History Anime / SoukouNoStrain

* DeadLittleSister: Older brother, actually.
** Played straight once you see Ralph's motivation for his FaceHeelTurn when he sees what the Union did.

Take ''ALittlePrincess'', [[RecycledInSpace put it in space]], add HumongousMecha and a lot of angst, twist the characters around and throw in some {{Fanservice}} to keep the fanboys with low attention spans.

* LikeThatShowButWithMecha: It's based on ''ALittlePrincess''.

* XMeetsY: ''ALittlePrincess'' meets ''{{Gunbuster}}''. With a little bit of {{Gundam}}

* NotSoDifferent: [[spoiler:Lottie is a young girl who entered the military in order to follow in the footsteps of her beloved big brother -- just like Sara. The main difference is that Lottie's brother was killed by Sara's, which results in Lottie going to kill Sara once her identity is revealed.]] This is even lampshaded by the title of the episode where we learn all this: "Like Looking At Myself".

* PsychoSupporter: Ralph to Vivian. [[spoiler:Although not entirely: he is insane, and he does hate the Union, but he also hates Deague and all other humans. He's just pretending to support Deague because it's convenient for him.]]

* VaporWear: the first episode makes a point of showing that Sarah doesn't wear anything under her flight suit.

* GoMadFromTheRevelation: [[spoiler: Happens to Ralph, when he discovers that an "unmanned" robot he was fighting turns out to have what looks like a little girl inside. She then reveals how the girls can share thoughts and memories with each other over vast distances, and gives him the same feelings. Which then causes an immense guilt trip when he discovers the Union performing secret experiments on the little girls.]]

* HumongousMecha: Strains are the actual ''humongous'' variety, and Gambees are only slightly bigger than their pilots.

* MistakenForSpies: Sara creates a new identity to avoid this. [[spoiler:For good reason -- once she's outed, everyone believes she's a spy for Deague anyway.]]

* BigBrotherAttraction{=/=]BigBrotherWorship: Both Sara and Lottie.

* VillainousBreakDown: [[spoiler: Ralph seems to suffer one after Emily refuses to go with him because she didn't want him going around on a killing spree.]]

* BLAMEpisode: Episode seven, which existed only for fanservice.

* InstantAwesomeJustAddMecha: It's based on ''ALittlePrincess''.

* KillEmAll: [[spoiler:eventual subversion.]]

* PlayboyBunny: Lavinia owns a Playboy Bunny suit. She uses it in one of her many, many failed Sara-seduction plans.

http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/SoukouNoStrain_2.JPG
-->''"[[ArcWords Only you can do what you've decided to do. If you keep that in mind, nothing is impossible.]]"''

* MohsScaleOfScienceFictionHardness: While some stuff is on the soft side of this scale, other aspects border on the harder parts, such as when they travel in sub-space, they age slower than people in normal time. In one episode, an instructor mentions that four days have passed for them, while back on their home planet, a month has passed. Also, when they reach Gala, Carris mentions having a little brother, who is actually physically older than him due to the amount of time Carris spent in sub-space.

* LittleMissBadass: Lottie may not be loli, but her [[{{pettanko}} flat chest]] and shortness were enough to give her the FanNickname. Also subverted by the [[spoiler:army of Emilys, actual lolis in mechs, who went down like... well, dolls.]]

* {{Pettanko}}: Lottie.

* {{Nakama}}: Lottie makes it clear that her team is one of these, and Sara is ''going'' to treat them like equals.

* SlidingScaleOfLivingToys: Emily's a Level 0.

* AlmostKiss: Interrupted once by an enemy attack, once by a phone call. [[spoiler:Both are immediately followed by the death of one of the would-be participants.]]

* AlphaBitch: Isabella, towards Sara. [[spoiler: She doesn't last more than a few episodes, and afterwards her posse continues to harass her, blaming her for her death.]]

Aside from its rather shocking beginning, the series has become notable for being chosen as one of the series to headline the launch of Funimation's own Internet video-on-demand service, allowing the entire series to be legally viewable online in fairly quality standard-definition for free, with higher-quality single-episode purchases and DVD purchases available. Anyone interested (and living in America) can see the series [[http://www.funimation.com/video/?page=show&b=93 here]].

* {{Fanservice}}: Quite a bit (to the annoyance [[YourMileageMayVary of a fair few]], especially since the show's based off of '''''A Little Princess'''''); it comes to the surface in the form of showers, change rooms and, well, [[MsFanservice Lavinia]].

* {{Bishoujo}}: ''Very'' much so.

* TheCheerleader: The Gambee pilots act like this towards Sara, which progressively gets worse when the Strain pilots try to befriend her and when she gets Ram-Dass. [[spoiler:Comes to a head after Isabella is killed in battle, at which point Mariette lures Sara to an isolated portion of the ship and starts harassing her, before she starts actually beating Sara up. Thankfully, at about the point where she goes for a large lead pipe, the Strain pilots intervene and shut the incident down.]]

* BigBrotherComplex: Both Sara and Lottie.

* AnimeAnatomy: Played straight early on, subverted with Lavinia in episode 7. Particularly embarrassing for her as she unintentionally runs out of the shower naked after accidentally kissing Jessie, then runs through the ship in her birthday suit in shock.

''"[[ArcWords Only you can do what you've decided to do. If you keep that in mind, nothing is impossible.]]"''

* FridgeLogic: ''Sub''-light speed, anyone?
** Being "swept away" in sub-light requires space to be [[SpaceFriction viscous]].
** While oddly named and with slightly-fudged properties, it's fairly clear that "sub-light speed" refers to relativistic speeds.
*** [[spoiler:Until the last episode, where consistency goes out the window. (Lead is stranded 100 years in the future, only to be picked up anywhere from 30 seconds to a few days later; her friends have only aged 20 years at the very most.)]]
*** Considering that A) we don't actually know how far they traveled and B) the others will also be traveling at sub-light speed, and thus do not age that much, I'd say that it's fairly consistent, all things considered.

* LesYay: Lavinia, Jessie, even Sara and Lottie to an extent.

* MoralEventHorizon: While we don't get to see exactly what Ralph did prior to this, his attack on the school in the first episode, and Sara seeing he was responsible for the deaths of her friends and classmates, qualifies.

* PortmanteauSeriesNickname: S-Strain.

* PinkBishoujoGhetto (Basion Tactical Training School at least ''started'' with an equal number of male and female pilots, but the mass slaughter of most of the students ended up with a squad of pilots mostly composed of cute girls and all reporting to male officers too old to be a [[{{Shipping}} ship]] threat. Only two male Reasoners are left, [[spoiler:one dies later, and the other spends the last battle on the sidelines with a broken arm.]])

* GrailInTheGarbage: Sara finds Emily in what looks like a scrap junkyard portion of the ship. She immediately grows attached to it.

* HeroicSacrifice: Cedie in the first episode. Also [[spoiler:Melchi and Dufarge... almost]].

* NewTransferStudent

* KarmicDeath

* KilledOffForReal