"Misdirection is the key to survival. Never attack where your enemy defends, never behave as your enemy predicts and never reveal your true intentions. If 'knowledge is power' then to be unknown is to be invincible." - Romulan intro, BotF
I'm so glad someone else remembers BotF, I absolutely loved that game and until recently still played a version modded to run on newer systems (but unfortunately with the intro cutscenes unplayable). I had the most fun in that game as the Romulans, and in that game the cloaking is broken, because they get a free turn to fire where the enemies couldn't react. Enough ships available can even destroy a borg cube in one turn, leaving you basically invincible in space combat scenarios.
There have been no series set on any starships other than Federation. The only series not set on a Federation starship was Deep Space Nine and they got one anyway. The Romulan sun went supernova and the Romulans will never be an Empire again. Their home is Ni’Var and it’s rejoined the Federation. The franchise is in danger of dying out completely and you’re looking for a Romulan series? “Resonate some understanding.”
@@AndrewD8Red, “Resonate some understanding” is a quote from Demolition Man. I can’t say what I really think of the idea and the guy who thought of it, because it’ll get censored by TH-cam. No doubt your responses are similarly limited.
@@RichardA.-yi5sz Yes... and that's a peculiar thing to say... I'm not sure what part of this concept is proving elusive to you... but I know I shouldn't expect too much from people like... well, you get the idea.
Balance of Terror the 1966 remake of The Enemy Below (1957) with a Star Trek theme. Still one of my favorite episodes as a kid in the 1970s because of the Space Battle
Indeed. This episode gave us insight into what was going on inside the Romulan ship. Rather than turn around and head for home, the Romulan captain yielded to the pressure from his first officer and tried to destroy Kirk and the Enterprise. In a later episode of TOS, the female Romulan captain underestimated Spock. As a result, she was beamed up with Spock to the Enterprise in her pajamas and not in her Romulan uniform.
I always figured that the Remans were native to that star system (perhaps even Romulus itself) when the first Vulcan diasporates arrived. They then subjugated and relocated the Remans. A very Romulan thing to do.
I like the idea that Remans are products of genetic tampering either pre Sundering or during it and were exiled to Remus. So they are still genetic siblings of the Romulans and Vulcans but are rejected and put to work in the mines due to their original abnormal features.
Much praise mentioning Monty Thrasher, an amazing creative Artist, for his work on the Romulan logo and Alphabet. He is brilliant and deserves more attention. I had the pleasure of seeing some of his Trek Concept work. There was lots more development than has ever been shown.
And centuries later, leaked documents show thousands of Tal Shiar Agents spending decades to orchestrate the light bulb going out in the first place to provide lighting for a possible attack on the Federation twenty years later. All members died of natural causes the next day.
I thought, after seeing nemesis, that the romulans with forehead ridges had interbred with the remans (who had forehead ridges). This interbreeding could be a conquest thing (the way roman soldiers would have their way with the women of places they conquered).
@@Kaede-Sasaki Especially when you consider how far Sela went in their society, so it might actually be a thing of incorporating things into their own gene pool. It also makes me wonder if there weren't also issues with genetic bottlenecking that the early Romulans were suffering with a population issue in the number that left Vulcan, because, well, it might have been a survival trait there
Regarding the ridges, my own head canon that probably doesn't line up properly is that the ridges were a genetic mutation that allowed some Vulcans to control their intense emotions but at the cost of their telepathic abilities. The ridgeless Vulcans, ruled by their emotions, saw the ridged Vulcans as abominations and tried to wipe them out and this is the Vulcan Civil War. Some of the ridgeless Vulcans, not completely consumed by their emotions, sided with the ridged Vulcans and helped them escape Vulcan and went with them to found Romulus, which why there are both ridged and ridgeless Romulans. Generations of interbreeding eventually led to the suppression of psychic abilities among the ridgeless Romulans which allowed them to control their emotions better. Meanwhile, back on Vulcan, the remaining Vulcans turned on each other and almost destroyed themselves but Surak developed a means to suppress emotion and guided the Vulcans towards logic.
i had always assumed that the Remans were the native species of the system that the Romulans had conquered and subjugated when they arrived separated from Vulcan.
I thought, after seeing nemesis, that the romulans with forehead ridges had interbred with the remans (who had forehead ridges). This interbreeding could be a conquest thing (the way roman soldiers would have their way with the women of places they conquered).
Seeing the Romulans in Balance of Terror was such a shock that they blocked out the fact that Spocks dad Sarek looked an awful lot like the captain of the Romulan ship
“All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romulans ever done for us?” Mon’Te p’Thon.
i did like the Romulan way novels' style and also the FASA TTRP game's efforts to put together a playable Romulan species and culture with what was available in the 80's (their game books were titled "the Romulan way")
There is a real life town of Romulus in upstate New York (USA) that our favorite Klingon in real life became the mayor (J. G. Hertzler). I briefly lived there.
