IS: Infinite Stratos

[Xanadu]

QUOTE (Killer_Ossi)Im a bit confused right now. I thought Shinono was the only one who is able to make ISs but it always sounds as if the different states can do it without her. Did they just explain it wrong or is it bad writing.

Other than that I knew that Shinono wasnt a great character from last ep, but that she is that worthless. I mean except for making IS she is totally useless, no wonder nobody wants to have something to do with her.
Tabane Shinonono is the creator of the IS. However, other countries can develop IS's due to the Alaska Treaty, which equally divided the IS tech, mainly the cores, to prevent mutually-insured destruction

(Those who get the red, congrats, you are knowledgeable.)

Also I don't think that nobody wants to have anything to do with her even though she shattered everyone's (including mine) perception the the IS creator and the fact that she causes Houki to move away from Ichika considering that she's #1 on the most wanted list. I found the rabbit-scientist's antics funny, but that's just me


QUOTE If you consider Charlotte still having a second generation IS france really is looking bad now ^^
France probably has 3rd-gen IS, but Charlotte's using an IS from her father's Corporation, which is struggling to to develop a 3rd-gen. She also would've had a 3rd-gen if it was for that then again she probably wouldn't have gotten an IS if that were the case.


QUOTE I always wondered why only women can use an IS but the answer could be quite easy. Because Shinono only wants women to use it. Why? Because of the fear that men will use it only for war, not that that assumption is wrong ^^
That's a though question. I think even if they were made for women-only use, if it wasn't banned, IS would definitely be used for war considering how powerful they are



QUOTE And why Ichika can use it is easy too. Shinono knows and trust him so she made one for him. That explains why his IS fits him more than it should from a random chance.
Good theory, but she could have made it after it was known that Ichika could use IS as it is still unknown if he can pilot an IS that wasn't made with one of Shinono's cores. and their would be no use if Ichika never found out that he could use IS. It could have been tuned to Houki's specs and given to her

 

[Kid-Wolf]

So with episode 11 Houki is excited that she has her own personal IS, but it seems that Ichika is notified that she might do something stupid and to keep an eye on her from his sister of course. Also, the most idiotic thing I can think of is how Ichika states that he wanted to protect the illegal fishing ship that wondered into the area. Ok I think I know where this is going, but go on. In any case it looked like a rather poor excuse to show that Houki is not acting like she should when she got her personal IS, and to top it all off he goes into a coma, and Houki pretty much sulks about until the end of the episode.

In any case I should really expect much from a stock harem anime, but hey it's something to watch though. I just hope that this ends propery instead of the whole infamous open end for this series.

 

[nijlandp]

QUOTE (Kid-Wolf @ Mar 25 2011, 08:47 AM)
In any case I should really expect much from a stock harem anime, but hey it's something to watch though. I just hope that this ends propery instead of the whole infamous open end for this series.

I fear that our hope will be shattered...the writers will never make a proper closed ending..until now they did everything they could to keep Ichika stupid about the girl's feelings and get a big harem so i am not expecting a closed ending. The only thing i do hope is that they make Ichika a bit smarter and let him say who he really likes. The "i want to protect everyone" remarks of him are pretty boring..

 

[Killer_Ossi]

At first the ep was pretty good, but after Ichikas Gundam 00 "lets connect our feelings in a different world"- thing it really was bad. Houki was totally right in what she did. If the fishers got hit their bad luck. The Gospel is a far greater threat. But how convenient that the Gospel made a break after that instead of eradicating a town or something. Ichika wouldve deserved taking the blame for that with his stupid Naruto-like naivity.
I mean why protect criminals? It feels almost like here in germany where the criminals get protected and the ones living with the laws punished -.-

And I think the producers got the sblings wrong. I mean Houki totally looks like Chifuyus little sister with her hair open. And Ichika is as stupid as Tabane is.

Until now the anime was pretty good but this ep was a big fail.

And no of course we wont get a closed ending. And Ichika doesnt deserve it. He should stay stupid as hell and die as a virgin with a horrible death.

 

[Xanadu]

I have a feeling that I'm one few people that didn't rage at Ichika being distracted by the boat. Even though the drama in the 2nd part felt dragging, I liked the battle half considering that they're not exactly soldiers. From what I'm reading from oter places they most likely failed at putting in some more crucial details from the LN, otherwise people may have liked it better. Oh, might as well wait for the LNs to be translated.

