Sylvia Sherwood

"Stop waiting for easy answers to fall into your lap, Rookie. Use that head of yours to find them for yourself."

- Sylvia Sherwood in Chapter 63

Sylvia Sherwood (シルヴィア・シャーウッド), also known as Handler (管理官) or the "Fullmetal Lady" (鋼鉄の淑女), is a recurring character of the SPY x FAMILY series. She is the commanding officer of WISE within Ostania and Twilight's main contact for Operation Strix.

Appearance
Sylvia is a tall woman with a slim figure and narrow blue eyes. She has wavy strawberry-blonde hair reaching the middle of her back. She is also sometimes seen having pink nail polish.

Though she disguises herself in public, she typically sports a pair of round framed glasses and a black wide-brimmed hat with a dark pink band that has a bow on the side. In her role as Handler, she most frequently wears a fitted black dress with a low-cut square neckline over a white collared shirt and a large black ribbon tied under the collar like a loose bow, as well as square-shaped drop earrings taking the shape of WISE's symbol. The back of her dress is long, reaching below her knees, while the front reaches mid-thigh. She also wears fishnets over black stockings with black high heels. Her age is unknown, but is advanced enough to the point that it has become a concern for her in physical combat.

As Secretary Sherwood, she ties her hair in a ponytail and dons rectangular-shaped glasses. She wears a dark coat over a suit and skirt.

Personality
Little has been revealed about Sylvia's personality. She is similar to Twilight in her commitment, skill, and logical approach to her endeavors. She is extremely dedicated to her given task; preserving peace between Westalis and Ostania by inserting Twilight into Donovan Desmond's inner circle. Like Twilight, she is willing to assist Anya's acquisition of Stella Stars by any means (including deception and espionage). Despite this, her plans for ensuring Operation Strix's success - such as bribing Anya or creating scenarios where Anya can be framed positively - are dubious at best, and her suggestions for Operation Strix can unnecessarily endanger the spies she manage. Dubbed the "Fullmetal Lady" by her agents, Sylvia has a fearsome reputation, as even her best agent, Twilight, would not even address the price tag she unknowingly left on her disguise out of fear and imagined that she would hold him at gunpoint to continue working if he asked for time off.

She is deeply compassionate, and has a soft spot for children and animals. She demonstrates these strengths in allowing the Anya to keep Bond after the terrorist bombing incident, and placating the child's concerns about the welfare of the other bomb dogs. She has said that she once had a daughter around Anya's age, but it is unclear how Sylvia lost her.

As shown in her speech to the student terrorists, Sylvia has a deep-seated hatred of war. Her fervent disgust for - and knowledge of - the atrocities and horrors of war seem to indicate that she suffered a great deal in the last conflict.

Despite maintaining an immaculate appearance in public, Sylvia's home is a complete mess, though her home was previously well-kept and tidy in the past. This deterioration is reflective of the trauma she endured from the loss of her partner and daughter during the war.

It is also established that her age is a sensitive topic for Sylvia since she once took minor offense to Anya saying "even at your age" to her.

Sylvia has surprisingly a childish side that she rarely shows to others. When changing her disguise to avoid the two SSS agents tailing her, she actually admires the new coat she wore. While at a park with her dog, she immediately engages in a bet with Loid Forger to see who has the best dog, wanting to prove her leadership skills are superior. In another instance, after Fiona Frost was hospitalized, she disguised herself as a nurse and paid a visit to her subordinate, mostly because she wanted to wear the nurse's uniform, with Fiona accusing her of playing around. She also teases Fiona about not pushing herself too much, even for Twilight, implying her awareness of Fiona's feelings for her co-worker.

Abilities and Skills
Disguise: Sylvia competently alters her appearance, as she often assumes various façades to shake off SSS pursuers in order to contact agents like Twilight outside the embassy, though she does make occasional mistakes.

