Let’s Watch is a weekly recap column where I follow an anime for the course of its entire runtime. Expect spoilers!

---

“Papa is a huge liar. But he’s such a cool liar!”

His codename is “Twilight,” alias Loid Forger (Takuya Eguchi). His real name unknown and unknowable. He is a spy; an international man of mystery. A shadow, a whisper. No one knows his name. In what is not said to be but clearly is the cold war, a certain nation stands divided in two. There, Loid is deployed for the commencement of “Operation Strix,” his toughest assignment yet. What could possibly challenge this earl of espionage? This master of manipulation?

Well, domestic life, for one. Loid’s assignment: find a wife and adopt a child, blend in as seamlessly as possible, and send said child to a prestigious private academy to get close to one of the nation’s top political leaders, a man of near-paranoiac caution who rarely makes himself available except at events for that very school. So begins SPY x FAMILY, Wit Studio and CloverWorks‘ adaption of the wildly successful Shonen Jump manga. So also begins our second Let’s Watch column of the season. We’re in for a ride, folks. Strap in.

For Loid, the first order of business is procuring a child. Time is of the essence, so doing so the—ahem—traditional way is out of the question. As such, the first major undertaking our big heroic superspy sets out on in SPY x FAMILY is a trip to a run-down, skeevy orphanage. There, he adopts Anya (Atsumi Tanezaki), a six-year-old girl with a very cute hair style.

^{Seriously though what ARE those things on her head? Antennae?}

She’s also telepathic, which leads to quite a few shenanigans. Namely; it takes Anya only a few moments to learn that Loid is a spy, being able to read his mind and all. This creates a fun dynamic wherein Loid thinks he has to hide his profession from Anya, who knows what he’s thinking at all times anyway, but who in turn also hides the fact that she knows what Loid really is. The implicit comedic observation that SPY x FAMILY makes here is that children, like spies, have thought processes that are pretty incomprehensible to the rest of us.

Anya is also afraid of what might happen if Loid finds out she can read minds. We’re told upfront that she’s been adopted and then returned to the orphanage four times before. This is a cloud that hangs over all of Loid and Anya’s interactions and provides an interesting shade to even Anya’s silliest antics. Her deep and abiding love of peanuts, for example. (Atsumi Tanezaki also deserves some real credit here for lending a believably childish air to her vocal tics.)

SPY x FAMILY is not a drama, really. But you could make the case for “dramedy,” perhaps, if heavier on the “edy” side. It has the good sense to cut its comedic side with more tonally complex moments, creating an actual emotional core as opposed to just a parade of gags. Anya fucking around with Loid’s spy equipment is funny. Her then panicking, wondering if she’ll be sent back to the orphanage if he finds out, and flashing back to her days as “Subject 7” in the facility she was born in? That’s sad. And like any good dramedy, SPY x FAMILY can juxtapose these polar opposites without making either feel out of place. This is, after all, a little girl that we’re talking about. Kids do think like that, and Anya’s been through more than most.

That’s not to say that all of this totally works. Later in the episode, after a great action sequence where Loid rescues Anya from the direct result of said equipment-fuck-arounding, he engages in a bit of self-lionizing, and we get some rather leaden backstory. This comes too early and too unearned to really hit the way the show seems to want it to. (This is to say nothing of it bumping up against the fact that, you know, real spies are generally not great people. SPY x FAMILY generally renders the profession too ridiculous to feel like it’s glorifying it, but it does occasionally come close.) Thankfully, it’s brief, and not enough to seriously ding the episode in any real way.

The episode ends with Anya successfully passing the exam to get into the private school that forms the crux of Loid’s mission. Perhaps more importantly; it ends with Anya snuggling up to her adopted dad on a couch (and him slightly freaking out about it. He fell asleep in front of someone! That’s a huge no-no for a spy). Then things, as they always do, hit a slight snag.

But we’ll discuss the full implications of that next week. See you then, anime fans.

^{Oh, I think I already have, episode title. I think I already have.}

---

Like what you’re reading? Consider following Magic Planet Anime to get notified when new articles go live. If you’d like to talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers, consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directory to browse by category.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.