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1* AlternateCharacterInterpretation: Is Ichika really as dense as he seems? Or is it all an act as a result of being an unintentional chick magnet in a school were he's the only male, the pressure of having to live up to his big sister's legacy, and a desire not to hurt the feelings of any of the girls chasing after him until he knows for sure which one he wants to be with? The Light Novel, which tells the story from his perspective, runs with this interpretation in mind, as it reveals that he’s not as clueless as he wants everyone to believe.
2* AmericansHateTingle: Season 2 was overwhelmingly considered to be a disgrace by most American fans. In Japan, however, the series still sold like gangbusters and was just as popular as the first season.
3* ArcFatigue: Instead of moving the plot forward, the show keeps introducing girls to Ichika's harem and putting too much focus on the harem antics. [[spoiler:By the end of season 2, the heroes are no closer to stopping Phantom Task than they were at the beginning, and the ''World Purge'' [=OVA=] is just an extended romantic fantasy almost entirely disconnected to the main plot.]] Not helping at all are {{Schedule Slip}}s caused by the author's health problems at the time.
4* BaseBreakingCharacter:
5** Tatenashi. You either find her the best girl in the series for her CoolBigSis tendencies and [[TheTease flirting toward Ichika]], or just way too perfect that borders on annoying. No middle ground!
6** Houki is another one. For some, she is one of the best girls of the show with an adorable personality and produces funny scenes with Ichika. Others just despise her saying she is just a generic {{tsundere}}, and believe that the author is [[DerailingLoveInterests trying to make her look good at the cost of degrading the other girls' characters]].
7** Ichika is another. His many detractors find his seemingly dense personality a hindrance. But there are supporters who find his insecurity towards the girls understandable, and how he's been improving in combat over the course of the series (even with the help of the girls most of the time).
8* ClicheStorm: Almost every cliche you'd expect in a Harem anime, you could expect to see it in here.
9* CrazyIsCool:
10** Tabane Shinonono. A DitzyGenius who has created the IS in the first place, (presumably) programmed about 2000+ [=ICBMs=] to launch towards Japan (just to give her creation a stellar debut), and (supposedly) took control of an "unmanned" IS just to let her younger sister debut as a personal IS user on her birthday. Doubles as a subtle ActorAllusion, considering that she shares her seiyuu with [[Franchise/LyricalNanoha Nanoha]]. When Tabane unveiled the IS to the world, she got a lot of ridicule and criticism. So what did she do? She [[DefeatMeansFriendship befriended]] them via mass ICBM launch.
11** Not only is her brain 'over-specced' but also her body as well. After she curbstomps three of Phantom Task's finest, with one of them in an IS, she tells them that only 'Chi-chan' is capable of holding her own against her.
12* DieForOurShip: As you'd might expect, fans of any one of the harem girls feel this way about the rest of the harem. The most amount of vitriol goes to Houki, however.
13* EnsembleDarkhorse: Honne Nohotoke, a side-character that appeared in the anime in Pikachu-esque pajamas, appears to have gained quite a following for someone with a less than a minute of screentime. She did show up in a few scenes wearing the IS academy's prescribed uniform, but hers seem to have overly long sleeves compared to the rest.
14* FanficFuel: War, politic, social shift... the potential is limitless, and three point above is rarely addressed in the canon source (except small clues here and there) despite it was said the introduction of titular PoweredArmor [[InformedAbility more than few things changed]], leaving the gap for the fic writers to explore. It was not rare to find the sheer difference of atmosphere in I.S. fanfic as the result, from RomanticComedy[=/=]{{Shipping}} to GrimDark WarFic, despite the [[SugarWiki/NeedsMoreLove tiny size of the fanbase]].
15* FanNickname:
16** Honne Nohotoke gained the nickname "Pikachu-chan", due to her unusual beach costume in season 1 episode 9.
17** Then there's "Neutron Star" for Ichika, due to his [[CluelessChickMagnet romance-related cluelessness]] which rivals even [[Literature/{{Kampfer}} Natsuru Senou]].
18** Some people call this series as "Country Wars" because it reminds them of [[Literature/DemonKingDaimao Color Wars.]]
19** A large number of people simply like to refer to the girls by the country they represent. Cecilia and Bri-tan is the most original it can get.
20** A lesser but still well-known nickname coined by /a/ would be [[Literature/CharlieAndTheChocolateFactory Ichika And The Jelly Factory.]] [[labelnote:Explanation]] Jelly in this case would mean [[ClingyJealousGirl jealous.]][[/labelnote]]
21** Invoking JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant, detractors call this "limit of successful works", meaning that if a work did not surpass IS's BD sale number(33,813), it cannot be considered successful.
