Author Topic: Infinite Stratos and why it's worth reading (SPOILERS)  (Read 15958 times)

Offline Haxton Fale

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Infinite Stratos and why it's worth reading (SPOILERS)
« on: January 02, 2012, 04:54:11 pm »
Some time ago I decided to spoil a bit of Infinite Stratos here on forums. Many people claim that IS is worthless/stupid/idiotic as a whole, while the light novels themselves aren't that bad. It's quite the opposite - they're pretty good (but the anime is still crap).

SPOILER WARNING!
Yes, in case you didn't notice shouting SPOILERS in the thread name. I will be spoiling. It's your last chance to back away slowly from here, in case you haven't watched the anime and/or you actually want to read the novels on your own, which is really worth it.

For now, I'll concentrate on what happens after the anime ends, which is volumes 4-7.

As most of you know, IS Academy's summer camp ended with personal machine users fighting a berserk IS, Silverio Gospel. Despite what was told in anime, Silver Gospel (which is its actual name) wasn't an unmanned drone - it had an American pilot Natasha Fairs, who actually expressed her thanks for saving her life.

Volume 4 cover and a usual Infinite Stratos art, this time featuring Byakushiki Setsura.
Chapter 1
Soon after the events in volume 3, actual summer has started. Firstly, Rin invites Ichika to Waterworld. Soon after that, he meets Cecilia, who just came back from England with her personal maid, Chelsea, a quite amazing person, unfortunately only episodic. After chatting for a while, and noticing a worsening in Cecilia's mood, Ichika offers her the ticket he 'received' from Rin. Since Ichika omitted the part where he can't go, Cecilia happily took the ticket. Neither of them was happy to see the other, as you have probably guessed. They decided to make use of the tickets though and took part in a contest. Being IS cadets, most of the contestants had little chance against them, however the outcome was, well, disastrous.

Chapter 2 is my personal favourite.
On the very same day, Charlotte is slowly getting tired of Laura's sleeping naked and nightmares threatening her room-mate's life (well, mostly sleeping naked), so they go shopping for clothes for our cute German cadet. Leaving quite an impression on store clerks, everyone had fun choosing clothes (mostly for Laura). After a while (and a taste of Charlotte's wild imagination), they were eating lunch at a nearby restaurant, when it turned out that the manager from a nearby maid cafe was looking for very temporary workers. Dressed as a butler and a maid, Charlotte and Laura started working there (being a great success), when the store got attacked. Despite being a cute pair of cute girls, we can't forget that both of them received military training. With a bit of destruction, the store was saved from the robbers.
But wait, that's not all to the chapter. After saving the day, some more shopping and eating crepes at the park, they went back to the Academy to try out their new pyjamas, when Ichika suddenly entered. While Charlotte was flustered, Laura kept her composure and tried to stay intimidating, but it was absolutely impossible in her current outfit.

Chapter 3 was adapted within the latest OVA, the second half.
Houki returns to her home shrine because of Obon festival and her miko duties there. She starts preparing to the divine dance, and after that Ichika appeared, clearly confusing diligently working Houki. They spend some time going around the stalls, when Gotanda Ran shows up. Ichika decides to spend time together, much to girls' dismay. After some time Ran had to leave with her brother, which left Ichika and Houki alone. On a viewing spot, Houki decided to confess her love, but her timing was a bit off, since it was drowned out by fireworks.

