#— anya talks!

[ggenggar]

the four F’s (and Daisuke)

[keywhole]

there's only four players. curly sat out. no one talk to me (except there's more under the cut)

something about anya and daisuke getting really into games, really into joy is something so special pre-crash. the fact that daisuke is considered "always insanely lucky", too, has importance, even though curly is just talking about board games. when curly breaks the news to everyone and jimmy goes off on his rant, he doubles down about how daisuke will be fine because of his parents, making him, supposedly, "the lucky one."

in the end, daisuke climbed through a vent just to witness either the final moments of anya's life, or to be face-to-face with her corpse. no one could stop it from happening, but jimmy had put so much pressure on him to "save her and curly". when jimmy goes into the medbay looking for disinfectant and he looks to the vent, he says "at least he made it out the other side". was that luck?

daisuke truly was just a damn good kid trying his best.

[peanutseagle]

imagine being obsessed with drawing your crush haha couldn't be me 💕

[anyataylorjoys]

One scene in the film sees Emma suffer a sudden nosebleed in an emotional moment, and Taylor-Joy somehow managed to start bleeding from her nostril right on cue.

The original plan had been to cut the scene and add the fake blood under Taylor-Joy’s nose, but as she told The Guardian there was no intervention necessary.

“I didn’t know I had that talent until that scene,” said Taylor-Joy. “As soon as my nose started bleeding, [director] Autumn de Wilde and Johnny [Flynn, who played Mr Knightley] both got as excited as me. The crew were going, ‘Cut, cut!’ because they were concerned about me but us three were like: ‘What are you talking about? Keep rolling! This is unbelievable! We have to capture it on film.’”

[themouthwashes]

Who is Anya? For the blind, she is vision. For the hungry, she is the chef. For the thirsty, she is water. If Anya thinks, I agree. If Anya speaks, I'm listening. If Anya has a million fans, I am one of them. If Anya has ten fans, I am one of them. If Anya has only one fan, that's me. If Anya has no fans, I no longer exist. If the whole world is against Anya, I am against the whole world. I will love Anya until my very last breath.

[dykedvonte]

I think about the fact Anya locking herself in the infirmary with Curly to kill herself and how it is in way reclaiming a space that was initially hers from Jimmy.

Not to mention how she must've been aware of Jimmy's obsession with Curly and the idea that he would lose his power over the both of them (based on the fact she likely thought they would never get the door open) and having to face the responsibility of two deaths being on his hands as acting captain.

It was her final act of agency stuck on that ship with her abuser and it says something that she chose to die next to Curly, despite his inaction, leaned against him as if they were just in a casual conversation before her death. Despite everything, Anya made the final decision on her own terms and it speaks volumes considering her treatment and demeanor up until that point.

[aerequets]

I didn't really think about this before, but in the iconic proposal scene, twilight thinks "until my mission do us part" and yor thinks "until my killing do us part". twilights bit made sense to me bc he planned to eventually end the family, but for Yor I was kinda like "oh endo must have just needed a parallel and yor doesn't have a specific end in mind so he must've just went with 'until my killing do us part' even if it doesn't make as much sense".

but i realized that maybe by "my killing" Yor didn't necessarily mean her job killing people, but rather HERSELF being killed? like was her life prior to the forgers just doing jobs until an inevitable end? cruise arc showed us that she found her new reason (family) to keep going with garden, but before that, was she just like. waiting for the one job that'd end up killing her?

idk maybe this was really obvious but I didn't realize LOL

[hisnamewasphil]

This is still one of my favorite interactions between Anya and Loid

[j-liz]

HEADCANON: Becky 100% gets her first Tonitrus Bolt when she snaps and publicly cusses out a teacher for being a jerk.

You think so, huh?

