Spy x Family Volume Eight includes material that, as of this writing, has not been adapted for the anime. If you’ve only been watching the anime adaptation, you may want to stop reading this review in order to avoid getting potential spoilers for the forthcoming second season of the anime.

Spy x Family Volume Eight
Written by: Tatsuya Endo
Publisher: Shueisha Inc.
English Publisher: VIZ Media
Release Date: September 20, 2022

The entirety of Volume Eight focuses on the storyline that was introduced right at the end of Volume Seven. Yor has been given an assignment to protect the scion of an organized crime family during a luxury cruise. However, Anya, through her telepathic power, won two tickets for a cruise on the same ship that Yor is on for her mission. Yor has to make sure that Loid and Anya don’t find out what’s really going on, since it wouldn’t match what her cover story is for being on the ship.

Volume Eight is the most Yor-centric volume at this point in the Spy x Family series. We also get to see the director from Garden, the organization that Yor works for, in action. But one of the most important things in this volume is seeing Yor as she spends time with the client, a woman named Olka and her son, who are the target of assassins after the woman’s husband was killed. Yor confides in her about her work and how her family is a cover, and Olka does what she can to help Yor hide from Loid and Anya while acting like two mothers spending time together on a cruise ship.

Unfortunately, they don’t notice all of the listening devices that have been planted around the ship, and the guy using them picks up on something when Olka makes a comment about her son’s real name being the same as her father’s. This is an important clue for this intelligence agent, and he uses it to figure out what cover name she’s using and relaying that information to the assassins who are competing with each other in order to get the bounty first.

While Anya and Loid aren’t as important in this volume, Anya does pick up on what Yor is up to through her telepathy. However, Anya is afraid that if Loid finds out the truth, her family will be broken apart. So we see her sometimes successful and sometimes not successful attempts at trying to help Yor and keeping Loid from finding out what’s happening. However, with Anya’s behavior, Loid finds himself feeling confused about her reactions. He’s trying so hard to not stand out as a spy that he ultimately overthinks things. These scenes serve as the basis for the humor in this volume, since Yor’s storyline is so serious.

I can’t forget to mention the brief scene that Franky gets in Volume Eight. He’s dogsitting Bond while the Forgers are on the ship, and we get to see him walking Bond in the park. The interactions he has with Bond, as well as with someone he meets there, also add a nice moment of levity to a volume that’s overall more serious in nature.

But this volume gives Yor plenty of action sequences as she takes on the various assassins that try to kill Olka and her son. One of the best sequences in this volume is the big fight that’s taking place at the same time that a fireworks show is going on. The intercutting between the fireworks and Yor’s fights was effective in the manga, and I could easily imagine how this would work in an animated format.

Volume Eight has a wonderful cliffhanger that includes a very important character moment for Yor. I’m really looking forward to getting the chance to read the next volume in order to find out what’s going to happen next.

There’s a bonus story included at the end that focuses on Yuri. It’s set while the Forgers are on the ship, and it shows Yuri coming down with a cold while on duty. This story includes a flashback of Yor taking care of Yuri when he was sick as a kid, and of course, we already know from previous flashbacks to Yuri’s childhood that there’s going to be something humorous in these flashbacks as well. I thought this bonus chapter fit in nicely after seeing the final few panels of Volume Eight, and it gives the volume a lighter note to end on.

I really enjoyed reading Spy x Family Volume Eight. While I do appreciate the slice-of-life stories that appear in the series, it was a nice change of pace to have an overarching story in this volume that focuses on the Forgers, their family dynamic, and on the secrets that they keep from each other. When this storyline is animated for the adaptation, I have a feeling that viewers who aren’t reading the manga will really like this one.

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