I've been repeatedly underwhelmed by slice-of-life anime released in the past few seasons, so I was a bit hesitant to start watching this show. I'm used to rather slow starts that ramp up into emotional climaxes through gradual character development, but Spy x Family gave a nice contrast to that by hooking me from the start. The bursts of action brought about by the spy theme help give extra entertainment that other slice-of-life animes naturally lack. That said, this comes at a cost. As of yet, I have yet to see any significant character development (I know we're only 12 eps in, but still). All we see is Loid and Yor showing an increasing fondness for their fake family.

That being said, I think the three main characters are a wonderful cast. The contrast in motives and lifestyles is very intriguing to watch as they must continuously deceive to hide their secrets from each other. However, this is where the current lack of character development makes things painful. I was very excited to see the family evolve and gradually change as they experience a new life together, but alas, nothing. Here's a brief breakdown of my opinion of each MC:

Loid: The best written IMO. His motives are simple, but make sense given his background. He is the only character whose development makes sense to me, as he has endured similar situations before and is used to distancing himself from emotions. This makes the small hints we get at him becoming fond of Yor and Anya that much more regarding and interesting.

Yor: A very enjoyable, but overly dumb character. It's a funny concept to have someone who is a top-tier assassin have no common sense, but some parts are a bit over the top. It's convenient for the plot but frustrated me at times.

Anya: I absolutely adored her character at the beginning, but I feel like she's being abused for comedy too much. It was most enjoyable at the beginning of the anime while in small doses and even made me laugh out loud, which rarely happens nowadays. Unfortunately, it gets a bit repetitive; I personally feel that they overused her smirk and the infamous "waku waku". She's still fun and succeeds at being the comedic centerpiece of the show, but I hope they tone it down a bit in the next slew of episodes.

I don't want to dive too deep and summarize the show, so I'll just talk about some parts of the show that I particularly enjoyed/disliked.

Anya's spy party: It's cute and all, but this was a part where the immersion really fell short. I agree that Anya should get a reward for getting into Eden, but just thinking of all the resources wasted by a secret organization on something so trivial really annoyed me, and made the latter half of ep 5 painful to watch. Also, the dudes with the glasses pisses me off, which certainly didn't help. It was cool seeing Yor and Loid have a brief fight, though.

Yuri meeting the Forgers: Yuri had the potential to be a very cool character, and make the current dynamic of the show much more interesting. He presents an additional challenge to Twilight, and could allow for a really cool cat and mouse dynamic, somewhat akin to Walter and Hank in BB. This still is possible, but it intrigues me much less after seeing what is done with Yuri's character. Turning him from a brother who simply idolizes and loves his sister into a creep who still wants to marry her is just plain unnecessary and gross. IMO, it's a complete waste of a character with a ton of potential. Him believing Yor's whole "I forgot to tell you we got married" was also frustrating for me, but just relates to the plot convenience thing about Yor that I mentioned earlier.

Anya and Damian: I really like their dynamic so far, and their interactions are very believable and entertaining. Him having an interest in her and covering it up with a rough exterior is a common trope with kids, but Anya's mind-reading ability gives it some extra zazz. It also has the potential for very interesting conflict down the line. If Damian and Anya become close and Loid kills his dad, how would Anya react? She knows what Loid's mission is, but is too naïve to understand what his true objective is. She would know that he killed Damian's dad if it were to happen, and I could see this being a really heartbreaking emotional climax.

I know I mainly talked about the negative aspects of the show, but that's because all the stuff it does right is rather basic; great animation (I expect nothing less from WIT and CW), fun characters, good pacing, and a unique and intriguing plot. It's just much easier to pinpoint what the show does wrong rather than right. It's very enjoyable for a slice-of-life, and a lot of the comedy is delivered well despite some repetitiveness. It's set up to be an amazing anime, it just needs a little refinement. I am very optimistic about the second half.