The Bush Baby

The Bush Baby
Genre	Drama, Adventure
Anime
Directed by	Takayoshi Suzuki
Studio	Nippon Animation

The Bush Baby (大草原の小さな天使　ブッシュベイビー, Dai sougen no chiisana tenshi busshu beibii) is the title of a 1992 anime series consisting of 40, 25-minute episodes. It is based on the novel, The Bushbabies (1965), by Canadian author William Stevenson.

The series is part of Fiji Television & Nippon Animation's World Masterpiece Theater which consists of TV anime series adaptations of classic children's books.

Plot outline

In 1964, a thirteen year-old British young girl named Jackie Rhodes living in Kenya travels the savannah in the area of Mount Kilimanjaro, Kenya, where her father is an Animal Protection/ Wildlife Officer. Jackie finds an ill animal called a Bushbaby, whereupon she adopts him, calls him Murphy, and nurses him back to health. Murphy, Jackie, her family and their friends go on many adventures involving wild animals, poachers and more. When her father loses his job, the family prepares to return to England where they came from. At Mombasa, right before they are about to leave, Jackie realizes that she has lost the papers for her pet bushbaby, Murphy. She leaves the ship heading for England and it sets sail without her. Luckily, she meets Tenbo, her father's loyal African assistant. Tenbo has been spying on the export warehouse of some poachers and is now being pursued by them. In addition, a manhunt for Tenbo has begun because people think he has kidnapped Jackie. They must cross the dangerous savannah to escape the poachers and police officers chasing them. Along the way, Jackie teaches the now domesticated Murphy to survive in the wild, so that, before she leaves, she can release him in his natural habitat.

Characters

• Jackie/ Jackleen Rhodes — Voiced by: Maya Okamoto
• Murphy — Voiced by: Yuri Shiratori
• Andrew Rhodes — Voiced by: Jun'ichi Kanemaru
• Arthur Rhodes — Voiced by: Takaya Hashi
• Penny Rhodes — Voiced by: Kumiko Takizawa
• Kate Addleton — Voiced by: Miyuki Matsushita
• Laisa Addleton — Voiced by: Ai Satou
• Micky — Voiced by: Youko Matsuoka
• Tenbo — Voiced by: Jūrōta Kosugi
• Henry Rutherford — Voiced by: Bin Shimada
• Hanna Kaufmann — Voiced by: Youko Sasaki
• Professor Crankshaw — Voiced by: Kenichi Ogata
• Hawa — Voiced by: Mami Matsui

Titles in other languages

• Spain: "Jackie y su mascota"
• Germany: "Buschbabies: Im Land der wilden Tiere"
• France: "Jackie dans la savane"
• Italy: "Le voci della savana"
• Saudi Arabia: زهرة البراري

Themes

• Opening Themes

1. "APOLLO" by Yasuhide Sawa (eps 01-22)
2. "A Smile as Prologue" (微笑みでプロローグ, Hohoemi de Prologue) by Satoko Yamano (eps 23-40)

• Ending Theme

1. "I'll Turn into a Bird" (鳥になる, Tori ni Naru) by Maya Okamoto

External links

• The Bush Baby (2075) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia
• The Bush Baby at Animenfo
• The Bush Baby at IMDb

[[[Category:African anime and manga characters]]