Spy X Family Animation Art Book Scans - Part 2

Spy x Family Animation Art Book scans - part 2

Today I'm back with a few more scans from the Animation Art Book! If you haven't seen the first page of scans I made from this book, click here. Since many of the character design pages in this book are similar to the ones from the cour 1 season 1 artbook, I'm mostly going to skip these, so be sure to check out the previous scans here and here if you haven't already!

While the main feature of the book is character and setting designs, it also contains a lot of miscellaneous, "niche" images that only briefly show in the anime but are interesting if you stop and look at them. One of my favorites is of course Loid and Yor's (fake) marriage certificate and the doctored up photos in their living room. Obviously WISE/Twilight must have some advanced photo editing technology since Photoshop shouldn't exist when the series takes place 😅

Next is some examples of Anya's handwriting and schoolwork, as well as the cipher she and Yor make in mission 20. It's a bit hard to make out, but it looks like she spelled her name "Ania" in the mission 4 example but maybe started spelling it the right way in the mission 24 example? As for those notes at the top from mission 20...is that Bond in the lower right corner? 😂 I can just about make out the first question on the mission 4 paper - it says "Solve if you can understand the clock." The rest says something like "When * will * two hours * effect the current time?" And it looks like her answer is..."Time"? 😅

In contrast, here's some examples of Damian's tests that Daybreak tampered with in mission 18. I'm not gonna bother to check if his math is correct...I'm assuming all or most of it is! I also couldn't help but notice his answer on the cake question, "How many cakes are left?" - instead of just putting "4" he writers out, "There are 4 left." What an overachiever 🤣

Here's a few more scribbles from Anya's notebook, but more interestingly, the Eden schedule of classes. I wonder what the class "Theme" is. And they have to share a poem every morning? I'm surprised we haven't seen one of Anya's poems yet!

And lastly, I wanted to share two character pages for Bond and Fiona since they're didn't feature in the previous book.

Spy x Family Operation Diary - Character conversations

I'm back with another Operation Diary post! There's a ton of adorable and funny conversations between the characters throughout the game. I wanted to highlight some of my favorites and provide translations.

*Note: The game uses parentheses to show that a character is thinking the dialogue as opposed to speaking. For my translations, I'll be using parentheses and italics.

There aren't any major Twiyor scenes in the game, but this one's pretty cute - takes place when they decide to go on an outing at Penguin Park. It's a nice callback to the aquarium chapter/episode.

Loid: Penguin Park, huh?

Yor: (Come to think of it, Loid was also really engrossed by the penguins last time.) Um, Loid, it would be great if we could see the cute penguins!

Loid: Huh? Uhhh...yeah, sure...? (What...? Yor liked the penguins?)

Anya: (Papa and Mama are funny.)

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Unfortunately I can only embed one video per post, so the rest you can watch via YouTube links.

The game actually has a few Yor and Fiona interaction, though they're mostly like this.....just Fiona having her usual unhinged thoughts, lol.

Fiona: (She's just your daughter-in-law. Don't overdo it, take the burden off your shoulders already. Then I will take over the wife role and provide super support as senpai's wife...!)

Yor: Being with Anya is so much fun. Raising her isn't difficult at all.

Fiona: (Hm...really trying to be a mother, huh? You'd better watch out now, Yor Forger...you'll be kicked out soon enough!)

Anya: (Anya likes the Mama she has now.)

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In this next one, Loid is having trouble getting Anya to study, so he breaks out the cringe Penguinman voice 😂

Loid: (In order to stimulate motivation in Anya...since it's come to this, guess I have no choice...!) S-Senpai! This is no time to be lazy. Don't you have to do your best everyday for the sake of world peace?

Anya: Agent Penguinman?

Loid: Our mission is to study, let's do it!

Anya: If Penguinman is with me, I'll do by best at studying!

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There were so many cute Yor & Anya interactions, a couple of which show how Yor will always protect Anya from danger ❤️

Anya: Mama! There's a crab!

Yor: Be careful not to get your hands pinched.

