Spy x Family Code: White movie review - A filler movie that cannot be missed

Spy x Family Code: White was released in Japan on December 22, 2023, hitting movie theaters across America on April 19, 2024. The original cast for both the Japanese and English versions of the series reprised their roles for the movie.

Spy x Family Code: White has a simple-seeming plot on the surface but ends up with several twists and turns that put the Forgers in the crosshairs of a dangerous enemy.

An otherwise easygoing working vacation to the neighboring country of Frigis lands all the Forgers in the middle of a conspiracy to turn the East and West Cold War into an active conflict, forcing their vacation to turn into a mission to stop an army and save the country.

Disclaimer: The following review contains spoilers for Spy x Family and Spy x Family Code: White. The opinions therein are strictly the author's.

Spy x Family Code: White - The Forgers' vacation to find a dessert clash with warmongering soldiers

Frigis and the Forgers in Spy x Family Code: White (Image via Wit Studio/CloverWorks)

The Forger Family all have their reasons for going on the trip to Frigis in Spy x Family Code: White. For Anya: Eden Academy is having a cooking contest, the winner gets a Stella, the principal of the school is the judge, and Frigis is the only place they can find the particular kind of Meremere dessert that he likes.

For Loid, he learns from his Handler that the WISE higher-ups are thinking of replacing him on Operation Strix and need to prove they can make progress. For Yor, she's convinced Loid is cheating on her after misinterpreting him kissing Fiona Frost, aka Nightfall, from a distance.

The vacation interrupted in Spy x Family Code: White (Image via CloverWorks and Wit Studio)

Spy x Family Code: White shows that the easygoing working vacation takes a turn when Bond, the future predicting dog, has a premonition of Anya finding a treasure that shady characters are after. The treasure turns out to be a chocolate truffle, containing a microfilm of the bad guys' plans. After trying to return it to its box and fumbling as the villain henchmen come to collect it, Anya accidentally eats it.

The two bumbling enemies, Dimitri and Luka, are easily dispatched by Yor when she discovers them trying to kidnap Anya and Bond. The bulk of Spy x Family Code: White is dedicated to the Forgers attempting to obtain the Meremere while also dealing with their individual issues and having the enemies come into play.

The Forgers' issues, amplified

The Forgers' issues in Spy x Family Code: White (Image via CloverWorks and Wit Studio)

The Forger family always had the lie quadrangle: Anya being a telepath, Bond having the gift of future sight, Loid being a master spy, and Yor being an assassin, with nobody except Anya knowing the truth of their identities. Spy x Family Code: White amplifies all of that, adding in several more issues for good measure.

Yor's issues are threefold: she's an assassin, she's insecure in romance, and she has anxieties that crop up throughout the film, including the idea that Loid is cheating on her. Loid saved Nightfall's hat from flying away and was close to her when he did so, and Yor got the wrong idea.

Her coworkers didn't help matters by telling her three telltale signs of cheating: giving plenty of gifts, going on more "business trips," and constantly changing clothes. These come into play later, especially the gift of lipstick and the "business trip" to Frigis.

Loid's issue is that WISE is thinking of reassigning him away from Operation Strix and being changed up, having to hide his spy profession and Twilight identity, and his emotional management problems and blindness when it comes to people. It took Yor drinking herself silly, flipping him onto the floor, and yelling at him to see why Yor was uncomfortable, as well as punching him in the face when he apologized too much on the Ferris wheel.

Anya's are especially on display throughout Spy x Family Code: White, as she's a telepath who knows about her parents' true identities and gets into more trouble than the two of them after mistakenly thinking they're getting divorced. After Loid's searches for the cherry liquor for the meremere prove fruitless, Anya leaves their hotel to get some and gets kidnapped by the main villain.

Spy x Family Code: White's villain is different

Colonel Snidel in Spy x Family Code: White (Image via CloverWorks and Wit Studio)

One of the interesting parts of Spy x Family Code: White is the main villain, Colonel Snidel. All of the villains of Spy x Family are usually smaller-scale villains, with the only recurring threats being the Red Circus terrorist group and Donovan Desmond. The rest are usually one-off villains: rival spies, secret police, terrorists, or assassins.

Also read: Spy x Family chapter 91 highlights

Colonel Snidel is different in that he's a military colonel, has a squad of armed soldiers following him around, a giant airship, and commands a level of authority not seen in other villains in the series. He debuts by strongarming his way into the "Rubbles and Bonds" restaurant that the Forgers are eating in, forcing the beleaguered staff to get him food, and stealing the last piece of Meremere after beating Loid in a dessert guessing game.

Snidel and his henchmen kidnap Anya in Spy x Family Code: White (Image via CloverWorks and Wit Studio)

Snidel's plans hinge on getting the microfilm stored in that truffle Anya ate, as well as a project labeled Type F. His plans may be the same as those of other villains: to kickstart the next big Westalis/Ostania war using a massive airship, but his methods and temperament make him a threat. Threatening to slice Anya open with the variety of knives at his disposal is one such moment.

He proves ruthless and clever by figuring out that one of his men worked for WISE and executed him on the spot in front of his men, figures out Loid was in disguise thanks to a superb sense of smell, and is more than a match for Loid in close-quarters shooting and hand-to-hand combat.

Anya's hallucinations

Anya's predicament and hallucination in Spy x Family Code: White (Image via CloverWorks and Wit Studio)

One of the more hilarious and surreal moments in Spy x Family Code: White happens when Anya is captured by Snidel. When Anya is captured by Dimitri and Luka, though not without a fight from her and Bond that leads Loid and Yor to track her down, Snidel orders Dimitri and Luka to get the microfilm out of her either through violent means or peaceful means and then get rid of her.

Also read: Did Anya reveal her powers to Damian in the Spy X Family manga?

