Spy x Family Season 3 Ep. 41 “Behind the Scandal | The Path to an Imperial Scholar”: Politics And Edumacation Fun [Review]

Spy x Family Season 3 now gives us a reprieve from the horrors of war with Ep. 41 “Behind the Scandal | The Path to an Imperial Scholar”. However, it’s still not all fun and games here. We do get a political and espionage thriller in the first segment. Fortunately, we do get some true reprieve in the form of a slice of life comedy where Anya tries once more to have edumacation pressed into her.

Spy x Family Season 3 Ep. 41 “Behind the Scandal | The Path to an Imperial Scholar”: Details in Brief

Spy x Family Season 3 Ep. 41 “Behind the Scandal | The Path to an Imperial Scholar” is the fourth episode (you can read my reviews of Ep. 1, Ep. 2, and Ep. 3 here) of the third season of this spy action-comedy anime, and the 40th overall in the series. Said anime is the anime adaptation of the ongoing Spy x Family manga series by Tatsuya Endo.

Wit Studio (Attack on Titan S1-3, Ranking of Kings, Suicide Squad Isekai) and Cloverworks (The Promised Neverland, Bocchi the Rock!, My Dress-Up Darling) remains the animation studios behind this anime, just as they have for the first two seasons. In fact, longtime readers at THS will recall that we reviewed the first and second seasons, plus the Spy x Family Code: White anime film as well. The staff is a bit different this time around though. Yukiko Imai has replaced Kazuhiro Furuhashi and Takahiro Harada as the director, but all other staff are reprising their roles.

The opening theme song for this third season of Spy x Family Season 3 is “Hi o Mamoru” (灯を護る) by Spitz. Meanwhile, “Actor” by Lilas Ikuta is the ending theme song for the same.

Synopsis

Alas, Spy x Family Season 3 is still an ongoing anime series. In fact, Ep. 41 “Behind the Scandal | The Path to an Imperial Scholar” only made its debut on October 25, 2025 on Crunchyroll and Hulu. Thus, to avoid spoilers, here’s the synopsis of this episode from Crunchyroll:

“WISE agents protect an opera singer and Henderson gives Anya tips on becoming an Imperial Scholar.”

Spy x Family Season 3 Ep. 41 “Behind the Scandal | The Path to an Imperial Scholar”: The Good

Like the vast majority of Spy x Family episodes, this one is divided into a pair of unrelated segments. Thus, we shall split this review into a pair of segments as well, starting with:

Behind the Scandal

Now this segment of Spy x Family Season 3 Ep. 41 is quite unique, because it goes deeply into the espionage and political thriller side of the story. Indeed, the entire story of this segment is basically political commentary on the nature of truth in a world where truth and lies are things are vague, murky concepts. With Handler Sylvia Sherwood (voiced by Yūko Kaida (JP) and Stephanie Young (EN)) having a very nice back-and-forth with an unnamed junior agent of WISE, who based on his actions during the episode, is someone who is incredibly susceptible to propaganda. In fact, this entire episode is basically all about identifying propaganda, and being skeptical of everything you read/hear in the news. Honestly, even though this storyline is years old by this point, it’s quite relevant in the present day what with today’s political climate.

That’s not to say that politics and espionage are the only things in this episode. There’s an action-packed component that puts to mind films like John Wick, with Handler engaging in some whip-like belt action for this episode. And even before that, the espionage component feels like detective fiction with a hefty dose of surveillance in it. When a large part of this episode relies on someone making accurate assessments from tiny clues, it feels very much like a Sherlock Holmes-style whodunit.

The Path to an Imperial Scholar

Now this is the segment of Spy x Family Season 3 Ep. 41 where fans of slice of life comedy are going to rejoice. This entire segment is essentially Henry Henderson (voiced by Kazuhiro Yamaji (JP) and Barry Yandell (EN)) attempting to teach some serious education to Anya (voiced by Atsumi Tanezaki (JP) and Megan Shipman (EN)).

Unfortunately, this segment also shows off just how…dense Anya is, since all of his talk is basically edumacation to her, and she gets absolutely none of it. It’s that bit that really plays into the theories that Anya is younger than she claims to be, but to be fair, he’s also trying to teach complex morality to a kid he thinks is 6 years old. Mr. Henderson, I don’t think 6-year olds have the mental capacity to understand complex themes of moral responsibility. Especially when the educator himself has doubts about the education methods, and the child is able to peer into his mind to see those doubts. Kudos to him for trying, at least.

Amazingly though, some of his impromptu lecture seems to get through to Anya. Sure, she was in it mostly for the snacks, but she does seem to develop…something like a sense of responsibility. It’s immediately turned into a joke due to Loid (voiced by Takuya Eguchi (JP) and Alex Organ (EN)) thinking that she wants to do homework to make up for another Tonitrus bolt, admittedly. But this segment still marks some significant character development for Anya. We shall hope that it sticks.

Spy x Family Season 3 Ep. 41 “Behind the Scandal | The Path to an Imperial Scholar”: The Bad

As amusing as the action in “Behind the Scandal” was though, it also had some noticeable flaws. A decent part of that action involved still scenes playing as the conclusion of each individual action sequence. This is basically an animation shortcut to reduce the amount of work needed for the action sequence. While it’s understandable why the animators would do that, it does result in an action sequence that’s not as good as it should’ve been had the entire scene been animated. It also chops up the action sequence into individual scenes, giving it a choppy pacing and lowers the quality of the action scene overall. Plus, it makes these action sequences resemble colored manga panels rather than anime, which is not what an anime should be like.

Anime Recommendations

Aside from that issue, the action sequence itself is rather short. If you want more action in anime, then might I point your attention to Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Kaiju No. 8, DDDD, DAN DA DAN, Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online II, Zenshu, Blue Box, Solo Leveling, Black Butler, Nyaight of the Living Cat, and May I Ask for One Final Thing?? Alternately, if you want more relaxing or non-action-oriented anime, then check out Senpai is an Otokonoko, Apocalypse Hotel, Spice and Wolf: Merchant Meets the Wise Wolf, The Ancient Magus’ Bride, My Dress-Up Darling, and/or This Monster Wants to Eat Me?

What do you all think of this week’s episode of Spy x Family Season 3? Tell us your thoughts in the comments section below.

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