Anya: Yup~

Yor: (If you hurt Anya, I will not forgive you...)

Anya: (Anya will be careful...for the sake of Mr. Crab, too...)

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Yor will also fight off sharks for Anya!

Anya: Mama! There are people diving in the ocean and looking at fish!

Yor: Diving, huh? That sounds fun!

Anya: But...what if there are sharks in the ocean...!

Yor: Don't worry Anya, there aren't any sharks in this part of the ocean. (And if there are any, I'll kill them in secret.)

Anya: (She can beat sharks too?! Mama's amazing!)

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Just like the resort island in the anime/manga, Anya has to remind Loid to be a "fun dad" at the resort in the game!

Anya: RESORT!

Loid: Don't jump, you'll fall.

Anya: Papa...I heard that a normal papa would jump and fly around with his daughter at a time like this.

Loid: (Is it really necessary to put on the family act at a tourist location?) Ok, let's enjoy the resort!

Anya: Papa's so simple.

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There are some scenes of Yuri tutoring Anya, in his usual way 😅

Yuri: Studying is training your muscles! You can't miss a single day!

Anya: Yes sir!

Yuri: That's right! Look at how your future self has grown!

Anya: Yes sir!

Yuri: And in that future, look at Nee-san's smiling face!

Anya: Sir! Yes sir!

Yuri: Ok, next workbook!

Yor: Please don't teach her anything too weird...

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This next one is part of the scenario from a previous post where the Forgers visit the art museum!

Anya: Mama! The lady in the painting! She's wearing a pretty dress!

Yor: Ooh, it really is. It's a very pretty painting. Her dress is pure white.

Anya: Would you try wearing it, Mama? It would look good on you.

Yor: Uh? Um, I suppose so...I like black and red. (In times of crisis, blood showing would be troublesome...)

Anya: (...!)

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Loid saves the day when Yor offers to cook 😅

Yor: Let's buy ingredients for dinner on the way home. I'll cook dinner today.

Anya: (The last supper...) Anya isn't hungry yet. Anya will play more.

Loid: You must be tired too, Yor. I'll cook dinner today.

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And lastly, Anya sings this adorable little song while drawing a picture of the family (while Loid is trying desperately to get her to study!)

Anya: Hm, hm, hm~ Papa and Mama~ Together with Anya, such a close family~

Loid: Hey, Anya! Stop drawing and listen to what I'm saying!

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I mostly focused on the family interactions since those are my favorites, but there are a ton of cute/funny conversations between Anya, Becky, and Damian as well! There's also much longer special event cutscenes that play when Anya speaks to certain characters enough times (and triggers the unique illustrations I posted here). But those are several minutes long each, and my Switch can only save video clips up to 30 seconds. But if you plan to play the game when it releases internationally in a few months, you can look forward to seeing those for yourself 😃

If you want to see more of my posts about the SxF game, check the sxf game tag on my blog here.

@buf309-art-binder Omg, what a pleasant surprise!!! You are so sweet Buf, thank you so much ❤️ I appreciate you and your fantastic SxF drawings too~ Such an adorable picture, I love it!

The Forger Hierarchy.

A gift for @yumeka-sxf, because I remember you really liked the first draft.

Thank you for all those scans, translations, analysis and information posts you have done for the SxF fandom. Your effort is deeply appreciated by everyone. Please accept this drawing as a tribute to your wonderful works 😌

Hi Jumeka, I noticed something during the tennis arc (mission 31), when "Twain Foney" serves, the pupil of his left eye is not drawn.

Missions later, we saw the flashback to the beginning of the war, "BabyLight" was wounded on that eye and years later "Roland Spoofy" was also wounded on the left eye during the war.

So... in your opinion, is it possible that Loid/Twilight has a blind spot?

You must mean this panel from Mission 31:

This is an interesting observation that I never thought about 😮 It could just be a coincidence and not a conscious decision by Endo, however if we keep getting more examples, then maybe it'll turn out that Twilight does have some blindness in that eye. We'll have to see if it gets brought up again!