Chapter 4 is also a part of the OVA. To be more precise, the first part.
Charlotte paid Ichika a visit at home. As expected, she was going back and forth between delight and extreme nervousness. She didn't have much time to cherish being ahead of other girls, because soon after Cecilia also visited Ichika's home and brought some cake. Usually Ichika's propositions are rather unfortunate to girls, but this time they were delighted with an idea of sharing.
However, it shouldn't be too surprising if I told you that the rest came over too. As usual, Ichika in response to his complaints got offensive stance from Houki and Rin, a kind of apology from Cecilia and Charlotte... and Laura's usual reaction, as if it was obvious she came to visit her bride. Not having much to do (and not wanting to leave his house), they decide to play some games first (a bit... intriguing games), and after that (and Chifuyu's short visit, which reminded girls about her advantage) - to cook dinner. Some girls were more successful, some less, but they had fun anyway (well, not so much when it came to eating...).
But let's not forget about Chifuyu! It turns out she went out to drink with always cute Yamada-sensei, apparently dealing with some problems. However, who would have guessed she's worried about her I won't give Ichika to you?

And that concludes volume 4. It's a very general summary, so quite a lot was omitted. Pictures included are from the light novels, scanned and hosted by Baka-Tsuki. You should go there to read the novels yourself and show the translators your appreciation. In volume 5 Ichika meets yet another girl, a Russia Representative, capable of... Well, I shouldn't spoil too much. All you need to know is that she's simply amazing, and some nice action starts in volume 5.
Also, you should at least check out illustrations for previous three volumes. They're worth it.

I would appreciate any reasonable opinions, as well as pointing out any mistakes in this block of text. If there's need for that, I can summarize volume 5, but I hope you'll start reading the novels by yourselves before that.

Offline UltimaniumX

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Re: Infinite Stratos and why it's worth reading (SPOILERS)
« Reply #1 on: January 16, 2012, 11:51:03 pm »
I think one of the biggest problems with the anime was that it was hyped up so much and generated a lot of expectations, given that the Light Novel is good and the concept was promising (Attractive Girls + Mobile Armours + Harem). For myself, I actually enjoyed IS because I went into watching it without any expectations, I knew nothing about it, and I only heard about it from a friend of mine.

I haven't read the Light Novels nor do I intend to, not because I hate IS or reading, but because I just don't have the time between work+school.

That being said, you provided a summary that was easy to understand and shared a lot of facts that weren't included in the anime. A big example was the whole "unmanned" IS, which I thought was a bit far-fetched even at the start. Now that it's been finally revealed there was someone in it, it just makes so much more sense. It is unfortunate that the anime failed to capture the accuracy and true plot of the Light Novel.

Your summaries did help explain a lot though. Even if you can't convince everyone to read the Light Novels, simply providing summaries from the original content will definitely do justice to the true plot of IS.

Offline Haxton Fale

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Re: Infinite Stratos and why it's worth reading (SPOILERS)
« Reply #2 on: January 17, 2012, 05:25:24 am »
Thanks. When I have too much free time, I might consider posting volume 5. There are two problems with that though: I need the said time and in vol5 starts some real stuff, which makes the novels really worth reading, and which I won't be able to avoid so easily for the summary to make sense.

That being said, you provided a summary that was easy to understand and shared a lot of facts that weren't included in the anime. A big example was the whole "unmanned" IS, which I thought was a bit far-fetched even at the start. Now that it's been finally revealed there was someone in it, it just makes so much more sense. It is unfortunate that the anime failed to capture the accuracy and true plot of the Light Novel.
Now I'm interested what are they planning to do with Ms. Fairs. Later on she appears in a scene where she is defending something using her Silver Gospel, and she might show up once again in volume 8... Well, the anime staff put themselves in a quite uncomfortable position... On the other hand, I might not watch the second season, if there will be any. Yet again, I can convince myself it's not warth watching over and over again, and still go and download it when it appears... Well, that's what happens when I see Harem with Sci-Fi show. I can't help hoping they might do it right next time (OVA was rather good, but they could've squeezed quite a lot more from volume 4)...

I haven't read the Light Novels nor do I intend to, not because I hate IS or reading, but because I just don't have the time between work+school.
You still lose a lot there :) For the sake of easy reading, I prepared myself a bunch of printable versions (no illustrations, sorry). Because these are light novels, and they are well-written light novels, they're pretty quick to read, so I still suggest you give it a shot :)