Congratulations! It's nice every once in a while to get one of these "X thinks you didn't know about…" headlines that actually includes things I didn't already know. You pulled it off! There's a greater than average number of things I didn't already know about Romulans.
8:43 I haven’t had any coffee yet and my house is at chaotic levels of noise (nothing’s wrong, my children just scream at each other recreationally) so I had to go back and make sure he said “In the fans of minds” and that my brain wasn’t playing tricks on me 😂
So this implies that the Romulan culture is basically the "Pre Surak" original Vulcan culture. So the Vulcans were originally ruthless, cruel, extremely emotional (T'Pol demonstrates this on Enterprise) and basically the Roman Empire. So this could also imply the Vulcans had a very hedonistic culture before Surak as well. The non-canonical books also explain that Vulcan had a pantheon of gods, just as the Romans did. But they seemed to have confused their early psionic and telepathic powers as something of a religious "gift". If you also look at their intelligence agencies, the Vulcans have the V'Shar and the Romulans have the Tal Shiar. The wording is probably similar. They even had a version of the afterlife. The Romulans call it Erebus, but that is Greek not Roman. Romans called it Scotus. So it makes me wonder what Hades means to the Romulans? It can also be implied that Romulan culture has been impacted by their more "under the table" trading. In the book "The Devil's Heart" there is a Romulan (no spoilers) whose family library contains a large assortment of Earth books. Probably traded by passing Romulan ships with the Ferengi and possibly the Klingons or even the Orion Syndicate. They probably found some kinship in the tales of Ancient Earth and maybe even find some of it useful. They are like their Vulcan cousins very curious, and love to study others.
We used to watch TOS after class in high school. We had a game - identify the episode within seven seconds. I almost always got it right. People say "You sure know a lot about Star Trek". I say, "No, no I don't, not even close. I know people who do, and I don't operate at that level." This fellow is one of *those* people. Respect.
@@ourkeving The remastered TOS adds a difficulty level, opening shots can look a lot different, but it is usually the music cues for me. I love the incidental music of TOS, it's glorious.
Romulans simply do not get enough respect. Their linage is not their own, Their planet is not their own, They are not treated as adequate adversaries. It took 10 films before they made it to being the "big bad" Then , when they lose their home, they are forced to move back in with mom and dad.
Also in STO, The Iconians destroyed the Hobus Star as revenge for Sela betraying them. As the Iconians were moments from destroying earth, an alliance of Romulans, Klingons, Vulcans, Ferengi, Andorians, Gorn, and Krenim used The Time ship from Voyagers Year Of Hell to travel 200,000 years to before the Iconian race was presumed destroyed. Sela tried to kill them while everyone else tried to save them and they swore revenge. It became a Causality paradox.
My less interesting head canon for why the Romulans are called that is simply because they reminded humans of the Roman empire. The Romulans presumably call themselves and their homeworld something completely different in their own language.
I can't remember if it was Chabon, Fontana or Duane who wrote a story about a Romulan archetect who defected to the Federation and was surprised how few escape tunnels, secret entrances and panic rooms there were in Federation designs. It was very amusing whoever it was.
the line in PIcard about the Romulans that came from the North had ridges was an Easter Egg for the 2005 Doctor Who episode called "Rose"....Rose asked the Doctor if he was an alien why did he sound like he came from the North (as in Northern England).....and his replied "Lots of Planets have a North"
I like it a lot, the look is not Classico, but it is exactly what Section 31 is! So I love it! 🎉 I wish that Tyler can be present, was really a shame that he was send off with the promise of a series Spinoff that never happened, and now we don't know the timeline 😢
The books covered the forehead ridges a long time ago. Essentially noble families thst traced back to their schism still had some families wo the ridges but over time the rank and file developed them
The Romulan story arc in Star Trek Online was hands down my favorite. It even has a young follower of Spock's in "Unification" as the New Romulus leader.
Although the Romulans call themselves an Empire, we never see or hear from any Romulan emperor or empress (at least in alpha canon). The de facto leader seems to be the Preator, making the form of state more like the Roman Republic than the Empire.
Well during the Roman Principate which encompassed the first 3 emperors. The illusion of the state still being a Republic was maintained. Despite the truth being that it was already a monarchy. So it's possible that is what the Romulan government is doing as well
My Question is: Do Romulans HAVE Vulcan Strength or not? I don't recall ever seeing mention of it, minus the JJ film, but I DO recall the Romulans being completely useless in Melee fights. Is this a known in canon thing and I've missed it or just a "We don't talk about the JJ trek" kind of thing?
I prefer the other make up director's theory about the Romulan ridges. She always thought they were keloids, from a Romulan scarification ritual. Meaning the Romulans had ritual where they would scar their foreheads as small children or infants to separate themselves from their Vulcan cousins. With the scars symbolizing the Romulan racial scar of being driven (though they weren't really) from Vulcan with coming of logic. I also like the apocrypha origin of the Romulan cloaking device, that it was found in Slaver (the races from Animated Series/Ring World Series) Stasis box and what the Romulans created/update over the centuries was their base attempt to back engineer such an advanced device (with some fans suspecting it was phase cloak too, but again so advanced, like everything from Slavers that the Romulans could never replicate it, only make poor copy).
