Anya Forger's telepathic abilities, explained

Key insights

• Anya has telepathic abilities due to previous experiments, causing her to have difficulty controlling her powers.
• Anya's telepathy allows her to read minds, assist with family missions, and provide emotional support to loved ones.
• While Anya occasionally uses her powers for personal gain, she also uses them to understand and help others in helpful and harmless ways. (118 characters)

In Spy x familyMany would initially look at Anya and think she is like any other child. They are innocent and often unaware of how the world around them works, but Anya is not like the rest of her classmates. Instead, she has the ability to telepathically read the minds of those around her.

With that power comes great responsibility, and Anya isn't always the best at controlling her powers or using them for good Spy x family. She often uses her telepathy to complete tasks at school or to manipulate others. However, there are occasions when she uses it to help others, such as her family.

How did Anya get her telepathic powers?

Instead of coming from a typical family, Anya Forger was originally used for human experimentation. Originally known as “Test Subject 007,” she was part of a secret experiment testing young children to give them special powers. It is unknown which organization was behind this experiment, but any fan can easily assume that the test was highly illegal and was hidden from the public for a reason.

I think our family is completely normal. —Anya Forger

Although it is not certain how exactly she got out of the facility, during her time there she developed the ability to telepathically read the minds of those around her. However, this initially caused a lot of uproar as she was put into the foster care system and seemingly unable to support a family. She often felt alienated and out of place as many of the families she went to did not understand her abilities and she often hid her powers from them. Despite running away several times, she eventually finds a family where she fits in perfectly with Loid and Yor Forger. Since she can read their minds, they never explicitly tell her what jobs they do, but she knows exactly what they do as a spy and assassin and feels right at home.

How Anya's telepathy works

How exactly does Anya's telepathy work? There are many ways she can use her ability, often to read the minds of those around her in real time, but this sometimes creates additional problems. Normally she can only hear people's thoughts from a certain distance, but when she is in a crowd she is also drowned out by background noise. Additionally, she significantly loses her powers during a full moon and cannot access memories or control a person's mind.

Dad's a big liar, but he's a cool liar! —Anya Forger

Another major problem with Anya's telepathy is that she often does not understand what she is hearing, which often results in comedic relief. As a young child, around 6 years old, it usually makes no sense for them to listen to the thoughts of older adults and often leads to misinterpretations. For example, in Season 1, Episode 2, “Secure a Wife”, Loid thinks about how he will complete his mission while sitting in the park with Anya. After hearing this, she says out loud, “Dad is so cool!”, which greatly confuses Loid since he never told her about his profession and she never revealed her skills.

Is she using it for good or for personal gain?

Although Anya is still very young, that doesn't stop her from occasionally using her abilities for her own personal gain. However, she often does this for harmless reasons, often to help her pass a test or receive a reward from Loid or Yor. She primarily uses her telepathic powers to get to know and develop a relationship with Damian Desmond, which is exactly what Loid needs to complete Operation Strix. Eventually she even learns that Damian has a crush on her and uses this to strengthen their friendship and respond to him in the best way possible.

The right time to use your strength, for example, is when you help your friend out of trouble. —Anya Forger

While she occasionally uses her powers to manipulate others, fans will also notice that Anya uses them to better understand others' feelings and to apologize when she has done something wrong. Regarding Damian, she uses her telepathy to apologize when she upset Damian after hitting him at the beginning of the anime. It's also obvious that she cares deeply for Becky as a friend and uses her telepathy to understand her better and give her advice when she needs it. It goes without saying that while she sometimes uses her powers for selfish reasons, she often does so in harmless ways and her intentions are usually for the best.

How she contributes to the Forger family

Aside from Anya's direct relationships with her family and friends, she also uses her powers to contribute greatly to the Forger family. This includes both Loid and Yor's many missions. Although her parents are unaware of it, there have been a few times when she has helped save others or assisted Loid in his missions. This includes reading the mind of a terrorist who has prepared a bomb. When she reads the mind of a bomb dog that can predict the future, she is able to discover plans to bomb a government official. She then uses her powers to figure out the time the bomb is set to explode and informs the authorities to help them disperse it.

Anya likes her mother, who is strong and cool! There, there. —Anya Forger

In addition to helping on missions, Anya often helps her mother, Yor, increase her confidence and role in the family. She uses her telepathy to make it clear to Yor that she is doing well as a mother and even praises her skills, such as when she cooks for the family. Although Anya's powers are something she can easily use to help herself, it often happens that she helps those around her by saving lives and giving her friends and family the support they deserve.

Spy x family is now available to stream on Crunchyroll and Hulu.