Japanese Linguistic Observations in Spy x Family - part 1

This is a post series I've been planning for a while and I've finally had the time to complete part 1! 😃 I may have mentioned here before that I got my B.A. in Japanese/East Asian Studies, and even though I'm not fluent, I know the linguistics of the language fairly well. So I thought it would be fun to examine the interesting aspects of the Japanese version of the SxF manga that aren't reflected in the English translation. It might also be an informative experience for those who don't know any Japanese to learn a bit about the language through SxF! I'll try not to get too technical with the linguistics and keep my explanations at a beginner's level.

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Part 1 - Twilight's "honne and tatemae"

One of the main themes in SxF is how many of the characters have secrets they want to hide, so they act a certain way in front of others in order to mask their true selves. Japanese has a word for this phenomena called 本音と建前 ("honne and tatemae").

I remember learning about the concept of "honne and tatemae" during my Japanese college studies – a quick google search will yield a lot of publications on the topic and its relation to Japanese culture in particular. While the idea of hiding one's true intentions behind a fake facade can exist anywhere and is not something unique to Japan, it is enough of an occurrence in Japanese culture that there are specific words for it. The Wiki article has a basic but good definition of honne and tatemae, to quote:

A person's honne may be contrary to what is expected by society or what is required according to one's position and circumstances, and they are often kept hidden, except with one's closest friends. Tatemae is what is expected by society and required according to one's position and circumstances, and these may or may not match one's honne. In many cases, tatemae leads to outright telling of lies in order to avoid exposing the true inward feelings.

Sounds very much like the characters in SxF, doesn't it? Twilight especially, because unlike other characters like Yor and Anya, who simply have secrets they need to keep but don't create fake personas for themselves, Twilight does – the cheerful, friendly Loid Forger is a different person from the cold, calculating Twilight after all. Also unlike Yor and Anya, who speak the same way consistently no matter who they're talking to, Twilight uses different speech levels depending on which persona he's using and who he's talking to.

There are many different levels of speech in Japanese, ranging from super formal to totally crude. These speech levels are distinguished mostly by the pronouns the speaker chooses to use for themselves and who they're speaking to, as well as how they choose to conjugate the words they use. For example, 座ってください (suwatte kudasai), 座って (suwatte,) and 座れ (suware) all mean "sit," as in, telling someone to sit down. But the tone being conveyed is different: the first one is polite, the second one is casual, and the last one could be seen as rude if you're not using it with a close friend/family member.

As Twilight, he uses casual speech with the masculine and less polite pronoun 俺 or オレ (ore). This is the speech he uses when talking to a fellow spy like Fiona, and for his own inner thoughts.

As Loid Forger, he uses the polite 敬語 (keigo) speech, which is basically comprised of using the -ます (-masu) conjugation for verbs and the "to be" verb です (desu). He also uses the pronoun ボク or 僕 (boku), which is the standard male pronoun and more polite than "ore." He uses keigo to address pretty much everyone who doesn't know his true identity. When talking to a higher-up like Sylvia, he'll still use "ore" but will use polite speech instead of casual speech.

Anya is an exception to this: with her, he uses his most casual speech, the same as he uses with Franky.

I discussed a bit about this in part 24 of my Twiyor analysis posts, but this could be because Anya is a little kid, so he doesn't feel the need to put on any airs with her (same with Bond, whom he also uses casual speech with).

An interesting side note is that, as a child, Twilight used the pronoun "boku" but then changed to "ore" as soon as he became an adult/soldier.

Another aspect of keigo, besides using the more polite forms of pronouns and verb conjugations, is putting the honorific さん (san) after people's names. Twilight does this all the time with Yor, as she does with him. However, he switches to casual speech and drops the "san" part in her name when addressing her in front of people who (supposedly) believe they're a real married couple, such as Yuri and Fiona – because it would be weird for a real couple who have been married for a year to address each other in such a formal way, especially the husband. In the below panel when Fiona visits them, he's calling her "Yor" instead of "Yor-san" and using casual speech instead of keigo.