Garek, the tailor, was the one who helped the Federation to get the Romulans to join the fight against the Dominion-Cardassian Alliance. A Cardassian style bomb placed aboard the Romulan ship that carried the Romulan senator was all that was needed. Garek had the stomach for it, when Sisko did not. Garek showed that he was once in the Obsidian Order.
My head cannon is that the faction of Vulcans that united under the raptor wing had almost all the Vulacans with head ridges and a part of the smooth forehead Vulcans. They were exiled from from Vulcan and settled in cannon locations.
Making Romulan plotting and duplicity the core of Picard series 1 & 2 was a bad move. It’s just all so bloody tiring trying to keep track of it all. Give me a simple narrative of a protagonist encountering an almost deadly challenge, losing faith, finding themselves through help of an unlikely source and becoming stronger as a consequence.
Props can be come major headaches. Star Trek Where No Man Has Gone Before, Dr. Dehner is listed being 5-2: actress Sally Kellerman is/was 5'-10." Mitchell is listed as 5'-8" whereas the actor is six feet. Errors will arise and get ingored.
Yes, so much wasted potential with the Romulans in TNG, loved the DD Warbird, some great parts with Tomalak, the defector and others, Their appearance in Redemption episodes, face of the enemy. I feel so much more could have been achieved
The Federation Was Lucky The Romulans Never Found Out How They Were Tricked On Joining The Dominion War Otherwise I'm Sure The Romulans Will Have Hit The Federation With Everything They Got
I really wished they would have used the Romulans in the Star Trek: Insurrection script! That INSTANTLY raises the stakes and I care more about everything on the film. Wasted Opportunity to me.
i am crossing my fingers with the enterprise nx01 refit finaly shown on screen we do see the earth romulan war on screen would be perfect setting for a mini series
I'd only want that if they use the beta canon as inspiration and bring Commander Tucker back as having faked his death to work with Section 31 in infiltrating the Romulan Warp 7 project and his work behind the scenes on Romulus during the Romulan War.
"They came for the North" so someone in Star Trek actually introduced ETHNICITY, racial or cultural, to an alien race/faction. Finally... I mean "fans" who still have a problem with Black Vulcans. You could easily write that in the Klingons and all the variations and depictions the same way and it would just make them so much cooler.
I remember Caecilius. He and his family (and one of the slaves?) were written as having died during the Mt. Vesuvius eruption in AD 79, the dog watching over his master in vain. In reality, Caecilius supposedly died in a completely different natural disaster, that being an earthquake, in AD 62.
Who in turn claim that you should never turn your back to a Breen... How shady to you have to be to have a ROMULAN make up a proverb warning you about dealing with them?
I always thought we were gonna get a reveal that somehow the Romulans and Klingons were related. To explain the appearance of cranial ridges on both in the TNG era where Vulcans did not. And that one episode where somehow on the flagship of the Federation (and an Enterprise no less) that there were no suitable blood donors to a dying Romulan but Worf. Ie no Vulcans somehow were on a prestigious assignment named after the ship captained by the first Vulcan in Starfleet. Or there were Vulcans, which is more likely, but somehow Vulcans could be unsuitable donors where a Klingon could be suitable. Maybe that tech exchange in the TOS era was a bigger exchange than we had been led to believe. Which would also explain the current hostility. No bigger hate than what springs from perceived betrayal. In this case the Klingons allying with the Federation
@rubaiyat300, I haven't seen that episode in a while so I may be misremembering...But I thought it was Worf's BLOOD that was a match, but that there was something IN HIS BLOOD Dr. Crusher could use.
Exactly. How would that be unless Romulans shared some genetic ties to Klingons? Like you’d be more related to a jellyfish than a sentient from another world even with Preserver shenanigans explaining some of that.
The idea of Northern Province Romulans (ridges) and Southern Province Romulans (no ridges) was originally the reason Gene Roddenberry gave for why the TOS Klingons and the TNG Klingons were so different from one another. 🖖😎👍
The pocket novels had the Romulus performing some brutal experiments on Vulcans and themselves in an attempt to regain telepathy. It’s possible the Remans were an unintended result of biogenetic experiments. (Echoing the Klingon ridge problem.)
Although I would not say deception was a way of life for ancient Greeks, in the Odyssey it is clear that deception is a perfectly acceptable means of gaining an advantage. If you were really good at it (as Odysseus is), it was even considered admirable. Even Athena is blown away by Odysseus' skillful use of deception. Ironic that the Romulans emulate the Greeks more than the Romans with their signature trait.
@@DragonTigerBoss True, but I don't think they considered deception admirable. Although I don't know as much about the Romans as I do about ancient Greece.
I thought, after seeing nemesis, that the romulans with forehead ridges had interbred with the remans (who had forehead ridges). This interbreeding could be a conquest thing (the way roman soldiers would have their way with the women of places they conquered).