[arataka-reigen]

I love how, despite being batshit insane sometimes, SxF still has some moments that are extremely realistic about children and their poor stressed out parents like anya destroying brand new clothes

[stellas-and-tonitruses]

Everything we know about Project Apple (and, by extension, Anya's past) thus far

thought i'd compile all of that now while endo's on break Just In Case the next chapter happens to start anya's backstory (i don't Think it will but endo likes surprising us LSDFKLFS)

important disclaimer that project apple and the organization in charge of anya's experiments have not been confirmed to be related! there's evidence that they have things in common, in particular employees, but that's our only real connection between the two thus far. still! worth looking into

more under the cut!

so, starting very strongly with the very first mention of anything related to the project: anya's introduction in chapter 1

despite her being a main character, we know very little about her past at the moment, and this little blurb at the beginning makes up a very big portion of what we know.

things to note here:

as an experiment, her name was "Test Subject 007". important to note that the notation differs between her and bond: she was Test Subject 007, bond was Subject 8, no zeroes in there;

she had been made thus by accident, the phrasing itself implying quite heavily that she was just a normal child before said accident (but this is the translation! i don't know japanese so i can't cross-reference with the raws to clarify if the phrasing changes anything, but the fanbook uses the word "gained" to describe her powers too);

because her mind-reading is an unintended consequence, that means the scientists were presumably not, at least initially, trying to achieve cognitive enhancements in humans, and were instead trying to achieve something else, whatever that might've been;

she escaped from the facility and then moved from institution to institution, looking for a family.

so, crucially, through this little introduction we learn that there is an organization, government-funded or otherwise, that is or was conducting human experiments for unknown purposes. we also learn that whatever family anya had prior to being involved in the experiments is more than likely unreachable, at least as far as she knows, and so she has settled for finding a new family to take care of her instead.

in terms of the facility itself, here we see they clearly drilled it into her that she can't ever reveal her secret (and the darn plush is there too -- in the anime it's even more emphasized, as you can see in the gif i made)

through her reminiscing though, we get our very first look at the scientists that were in charge of her! they're in the gif above but here they are in the manga too. it's so interesting that the anime actually shows their eyes behind the glasses though, fascinating choice.

the insistence on world peace is important, as it explains her own personal obsession with it and shows that it's not just because of twilight's own focus on preserving the peace. i also don't think twilight ever really talks about "world peace," only about "preserving the current peace between westalis and ostania" -- anya seems to be the only one talking about WORLD peace (even in the very first scene where either of them mention it in proximity to each other in ch 1, loid says "understanding the other party is the first step towards peace" and anya's interpretation is "understanding me makes world peace?") but take this with a grain of salt because i might be wrong! going through every single mention of peace in the story just to fact check this one little trivia fact is a bit much i think so i'm not doing it JSDFKLSD

but yes

remember mr hair strand and baldy, we'll see them again. not her though, ig she wasn't in charge of bond

now, fast-forwarding to chapter 19, we finally get a name and a premise for the experiments:

"but oana," you might say, "this is talking about animals only! how do we know it's the same project as anya's, which involved human experimentation?"

i don't think it is, is the thing! i think it's related to the experiments anya was a part of, which is evidenced by the same scientists being featured in project apple too, but there's more going on that we don't know about. there wouldn't be such adamancy on keeping the two separate in every official mention of them if they were just the same thing, imo!

back to the evidence, we learn that the project, conducted and funded by the previous ostanian regime (meaning donovan's related to it one way or another, since he was prime minister), was marked by franticness and desperation -- a prime place for accidents like anya's telepathy and bond's future vision.

we also learn that the project was sacked by the new administration and that the former test subjects ended up on the black market.

(this makes it very important, imo, to learn when anya escaped the facility vs. when the project was sacked. it's clearly no longer in function, but while we've heard nothing from them thus far, i'm willing to bet the shady dealings around the desmond group are NOT related to the war, as W.I.S.E. has been led to believe, but rather to reignite project apple. that is speculation however so i'm going to refrain from theorising much on why the desmond group is focused on acquiring pharmaceutical companies!!)

ok speculation tangent over, back on track

so, that's already a decent amount of info! but moving to chapter 22, when bond is finally home, and we finally see some familiar faces

behold! baldy and mr hair strand!

and 2 other guys we don't know but will see again in another bond flashback!

that's 2 out of the 3 scientists we've seen thus far from anya's own time as subject 007, confirming that there IS a connection between anya and bond's experiments, regardless of whatever the project anya was a part of might've been named.