Oddly in these situations, while he uses just "Yor" when addressing her directly, he still calls her "Yor-san" when talking about her. During Yuri's first visit for example, he calls her "Yor-san" when telling Yuri how much Anya loves her (talking to someone about her) but then calls her just "Yor" a few moments later when telling her that he'll clean up the spill (talking to her directly). It's strange to me that he wouldn't just consistently use "Yor" whether he's talking to her or about her in these situations...I'm honestly not sure if he does this intentionally or if he just slips up since he's so used to using "Yor-san" in her presence.

*UPDATE* Thank you to @dentedintheworld-blog for enlightening me with the below reply about this!

"In Japanese, when speaking to your spouse's family about your spouse, you address her/him by attaching "san" her/his name out of respect for her/his family. This is also to show her/his family that you respect your spouse. That's why Loid calls Yor with san when he talks about how much he loves Yor to Yuri."

That definitely makes sense for why Twilight switches between "Yor" and "Yor-san" in these situations.

Regardless, this is why the scene in chapter 86 is so significant – when Yor isn't present, there's no reason for him to refer to her as "Yor-san," especially in front of a fellow spy like Fiona who knows he (supposedly) shouldn't have any feelings for her. Yet, even after he just called Yuri by his full name "Yuri Briar" a moment before, he doesn't do the same for Yor and continues to call her "Yor-san" here, much to Fiona's dismay.

In the same chapter, it's also significant that he uses "ore" when addressing Yor directly in his thoughts. Even though he's not speaking out loud, I believe this is the first time he's speaking directly "to" her as Twilight and/or his true self and not as Loid Forger.

But despite all this, I think that both Loid Forger and Twilight are tatemae…they're both masks to hide the person he truly is. The person who fondly talked about his mother to Yor on the park bench, the person who genuinely expressed gratitude for her sacrifice when leaving the resort island, the person who refused to kill Yuri in a life-or-death struggle because he knew it would hurt her…that's his actual honne. But of course, the ongoing conflict of the series is that he has yet to realize this. He won't even show his honne to his closest friend, Franky. Seems like it mostly comes out in dribs and drabs during his interactions with Yor...no surprise there, lol. The man is certainly a work in progress. When he finally starts letting his "honne" show, I'm curious what form of speech he'll adopt.

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Continue to Part 2 ->

Spy x Family Operation Diary - game overview

I've played through a good amount of the Spy x Family video game, Operation Diary (called Spy x Anya: Operation Memories in the localized version). In my opinion, the game is an absolute joy for any SxF fan: there's so many cute and funny family moments, the mini-games are varied and fun, and all the voice actors bring their A-game performances! Currently the game is only available in Japanese, so I wanted to provide an overview about it for anyone interested in playing it either now or when the English version is released later this year. I'll describe the basics of the game so you can decide if it's something you'd like or not.

Premise

You play as Anya, though you do briefly play as other characters in the mini-games. The goal is for Anya to complete a picture diary of memories she's made with friends, family, etc.

The game is divided into days, with every three days being a family outing day, and non-outing days are school days.

Diary Photos

There are many locations throughout the game where Anya needs to take pictures for her diary. These places are at the Forger house, at Eden, and at the several family outing spots. However, you can typically only take one or two photos per visit to that location each day.

When you select a spot to take a photo, you can move the L and R control sticks to make sure you have the right focus and angle for the photo. In addition, you have to hit the shutter button at the perfect time, for example, when Anya and other characters are doing something cute or interesting. You're limited in how much time you can take to snap each photo and how many attempts. If your focus, angle, and timing are perfect, you'll get the full three stars for the photo. Below is an example of how the photo taking works.

Each day starts with the Forgers at home. If it's a non-outing day, Anya will go to school at Eden. There are a few locations at the school, such as the classroom, gym, and study hall, where you can take photos for the diary.

Once you take your daily photo at Eden, you can go home to the Forger house, where you'll get to take another photo since the Forger house also has a number of photo opportunities. And once you're done doing that, the day shifts to evening. This is the time where Anya is writing "memories" in her diary that the mini-games represent.