Honestly, the duplicity side of things might be a thing where it's a more self-control thing, essentially outplaying the opponent rather than just beating them with outright violence there. I wonder if it came from their time wandering before finding Romulus/Remus, not having the population to actually lose anyone they could avoid losing, so conflicts being resolved with manipulation and backstabbing over open conflict seems like it might have developed more there. The same population issue could also explain the forehead ridges, being something from interbreeding due to genetic diversity issues and potential defects from it...which could also be an explanation for how well Sela did since, to most Romulans, she's still Romulan despite her mother not being one, so she'd, largely, be treated the same as any other Romulan unless there were other issues that came out of it.
I've always wondered whether the Mintakans are actually some of the migrants from Vulcan who established Romulus who crashed or had to abandon ship on Mintaka, and that over time forgot their origin, or even that they were another offshoot, who deliberately formed a neo-primitivist colony and concealed their true origin from their children and grandchildren.
"Misdirection is the key to survival. Never attack where your enemy defends, never behave as your enemy predicts and never reveal your true intentions.
If 'knowledge is power' then to be unknown is to be invincible."
- Romulan intro, BotF
I'm so glad someone else remembers BotF, I absolutely loved that game and until recently still played a version modded to run on newer systems (but unfortunately with the intro cutscenes unplayable). I had the most fun in that game as the Romulans, and in that game the cloaking is broken, because they get a free turn to fire where the enemies couldn't react. Enough ships available can even destroy a borg cube in one turn, leaving you basically invincible in space combat scenarios.
😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😮@@jamesh2321
Sun Tzu would be proud.
@@jamesh2321 It was not the most polished of Star Trek games, but it was all we had and we will never talk down to it!
I'm still playing it. Romulan cloaks rock.
I had no choice but to come to here to see what you're saying about me.
Agreed.
Jolan Tru.
@@jolan_truA flower to brighten your table.
Indeed.
What do you care? You died in 2006.
@@RichardA.-yi5sz Incorrect. You're clinging to reality. Pfft. Humans.
The most interesting race in Trek and it's a crime that we haven't had a series set on a Romulan starship yet.
There have been no series set on any starships other than Federation. The only series not set on a Federation starship was Deep Space Nine and they got one anyway. The Romulan sun went supernova and the Romulans will never be an Empire again. Their home is Ni’Var and it’s rejoined the Federation. The franchise is in danger of dying out completely and you’re looking for a Romulan series? “Resonate some understanding.”
@@RichardA.-yi5sz
What a... peculiar thing to say
Very peculiar 🤔
@@AndrewD8Red, “Resonate some understanding” is a quote from Demolition Man. I can’t say what I really think of the idea and the guy who thought of it, because it’ll get censored by TH-cam. No doubt your responses are similarly limited.
@@RichardA.-yi5sz
Yes... and that's a peculiar thing to say... I'm not sure what part of this concept is proving elusive to you... but I know I shouldn't expect too much from people like... well, you get the idea.
Thank you for having the thumbnail of Andreas Katsulas.
I loved him as G’kar in Babylon 5.
Balance of Terror the 1966 remake of The Enemy Below (1957) with a Star Trek theme. Still one of my favorite episodes as a kid in the 1970s because of the Space Battle
Indeed. This episode gave us insight into what was going on inside the Romulan ship. Rather than turn around and head for home, the Romulan captain yielded to the pressure from his first officer and tried to destroy Kirk and the Enterprise. In a later episode of TOS, the female Romulan captain underestimated Spock. As a result, she was beamed up with Spock to the Enterprise in her pajamas and not in her Romulan uniform.
"Romulans, they're so predictably treacherous." - Weyoun
A tool of the Dominion should talk! 😂
"Romulans have no honor"
Worf
I always figured that the Remans were native to that star system (perhaps even Romulus itself) when the first Vulcan diasporates arrived. They then subjugated and relocated the Remans. A very Romulan thing to do.
I prefer that explanation honestly
YEP! MY take exactly! Original aboriginal inhabitants, easily over powered by the aggressive, ancient Vulcans.
I like the idea that Remans are products of genetic tampering either pre Sundering or during it and were exiled to Remus. So they are still genetic siblings of the Romulans and Vulcans but are rejected and put to work in the mines due to their original abnormal features.
My favorite part of this entire video: the image of Kivas Fajo when you mentioned "collectors." 👍🏼 😂 🖖🏼
Fun fact: they don't believe in Luck. Was rewatching DS9 and one of the commanders said that. I wonder if it was a star wars reference.
Much praise mentioning Monty Thrasher, an amazing creative Artist, for his work on the Romulan logo and Alphabet. He is brilliant and deserves more attention. I had the pleasure of seeing some of his Trek Concept work. There was lots more development than has ever been shown.
How many Romulans does it take to change a light bulb? Two. One to change the bulb and one to shot him and take the credit.