 

[Kid-Wolf]

Well to be honest I actually facepalmed when Ichika decied to go with the whole "I want to be a Hero and save everyone I see, just like Shirou." Kudos to those who get this reference here.

Besides it looked like a highly poor excuse to get Houki to know what to fight for, but to be honest she didn't need to beat herself up on it. More along the line of knocking Ichika back into his current coma.

I mean he did deserve to go for the whole Lawful Stupid and then complain to Houki that everyone needs to be protected, even criminals.

 

[Xanadu]

During the battle:

Really now, the gospel was way overpowered. I kept wondering how mush energy that thing had considering it kept pulling of those 'bullet hell' attacks, and the wing attacks it used in its 'archangel' mode.

Houki remembered that she had other weapons in her fold-out armor and managed to take off one of Gospel's wings even if it did piss off the AI and made it go second shift and 'wing cannon' everything.

In the dream sequence, why was I reminded of eva? Did they even have a 'water reflecting sky' scene in eva or was it some other show?

A few things we learn after the battle:

Ichika was able to recover due to Byakushiki's core (Core 001) which is the same one that the white knight used

Tabane really loves to take things to the extreme. For the Intro of IS, she hacks into 12 countries missile systems to show an IS's power and for Houki's debut as an IS pilot, she make the Gospel go berserk. Does that fall under the lines of 'Sisterly love'? but at least we found out why it sat there doing nothing until it was attacked. and to finish off, she pulls off a batman on Chifuyu

Houki almost scored with Ichika until he bumped his head on a blue Tear. Can you even dodge lasers at point-blank range? Looking at the girls, Laura and Char were angry for being worried for nothing, Rin went yandere, and Cecelia just plain snapped. I did lol at Laura's "You're not paying enough attention to being my wife!" comment, in fact that segment make me laugh every time I watch it.

This is why you never try to hit it off with one of the harem mate in the open, especially if they have hi-grade weaponry. At least Ichika denseness wasn't at Natsuru's level (Even I was annoyed by him and I like dense harem leads), and for that we thank you. (try figuring this reference)

Wow my post is all over the place, but I think I said what I wanted... I tihnk. Hope there's a S2 to cover the other LN volumes.

 

[Kid-Wolf]

Ok so it ends with episode 12 with what seems to be the IchikaxHouki paring. Although the rest of the harem isn't ammused about this. Heck I mean he did focus mostly on Char at one point in the series only to run back to Houki in the end.

Still this series felt way to short for there to be any major development, but it's wishful thinking that this will get a second season. Although with the bad writting in some parts here and there still kind of make me wonder if they would even try and go further with this series.

Still I have to say that when I hear Char, I think instantly of Gundam no matter what anyone says. also, it seems that the last two episode did something A-la latest Gundam series moment with the personality dive of some sort.

Not only that, but why do I want to say that Houki's sister was secretly going, "Just as Planed" a-la Light from Death Note with not only for Houki's debut but with her being piared with Ichika?

Overall Score for this series is really a 4/10. It would of been higher if they knew what they were writing about since at first they made Houki's sister rather secretive, but then later on make her a total ditzy genious that likes wearing robot bunnyears.

 

[Killer_Ossi]

The end was pretty good, especially if you remember how bad ep 11 was.

Overall this series is far better than most harem series. No I dont know even one harem anime which was better in fact. Not only were the characters not as archetypical as usual no we even got an pairing at the end since Ichika clearly wouldve kissed Houki if Cecilia didnt intervene.
And if you look at it from the action-side Ichika wasnt nearly as whimpy as the other male protagonists in harem animes. Sure he was dense since he didnt realize the girls were after him, but that is not really his fault but the fault of the genre and the producers.

The character were mostly interesting, with Chifuyu beeing the best. But they couldve done more about the other characters since we dont really know a lot of the sidecharacters like the girl trio. But there just wasnt time for that. But I must say that Ran and her brother were totally useless. I wonder why they were even there.

And just like I thought it was Shinonono who made it possible for Ichika to get an IS even though she herself doesnt understand why. But for her to actually trigger the fight at the end was surprising. But it made it more logical since I always wondered why Gospel went into break mode after defeating Ichika and Houki.

Overall a nice anime which gets a 8/10 from me.

