Welcome to week 2 of Spice and Wolf! This week Lawrence and Holo have a sleep over at a church, get involved in shady deals and lie to a pastor. So without further ado, lets talk about these paragons of virtue!
Right off the bat, Spice and Wolf surprised me this week. You see, I’m typically not a fan of shows that are 90% talking. Hell, I don’t even like Re:Zero that much and that one at least has some murder. But some how, some way, Spice and Wolf did a good job of making its dialogue engaging. The back and forth between Lawrence and Holo was rather nice. Their constant one-upping of each other, of poking and prodding to figure each other out. I think a good portion of this is carried by Ami Koshimizu’s voice work as Holo. Her inflections and the way she speaks ride this line between smug and playful really well, pulling me along through the conversations. I especially like when she drops the playful bit and gets… maybe not sultry, but its a fitting word nonetheless.
Getting into the narrative, I mentioned last week some things I wanted to see Spice and Wolf do. And lo and behold the very next episode, Spice and Wolf does just that with the church. It’s minor so far, I hope we get to see some actual conflict when people find out what she is. But its nice to see that Lawrence thought about this, that Holo does indeed have to hide her appearance from them. It makes all of her interactions in these sorts of settings just a tiny bit tense, since I have no idea if/when she will be revealed. This constant need to cover up also juxtaposes nicely with Holo’s complete lack of modesty. She doesn’t care about clothes and she seems to think Lawrence is rather silly for how he reacts to them. It’s all just more evidence of why some people may like her.
I also enjoyed how Spice and Wolf expanded on Holo’s lore, further explaining how/why she is here. The idea with the wheat, that so long as its around she can stay, turning into a necklace is great. Suddenly Holo’s presence as godly side-character isn’t assured, she can be removed. It’s another layer of conflict, of tension, that I wasn’t expecting from Spice and Wolf. It makes me wonder if we are going to see Holo disappear at some point in the future. Maybe she and Lawrence get separated because of the wheat and we get small time skip to the next harvest. Or perhaps they get their own solo adventures before they reunite. It opens up a lot of possibilities for the story beyond “Lawrence and Holo travel and visit towns like Kino’s Journey“.
Speaking of Lawrence, he got to talk economics this episode! The other writers here at Star Crossed did tell me that this was basically the only show in the “mercantile” genre of anime. I see now they weren’t joking! I won’t bore you by repeating the details, instead I’ll just say it was more interesting than I expected. The idea of trading goods, rather than coin, of it only being useful for traveling merchants, and even playing with the fluctuation of currency values! Spice and Wolf seems to have a legitimate handle on economics, rather than relying on bullshit technobabble to fake its way through, and I appreciate that. It was also nice to get a glimpse of the other, less than reputable, side through Zheren. We don’t yet know what his plan is but he seems to be trying to defraud Lawrence. Hopefully we see where that goes.
Beyond the mercantile though, Spice and Wolf also did some interesting stuff with the Church. It made sure to show, to point out, every single time they donated. Making it clear not only the power of the Church, but also that nothing in it was truly “free”. If you wanted dinner, you didn’t pay for it, rather it was your “duty” to thank the Church for it. It’s small, neigh inconsequential, after all what’s really the difference between that and paying. But I think small details like this, shown rather than outright told, are what help build a setting. Hopefully these kinds of small details continue to appear, because just like what we saw in Twelve Kingdoms, a well established setting can do a lot to aid characterization and stories.
Finally lets talk about the ending scene this week, the first real conflict between Lawrence and Holo. I said before I enjoyed their back and forth, how they were testing each others limits, and I do! But I also really like how they find those limits by accidentally crossing them. They are strangers, they barely know each other, so it makes sense that something like this would happen. That their playful dialogue was already established this feel really natural, especially with the topic of conversation. Wolves are dangerous to travelers, Lawrences unrest makes sense. But Spice and Wolf also uses this to remind us just how powerful, how dangerous, Holo has the potential to be as well. Up until now she’s been this adorable, playful waifu. But are they all jokes? Has she killed, has she “eaten someone’s head to gain their power”? It’s engaging, seeing this side of her.
So all in all, how was Spice and Wolf this week? To be frank, it was surprisingly good. I went into this series expecting to be bored. To have some nice backgrounds, perhaps a new adorable waifu, but to not be engaged by the story itself much. Because as many of you know, I’m not a big Slice of Life/talking show fan. I like things to happen, big events, conflict, etc, and I wasn’t expecting that from Spice and Wolf. So to have those elements presented this early, whether it be the Church, Zheren or Holo’s past/beastial nature, was a pleasant surprise. Hopefully Spice and Wolf can continue to build on this, to keep its conversations interesting. Because while this is great, I don’t expect it to turn into an action show anytime soon, so their dynamic has to stay top notch.
All that said though, it was pretty good. I’m looking forward to more next week and I hope you are to. For any readers out there, new or old, how are you finding Spice and Wolf so far? I’d love to get your thoughts on it, if only to get second opinions or to hear about anything I missed. Thanks, and I’ll see you next week! Or earlier if you read my other series, haha.