And centuries later, leaked documents show thousands of Tal Shiar Agents spending decades to orchestrate the light bulb going out in the first place to provide lighting for a possible attack on the Federation twenty years later.
All members died of natural causes the next day.
I’ve heard that but I heard 3 a third to interrogate the light bulb and the last one shot both
I heard it was five but there are four lights, ends up all were Cardassians as the Romulans were hiding their involvement
@@karter95 Either way the Tal Shiar was watching them in secret the whole time.
2.
One to change the lightbulb, the other to blow up the ship out of shame.
Vulcans have ridges, they just spent 100s of years learning how to suppress them...
They use dermal abrasion without painkillers to test children's ability to suppress emotions.
I thought, after seeing nemesis, that the romulans with forehead ridges had interbred with the remans (who had forehead ridges). This interbreeding could be a conquest thing (the way roman soldiers would have their way with the women of places they conquered).
@@Kaede-Sasaki Especially when you consider how far Sela went in their society, so it might actually be a thing of incorporating things into their own gene pool.
It also makes me wonder if there weren't also issues with genetic bottlenecking that the early Romulans were suffering with a population issue in the number that left Vulcan, because, well, it might have been a survival trait there
That explains how the other potato chips and crisps are different from the Ruffles.
It's pure muscle exertion. It's why Vulcans can do the eyebrow lift so well. Supreme forehead musculature control.
Glad to get a reference to “My Enemy My Allie” one of my favorite trek books.
Regarding the ridges, my own head canon that probably doesn't line up properly is that the ridges were a genetic mutation that allowed some Vulcans to control their intense emotions but at the cost of their telepathic abilities. The ridgeless Vulcans, ruled by their emotions, saw the ridged Vulcans as abominations and tried to wipe them out and this is the Vulcan Civil War.
Some of the ridgeless Vulcans, not completely consumed by their emotions, sided with the ridged Vulcans and helped them escape Vulcan and went with them to found Romulus, which why there are both ridged and ridgeless Romulans. Generations of interbreeding eventually led to the suppression of psychic abilities among the ridgeless Romulans which allowed them to control their emotions better.
Meanwhile, back on Vulcan, the remaining Vulcans turned on each other and almost destroyed themselves but Surak developed a means to suppress emotion and guided the Vulcans towards logic.
I'd be interesting to know more about The Klingon-Romulan Alliance.
I wish they had some sort of team up of Klingons and Romulans on a TOS episode.
Sela & Lursa & Betor comes to mind
Klingons and Romulans are usually depicted as arch-enemies to one another.
i had always assumed that the Remans were the native species of the system that the Romulans had conquered and subjugated when they arrived separated from Vulcan.
I thought, after seeing nemesis, that the romulans with forehead ridges had interbred with the remans (who had forehead ridges). This interbreeding could be a conquest thing (the way roman soldiers would have their way with the women of places they conquered).
Seeing the Romulans in Balance of Terror was such a shock that they blocked out the fact that Spocks dad Sarek looked an awful lot like the captain of the Romulan ship
Same actor!
@@jae1567 I know but the whole race thing they were trying to make in Balance of Terror with the one crew member would have made more sense with Babel
“All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romulans ever done for us?” Mon’Te p’Thon.
I saw what you did there! Monty Python's The Life of Brian. Well, they did bring us peace and a higher standard of living.
Architecture
i did like the Romulan way novels' style and also the FASA TTRP game's efforts to put together a playable Romulan species and culture with what was available in the 80's (their game books were titled "the Romulan way")
Incredible video one and all. Big points to you for the love you gave to Diane Duane!
There is a real life town of Romulus in upstate New York (USA) that our favorite Klingon in real life became the mayor (J. G. Hertzler). I briefly lived there.
HOW ever did he SHARE the place with hadibah like you ? ;o)
Congratulations! It's nice every once in a while to get one of these "X thinks you didn't know about…" headlines that actually includes things I didn't already know. You pulled it off! There's a greater than average number of things I didn't already know about Romulans.
8:43 I haven’t had any coffee yet and my house is at chaotic levels of noise (nothing’s wrong, my children just scream at each other recreationally) so I had to go back and make sure he said “In the fans of minds” and that my brain wasn’t playing tricks on me 😂
I noticed that little spoonerism as well. You aren't crazy!
I wonder if Patrick Stewart's intervention in removing Rumulans was a factor of why Insurrection wasn't very appealing 🤔
I love patrick stewart. But a lot of the worst ideas of picard season 1 and 2 were from him.
This. I even wonder if he actually understands Star Trek lol
LOVED My Enemy, My Ally, etc. Fantastic books.
I remember seeing somewhere that the reason TOS had more Klingon episodes than Romulan episodes was to save on makeup costs.
Yeah the ears were too expensive to make, that's why the Romulan crew wear centurion helmets to hide their ears.
I really think TOS had the best Romulan aesthetic
New Trekculture video - yay....
Seán is hosting it - "ok let me make a coffee and get comfortable"
It's about the Romulans -"wheres my phaser"
Came in with faint hopes that you’d remember to discuss Diane Duane’s work… and you did! Good job!