What follows is Anya trying very hard not to use the bathroom. The array of expressions, dances, and stalling she does is sure to be familiar to anyone who has an emergency and has to use the bathroom. The hallucination Anya experiences, however, may catch audiences off guard.

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The hallucination is Anya imagining herself being flown away into a fantasy land where the god of toilets helps her get to the bathroom. This is a hilarious moment and one of the standout moments of the film: Anya tries not to defecate herself because the criminals will kill her when she does.

Also read: 8 reasons why people like SpyxFamily

The resulting amount of expressions Anya makes and the Scooby-Doo-style chase she sends Luka and Dimitri on to capture her is hilarious due to the absurdity while also maintaining the life-threatening tension. This is especially true when Anya gets re-captured as Loid and Yor infiltrate the airship.

Rescuing Anya: Loid and Yor's big action scenes

As it so happened, Nightfall was in Frigis after being assigned to the area. She informs Loid of the WISE agent's death, after failing her usual antics of wanting to be his wife, and helps Loid locate Snidel's airship. Loid hotwires a military plane and sets off to rescue Anya, with Yor sneaking into the cargo bay to assist.

Unfortunately, the colonel reacts with hostility to Loid's request to land. After a spectacular crash landing involving dodging anti-aircraft fire and guided missiles, both Loid and Yor infiltrate the ship. Loid quietly knocks out and steals the identities of two soldiers to proceed, while Yor loudly destroys one of the airship's anti-aircraft guns and starts a fire while doing so.

What follows are Spy x Family Code: White's climactic fight scenes: Loid vs. Snidel and Yor vs. the Type F soldier. The animation for both is exceptionally clean, and both are shot very differently. Loid's is shot like a James Bond film, with disguises, a damsel in distress, and ending on a shootout with the main villain. Yor's is shot like something out of Metal Gear Solid or Terminator: a fight against a mechanized soldier within the wrecked, flame-engulfed cargo section of the airship.

The final battles in Spy x Family Code: Whtie (Image via Wit Studio and CloverWorks)

The two fights end with everyone having to get creative to defeat the villains. With Loid, he was pinned down by gunfire for most of the fight and unknowingly had Anya's assistance when she broke her bonds and headbutted a button that opened the windows to let out poison gas Snidel dispersed. Loid then dispatched Snidel by disguising himself as Snidel and knocking him out after an intense hand-to-hand fight.

Also read: Spy x Family season 3 confirmed with a key visual

Yor's battle with Type-F is like battling a Terminator: a human head and brain, with the body being mechanical and stuffed with various killing tools, including transforming hands into guns and ammo in the chest. She manages to destroy it by marking it with her new flammable lipstick and igniting it, but it takes several attempts.

The fitting ending

The Forgers finally going home (Image via CloverWorks and Wit Studio)

Spy x Family Code: White ends with the Forgers having to work together to land the crashing ship in the nearby bay to avoid damage to the city. The mission to stop Snidel was successful; the microfilm was recovered because it was between Anya's teeth the whole time; Operation Strix was back on track; Loid and Yor's "relationship" was recovered; and Anya had everything needed to make the Meremere.

The contest didn't get a chance to begin as an accident destroyed Eden Academy's oven. The contest was postponed, and the vice principal had even more peculiar tastes. This time, however, Bond predicts the trip will be a pleasant vacation in a tropical climate.

Franky appears in Spy x Family Code: White (Image via CloverWorks and Wit Studio)

This pleasant ending fits the Spy x Family flow of having something fun happen after a stressful occasion, like how there are occasionally smaller adventures between the bigger story beats like Becky trying to flirt with Loid or Bond catching an arsonist.

There is a humorous post-credits scene that bears mentioning, aside from Anya dancing. When Twilight is using all of his spy skills to scout Frigis for the Cherry Liquor, he contacts Nicky back in Ostania for aid in finding it and says to meet him in Frigis. The post-credits scene shows Nicky, already catching a cold, cursing Loid for not meeting him since he had to go to great lengths to find the liquor offscreen.

Spy x Family Code: White in review

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Spy x Family Code: White is Spy x Family distilled into a roughly 2-hour movie. The animation is crisper than the original anime, and the anime is already smoothly animated. Sometimes it did feel like the ending fight scenes went too fast to follow, at least with Yor's fight against Type F. The story, while not entirely original, follows Spy x Family's formula perfectly: start with something mundane (getting the dessert) and escalate from there (Anya getting kidnapped, the end fights).

Regarding the canonicity of Spy x Family Code: White to the original anime and manga, CloverWorks and Wit Studio have stated it's non-canon. The movie can be safely enjoyed without any mandatory viewing beforehand. Several new fans have stated the movie made them want to watch the anime, which is good given that it's the first new Spy x Family animated content to premiere since the second season finished in 2023.

Spy x Family Code: White is best regarded as an old-style "filler movie" from the bygone days of Dragon Ball Z's movies or Naruto. Anime fans the world over have lamented the fact that these types of films have been going out of style, with many others like My Hero Academia or Demon Slayer opting to canonize their films and therefore seemingly not having room for anything that doesn't relate to the main plot.

The fact that it's non-canon may be disappointing, given the stakes, the different location, and the humorous antics, but movies like Spy x Family Code: White exist to give a breather to the main plot and creativity to put the characters in different scenarios. Other reasons why it shouldn't be missed include the Anya hallucination being a gut-busting break from the action and seeing the Forgers all having to help each other when usually Loid or Anya are highlighted.

The film has a limited theater release in the U.S. and abroad. Fans can check Crunchyroll for ticket prices and available screenings. Others will need to wait for either the Crunchyroll streaming release or for it to be available on Amazon, iTunes, and wherever digital and physical entertainment is sold.

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