What would happen if only women could pilot the most advanced weapon system in the world?
They would all attend a school where they use high yield explosives in sporting events!
Infinite Stratos (or IS) follows the only male in the world who can use these powerful mechas: Ichika Orimura. He attends the only school in the world where women train to use these machines. It is also the testing ground for the latest models. Yep, one guy in a school populated by go-get-em girls used to blowing each other up in competitions. Obviously this is a harem anime.
Why doesn’t anyone get killed from these competitions you ask? IS are equipped with energy shields. Once the shield is drained, the match is over…unless some type of accident happens in the safety mechanisms. By the way, no one knows exactly why Ichika is the only one who can pilot an IS. It may have to do with the fact his eldest sister (and his teacher at the academy) is one of the best pilots in the world. The IS have ushered in an age of world peace because IS tech is equally given to all nations by its inventor and sister of Ichika’s childhood friend Tabane Shinonono.
Ichika, being the only guy, has to deal with the attentions of an entire school. Apparently all girls are out to fight over a guy according to harem anime.
Infinite Stratos is pretty typical in the harem department. Ichika is a clueless brick when it comes to the girl’s advances…at least when it comes to those that matter. The cast is the usual, the childhood friend and love interest, Houki Shinonono; the Westerner elite girl, Cecilia Alcott; the other childhood friend, Huang Lingyin, and the mysterious quiet girl (who happens to be German), Laura Bodewing.
Antics involve the usual fare of girls fighting over who will date Ichika (in and out of the mecha) down to Ichika waking up beside a naked Laura who already “married” him. Of course, other antics involve sharing a room with a girl and other problems for a guy attending an all girls school.
The storyline felt tacked on since the focus was the conflict between the characters. It had to mainly do with some mysterious unregistered IS units showing up time to time. The IS did lend an interesting dynamic to the usual harem fights. The mecha fights were done in CG, but they looked nicely seamless compared to the regular animation. It is pretty much the norm for mecha fights to be CG anymore.
The fights were interesting and dynamic, but I wasn’t really surprised to find there wasn’t much in the way of actual danger. This is a romance story after all. Ichika, as usual for harem protagonists, was often annoying with how clueless he was. Out of all the characters I thought Laura stood out despite the limited screen time. She was different and interesting. Not to mention she was one of the few who wasn’t, well, top heavy. Large bosoms tend to detract from character designs much of the time.
There wasn’t any panty fan service luckily, but there was a fair bit of breast jiggle as the IS clamped over each girl when they were activated.
Being a harem, I wasn’t expecting too much from Infinite Stratos. It kept me amused enough to watch all 12 episodes.
