Soukou no Strain (Strain: Strategic Armored Infantry)

Eleven-year-old Sara Werec's elder brother, Ralph, was sent to the frontlines of an interstellar war 130 light years away, and Sara vowed to reunite with him one day as a comrade. Five years later, Sara is a student at Grapera Space Armed Soldier Academy, training to become a Reasoner, a pilot of an advanced weapons system called a "Strain."

When the academy is suddenly attacked by enemy forces, Sara enters battle against a Strain that quickly overpowers her. After incapacitating her, the pilot reveals himself to be her Ralph. Killing all the other students and destroying the school, he disappears, leaving Sara to question everything she has ever known. Soukou no Strain is the story of Sara as she reenters training under a new name, now determined to confront her brother and make sense of her brother's actions.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Characters & Voice Actors

Werec, Sara

Main

Kawasumi, Ayako
Japanese

Werec, Ralph

Main

Kondo, Takashi
Japanese

Emily

Supporting

Nonaka, Ai
Japanese

Gelh, Lotti

Supporting

Yukana
Japanese

Reberth, Lavinia

Supporting

Nonaka, Ai
Japanese

Carmichael

Supporting

Tanii, Asuka
Japanese

Shobbeypower, Martha

Supporting

Melchisidec

Supporting

Minagawa, Junko
Japanese

Radofrics, Carrisford

Supporting

Hoshi, Souichirou
Japanese

Iges, Jessie

Supporting

Matsuki, Miyu
Japanese

More staff

Staff

Cook, Justin

Producer

Watanabe, Tetsuya

Director, Episode Director

Kameyama, Toshiki

Sound Director

Aoki, Ei

Episode Director, Storyboard

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Opening Theme

"Message" by Yoko Ueno (eps 1-13)

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Ending Theme

"Umi no Opal" by Sema (eps 1-13)

Reviews

Mar 30, 2016

Joby05

Recommended

Summary: This is the perfect epitome of a good anime. It has a handful of unique and fantastic moments but for the most part is fairly straight forward and forgettable. It isn't bad, it isn't great... it's good. If you're looking for a middle of the road mech anime that focuses more on character development than fighting you will likely enjoy this, but I doubt you'll be moved. One thing I should emphasize is this is NOT ecchi. This is a mech anime. There are a few topless scenes for... reasons... and if you come in thinking high school dxd meets mobile suit gundam you ... will be VERY disappointed.

Story: 6/10
The story is pretty typical. Sara Wernec becomes a space cowboy because her brother is a space cowboy and she wants to follow in his footsteps. She develops mostly superficial relationships with characters (they are disguised as deep relationships but feel very superficial). She has an arch rival who she needs to overcome to ensure the safety of the world. The reason for the main antagonist existing is to watch the world burn because of some terrible thing humans did. These are all very typical tropes and I don't think there is enough difference to make this anything but good.

Art: 7/10
The art is good. The mechs look cool and the mech combat flows nicely. The characters all have diverse models and the art is drawn well. I likely how the MC Sara had a kind of butch haircut... it felt unique and I thought it was a good look for her.

Sound: 7/10
Again... good. There were a few songs I liked and the acoustic guitar rift playing during the climactic fight was an interesting take. You likely won't download the OST but you may grab a song or two.

Character: 6/10
The conflict between protagonist and antagonist was intense and the one scene with Sara and Lottie was fantastic (you'll know it when you see it). That said, all the rest of the relationships were trite. Nothing new, you've seen every one of these relationships 10 times at a minimum and they were likely done better at least a few times out of those instances.

Enjoyment: 7/10
At this point you may think I didn't enjoy this. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it very much. It was paint by the numbers but that didn't mean it didn't have a few unique elements and certainly doesn't mean it was bad. I almost never watch mech anime so these types of anime aren't as played out to me. There is enough unique elements to keep you watching to the end. The ending was a smidge rushed but it was a single season anime with a clear and established ending... considering how many anime can't get this right in several sceasons I'm going to cut this one a break.

Overall: 7/10
Overall, a good mech anime. If you a connoisseur of the genre you will likely see how generic and lackluster it is. If you're not huge into mech but like a story driven narrative and don't mind a bit of the familiar in regards to plot and character relationships I suggest giving this a watch.

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Mar 12, 2021

AnimeEnjoyer420

Mixed Feelings

Summary: Strain is a solid sci fi action series for fans of mechs and space operas. While the action itself is not always the best, the plot is interesting and engaging and has a solid payoff to its various mysteries. If you like fanservice, there's plenty of titties and girl on girl kissing as well.

Positives:

+ Interesting plot. The main story of Sara Werec and her attempt to understand why the brother she loved slaughtered all of her friends is appropriately dramatic for a space opera. The series is paced well and gives you answers at the right times, and it's fun ... to follow along and theorize about it yourself as you watch.

+ Art is very good considering it was made in 2006. Apart from a handful of dated looking character designs, you would never know this series is that old. The animation and CGI looks solid and everything is well drawn and smoothly animated for the most part.