So this implies that the Romulan culture is basically the "Pre Surak" original Vulcan culture. So the Vulcans were originally ruthless, cruel, extremely emotional (T'Pol demonstrates this on Enterprise) and basically the Roman Empire. So this could also imply the Vulcans had a very hedonistic culture before Surak as well. The non-canonical books also explain that Vulcan had a pantheon of gods, just as the Romans did. But they seemed to have confused their early psionic and telepathic powers as something of a religious "gift". If you also look at their intelligence agencies, the Vulcans have the V'Shar and the Romulans have the Tal Shiar. The wording is probably similar.
They even had a version of the afterlife. The Romulans call it Erebus, but that is Greek not Roman. Romans called it Scotus. So it makes me wonder what Hades means to the Romulans? It can also be implied that Romulan culture has been impacted by their more "under the table" trading. In the book "The Devil's Heart" there is a Romulan (no spoilers) whose family library contains a large assortment of Earth books. Probably traded by passing Romulan ships with the Ferengi and possibly the Klingons or even the Orion Syndicate. They probably found some kinship in the tales of Ancient Earth and maybe even find some of it useful. They are like their Vulcan cousins very curious, and love to study others.
Just had to comment about the short plebs clip when talking romans. Was surprised but tickled by it
The forehead appliances were easier to apply and with the built in ears or ears hidden by wigs, probably enabling to cast more Roms
We used to watch TOS after class in high school. We had a game - identify the episode within seven seconds. I almost always got it right. People say "You sure know a lot about Star Trek". I say, "No, no I don't, not even close. I know people who do, and I don't operate at that level." This fellow is one of *those* people. Respect.
A friend and I played a similar game on the phone. We were usually longer than 7 seconds, so good on you.
@@ourkeving The remastered TOS adds a difficulty level, opening shots can look a lot different, but it is usually the music cues for me. I love the incidental music of TOS, it's glorious.
Romulans simply do not get enough respect. Their linage is not their own, Their planet is not their own, They are not treated as adequate adversaries. It took 10 films before they made it to being the "big bad" Then , when they lose their home, they are forced to move back in with mom and dad.
Also in STO, The Iconians destroyed the Hobus Star as revenge for Sela betraying them. As the Iconians were moments from destroying earth, an alliance of Romulans, Klingons, Vulcans, Ferengi, Andorians, Gorn, and Krenim used The Time ship from Voyagers Year Of Hell to travel 200,000 years to before the Iconian race was presumed destroyed. Sela tried to kill them while everyone else tried to save them and they swore revenge. It became a Causality paradox.
Outstanding! Thank you and J’Olan Tru
Im gonna go lurk over there.
New Trekculture video! Hold on..let me warm some leftovers!
I live the name DoctorSmock!😂🍻
The Romulan expansion in STO was my favorite.
it's such a slog though, good story, just so bleeding long.
man just imagine if the romans king romulus and remus in the star trek universe where romulans stranded on earth
🤯😎
My less interesting head canon for why the Romulans are called that is simply because they reminded humans of the Roman empire. The Romulans presumably call themselves and their homeworld something completely different in their own language.
Ancient astronauts/-stranded time travelers would certainly be a possibility in the Star Trek franchise.
Iirv in the books and games, romula ns call themselves "rihan" or "rihansu" @@Psyk60
2:54 this is why i LOVED this guy
Thinking on the same page
Putting the ridges on romulus became a twirling mustashe villian
I echo Moore point
Thanks Sean! Live long and Prosper!🖖🍻
My head canon: Romulans with forehead ridges are part Klingon.
I can't remember if it was Chabon, Fontana or Duane who wrote a story about a Romulan archetect who defected to the Federation and was surprised how few escape tunnels, secret entrances and panic rooms there were in Federation designs. It was very amusing whoever it was.
I wanna read that! Got a link or a title?
@@sweetsucculentcontentnectar I think its in one of Rhinasu stories but its very blink and you miss it.
Lower Decks Romulans are sexier. Cheers from the Pacific West Coast of Canada.
the line in PIcard about the Romulans that came from the North had ridges was an Easter Egg for the 2005 Doctor Who episode called "Rose"....Rose asked the Doctor if he was an alien why did he sound like he came from the North (as in Northern England).....and his replied "Lots of Planets have a North"
It sad that we never to get to see more of the 32nd century Romulans. But I hope we'll see a Romulan character in the upcoming Star Trek Academy.
I like it a lot, the look is not Classico, but it is exactly what Section 31 is! So I love it! 🎉 I wish that Tyler can be present, was really a shame that he was send off with the promise of a series Spinoff that never happened, and now we don't know the timeline 😢
The books covered the forehead ridges a long time ago. Essentially noble families thst traced back to their schism still had some families wo the ridges but over time the rank and file developed them
The Romulan story arc in Star Trek Online was hands down my favorite. It even has a young follower of Spock's in "Unification" as the New Romulus leader.
