Soukou no Strain

[Zati]

Episode 1 - Shinsen

In the distant future, the mankind is divided into two powers; Union and Deague. They have continued long war that no one is sure when it began. Union uses manned weapons, Strain, as the main military power, while Deague uses unmmand weapons Tumoru.
Sara Viereck, a daughter of a good family, is a Union’s 16-year-old girl who goes to Grapera Space Armed Soldier Academy locates in Cranial Solar System in order to become a full-fledged Reasoner (a pilot of Strain).
Her brother, Ralph Viereck, was sent to the front line 130 light years away to accomplish a special mission when she was 11 years old. It takes 400 years of objective time even by the fastest sub-light speed space craft of Union. However, according to relativist theory, it corresponds to two subjective years (the time crews experiences). Therefore, Sara needs to go to the same battle field to meet her brother.
Because they lost their parents when they were quite young, Sara thinks of her brother as a guy dearer than a sibling, and she lives for their reunion.
One day, the planet Sara lives is suddenly assaulted by Deague. Surprisingly, it was her brother Ralph that takes away a mysterious girl sleeping in a capsule.
To search the truth, Sara gets in Strain and runs after him. However, she receives an attack from Ralph, and the Mimic is broken. The Mimic is a copy of the pilot’s brain, and it is an essential part to control the Strain.
Taken from Animenfo

http://anidb.info/perl-bin/animedb.p...anime&aid=4556
http://www.animenfo.com/animetitle,3...no_strain.html
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/ency...me.php?id=6829
http://www.s-strain.jp/

[Kraco]

Her brother, Ralph Viereck, was sent to the front line 130 light years away to accomplish a special mission when she was 11 years old. It takes 400 years of objective time even by the fastest sub-light speed space craft of Union. However, according to relativist theory, it corresponds to two subjective years (the time crews experiences).

You would think the technology would be quite obsolete once it gets to the destination after 400 years of travelling... >_>

How was the first episosde? Did you check it out?

[Zati]

The first episode was pretty good, looks like another nice new mecha series, and I was quite impressed. The second half of the episode was unexpected, I was surprised what happened to all her friends in just the first episode, and makes you root for the female lead. If you like Code Geass, give this a try, you might like it.

[Kraco]

DF should have a look at this. While Sara's not Saber, she's still a blond and voice acted by Ayako Kawasumi...



Anyway, it looked like a decent series although I'm not the greatest fan of characters suffering from serious brother (or sister) complexes. It's just simply annoying and feels like a plot device, no matter how tragic and orphaned childhood such characters might have had. Perhaps it was natural for little Sara, who had nobody else left than her big brother, but that she's still like that when she's a cadet already is questionable. Is she dreaming of marrying her brother or what?

Well, fortunately the brother didn't have such emotional problems, and returned her warm feelings by almost killing her...

Edit: The next ep already got released:

Episode 2 - Shinsen

[Zati]

Just released again!

Episode 2 - Shinsen

Edit : The first two episodes were aired on the same day, like a doubleheader/twin-bill opener, which I think more series should try.

[Kraco]

A pretty good episode. A lot better than the first one, in my opinion. Even if Sara hasn't yet spoken aloud her desire to kill her brother, she's otherwise assumed quite a few Sasuke characteristics. She also sounds a lot more like Saber in this episode than in the previous one, in which she was still a somewhat happy and easy-going person, despite her obsessive dream of meeting her far away brother again. Now, when she's at the bottom, deadly determined, and being bullied because of that, I guess the required edge is a tone like Saber had.