Tatsuya Endo’s Spy x Family is a fascinating stew of ideas, crammed into one place in a dizzying Jenga tower of contradictions and potential. The basic premise is thus – a superspy, codenamed Twilight, cover identity Loid Forger, must contribute to maintaining the balance of power during a cold war in a city clearly inspired by Berlin in the 1950s. His current assignment is to get close to the reclusive Minister Desmond by infiltrating his son Damian’s prestigious private school. 

Rather than join the staff, Twilight rapidly builds a family from scratch, creating a paper marriage with a woman named Yor Briar and adopting a girl the same age as Damian Desmond. Anya, Loid’s adopted daughter, will be tutored until she has excellent grades and the Forger family is invited to attend school social functions with the Desmonds. Convoluted? Sure. But we’re just getting started. 

You see, Loid has accidentally married the Queen of Thorns, who was approaching thirty and single and thought that getting married would decrease her risk of being discovered as Berlint’s most dangerous assassin. Yor has also married Loid as part of a cover, although for far less noble purposes than upholding the fragile peace between major world governments. Lots of potential dramatic tension there, as they could wind up working many of the same situations but on opposite sides, then come home after and not even realize they’d been in conflict. A bit cliché? Sure. But it could be executed well, provided nothing else comes- 

Oh. I forgot. Anya is a six year old with telepathic powers, the result of clandestine experiments performed on her before she escaped from captivity. This means she knows both of her adoptive parents secrets, even as the adults hide them from her and each other. She is also the only one capable of understanding the visions of the household pet, Bond, who is a dog that can see the future. 

There is so much going on in this family it seems like the whole thing should just come apart. However, Endo’s firm sense of comedy, clean art and heartwarming touch take these ingredients and blend them into something far beyond the sum of their parts. There’s a strong desire in some storytellers, myself included, to look at the elements of a story and allow them to take over. The spy and the assassin must be in conflict. The psychic girl must be burdened by knowledge. The struggle between spy mission and family integrity must be ever present. But Endo does something a little different, allowing the two elements named in the title of his work – spycraft and family – to orbit one another in a constant dance, informing each other but never fully overriding each other. Everything else, the weird powers, the geopolitical conflict, the school drama, all boils down to fodder to emphasize the symbiotic relationship between the Folgers as a family and their secret lives. 

At the heart of the story is Twilight, a man who works for world peace as an ideal but never had any stake in it himself. He’s alone and always has been. But in striving to create something to benefit the world he finds the people he needs to complete himself. In many ways the Forger family, although originally a forgery, become a united family, dedicated to protecting one another and, at the same time, protecting the peace of the world. It’s a heartwarming tale about how doing small things is a necessary building block towards greater things, and how no truly great thing is done alone. 

It’s also funny, full of wacky characters and situational hijinks. Anya is one of the best written young child characters I’ve seen since Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes. Loid and Yor are both full of contrasting strengths and weaknesses that can be both humorous and endearing. Berlint itself is a nostalgic look at a world of romantic secrets and adventures that never really existed, but we all kind of wish had. By the same token, by all rights Loid’s family of secrets should inevitably end with broken hearts and broken lives. But even so, based on everything I’ve seen, I’m almost certain everything will turn out all right in the end.