Although the Romulans call themselves an Empire, we never see or hear from any Romulan emperor or empress (at least in alpha canon). The de facto leader seems to be the Preator, making the form of state more like the Roman Republic than the Empire.
Well during the Roman Principate which encompassed the first 3 emperors. The illusion of the state still being a Republic was maintained. Despite the truth being that it was already a monarchy. So it's possible that is what the Romulan government is doing as well
My Question is: Do Romulans HAVE Vulcan Strength or not? I don't recall ever seeing mention of it, minus the JJ film, but I DO recall the Romulans being completely useless in Melee fights.
Is this a known in canon thing and I've missed it or just a "We don't talk about the JJ trek" kind of thing?
I prefer the other make up director's theory about the Romulan ridges. She always thought they were keloids, from a Romulan scarification ritual. Meaning the Romulans had ritual where they would scar their foreheads as small children or infants to separate themselves from their Vulcan cousins. With the scars symbolizing the Romulan racial scar of being driven (though they weren't really) from Vulcan with coming of logic. I also like the apocrypha origin of the Romulan cloaking device, that it was found in Slaver (the races from Animated Series/Ring World Series) Stasis box and what the Romulans created/update over the centuries was their base attempt to back engineer such an advanced device (with some fans suspecting it was phase cloak too, but again so advanced, like everything from Slavers that the Romulans could never replicate it, only make poor copy).
Trek/Who Culture needs Sean, Marcus and Adam
These guys drew me in and we just don't see enough of them
But everyone knows Sean's the only one in TrekCulture. And he's trying to steal WhoCulture from Ellie!
“Paranoia is a way of life for you isn't it? “ The Doctor
Also, Sean, did you go to Cambridge? I did a study abroad stint in Oxford back in my undergrad days so if so I guess that would make us rivals, haha.
Garek, the tailor, was the one who helped the Federation to get the Romulans to join the fight against the Dominion-Cardassian Alliance. A Cardassian style bomb placed aboard the Romulan ship that carried the Romulan senator was all that was needed. Garek had the stomach for it, when Sisko did not. Garek showed that he was once in the Obsidian Order.
Nice Doctor Who reference!
ok am i losing it or is there some kind of pop song/beach boogie playing faintly in the background?
Gotta love those Romulans 😊
My head cannon is that the faction of Vulcans that united under the raptor wing had almost all the Vulacans with head ridges and a part of the smooth forehead Vulcans. They were exiled from from Vulcan and settled in cannon locations.
TOS "Balance of Terror" is a re-telling of the story and movie about a submarine called "Run Silent, Run Deep"
Making Romulan plotting and duplicity the core of Picard series 1 & 2 was a bad move. It’s just all so bloody tiring trying to keep track of it all. Give me a simple narrative of a protagonist encountering an almost deadly challenge, losing faith, finding themselves through help of an unlikely source and becoming stronger as a consequence.
Thanks. 🖖🏻
Props can be come major headaches. Star Trek Where No Man Has Gone Before, Dr. Dehner is listed being 5-2: actress Sally Kellerman is/was 5'-10." Mitchell is listed as 5'-8" whereas the actor is six feet. Errors will arise and get ingored.
Yes, so much wasted potential with the Romulans in TNG, loved the DD Warbird, some great parts with Tomalak, the defector and others, Their appearance in Redemption episodes, face of the enemy. I feel so much more could have been achieved
According to some Klingon guy named Worf "they claim all that lays in their field of view."
The Federation Was Lucky The Romulans Never Found Out How They Were Tricked On Joining The Dominion War Otherwise I'm Sure The Romulans Will Have Hit The Federation With Everything They Got
3:16 SEAN! You're displaying MINTAKINS while talking about ROMULAN ridges. The Mintakins were too busy worshiping The Picard to worry about ridges.
I really wished they would have used the Romulans in the Star Trek: Insurrection script! That INSTANTLY raises the stakes and I care more about everything on the film. Wasted Opportunity to me.
i am crossing my fingers with the enterprise nx01 refit finaly shown on screen we do see the earth romulan war on screen would be perfect setting for a mini series
I'd only want that if they use the beta canon as inspiration and bring Commander Tucker back as having faked his death to work with Section 31 in infiltrating the Romulan Warp 7 project and his work behind the scenes on Romulus during the Romulan War.
8:42 The fans of minds indeed!
"They came for the North" so someone in Star Trek actually introduced ETHNICITY, racial or cultural, to an alien race/faction. Finally... I mean "fans" who still have a problem with Black Vulcans.
You could easily write that in the Klingons and all the variations and depictions the same way and it would just make them so much cooler.
Fascinating...
I had always thought of romlulus and remus as a Planet and a Moon pair. although a very large moon.
I appreciated the Picard solution
TOS was obsessed with grecco/Rome. The romulans, "bread and circus", Apollo, "plato's stepchildren", even the mirror universe had an emperor.
