It's a generic harem anime, i.e. it goes downhill in Season 2. That's normal in a harem show without a resolution (which is most of them). Season 1 will be engaging with its concepts for the first time and the girls' personalities and motivations will be fresher, whereas the second season will think we want 12 pointless episodes of "THEY ALL LOVE HIM!!!" Guess what. That's true here too. Season 1 also had mecha battles. Those are also boring, to be honest, but at least they give the show some level of identity beyond "GIRLS!!!".

Also, in Season 1, it was possible to spot differences between the girls. Personally, I thought Charlie was the best by miles. She's thoroughly nice and gets closer to him in a way that no one else manages. In Season 2, though, everyone's generic and indistinguishable, forming a multi-bodied blob of heads and boobs who all behave in the same standard harem template way. The show's no longer capable of doing anything character-based with them and has to introduce another one.

A mechanical exoskeleton system has been developed in Japan. It's called Infinite Stratos (IS) and it can trounce conventional military weapons. However, men can't pilot it. Why? Er, because, um, anime harem nonsense. The only exception is our Token Male Protagonist! Ichika Orimura becomes the only male student at the prestigious Infinite Stratos Academy. Season 1 has an approximation at an ongoing plot, but Season 2 loses interest in such things except for the season finale. The baddies are... um, I suppose there's Phantom Task, but it would be possible to watch this show and afterwards forget that they were even there. Our heroes are no nearer to stopping Phantom Task at the end of Season 2 than they were at the beginning.

I've heard that Season 1 faithfully adapts the first three light novels. Season 2 ostensibly adapts volumes 4-8, but skipped a lot (especially volumes 6 and 8) and went anime-original for the last few episodes.

If you make the mistake of watching this show, you might notice:

1. Ichika can be a moron and not just because he's an "oblivious to love" harem protagonist. (He's a teenage boy in a school of buxom girls who all become obsessed with him, but he doesn't perceive a sexual dimension to anything.) No, he's capable of throwing away the school's set textbook and then complaining when the teacher says she'll replace it and that he must read it.

2. The only thing that reliably made me laugh was the ancient running gag about bad English cooking. "I need you to learn that England has delicious food too!" The IS students all represent different nationalities, you see, and there's an aristocratic English girl called Cecilia. In Season 2's best episode, she tries to improve her cooking in something like a series of assassinations with food as the murder weapon (except that no one dies).

3. There's nudity and nipples, but not enough to interest sleazehounds.

4. Season 1 episode 5. A "boy" with an obviously female voice has just arrived... ahem, yeah right. The show's not even trying to hide the imminent twist about Charlotte Dunois's gender. Mind you, I laughed at Ichika saying "er, here's some body soap" after walking in on her in the shower.

5. Season 2 has some harem antics so brazen that they're paradoxically the most memorable thing about the show. Episode 1 kicks things off with swimsuits, a resort, a water slide, etc. Episode 5 has the Orimura Ichika Servicing Competition. ("Each contestant gets to choose what to do, and whoever pleases Orimura-kun the most wins!" He doesn't get a vote in all this and has been tied to a chair.) Episode 6 has vanishing knickers and Episode 10 has Ichika being ordered to take everyone's measurements. Why him? He protests, thinks it's weird and is delighted to be given a blindfold (but it's actually see-through). If you think teenage boys behave like that, I have a bridge to sell you.

This anime is pointless, but not painful. No one's obnoxious or nasty. The girls are likeable and Ichika's innocence manages not to be annoying. Sure, he's implausible, but this show would have been unwatchable had he been leering over everyone. There's ostensibly a plot with mecha fights, action, baddies, etc. I reached the end of the show without screaming in pain. I certainly wouldn't recommend this and it deserves to be forgotten, but there's far worse out there.