on adult women such as Caroline and Zhenya.
  • In A Kind of Magic, Tom is in love with his teacher Miss Tinker, and at one point has a dream sequence where he is taller and dancing with her.
  • In Adventure Time, 13-year-old Finn had a crush on 18-year-old Princess Bubblegum. He then moved on to Flame Princess (who is his age) and Huntress Wizard.
  • Ferb from Phineas and Ferb, given the Vague Age of "under 15", has a crush on Vanessa Doofenshmirtz, who has her Sweet 16 party in an early episode. Word of God says they'll go on a date at least once when they're older.
    • Buford has been implied to be in love with Phineas and Ferb's 15-year-old sister Candace. In "Chez Platypus", he denies her and Jeremy entrance to the restaurant in a way that hints he's jealous.
    • The boys' biggest fan, Irving, also shows affection towards Candace and her best friend Stacy.
  • In Gravity Falls, Dipper had a crush on Wendy and constantly tried to impress her. Wendy discovers this in the episode "Into The Bunker", and suggests that they simply remain friends, which Dipper agrees to since things would remain awkward between them otherwise.
  • Dexter's Laboratory episode "Babysitter Blues" revolves around Dexter's crush on his teenage baby sitter and his attempts to separate her and her jock boyfriend. "Dee Dee and the Man" also has him show particular interest in a much older woman who he hires as Dee Dee's replacement. A third episode suggests that Miss Wimple, a teacher, tends to fawn over her star student.
  • 11-year-old Johnny Test eventually becomes attracted to Dark Vegan's daughter Jillian, who is 15. In "Sleepover at Johnny's", he mistakenly kisses her, and Dark Vegan tries to separate Johnny from her - both figuratively and literally (with his laser sword).
  • On an episode of Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, several characters (including kid main character Mac and his imaginary friend Bloo) end up falling for the Frankie (who is Madame Foster's teenage daughter) while she prepares for a date, and then try to sabotage it when it turns out he's a jerk.
  • In Chowder, a younger Mung is seen during his apprentice days, where he immediately begins showing interest in women as soon as he learns to say "Ladies", which apparently explains how he got his big teeth.[context?]
  • In one Family Guy episode, evil genius toddler Stewie has a crush on his teenage/young adult baby sitter. Eventually, he grows tired of women and decides to become gay.
  • On Rick and Morty', though 14-year-old Morty has multiple relationships with other girls his age (such as Jessica and Annie), he has also been involved with adult women like Stacy and Jacqueline.
    • "Raising Gazorpazorp" focuses on the consequences of his uncle Rick buying him a sex robot from a alien pawnshop so he can have sex whenever he wants; neither of them were aware that the robot is also used to produce offspring, and it gives birth to a human/alien hybrid (which they name "Morty Jr.") that Morty must raise.
  • BoJack Horseman has a character named "Vincent Adultman", Princess Carolyn's ex-boyfriend who constantly claims to be an adult. Bojack can tell "Vincent" is just three boys standing on top of each other and wearing a costume, though nobody believes him when he says otherwise. One of the boys, Kevin, pretends to be Vincent's son, and Vincent's supposed ex-wife is actually his mother.
  • In Code Lyoko, Odd has dated almost every girl in the Academy, who is at least his age or older. Hiroki's friend Johnny also falls for his older sister Yumi, which makes Ulrich feel uncomfortable giving him dating advice (since he also likes Yumi).[context?]
  • In Victor and Valentino, Valentino blushes awkwardly when holding Xochi's waist, suggesting a crush.[context?]
  • Animaniacs has a Running Gag with Yakko and Wakko swooning and going "Hello Nurse!" whenever they spot the older and attractive assistant of Doctor Scratchansniff (whose name is indeed "Hello Nurse"). Dot is frequently less than impressed with this -- when she isn't falling over herself for older men, anyway.
  • On an episode of South Park, Kyle's 5-year-old brother Ike drew a picture for his teacher Miss Stevenson, which shows that he likes her, but Miss Stevenson took it too literally and instantly falls for Ike, resulting in the pair having sex. Naturally, Kyle is the only character who sees how unhealthy this is; the other guys and even the police thinks it's "nice" and consider him lucky.
  • In the "Five Days of F.L.A.R.G." episode of The Fairly OddParents, ten-year-old Timmy Turner wakes up after an amnesiac spell (which is what the third letter of the F.L.A.R.G celebration stands for) and discovers a heart-shaped tattoo with the name "Carly" on it. Later in the episode, he runs into Carly, who turns out to be a much older woman. In another episode, while was in Hawaii with his parents and fairies, he immediately falls for a woman in a grass skirt when she gives him a flower necklace.