James TIBERIOUS Kirk
I remember Caecilius. He and his family (and one of the slaves?) were written as having died during the Mt. Vesuvius eruption in AD 79, the dog watching over his master in vain. In reality, Caecilius supposedly died in a completely different natural disaster, that being an earthquake, in AD 62.
Yes, and Grumio est in culina ancilia valde pleasbaunt
Never turn your back on a Romulan! 🤣🖖
Who in turn claim that you should never turn your back to a Breen... How shady to you have to be to have a ROMULAN make up a proverb warning you about dealing with them?
@@jamesh2321 Classic Romulan misdirection. 😎
Hmm, thought for sure this would include that their robot warriors are read only memory lancers.
I always thought we were gonna get a reveal that somehow the Romulans and Klingons were related. To explain the appearance of cranial ridges on both in the TNG era where Vulcans did not. And that one episode where somehow on the flagship of the Federation (and an Enterprise no less) that there were no suitable blood donors to a dying Romulan but Worf. Ie no Vulcans somehow were on a prestigious assignment named after the ship captained by the first Vulcan in Starfleet. Or there were Vulcans, which is more likely, but somehow Vulcans could be unsuitable donors where a Klingon could be suitable. Maybe that tech exchange in the TOS era was a bigger exchange than we had been led to believe. Which would also explain the current hostility. No bigger hate than what springs from perceived betrayal. In this case the Klingons allying with the Federation
@rubaiyat300, I haven't seen that episode in a while so I may be misremembering...But I thought it was Worf's BLOOD that was a match, but that there was something IN HIS BLOOD Dr. Crusher could use.
Exactly. How would that be unless Romulans shared some genetic ties to Klingons? Like you’d be more related to a jellyfish than a sentient from another world even with Preserver shenanigans explaining some of that.
Hi 👋 👋 👋
I've had Romulan Ale. It's just Bud Light with Blue Curacao.
The idea of Northern Province Romulans (ridges) and Southern Province Romulans (no ridges) was originally the reason Gene Roddenberry gave for why the TOS Klingons and the TNG Klingons were so different from one another. 🖖😎👍
The pocket novels had the Romulus performing some brutal experiments on Vulcans and themselves in an attempt to regain telepathy. It’s possible the Remans were an unintended result of biogenetic experiments. (Echoing the Klingon ridge problem.)
Although I would not say deception was a way of life for ancient Greeks, in the Odyssey it is clear that deception is a perfectly acceptable means of gaining an advantage. If you were really good at it (as Odysseus is), it was even considered admirable. Even Athena is blown away by Odysseus' skillful use of deception. Ironic that the Romulans emulate the Greeks more than the Romans with their signature trait.
Well, the Romans spent a lot of their own time and effort emulating the Greeks.
@@DragonTigerBoss True, but I don't think they considered deception admirable. Although I don't know as much about the Romans as I do about ancient Greece.
I hate to tell you but when it comes to Romulans..."IT"S A FAKE!"
Best war episode of star Trek
I thought, after seeing nemesis, that the romulans with forehead ridges had interbred with the remans (who had forehead ridges). This interbreeding could be a conquest thing (the way roman soldiers would have their way with the women of places they conquered).
I see my buddy phil gave up 🤣🤣
Honestly, the duplicity side of things might be a thing where it's a more self-control thing, essentially outplaying the opponent rather than just beating them with outright violence there. I wonder if it came from their time wandering before finding Romulus/Remus, not having the population to actually lose anyone they could avoid losing, so conflicts being resolved with manipulation and backstabbing over open conflict seems like it might have developed more there.
The same population issue could also explain the forehead ridges, being something from interbreeding due to genetic diversity issues and potential defects from it...which could also be an explanation for how well Sela did since, to most Romulans, she's still Romulan despite her mother not being one, so she'd, largely, be treated the same as any other Romulan unless there were other issues that came out of it.
Seing as how the romulans continue to be the most mysterious race. This is well done.
I've always wondered whether the Mintakans are actually some of the migrants from Vulcan who established Romulus who crashed or had to abandon ship on Mintaka, and that over time forgot their origin, or even that they were another offshoot, who deliberately formed a neo-primitivist colony and concealed their true origin from their children and grandchildren.
Sargon's people might have something to do with the Mintakans.
"But it would explain certain aspects of Vulcan prehistory."
I always assumed the Remans were the result of a Romulan augment project that was later abandoned and they put them all to work in the mines
Never liked the ridges too similar to klingons. Not that i dont know a few klingons lol
I was only commenting on the episode of Balance of Terror.
"...in the fans of minds..."???? 8:44
I am a fan of minds. 😁
How long shall we stare at each other across the neutral zone!?!?!?!?! There is an alternative Tomalak. Each side sends one ship
I'm wondering if Romulan ale is just blue wkd
There are only, like, 6 Vulcans in Starfleet. If you see a "Vulcan" officer, you can safely assume its a Romulan agent working up through the ranks.😂
Even modern winter coats suffer from the loose good. I've never found one that will stay up without tying a scarf around it.