22** Some fans referred to the anime's second season as ''Infinite Stratos 2: [[OddlyNamedSequel2ElectricBoogaloo Electric Boogaloo]]''.
23* FanPreferredCouple: Charlotte/Ichika. Many fans argue that it would be refreshing for a harem hero to end up with a sweet, gentle and kind girl rather than yet ''another'' violent, domineering, inconsiderate, selfish and emotionally insincere tyrant (which is unfortunately EVERY other girl in the harem, at least at first) for a change. There's even a spin-off manga where Charlotte is promoted to being the main character and the two are more or less an OfficialCouple.
24* HarsherInHindsight:
25** Laura during Volume 8's [[spoiler:LotusEaterMachine sequence]] mentions [[spoiler:“The situation in the Middle East is changing."]] Cue the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
26** This series' very acronym, "IS", is now shorthand for that same entity among major media outlets. If you were to ask a random person out there what IS means, chances are he or she would respond with Islamic State.
27* HilariousInHindsight: Creator/SentaiFilmworks is known to throw out the "lewd card" meme from season 2 for a while in regards to Creator/JessicaCalvello. Cue her casting for the Season 2 English Dub as [[SensualSlavs Tatenashi]] [[ShamelessFanserviceGirl Sarashiki]].
28* HoYay:
29** Ichika and Charles seem close, and a lot of the Academy girls love it. No one minds however after Charlotte's [[UnsettlingGenderReveal gender reveal]].
30** Female examples: Laura for Orimura-sensei. Her teammates back in Germany really thought she ''was'' gay for Chifuyu.
31*** This gets toned down a lot after her SuperpowerMeltdown, though, when Chifuyu tells Laura to become her own person and stop trying to imitate her.
32** Rin gives Cecilia [[HappyEndingMassage a lower-body massage]], complete with much laughter and squealing from the latter. (Actually, she's trying to "save" Ichika from having to do the same.)
33** Season 2, Episode 1. [[spoiler: Charlotte]]/Laura so very much.
34*** So much, that the other people in the store with them ''start taking photos''.
35*** Special mention goes to Laura ''licking'' crepe off [[spoiler:Charlotte]]'s cheek, with [[spoiler:Charlotte]] getting understandably [[LuminescentBlush flustered]]. Of course, Laura does this largely because she has NoSocialSkills.
36*** [[spoiler:Charlotte]] also gets rather touchy-feely with Laura when they both put on their kitty pajamas.
37** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4n3ZBj7Z3KU Episode 8]] of the second season has Tatenashi suddenly sneaking up on Houki while she's practicing kendo and feeling up her boobs. Later on when doing a scan of Houki to check their compatibility as tag-team partners, she's rather interested in the fact that Houki has bigger breasts than her, much to Houki's consternation.
38** There is a scene in Volume 4 of the novels between Squall and Autumn that is full of subtext between them which was not present in the anime.
39* IronWoobie: You gotta hand it to Ichika. He's thrown into a situation he is woefully unprepared for, his BattleHarem won't take "no" for an answer, a terrorist organization that wants to kill him and take his [=IS=] core and the guy still manages to remain cheerful and optimistic.
40* ItWasHisSled: How many places actually still spoiler-mark Charles/Charlotte's true gender and name?
41* MemeticLoser: Pretty much [[BaseBreakingCharacter Ichika]] himself: Many fans take advantage of his (feigned) stupidity by adding him in dense-related content.
42* MemeticMutation:
43** [[{{Fanservice}} PLOT]] as coined by [[Website/FourChan /a/]], possibly derived from "[[IReadItForTheArticles I WATCH xxx FOR THE PLOT]]"
44** Also, post anything about Charles/Charlotte and [[ItMakesSenseInContext windows]]. Guaranteed replies complete with white knighting ''with pictures''. Becomes sort of an AscendedMeme with the Season 2 opening.
45** "France-tan is best-tan!" and "Char is special..." Technically Charlotte is now the fanbase's own SacredCow.
46** [[RhymesOnADime Houki Pouki]] thanks to Houki ''launching Ichika in the air'' with a kick.
47** /a/ is now Infinite Str/a/tos after moot allegedly confessed to liking ''Infinite Stratos'' on the boards.
48* {{Moe}}:
49** '''[[HoYay Charles]]''' and Laura post-[[DefrostingIceQueen meltdown]]. Also, SenseiChan Maya.
50** Taken up to eleven with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_xyc3rg0ko this bit from Season 2]]. So Moe, it ''definitely'' hurts...
