SPY x FAMILY season 2 is back and while we love having our beloved madcap family back on TV, something has felt a little off.
The first few episodes of the season either focused primarily on Anya or were split into mini-chapters, meaning there wasn't much room for serialised storytelling.
All that has changed with the latest three episodes though, thanks to a giant cruise ship and a much-needed focus shift to Yor. Everyone's favourite assassin mommy has finally taken centre stage, and the show is all the better for it.
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The Cruise Adventure Arc sees Yor enlisted by her assassin agency, The Garden, to accompany and protect the spouse of a former mob boss as she and her child attempt to cross the border and defect.
If you've (understandably) forgotten, SPY x FAMILY takes place in a weird facsimile of East and West Berlin during the Cold War.
This mission has separated Yor from the rest of the Forgers and has given her plenty of stuff to do on her own. She's been high-kicking her way around, throwing poison darts left right and centre, and even talking to people that aren't Loid and Anya.
It's a welcome change, especially since the character felt a little left behind and underused across the end of the first season and into the second.
A lot of that is because Yor is the character we know the least about. We saw Anya at the start of her Forger journey, and have obviously spent a lot of time with her at school – learning her likes and dislikes and seeing her weird little social circle develop.
We also spent a lot of time with Loid at his actual work. Unlike Yor, who's often busy with her cover story as a part-time-something in City Hall, we saw Loid do espionage admin. We met fellow agents like Franky and his handler Sylvia, and saw how Operation Strix was organised.
But Yor's life outside the Forgers is more nebulous and we don't know too much about her past, apart from her weirdo brother. This makes sense, since what she does is absolutely outside the law, but we're glad we're finally getting to see more of her doing what she does best (murder).
The show's initial setup positioned Yor and Loid as equals, but we haven't seen Yor fight or do a single spin-kick in quite some time. Watching her flip and sneak around the decks of the cruise ship feels like a fulfilment of one of the show's core concepts.
A lot of Yor's recent storylines have focused on her inability to be a good housewife, something she wants to improve on for the sake of her cover. She's a terrible cook and gets demeaned at work for her domestic failures.
It's all played for laughs, and we know the reason Yor can't make a pie is because she's too busy practicing her stealth skills – but that doesn't necessarily make the stories and moments themselves feel less regressive.
That's why, for instance, episode seven's fight scene is so great. Yor reminds us that she's just as skilled at hand-to-hand combat as Loid, and that there's a reason they call her the Thorn Princess.
Speaking of Monikers, getting to see how The Garden operates also adds another element to the show's world. We've known that Yor was part of an elite murderers club since we met her, but getting to see them in action – with all their weird esoteric rules and stipulations – was very John Wick and very welcome.
SPY x FAMILY is an ensemble show and what's also cool about giving the 'A' plot to Yor, with its violence and subterfuge, is that Loid and Anya get to be the comedic relief. It flips the script on how the dynamic normally plays out and suits the other two Forgers really nicely.
SPY x FAMILY season two's Cruise Aventure Arc has another episode or two left, but if it keeps letting Yor be the captain then we won't ever want to disembark.
SPY x FAMILY season one and two is available to watch on Crunchyroll.
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Ali is Hearst UK's deputy social strategy director. He has been covering TV and movies for more than six years, all while wrangling Digital Spy's social media and video channels - for which he received a PPA 30 Under 30 award. He specializes in writing about anime, LGBTQ+ representation, science fiction, and comic book adaptations. Recently he's begun collecting Star Wars interviews like Infinity Stones and has spoken with The Mandalorian's Pedro Pascal, Andor showrunner Tony Gilroy and the creative team behind The Bad Batch. Dave Filoni, you're next.