this is also the chapter in which we learn that bond himself was subject 8 (or, if we take it from the fanbook, subject #8. still, diff notation from anya!)

in chapter 31, we learn an interesting tiny piece of trivia. we don't get any further info on it, but it IS mentioned as something that is known by W.I.S.E.:

ostania is rumoured to have done human experimentation! and W.I.S.E., and by extension loid, are aware of that.

do i know how them knowing may be important later? not really!

the next droplet of info we get is in chapter 40. we see that project apple had collaborators that are still functioning unhindered.

of course, born industries is only rumoured to have been involved with project apple, but regardless of whether or not they actually were, the rumour itself implies that the project likely pulled scientists from various other companies' R&D departments.

(this makes the desmond group's acquisition of glooman pharmaceuticals shadier, but anyway)

as a side note, twilight is emoting so much at just his wrong assumption that bond is seeking revenge against the scientists. imagine how he's going to react when he finds out about anya JKSDFKLFSD

and now aaaaall the way in chapter 58, we see the bald guy who anya also knows, the two scientists from bond's previous flashback, and one whole new guy!

and thus ends our current knowledge of it all!

the only other thing worth discussing is anya's knowledge of classical language

but plenty people have already discussed these scenes, especially recently, so here are some links: 1 | 2 | 3

the only thing i can add is that i'm fairly certain that classical language is a lot more likely to be latin than old english, because it's a very common language to learn in school (in europe at least, and ostania is based on east germany so it makes sense to me. i learned mandatory latin in school for a few good years too, even if i wasn't that good at it lol) and because one of the most common modern usages of latin are in medicine and science, it would make sense that she'd be better at it due to exposure.

a possibility is also that the scientists would think in latin to conceal their thoughts from her, and that's how she ended up learning so much. she's not fluent in latin, she's just well acquainted and that cicumstance would explain the how.

BUT THAT'S SPECULATIONNN

also i don't think "ANIA" is an acronym, nor do i think anya's been misspelling her own name out of lack of knowledge. "ania" is a polish diminutive of anna and an alternate transcription of Аня, so i think it's far more likely that anya isn't ostanian or westalian than it is that her name comes from an acronym.

now,

TL;DR!

what we know about project apple (and the "mysterious organization"):

project apple was funded and conducted by what appears to have been donovan's regime and, from what W.I.S.E. knows, aimed to create highly intelligent animals for military purposes;

W.I.S.E. is aware that ostania is at the very least rumoured to have dabbled in human experimentation;

the project is presumably no longer on-going, though it is likely there are efforts behind the scenes to revive it;

it is rumoured but not confirmed that project apple had collaborating companies that are still functioning perfectly fine;

the same scientists who were in charge of bond were also in charge of anya, signalling that there is a very significant connection between project apple and the "mysterious organization;"

based on what they were telling anya, they were/are very focused on "world peace";

their experimentation methods include but likely aren't limited to electrocution.

and what we (vaguely) know about anya that relates to this:

she is at the youngest, 4 years old, and at the oldest, 5 nearing 6. we don't know her real age, all we know is she definitely lied about being 6;

she is very fixated on specifically world peace while twilight is focused on peace between ostania and westalis. the scientists are the very first we see talking about this, so it's likely their fault;

she is unreasonably well acquainted with classical language;

she has escaped the facility at LEAST 1 year ago;

and, one tidbit from the fanbook (page 29): "Anya has been reading minds for as long as she can remember," implying that her memory of a life before the lab is muddy at best and absent at worst.

that's all we know that i know of!!

if you got this far, thank you for reading :D hope any of this was interesting or sparked any theories >:] have a good day!

[loosescrewslefty]

Local Floriography Bitch Emerges from Hibernation Because Cute Spy Found Family Romcom Has Cheeky Flower Shot!

Alright, let's get the Basic Bitch of Floriography addressed first, which means looking at Bond and his Yellow Rose

Roses are the flower that even people who know next to nothing about Floriography usually know on sight, but it's still cute that they gave the flower representing Friendship to Man's Best Friend.

Moving Counterclockwise through the picture, our next subject is Yor, sporting a fetching Orchid on her hairband.