51* MoralEventHorizon:
52** Tabane Shinonono crosses it [[spoiler:when she shows no regret that Ichika was nearly died by Excalibur and gleefully drove him to despair by calling him a monster after revealing that he is an ArtificialHuman.]]
53** Madoka crosses it [[spoiler:when she stabs and nearly kills Ichika while he was despairing at the revelation from Tabane.]]
54* OneTrueThreesome:
55** The fact that Charlotte and Laura are extremely friendly to each other has led to some portions of their fan bases proposing this solution. The first episode of the second season shows they really are good friends, with both of them foiling an armed robbery and [[LesYay Laura licking some spilled ice cream off the corner of Charlotte's mouth.]]
56** True enough, one chapter of the ''Sugar & Honey'' spin-off is actually an excuse for this trope.
57* SacredCow: Charlotte, big time. This may be because people are absolutely sick of harem girls who are violently jealous Tsunderes (which is pretty much all the other harem girls, with the possible exception of Laura), and Charlotte's sweetness and general [[BuffySpeak not-Tsundere-ness]] is very refreshing to fans of other harem animes. See also the FanPreferredCouple entry above.
58* SecondSeasonDownfall:
59** There are quite a few who feel the second season is far inferior to the first. Part of it is probably because a good 90% of the second season has been focused on wacky harem antics, with very little time devoted to advancing a plot or even having awesome mech battles (which was, you know, ''[[JustHereForGodzilla the one thing]]'' that distinguished this series from other harem shows). While it's true the first season had a pretty weak main plot too, it at least managed to strike a pretty even balance between harem hijinks and IS action, which cannot be said for the second season. Basically, the second season ''doesn't have enough StuffBlowingUp.''
60** There is also the issue with season 2 cramming 3 volumes into 5 episodes. Normally this alone is enough material for an entire season [[labelnote:*]]Not an exaggeration: the ''entire first season'' consisted of Volumes 1-3.[[/labelnote]]. The result is the elimination of anything not harem antics related, which means that CharacterDevelopment, such as Cecilia's, was completely eliminated. Overall we are missing some 80% to 90% of the plot of volume 4 to 6.
61*** Volumes 4 and 5 were actually adapted pretty accurately, as was Volume 7 (though half of V4 was covered in an OVA, and the school festival in V5 was shortened in the anime but at the same time the Cinderella play was extended). It was Volumes 6 and 8 that really suffered AdaptationDecay; those volumes are the ones missing almost all their scenes. The series started off very faithful to the novels but around the middle of the second season, the anime started taking liberties with the source material until the final three episodes went into all-out anime original territory. [[http://myanimelist.net/forum/?topicid=708315 This topic]] explains all the differences between the novels & anime (be warned for spoilers that span the entire series, both books and show).
62*** The "World Purge" OVA was a pretty accurate adaptation of the titular incident from Volume 8.
63* ShipToShipCombat: It's an UnwantedHarem with PoweredArmor, it's to be expected.
64* SignatureScene: Laura stealing Ichika's FirstKiss. Alternatively, Charles' UnsettlingGenderReveal via ShowerOfAwkward.
65* SoBadItsGood: The second season was a major step down in quality but dammit if it wasn't funny sometimes.
66* SoOkayItsAverage: The show really doesn't break any ground with Harem tropes. And if Amazon reviews are any indication, the Japanese audience feels the same way: most of the novels fall squarely in the 2 - 2.5 star range.
67* TearJerker: In the Drama CD, Houki and Rin return to the academy after learning that Ichika wants ''to be with'' Tatenashi. They have spent the entire time eating to their hearts' content and trying to forget about their love interest by cursing his name. But then, they look at their food and get reminded on how much Ichika loves these. It wasn't long before both Houki and Rin were crying and begging Ichika to come back to them. Even though they were harsh on Ichika, they truly did love him and it was sad to hear them just breaking down.
68* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: The idea of a world where position toward genders has been inverted due to a new weapon of mass destruction being usable only by women actually had a lot of potential for an interesting story, but ends up being used as little more than a background for a typical harem plot.
69* ValuesDissonance: [[http://bato.to/read/_/273496/infinite-stratos-yuuki-homura_ch10_by_rapid-switch/16 There's a moment in the second manga adaptation]] where Rin points chopsticks at Houki while bragging about how she will win the next tournament. Ichika's internal monologue chastises Rin for being uncultured. This might not seem like a big deal for those unfamiliar with the context, but in many East Asian countries, pointing chopsticks at someone is extremely rude as they resemble incense sticks and it can be interpreted as a funerary symbol.
70* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: The IS fights in the anime are very well animated.

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