Spy×Family 36

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis

Becky watches a romantic soap opera and decides to make a move on Loid. As such, she calls Anya and immediately comes over for a visit. Anya calls her papa out, causing Becky to become flustered, and even fall to the ground. After reading her mind, Anya realizes Becky’s “love” thoughts are similar to Fiona’s. Anya decides to support Becky after reading Becky’s mind and the plans she has for a luxury lifestyle, including a chef.

Loid decides to make some small talk with Becky to gleam some intel on her powerful and rich family. Becky takes this interest as proof Loid is interested in her. Yor comes home, so Becky decides to step up her game. She lets down her hair, but gets no reaction. Further, Yor seems supportive of Becky’s actions. Yor makes tea, so Becky decides to imitate her soaps and pretend to be drunk. Yor panics and starts to rush her to the hospital. Becky confesses her actions and is surprised that Yor isn’t angry.

Loid and Anya show up, so Becky decides to show Loid she can be a strong woman. Nearby is a strength booth, but Becky can’t even lift the heavy hammer. Yor thinks Becky wants to innocently give Loid a gift. As such, she accidentally uses her full strength to destroy the strength machine. Becky gives up and asks to be trained, so Yor agrees to do so. Anya decides Yor is a more entertaining mother.

Back before Loid’s vacation, Fiona takes on some of Loid’s workload. She successfully carries out her mission and trains, all wiht the goal of taking Yor’s place as Loid’s wife. When Loid returns, he gives her a souvenir, secretly thrilling her to no end.

Thoughts/Review

The first two-thirds of Spy×Family 36 were pretty good. The last third, not so much.

Modifications to the Source Material

Chapter 59 made up a majority of Spy×Family 36. This was all faithfully adapted, with a bit of padding throughout. No issues with any of that, but again, I note the differences in what the anime subtitles say and what the manga adaptation says. Not sure which one is more correct, but when comparing the two, I felt the anime’s translation missed the mark in some places. But I won’t harp too much on that.

All of the stuff with Nightfall/Fiona is anime original. I have to say, of all of the anime original content, this section was the weakest. It was clear that the writers didn’t want to have Fiona actually do anything that might contradict what might be revealed in future manga chapters. And the anime production team made the odd choice of interposing flashbacks of the cruise trip from Loids perspective. Initially, this confused me, but then I realized the anime folks were attempting to show that when Twilight was doing X, Nightfall was doing Y at the same time.

As such, the last third of the episode is just hard to watch. It is clearly time-wasting filler to get us through the last ~8 minutes of the episode (counting credits). It is a shame too ’cause Fiona is a fun character.

Becky’s Move

When I reviewed volume 9 of the manga, I had a little bit of a problem with Becky’s attempts to be involved with Loid in a romantic fashion. However, the rest of the story was funny enough to make me look past that. Fortunately, Spy×Family 36 made everything even funnier by seeing things in action. At the same time, it made me pity Becky as a character. She doesn’t really know what’s she’s doing, but she’s doing it anyway.

Still, all of Becky’s attempts at seduction and romance were mostly lost on Loid and especially Yor. Seems kinda odd that as a woman, Yor wouldn’t pick up on the intent from Becky. But Yor just assumed everything Becky did was innocent. As such, she even helped Becky, which made me laugh.

As an aside, the incident with Yor running and carrying Becky to get to a hospital was awesome. Seriously, Yor is so amazing. I feel confident that even though some aspect of her physical strength and durability are done for comedy, there will be a plot explanation for it. Nevertheless, the moment she tossed Becky up for safety, shrugged off getting hit by a car, and still raced at incredible speeds was awesome to see. Yor really is the best, especially when she’s acting out of caring for others.

Japan in Faux Germany

One of the things that depresses me about Japanese writers is that they really have zero clue about how cultures are outside of Japan. As such, even a series that’s supposed to take place within a 1960’s faux Germany is basically Japan, only with a Western veneer. That felt very evident to me in Spy×Family 36.There was so much Japanese going on, I couldn’t help but think, “It would really be cool if the Japanese actually wrote a story with a non-Japanese culture as well as setting.”

I’ve already talked about how Becky is addressed as “Ojousama”, and certainly, that came up in the episode. Becky’s butler bows like the Japanese do, and Loid returned that bow. Loid addresses Becky as “Becky-san”. Of course Yor addresses everyone with the “-san” honorific (even if the translators can’t come up with alternatives for all of the scenarios). And Becky kept referring to Loid as “Loid-sama”, to not only indicate her affection, but how she’s placed him on a pedestal.

Did it ruin my enjoyment of this part of the episode? No. But it just made me wish that just once, Japanese writers would do some actual research on Western cultures they are attempting to depict.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

In the end, Spy×Family 36 is two-thirds good, one-third meh. But there’s more good than meh, so overall, an enjoyable experience. And I was wrong; this was not the final episode. Next episode is the final episode.