Orchids symbolize Beautiful Woman, Refinement, Grace, and Uniqueness, and while it's 100% accurate for Yor, a part of me started to strongly suspect here that Loid is responsible for everyone's blooms, and used to opportunity to give discreet messages to his family without them knowing what he's telling them. (sneaky sneaky~)

Speaking of Loid, the man himself is up next, standing slyly with a Blue Aster.

Asters are also known as Starflowers, a sneaky nod to Loid's codename Twilight. And like roses, asters have different meanings depending on the colors you choose. Blue asters just so happen to symbolize Trustworthiness and Faithfulness. The perfect flower to represent a hardworking family man devoted to his wife and daughter! And certainly not the sort of thing one would associate with an undercover spy!

And finally, there is the last Forger Family Flower, and a brutal suckered punch to my soul;

Anya, and her Cosmos.

Just like with Loid's Aster, Cosmos are also flowers associated with the stars, and have even been called "Mexican Asters." Which doesn't feel like an accident when Anya here is mimicking Loid's pose and holding the flower to her lips. And Cosmos have a very, VERY special meaning.

"Hold My Hand and Walk With Me"

[bartex-x]

I don't feel safe saying this on twitter, but genuinely, where is all the jimmy x curly shipping I keep hearing about? Y'all talk about it like it's one of the core problems of the fandom, but I've seen maybe 6 fanarts of the ship. Most of the drawings and writing with them together just portrays the abuse in different ways and in no way advertises the idea that Jimmy and Curly were/are/should be in a romantic or sexual relationship.

Genuinely where are you finding all that?

[risetherivermoon]

am i the only one who thinks that Anya wouldn't actually be mad with Curly about what he did. Like I think some part of her deep down is angry about it, that he didn't help her like he said he would, but i also don't think she's actively blaming him for it.

I personally believe Curly was at fault for not taking responsibility and doing something about what Jimmy did to her. But i feel like characterization wise she wouldn't uphold him to such a standard, that she'd lose trust in him to an extent, but not enough that she'd hate him. I don't know if I'm explaining this right,

basically I just always feel strange whenever i see people depicting Anya as being resentful towards Curly after the crash, i believe she holds the blame on Jimmy alone, and once Curly has become bedridden and disabled, she focuses on helping him and doing her job. She and him were close friends, enough that she did trust him with the information that Jimmy assaulted her, she still cares.

something about the line: (which she says specifically about Curly) "I have to believe our worst moments don't make us monsters" flying over peoples heads when it comes to her characterization

i do think it's hard to figure out a way to characterize Anya in a light that is justifying, especially since in canon we aren't exactly given a good perspective on her. Curly is the closest we get to that, but he isn't that reliable of a source either when it comes to her (thats a whole other post tho)

but I don't think she'd be hateful, even to someone who has wronged her. I don't think she's weak or small, don't get me wrong, but with the way we are shown how much empathy she has for Curly (with her being unable to give him meds because it makes her nauseous with how it hurts him, and with the quote about Curly's worst moments)...i just dont see it

i can see the appeal of having victims resent and be able to stand up for themselves when it comes to their abusers (in Jimmy's case) and people who supported them, (as in Curly) but I just personally don't see that with Anya. And just because you aren't angry or outwardly standing up to the abuse you go through, doesn't mean that you are weak.

Anya isn't weak, but she's empathetic and in a situation that could only end badly for her. She's also a kind person, and a nurse. I don't think violence or anger are her go-tos

[etourvol]

In the back of my mind, it's always there

[beannoss]

Something I think about a lot and wonder if maybe gets overlooked in Twilight’s story and as vitally indicative of his character is actually in the very first chapter:

Anya isn’t needed for Strix. Twilight decides to adopt her anyway.