+ Emily is ridiculously adorable. You can't even understand until you watch it.

Negatives:

- Characters lack personality. Sara especially, while recovering from the trauma of her friends' deaths in the series opener, is basically a personality black hole. She rarely speaks and has no internal monologue, so you never understand what she's thinking until she begins speaking to a doll occasionally. The side characters are also all just there for the most part, only Lottie has anything like a real personality among the other Reasoners on the Libertad.

- Some poor voice acting. I noted more than once while watching this series that the voices sounded flat and like they weren't matching the emotion that the scene called for.

- Slight spoilers, but the absolutely ridiculous way of setting the plot in motion on Gall by having Lavinia suddenly become extremely gay for Sara and go to extreme lengths to seduce her was too much and was not set up well enough to take seriously.

- The action is sometimes kind of boring. The Tumors are uninteresting baddies and the action is not especially dynamic. Most battles become a one sided massacre and lack drama beyond "which characters are going to die".

- Lack of worldbuilding. I'm not asking for like Game of Thrones level lore here, but there is so little explanation of the broader universe that they live in that it feels a bit impersonal, or like there's nothing that exists in the show universe outside of what's being depicted on screen at that very moment.

- Sudden ending to the series that comes out of nowhere. Feels like it was missing the last 5 minutes or something, it was very unexpected when it went to a black screen.

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Aug 24, 2023

FireRifle64

Not Recommended

Story: 3/10
Supposedly, this anime draws from an existing novel for inspiration called A Little Princess in which the main protagonist attends a rich school in New York City but her father dies in World War II which causes her to become a maid for the school. There she is laughed at by her peers and treated poorly. This anime utilizes that setup to create a similar scenario of the main character having it all and losing it all and being bullied.
The story is nothing special. In the background, two nations are fighting to establish an existing conflict and they aren't really explored or fleshed ... out in the runtime. As mentioned, the main character, Sara, attends a special school for piloting special mechs but an enemy attack hits her area and it turns out her brother became a traitor. We follow her becoming basically a grunt mecha pilot for an academy where she is laughed at and mocked for being distant and showing off her skills. From there, trouble ensues and casualties take place.
The story felt rather boring. It contains action moments given its mecha tag but it could have used more screentime for fights. The show has like 2-3 eps of downtime to add humor which isnt all that funny. And for a show labelled an ecchi, it only has 3 eps with nudity. They should have leaned heavy into the nudity which it didnt.
The series does end for Sara. Nothing epic like ending a war but for her own journey. Having said that, the ending has a happy route which I did not care for since none of the conflict or characters I cared for to appreciate the ending.
Characters:3/10
Let me just say this first, no one in this damn show is memorable nor are they likable. Many side character that are introduced are not fleshed out and several die to push some sort of reaction from characters and motivation to perform some action due to their deaths. Sara was a MC whom I could not care for. I thought her struggles were ok. I enjoyed the riches to rags to whatever she became in the end and that was it. The antagonist, her brother Ralph, was forgettable, and his motivations were rather shallow and unimaginative. OF all the characters in the show, I hated one girl named Lavinia because she attempts to do something to the MC in the name of love which backfires and create more conflict. I just hated her and she was one of the only source of ecchi in the show which sucked even more.

Sound: 4/10
I felt overall, none of the music in the show really stood out. Rather bland to listen to. Additionally, I had no thoughts on the VAs.

Art: 4/10
The character designs were generic and unappealing. They kind of looked bad. The thing that stood out for better and for worse was the inclusion of CGI. It was used for the mechas which I will say were unique in design. The models though for other CGI entities looked out of place and the CGI explosions did not look right. I value them attempting to incorporate dynamic scenes with the help of CGI but wished they looked better and had more screentime for these mecha fights.

Enjoyment: 3/10
I think the only thing I will remember from this show is how much of a snoozefest it was. There are better mecha genre out there that should suffice rather than watching this. Same goes for ecchi. I would not recommend anyone to really watch this unless they desire something to help them sleep.
Overall: 3/10

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Poll: Soukou no Strain Episode 11 Discussion zanmato666 - Feb 10, 2007	9 replies	by Dekom »» Apr 25, 4:38 PM
Poll: Soukou no Strain Episode 10 Discussion blackfeather_58 - Aug 7, 2008	7 replies	by Dekom »» Apr 23, 4:49 PM
Soukou no Strain Episode 9 Discussion martino - Jan 4, 2007	4 replies	by Dekom »» Apr 22, 5:06 PM
Poll: Soukou no Strain Episode 8 Discussion ShanaFlame - May 27, 2009	6 replies	by Dekom »» Apr 21, 4:49 PM
Poll: Soukou no Strain Episode 7 Discussion ShanaFlame - May 27, 2009	11 replies	by Dekom »» Apr 19, 4:56 PM

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Werec, Sara

Werec, Ralph

Emily

Gelh, Lotti

Reberth, Lavinia

Carmichael

Shobbeypower, Martha

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Iges, Jessie

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