    • In "Escape from Unwish Island" Timmy wished for supermodels that can bake him cookies.
  • In The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, Jimmy and his friends end up attracted to Beautiful Gorgeous, who is the daughter of Professor Calamitous, and unfortunately just as evil.
    • Carl also develops a crush on Jimmy's mother. One of the Jimmy Timmy Power Hour crossover episodes takes this to a rather weird conclusion. Carl manages to get Jorgen to shrink Calamitous, who had just attempted to use Jorgen to remake the universe, and trap him in a bottle... and also turn him into a lookalike of Jimmy's mom.
  • In The Davincibles, Pablo is in love with Quba's daughter Cherie, who barely realizes he exists and frequently mispronounces his name.[context?]
  • In Kick Buttowski: Suburban Daredevil, Kick develops feelings for a 15-year-old girl named Scarlett, who is a stunt double on one of his sister's favorite shows. He's also a frenemy of the school's "teachers pet" Kendall, who slowly develops an interest in him; one of Kick's imagine spots has her as a Tankini Lumberjack (which his brother Brad is obsessed with), suggesting that the feeling is mutual.[context?]
    • Gunther attempted to ask Teena Sometimes out on a date, but she instead goes for another stunt double, who is an older man.[context?]
  • Clyde from The Loud House has a embarrassing crush on Lincoln's oldest sister Lori, developing a nosebleed at the mere sight or mention of her. Bobby's young cousin, Carlino, also has eyes for Lori and constantly plots to win her over.
    • In the episode "Study Muffin" Lincoln and his classmates keep failing a test because they are constantly distracted by the beauty of the substitute teacher, Ms. DiMartino.
  • In Codename: Kids Next Door, Number 2 has a crush on Number 5's big sister Cree (who is a teenager working for the Adults). One episode had him impersonate a teenager named Hank, and he eventually got a kiss from her - just as he turned back to normal.
    • A kindergartner named Sandy (who much prefers the title "King Sandy") shows interest in the ten-year-old Number 3, and demanded that she be his queen (AKA his girlfriend); she turns him down believing him to be playing pretend, which makes him quite angry. Eventually, he instead sets his sights on Number 3's younger sister Mushi.
  • In the episode "Mysterious Mayhem at Mutant High!" of The Super Hero Squad Show, Reptil (who is 15) tries to flirt with the X-Academy cheerleader Jean Grey/Marvel Girl, who is a adult. Her boyfriend Cyclops becomes protective, warning him to stay away from her.[context?]
  • On Wayside, Todd accidentally ate Miss Mush's "mushroom surprise", which causes him to fall for his teacher Mrs. Jewls, with Maurecia trying to snap him out of his trance.
  • The eight-year-old Tails in Sonic Boom falls for another fox named Zooey, who looks older than him. He eventually wins her heart in the episode "Tails' Crush" after rescuing her from one of Dr. Eggman's plans.
  • On The Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Dr. Robotnik creates a female robot hedgehog name Breezie to distract Sonic so he can destroy the underground Wells of Mobius. Sonic ends up writing her a love letter that changes her ways, and she eventually becomes his ally. In another episode, Breezie eventually marries Robotnik's "son" Robotnik Jr., who is also a robot created by him.
    • In a segment of Sonic Says, Sonic discusses what kids should do in cases of possible sexual harassment, which can realistically occur with real-life instances of this.
  • Fanboy and Chum Chum fought over the affections of the school's attractive nurse (who they call Nurse Lady Pam), only to find out that she is the girlfriend of the boys' hero, Man-Arctica.
  • Sanjay from Sanjay and Craig has feelings for Belle Pepper, a teenage girl who works at the Frycade (which is owned by her dad), with Craig frequently questioning his interest.
  • In Yin Yang Yo!, Yang dated a teenage girl name Smoke until he finds out she is crazy, and immediately broke up with her after a battle between her and her brother, Mirrors. Smoke decided to become a feminist, and kicks Yang whenever he says something stereotypically sexist.
  • In a episode of Xiaolin Showdown, Omi and the other boy monks fall for a beautiful mermaid name Dyris, who was frozen alongside a scary looking hunter Klofange. They eventually discover that she is actually a evil Siren who used Klofange's appearance to sway them to her side.
    • In the continuation series, Xiaolin Chronicles, the boys yet again fall for a new female Xiaolin monk name Willow, who is actually an agent named Shadow and working for Chase Young.[context?]
  • Oskar from School for Vampires secretly hangs out with a human girl named Sunshine - the problem is, she doesn't know he is a vampire, and her father is a vampire hunter.[context?]
  • On The Mr. Peabody and Sherman Show, Sherman falls for the then-teenage gunslinger Annie Oakley.


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