[Spoiler warning: Mostly this post deals with early chapters already in the anime but there is reference to chapter 62, which has not yet been animated and will be in season 3]

Twilight decides it — “I’m going to rework the mission so it doesn’t involve a child because that’s too dangerous” and he’s 100% right! Donovan Desmond is canonically a far right warmonger with fascistic authoritarian aims. His government made liberal use of the SSS — a group to mirror the Stasi — who continue to operate in morally dubious ways (much more likely they’re actively morally reprehensible, though we’ve mostly only had rumours of that so far). From what we can tell, Desmond is at best an absent father and likely actually worse than that: if that's how he treats his own children, imagine how he might treat others. And the timeline seems to indicate that the experimentation performed on Anya was done under Desmond's government — even if Twilight isn't aware of experimentation on children, he is aware of both human and animal experimentation under Desmond's government. Taking all that and also the complexity of Strix's aims, undoubtedly there were other things that could be done, more straightforward if not necessarily easier.

So. Why? Why entertain the change at all? And then, having entertained it, why go back when the reasoning is indisputable?

On the Doylist level, I think Endo wanted to ensure that Anya had some agency within the set up — Endo also does this with Yor. It would be much harder to be on Twilight’s side fully, or to trust him on an ethical level/take him as any sort of moral authority, if he were just straightforwardly using these two people. To have them be active and consenting participants (arguably to actually be affirming the arrangement: Twilight sets it up, but Anya and Yor actually make it happen) even if the audience only knows the depth of their knowledge/motivations/etc currently, shifts the power dynamic in important ways.

But it also the set up tells us important things about Twilight. He is largely impatient, cold, detached in chapter one. His overarching feelings towards Anya are, I think, real annoyance, real confusion, and real impatience. He just doesn’t understand this damn kid and it turns out she’s a person which is frankly unacceptable — he’d needed and anticipated an automaton, ideally of himself in miniature form. (Though I think one could ponder whether Twilight was, in many ways, an automaton himself at this point, but that's maybe for another meta 🙃)

He’s not entirely unmoved of course — we're given to understand he’s affected when Franky tells him how many times Anya’s been adopted and returned, and isn't amused by Franky's joke about names. Franky's comment — "Just don't get attached" — reinforces this. The prospect of “the future” perturbs Twilight when he’s reading the parenting books. His initial reaction to Anya’s kidnap is horror. All these are true too.

Then there’s also this, from earlier in the chapter:

It’s exposition, yeah, and it’s also exposing. "Hopes" and "joys" are very specific words to describe those events. It could simply have been "A marriage? An ordinary life?" but describing them as such — hope for marriage; joy in ordinary life — expose something of what Twilight feels about those two experiences and, on the flipside, they expose what he deems he's lacking. No hopes of intimacy; no joy in (an ordinary) life. There's an argument as well, of course, that he's being ironic but I don't think that actually invalidates the above analysis. Drawing attention to 'hope' and 'joy' at all are revealing, regardless of Twilight's tone in thinking of them. I think it's also interesting this panel, taken in conjunction with a pair of panels in chapter 62, Twilight's backstory. The above is almost a pulled out version of this below panel of Twilight's recollection of his childhood, and of course the returning image of not just a rubbish bin but a rubbish bin on fire when it comes to disposing of his identity:

Back to Strix. Both his final interaction with Karen and the whole everything of the framing of Strix is making Twilight think (and feel, ahem) things that he hasn't for some time. Twilight decides, I’m reworking this. It can’t proceed this way. Not because Anya is a pain in his ass, not because she’s not as (apparently) intellectually advanced as he’d originally thought, not even because he thinks he can find another child who would better be exactly what mission parameters called for. No:

And what changes his mind is Anya asking to come home.

One of the important parts of this to me is this:

He seeks consent.

This moment is a keystone, I think, to understanding Twilight. It’s also more telling than he maybe realises. Twilight is decisive — we all laugh because he spirals at the drop of a hat when his daughter or wife look even mildly upset but outside those (also very telling) scenarios, he makes decisions and he pursues them. Often he makes decisions quickly. He’s a dab hand at it; it’s a large part of why he’s as good a spy as he is.

He’d decided to change Strix.

Anya asks him, in essence, not to.

So, he doesn't.

But it's wild that he entertains keeping her request at all — why? Why even entertain it? It’s dangerous; it’s impractical; there are too many moving parts outside his direct control; Anya isn’t the sort of child he’d wanted for the mission if he’d spent any time thinking about what a child might actually be like; Strix is in many ways an extremely long shot anyway, Desmond could just stop attending for reasons unknown and unrelated; etc.

