Hello everyone, and welcome to another week of SpyXFamily! If you read the Danseur post then you know I’ve been a bit tired this week, so this was a bit late. Still, the show must go on! So without further ado, lets jump into the episode!
Starting off with the bad news, this episode was… I really liked last weeks Yuri, right? He wasn’t to much, not to little, just enough to bring something new to the cast dynamics. His sis-con nature was enough of an excuse for him to be simultaneously suspicious of Loid while also distracted. It was all the justification we needed to make his interactions work. But this week? I feel like SpyXFamily took it a bit to far. His sis-con nature wasn’t amusing anymore, it was creepy and controlling. His whole flashback about wanting to marry Yor was just a step to far. And that’s kind of the whole episode in a nutshell if I’m being honest. The comedy was subsumed by these more… Serious? That isn’t the right word, maybe concerning, narrative threads. What do I mean? Well lets take a look at Loid.
In the second half of the episode we see Loid reacting to Yuri’s visit, suspecting Yor of knowing his real job. This results in a convoluted scheme to wire-tap her, as well as dress up as Secret Police and threaten her to see if she will use Yuri’s position to get out of it. Now I want to be clear, does this make sense from Loid’s perspective? Yes. Is it surprising that he would do this? No. However, does it make for a comedic or wholesome story? No. It does not. At the end of the day, we just watched our lead character stalk and threaten someone who is, ostensibly, his wife. It’s a more “serious” tone than the series has taken throughout the rest of its runtime. And its one that doesn’t lend itself very well to jokes.
Now to be fair to SpyXFamily, there was some wholesomeness out of all of this. Loid being jealous of Yuri and Yor’s sibling relationship, and his clear desire for one of his own, did it’s best to cover from what is a really creepy relationship on Yuri’s end. Similarly, Anya’s childlike request that Loid and Yor stop fighting, the “intuition of a child” as Loid puts it, is cute. As is their chat near the bus stop about Loid not wanting any masks at home. But none of this really changes the fact that like… 90% of the episode felt uncomfortable for me. So I want to take this opportunity to ask you, dear readers: Am I alone in this? Did you also feel uncomfortable with this storyline, with the almost voyeuristic shots in the second half to sell Loid “spying”? Let me know down below, I’m curious.
As for Yor’s side of this whole shindig, I thought it was fine. I’ve seen some concerns about the “Women need to be good wives” narrative that might have come from Yor, but I don’t really see it myself. Yor is concerned with not being able to cook or make kissy-face, yeah. And I can see how that might come across as “Women are only good for cooking and kissing”. But the ending of the episode from Loid basically reaffirms Yor that she’s perfectly fine as is, that none of that is necessary. Maybe some might see that as a “Man” telling her how she can feel rather than coming to it herself but like… C’mon. The whole thing was about becoming more comfortable with their true selves and letting their hair down so to speak at home. Let’s not blow this out of proportion.
I think my biggest issue with this week though was the complete lack of Anya. She had maybe 2 cute scenes in the entire episode, those being waking up for breakfast and telling Loid/Yor to stop fighting. Simply put, this wasn’t enough. Anya is kind of the comedy heart of SpyXFamily. She’s the one that puts Loid in silly situations, who takes the blame anytime anything stupid happens. But its ok, because she’s a 5 year old! And you can’t stay mad at a 5 year old! I think it’s because of how little screen time she got this week, even just existing in the background like in episode 5 I believe it was, that the tone felt so off this episode. Hopefully SpyXFamily remedies this next week, and tones down Yuri’s sis-complex the next time he appears. Because I like this show. I don’t want it to suck.
While this is technically a slice of life comedy, it does dip into serious topics. Without spoiling anything,what Loid went through during the previous war was heartbreaking and terrifying. That brief flashback in the first episode doesn’t go into how hellish it really was, and that flashback was pretty grim. The show/manga doesn’t forget this and throws in the occasional serious non-gag sections to try and ground the absurd situation these 3 people find themselves into some sort of reality.
In general, going forward any episode where Loid is the focus will be more serious in nature, Yor will be action packed, Anya or the dog (he should show up after the break) will be hilarious, and Yuri will be uncomfortable.
Well, you certainly had more of a threshold for Yuri than I did, because I didn’t like his whole sis-con thing as soon as he got to their house in the previous episode!
I was fine with the Sis-con jokes when it was just him being a possessive older brother and justified his random suspicion of Loid. It got to be to much when it became full on romantic kind of love.
Oh, I knew Yuri’s schtick was going to go in that direction the second he was introduced, because that’s usually how it goes for pretty much every character in any anime that acts like that!
“Did you also feel uncomfortable with this storyline, with the almost voyeuristic shots in the second half to sell Loid “spying”?”
Didn’t feel uncomfortable, because he is a spy and we have seen him spy on many other people. If anything, it’s surprising that he didn’t try to confirm who Yor was earlier (and comedy aside, he did miss the fact that his wife is a brutal serial killer who, unlike most hitmen in fiction, has yet to show remorse for killing people). I don’t think this is a case where you can pull parallelisms to Stalking.
With that all said, Spy x Family may be mostly comedy and fluff, but it’s still a story about an agent who is trying to stop a world war from occurring, and the author isn’t afraid to occasionally go into dark territory, be it with dark humor or serious topics (the most recent arc in the Manga, which showed us Loid’s past, was 0% comedy and 100% tragedy). And even when comedy is in full throttle, the underlying plot is complex, meant for mature audiences, and has several grim moments.
I think that’s fair. It’s certainly focused more on the fluff and comedy portion than the spy portion, so its possible that jumping back into the spy stuff felt… Off? Hopefully its able to strike a better balance, or ease between the two tones of story telling, a bit better in the future. Cause you’re right, Loid is a spy, and there is an entire story about preventing war. We just haven’t really scene it because of the hijinks.