Metallic Rouge – Season 1 Episode 7 Recap & Review

Appropriate Gear 

Episode 7 of Metallic Rouge starts with Rouge’s brother Jean reflecting on this world’s Venus Project. Suddenly, Naomi arrives and greets Jean. She refers to him as the former Chairman, signaling to the audience that Jean was terminated. Also, she states the Protection Bureau disbanded the Ministry of Truth because Jean discovered a proto-Nean.

Naomi says she can’t overturn the decision despite her status. Jean argues the Protection Bureau has been wanting to negotiate with visitors without going through the Ministry of Truth. He mentions there’s a reason for it and asks Naomi if she leaked something. Naomi smiles, signaling to the audience and Jean that she did leak something. 

After that dribble, Naomi informs Jean that she encountered the Puppetmaster and his cronies with Rouge. Naomi asks Jean if he knows who the Puppetmaster is. Jean says he’s still looking into that person’s identity and has sent an agent to go after the Puppetmaster. However, Jean says he lost contact with that person. 

Naomi thinks the Puppetmaster and his allies will visit Venus for several reasons. Then, Naomi brings up the Puppetmaster’s mind-toying shenanigans with Rouge. She feels Jean’s hiding something from her about Rouge’s past. Nonetheless, Naomi says Rouge will be transferred to the Protection Bureau and will receive punishment because her true identity has been discovered. 

Meanwhile, Ash shares his complaints about getting kicked off the Junghardt case. Noid comforts Ash but feels the people who kicked Ash off the case made the right move. Ash tells Noid he wants to visit the Ministry of Truth and interrogate Rouge. Noid doesn’t think it’ll be possible for Ash to see Rouge. 

Ash tells Noid he’ll figure something out when they arrive at the Ministry of Truth. After we see Rouge in some type of water-filled container, we cut to two men chatting with Chief Chau about the recent violation of Article 5 of the Artificial Species Operational Regulations. They mention Jean’s involvement with this.

Simultaneously, they’re doubting Chief Chau and her leadership role in the Ministry of Truth. They feel the ministry is abusing their power and state how they’ve submitted a dissolution to the Commission for the Welfare of Artificial Species. This will result in Chief Chau being relieved of her duties. 

Naomi arrives and tells the gentlemen without the Department of Divinities’ authority, the Commission won’t accept their submission. The only ones who will are the Department of Divinities, which means Naomi has the right to accept their repeal or not. She recognizes one of the gentlemen as Herman, PanaCare’s managing director.

She questions why a civilian like him is here. The other gentleman says they need Herman’s cooperation for Rouge’s case. Since Rouge is a precious sample to Herman, Herman says he’d like to take Rouge to his company and let them disassemble and research her. Chau says they won’t hand Rouge over.

Herman argues that they shouldn’t have Rouge since Chau’s organization violated a law. Naomi reminds both parties that she’ll be the one to make the call on Rouge’s fate. Suddenly, we cut to two men observing Rouge via several monitors. The monitors malfunction, causing our gentlemen to panic.

Jill walks into the room and shoots one of the men. She proceeds to shoot the other gentleman, breaks Rouge from her canister, and injects her with nectar. Rouge wakes up and asks Jill how she got inside. Jill says a Nean ally of her helped her enter the building. Jill reveals she’s a Nean and hands her a chocolate bar. 

Jill leads Naomi to a room full of dangerous Neans. She reflects on the ways humans and Neans are punished for their wrongdoings. During this discussion, Rouge might be a part of the Immortal Nine. Jill says she brought Rouge into this room because she needs her aid in freeing Neans from the Asimov Code, Nectar, and other things. 

Rouge doesn’t think it’s possible, but Jill disagrees. Jill informs Rouge about Jean’s termination from the Ministry of Truth. She proceeds to tell Rouge that she and Jean are replaceable figures. She asks Rouge to join her and Altar but Rouge refuses. Suddenly, an alarm goes off and we cut to Chau and Naomi learning Rouge escaped her imprisonment. 