So, yeah, why? Maybe because of this —

In conjunction, I often think of this moment in the cruise arc:

Twilight first naming the feeling as lonesome, and secondly tacitly conceding that he perceives Yor as a companion and that that relationship is important to him, something to be missed. What makes this for me though is that Anya calls this out "Papa's you're so sappy" and Twilight's reaction is that of someone caught-out. He doesn’t say “nuh-uh!” but he may as well have. Essentially, something landed a bit close to home, hm? Maybe some of that hope for marriage? A soupçon of joy of an ordinary life?

Twilight’s loneliness underpins many of his decisions with his family — probably without him being fully conscious of it. I think he is at least somewhat conscious of it, but also if he looks too closely... Well, best not to. I could fill this post, I think, with images that demonstrate his loneliness throughout the series; that sorrowful/pensive close-up of his eye(s) is one of the abiding motifs for Twilight throughout. I'd probably start with this one from Twilight's backstory arc:

Anya's request plays directly off his loneliness. Still though, he doesn’t immediately capitulate — he emphasises Anya’s choice. Is she sure? The last day has been scary for a child (and for him, but he's ignoring that part) and Twilight, in his increasing recognition that Anya is a person, is probably aware in the back of his mind that he hasn’t exactly been warm or welcoming or at all patient with her. Things that people respond to — he's otherwise excellent at manipulating people, so of course he understands this. So. Given she'd just had this scary experience, given he hasn't exactly been great with her: Is she sure? She wants to come home — with him?

I think the moment may get a little lost because Anya says something riffing off his own earlier thoughts and self-revelation (featuring that shadowed, lonely eye motif again!)

Were this a post about Anya, I’d talk about how it’s an important character moment for her as well by way both of demonstrating her agency/choice and also that she isn’t nearly as dumb as Twilight thinks (and the audience, maybe, also thinks).

But in my view, she didn’t actually need to say anything about it making her cry. I think she could simply have said yes in that moment and Twilight would have agreed.

Twilight’s an unreliable narrator; he’s disconnected from his heart and that shrouds his own motivations from himself — something he actually also concedes in this chapter!

And it shrouds from us just how much he actually understands himself. He’s also a master of deflection. Easy to assume or say that bringing Anya home is just to align with Strix. Nothing more to see here; nothing else going on. But also that ripping off of the mask in the panel above — and the literal 'riiip' sound effects — also indicate to us that this is an unveiling to himself.

In my view, Twilight agreeing to Anya's request, deciding to go back to original mission parameters, actually shifts his motivations, subtly. Now he’s committed not only to the original mission goals, but also to Anya. He needs Anya to succeed at Strix, not only for Strix's sake, but also because otherwise the mission will end and she’ll have to go back to the orphanage, and he’s just agreed with her not to do that (not right away, in any case). I don’t think at this point he’s thinking it’s forever — his thoughts throughout the manga indicate he still expects the Forgers to be temporary. I don't think the shift in motivation is necessarily even conscious, but given the set up, I think something inside Twilight recognises that agreeing to bring Anya home is a compact, jointly engaged. Mostly all this has become subsumed into Strix: he makes decisions. He pursues them. He deflects, even from himself. Of course it's just for the mission; this saved him the trouble of reworking it, of figuring out something else. Nothing more to see; no need to think any more on it. And to be fair to him, Strix is very high stakes, resting pretty solely on his shoulders, so of course that is, objectively, motivation enough. Why even consider beyond that?

But I personally think that to the extent he's aware of it at all, there is something else going on, that he wants to have Anya for as long as it takes him to work something else out for her. If that's the case, then of course, we have Occam’s razor: the simplest solution may be the best one.

Maybe Twilight should just keep Anya himself, eh?

[Image description: gif from Spy x Family season 1, episode 1. Twilight and Anya have just found out Anya passed her entrance exam and are overjoyed. Celebratory, Twilight picks Anya up and swoops her into the air as they smile at one another. End image description]