 

[Patrick5087]

QUOTE (Killer_Ossi @ Feb 27 2011, 04:45 PM) A pretty good ep.
The fight was enjoyable and the character-development for both Laura and Charlotte was good too.
But the best was the end when Laura said Ichika will be her waifu. This is just so totally wrong its great. I guess we will now see a troubled Ichika since he gets too much attention from Laura.

@Xanadu: Aehh, they never even once wore normally clothes under their IS. I wonder how you came to that assumption oO

@nijlandp: It should be obvious who he wants to protect. Houki, Chifuyu and everyone else around him. And Ichika is a lot better than most maincharacters in my eyes. At least in the fights he looks like a man.
And outside of a fight Iw would say he is the typical japanese. Just like every american is the typical badass undefeatable hero without flaws in american movies and shows since they think they are really so, japanese male maincharacter are gutless and useless when it comes to romantic and women. At least Japan seems to see itself like that.
yea that was great (late in the discussion and everything but meh.)

I think that is the first time in me ever watching anime where i have ever was speechless and had the whole jaw-drop along with everyone else in the anime. then the whole "going to be my wife" line almost busted a gut there

 

[askara]

you know? for those who complain about harem anime male being wimpy and dense, those characteristic is a must! i mean think if he is a normal guy, the genre of the anime would have to change from "harem" or "mass orgy"

 

[Xanadu]

No, wimpy doesn't apply to Ichika in my opinion. He's a little dense but I like denseness to an extent. The wimpy character in the series is Celilia's father in my opinion

 

[nijlandp]

This series is probably one which can be called to be good in the beginning and gradually dropping down to a doubtful level. Storywise it ain't bad as the questions which come in the beginning are answered. However the feeling that the answer is made up along the story is slowly creeping up while watching. In the end it feels somewhat unsatisfactory to have seen this series. Ichika almost kissing Houki was very good though. A nice ova to actually get them to kiss would be nice. It would conclude what we already know.
The characters are pretty good with Chifuyu being the best at that. However some characters were weak or even got to be sidetracked after the first episodes like the three girls (the one who wore those strange suits was the best of them. A bit more of information on them would have been nice).
In all it is a nice series which does have its problems as the writers seemed to have too little time to actually get the storyline tweaked and had to make up things along the way. Still it is worth a 7 out of 10 for me.

 

[JCDRANZER]

I guess my opinion compared to people who watched this series as it was airing weekly will be different as I pretty much marathoned this series in a few hours. I personally loved it, the characters but seriously 3 quarters of this series was introducing a new character, however, I liked them a lot especially Charlotte who had the whole HanaKimi thing going on and I knew she was a girl straight away too. I especially liked the seiyuu for Charlotte, she was the nicest to listen to.

This anime is not a great mecha anime but definitely one of the better harem animes but would only raise the bar if there was more time to develop the characters and bring about a plausible story because Houki's older sister, Tabane, is pretty much bat-shit crazy and the whole "hypothetical conversation" btw Tabane and Chifuyu-nee kinda annoyed me but I guess it makes sense since Tabane is just eccentric like that.

According to the novels, the anime is somewhat being true to its source but a few major difference like making the Silver Gospel being an unmanned IS, which in fact in the novels is operated by a girl, in both cases the Silver Gospel goes berserk (it's not the girl's fault in the novels...system malfunction or something like that).

I would like to see a 2nd season for this series and I think I'll start reading the mangas and light novels for this series soon.

My score for this anime is 8.5/10, I really liked it, I pretty much enjoyed all aspects of the anime and I want to just give it a 9/10 but it was lacking and thats why it achieved that rating.

EDIT #1:- Infinite Stratos OVA Review

I just finished watching the OVA episode of IS and I am very glad that it continued directly from the ending of episode 12. Watching this charming OVA has only got me to want a 2nd season more. A perfect way of ending a 1st season and making viewers want more.

I lol'ed at Chifuyu-nee when she was kinda admitting her brother-complex somewhat and the whole thing of her being too kind and her actually understanding that the other girls view as a rival after she said she won't give Ichika to them, which I laughed at too......since she was a little tipsy because of the beer she was drinking (she must be a weak drinker) and she said she wouldn't give Ichika to them.

Ahhh, I'm a little upset that the series is finished for now. It was good and I'm not ashamed of saying that I loved it.

My score for the OVA episode is 9/10 despite it being very generic, I loved it because all the characters are pretty darn awesome except for Ichika being super-dense.