Spy Handler: As a handler, Sylvia is the Westalian Intelligence agency's primary liaison with agents in Ostania and is responsible for managing them and their missions. Her primary duties include watching for signs of restlessness in Ostania and deploying her agents to prevent any potential incidents. Despite the strict surveillance from the nation's secret police, Sylvia manages to evade notice while competently handling her agents, earning her the nickname "Fullmetal Lady."

Expert Hand-to-Hand Combatant: Sylvia is skilled in unarmed combat and readily makes use of makeshift weapons as shown with her quick immobilization of Pance Karmer with a belt as he tried to kill Jonas Wellman.

Weaknesses
Age: Although her precise age is unknown, she is visibly disadvantaged by it with bouts of weakness and back and shoulder pain after combat, which secretly concerns her.

Chapter Appearances

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Anime Appearances

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Etymology

 * The name Sylvia means "wood/woods, forest/from the forest/of the forest" in Latin.
 * Sylvia's surname Sherwood is a habitational name from any of several places called with Old English scīr + wudu 'bright or clear (perhaps sparsely-grown) wood.'

Trivia

 * The German Shepherd that attacked Loid was taken in by WISE and is currently under Sylvia's care.
 * Sylvia has a messy room at home. After work, her appearance becomes slovenly.
 * After Loid and Fiona's joint tennis mission, Sylvia liked the rings they gave her and wore them for several days after.
 * Sylvia is aware of her nickname "Fullmetal Lady," which she appreciates as long as it makes her sound dignified and in charge.
 * Sylvia's has poor eyesight, hence why she wears glasses.
 * Tatsuya Endo describes Sylvia as "the cool big sister type."
 * Endo based Sylvia's design on fashion shows that he watched, like Paris Fashion Week, but mentions that drawing her glasses, hat, and curly hair are a pain.
 * During the original sketches, Sylvia's design had dark and unkempt hair, and appeared to be a smoker. She was originally intended to be Loid's teacher (which is shown later on in chapters 62 and 63), and her code name was "Nighthawk" (夜鷹).
 * Another design appears to be a bit closer to Sylvia's current one, and she is described as "a motherly manager who can see right through anyone," composed, can be kind and strict, uses pointed language and retorts with wit and biting humor, and the one person the protagonist [Loid] could never defy."
 * Sylvia's chair, featured on the twelfth volume cover, is a Diamond Chair designed by Harry Bertoia.
 * Before this, Sylvia was shown to be sitting on the same chair in Episode 17 of the anime, though it appeared with a cushion.

Quotes

 * (To Student Terrorists): "Have any of you ever killed anyone before? Have you ever been killed before? Have you ever had a limb torn off by an artillery shell? Have you ever heard the sound of bones shattering? Have you ever smelled the reek of rotting flesh? Have you ever found the crushed bodies of your parents and siblings in a pile of rubble that used to be your home? Have you ever discovered a blown-off piece of your lover stuck to a wall? Have you ever been so hungry you tried to eat tree bark? have you ever stewed human flesh in a pot? have you ever convinced yourself your enemy was subhuman so you could slaughter them like animals? Have you ever been so haunted by shame and regret afterward that you cried until you puked? Have you ever had friends who did the same, and took their own lives? Did you learn nothing about war at your university?"
 * (To Loid Forger): "Peace won the day. That's all that really matters."
 * (To Loid, before his cruise trip): "We'll consider it a part of Anya's care and education for Operation Strix. Agent Twilight, I expect you to execute your mission of rest and recreation as thoroughly as you would any other."
 * (About Loid): "Heh. Sometimes I can't tell if that man is highly capable or highly incompetent."
 * (To Loid, while training him): "Don't view everything in terms of black or white. Don't try to make everything fit into your preconceived notions. And don't rationalize! Are those brains of yours purely for show? Well?"
 * (To Aaron, about herself): "I used to keep a much neater house, but... when you've been alone for long enough... stuff like that just doesn't seem to matter anymore."

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