Naomi tasks the Fenrir Squad to retrieve Rouge. After we see Ash and Noid rush into the Ministry of Truth’s HQ, we cut to Jill and Rouge running toward another Nean. Suddenly, Jill’s group bumps into a few soldiers. Jill defeats them and the Nean that assisted them succumbs to the Asimov Code’s effects and dies. 

Jill shares her disdain for this code and hopes Rouge will realize something from this exchange. Rouge glances at the sorrowful sight and leaves. Suddenly, four cyborgs arrive and surround Jill. Rouge arrives somewhere and Naomi calls out to her. Ash and Noid arrive at the scene, too. Rouge calls out to Naomi, questioning her for her actions at the end of episode six. 

Before Rouge could receive a response, an explosion caused by Jill’s fight with the cyborgs happened. Jill walks out and transforms into her gladiator form. Naomi recognizes Jill as Sylvia of the Flash, a member of the Immortal Nine. Sylvia combats the cyborgs. While doing so, she’s trying to get her points about humans across to Rouge. 

Before the cyborgs harm Rouge, another gladiator named Acros arrives and helps her. She grabs Rouge and flees. Rouge lets go of Acros because she’s baffled one of the Immortal Nine is helping her. Then, Noid and Ash hold Acros and Rouge at gunpoint. Acros rids herself of their gladiator form and we learn that it’s Aes. 

Additionally, we learn Alice never existed and that Aes is suffering from some type of dissociative identity disorder. Meanwhile, Jean’s technology informs him they found some corruptive security footage data for the Yunghardt residence. Jean investigates it but doesn’t find anything valuable. Suddenly, a bird that functions similarly to MK II arrives at Jean’s establishment. 

The person using this MK II-like bird brings Jean some data he requested. Additionally, he tells Jean that Rouge escaped. Jean heads off somewhere via a car and we see a girl with light blue hair monitoring him. At Ash’s current residence, Rouge asks Aes why an Immortal Nine member like him would save her. 

Aes argues that Alice (his other personality) researched and told Aes about Rouge which enticed him to help her. Aes says that he, Alice, and Jill are different from the other Immortal Nine members because they want to live mundane lives. Aes and Rouge have a deep discussion about Rouge’s Immortal Nine killing mission which snowballs into a chat about good vs evil. 

Eventually, Aes/Alice leave the room. Ash confronts Rouge about Roy Junghardt’s death and shows her footage that depicts her committing the act. Rouge ensures Noid and Ash she didn’t do it. Noid suspects Jaron did it and used his camouflaging ability to frame Rouge as the culprit. 

After a brief sequence occurs with Jean, we shift to two boys looking at Jaron on a beach. Jaron awakens, scaring the boys away. Then, Jaron’s buddy, Graufon, enters the scene and the episode closes with Jaron greeting him.  

The Episode Review

Despite the stellar action and wonderful world design, Metallic Rouge’s narrative continues to be a downer. Not only are matters getting more confusing to follow, but the characters are starting to get mildly dull, too. Additionally, there was a lot of organization chatter sprinkled throughout this chapter, making the pacing feel a bit unnatural at points. 

Moreover, fans might be disappointed that Rouge and Naomi didn’t properly confront each other about the imprisonment fiasco. While the episode addresses why Rouge was imprisoned, fans would’ve loved seeing the two discuss this fiasco further. It could assist the two in the character development department, something Metallic Rouge needs to work on. 

Fortunately, this episode throws Jill and Aes/Alice fans a bone though. From their Immortal Nine affiliation to Aes’s dissociative identity disorder, Studio Bones gave these characters some layer of uniqueness to help them feel unforgettable. Hopefully, they won’t be one-and-done characters though. 

Overall, this was a fine showcase from Metallic Rouge this week. While its plot is a bit confusing and disoriented, folks will stick around for its gorgeous visuals, fun fights, and decent cast.