Inspiration Points

When you successfully take a photo for the diary, you'll get Inspiration Points depending on how good it was. You can use Inspiration Points to play the mini-games. Completing mini-games earns you Play Points, which is the currency you use to buy things at the shop (more on that later). Each mini-game costs a certain number of Inspiration Points to play (typically you'll have enough for one or two per day). However, even if you run out of Inspiration Points, you can still keep playing the mini-games as much as you like, you just won't earn any Play Points or other rewards from them.

Mini Games

There's a ton of mini-games, and as of this writing, I haven't even unlocked all of them yet! I'll probably make another post just about the mini-games since they're all very unique - of the ones I've played, there's Yor's cooking where you have to get Yor to cut the vegetables perfectly, Eden dodgeball, a Pac Man-like maze game with Anya collecting peanuts, a stealth game where you play as Twilight on a mission to swap museum paintings with fakes, a Becky fashion show rhythm game, a Forgers bowling game, and a Thorn Princess game where Yor has to defeat a bunch of bad guys within a time limit.

Once you're done with mini-games for the day, Anya will go to bed and the next day will start!

Play Points

The Play Points you earn from the mini games are used to buy items at the shop, which you can access pretty much any time. The shop sells "items of interest" (which I'll discuss below) as well as tons of different clothes for the Forgers.

Some of the clothes are just cosmetic, but some have additional bonuses when the characters wear them, such as increasing the number of Inspiration Points or Play Points you earn.

Family Outing Days

On family outing days, instead of going to school, Anya will instead go with Loid, Yor, and Bond to one of several previously selected locations, such as the aquarium, dog park, castle, etc.

Just like Eden and the Forger house, these locations will have a number of photo opportunities, but in addition, you can bring up to three "items of interest" to these places. These items are typically something unique to that location, like the frisbee for the dog park. If you have these items when you go to the location, you'll unlock an additional photo opportunity. Once you've taken photos with all three items of interest at a particular location, you'll then get the ability to take a final "special" photo there as well!

Missions and Challenges

There are various missions and challenges that you complete for performing specific tasks. Some you'll achieve naturally by progressing the story, but most have additional requirements, such as talking to a character a certain number of times or beating a mini-game with a certain score. When you complete these challenges you earn Raffle Tickets. You get the chance to visit the Raffle Ticket booth before you go on an outing. Each ticket allows you a chance to win a costume item for one of the Forgers if you pull a winning number from the box.

The odds of winning are low, but you will get some Play Points for every attempt, so it's not a total waste! There are also some clothing items that increase your odds of winning if the Forgers are wearing them.

Character interactions

Anya can talk to all the characters to trigger cute and funny interactions!

Talking to characters each day also allows Anya to get a boost in the number of Play Points earned in mini-games. Though some of the dialogue repeats, there's a lot of unique interactions with characters that are needed to complete challenges and also unlock events. You'll know you can trigger these unique dialogues when the characters have red exclamation marks above their heads. Talking to them in this situation will increase a gauge, and once you've talked to them enough times to fill the gauge, you'll trigger a unique cutscene as well as an illustration for your album!

Each character has 1-3 of these special cutscenes and illustrations. You'll always have one chance per day to have these special conversations with Damian, Becky, and Henderson at Eden, and Yor and Loid at home. Yuri and Fiona will appear randomly at the Forger house or at one of the outing locations, so you'll have to wait for those opportunities to talk to them.

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And that's pretty much what the game is about! To me, it's a mix of Pokemon Snap and a mini-game collection, with some visual novel elements too (but with voices instead of just reading). Obviously it doesn't have much appeal to anyone who's not a SxF fan, but I'm assuming most of you reading this are 😅 If you want to see a lot of cute and funny interactions between the characters, do some silly stuff like dress the Forgers up in various costumes, as well as play some quick but addicting mini-games with our beloved characters as the main attraction, then you'll definitely like Operation Diary!

As I mentioned, I plan to make at least a couple more posts about the game, so stay tuned~