I think the producers felt that Trek was immune from cancellation. If they were taking the rating seriously (as they should have been), they would have started with Romulans from S1 and skipped all of the Suliban, Xindi, Temporal War, etc etc.
Season 3 - should have been the Romulans, not the Xindi?
- Thread starter Cadet49
- Start date
The producers took Trek's ratings very seriously. Hence their decision to separate the new series from the baggage of existing lore to a reasonable extent while maintaining crucial ties for the fans.
It wasn't the producers that ordered the Temporal Cold War. It was UPN. They didn't ask for it specifically, granted (the suits at any major network are somewhat unlikely to know the difference between a Cardassian and a runabout) but they told the producers in no uncertain terms that the show as a flat-out prequel without some new hook not in their original game plan wasn't going to work out.
^^ If that was the goal, then they utterly failed, because the incoherent make-it-up-as-we-go TCW wasn't much of a "hook" for anyone.
I agree with the other posters that if you make the Suliban/Xindi part of a "Romulan Cold War" then you at least have a coherent build up to what everyone knows was going to happen, had the series survived.
I agree with the other posters that if you make the Suliban/Xindi part of a "Romulan Cold War" then you at least have a coherent build up to what everyone knows was going to happen, had the series survived.
S1 should have been the final year of the Romulan War (2159-60), with the main characters (Shran is included in this category) spread out on different ships as each one plays its part during the war. The season finale being the Battle of Cheron, where the Captain's ship is destroyed in a blaze of glory (he and most of his crew survive, obviously).
S2 then opens with him cooling his heels on Earth, waiting for a new ship as the peace treaty is being written up and the allied planets continue to try and work together following the fighting. He gets his new ship (if it has to be the Enterprise then very well, though I'd prefer the Daedalus personally), selects his new crew, finally assembling them all together, and then heads out to being patrolling and charting space in the name of the newly founded United Federation of Planets.
Commanding Officer - CAPT Jonathan Archer
Executive / Science Officer - S-CDR T'Pol (Vulcan)
Engineering Officer - LT CDR Charles Tucker III
Tactical Officer - LT CDR Thy'lek th'Shran (Andorian)
Security Officer - MAJ Malcolm Reed
Navigation Officer - LT Lenelle (Deltan)
Helm Officer - LT JG Travis Mayweather
Communications Officer - ENS Hoshi Sato
Physician/Surgeon - DR Phlox (Denobulan)
S2 then opens with him cooling his heels on Earth, waiting for a new ship as the peace treaty is being written up and the allied planets continue to try and work together following the fighting. He gets his new ship (if it has to be the Enterprise then very well, though I'd prefer the Daedalus personally), selects his new crew, finally assembling them all together, and then heads out to being patrolling and charting space in the name of the newly founded United Federation of Planets.
Commanding Officer - CAPT Jonathan Archer
Executive / Science Officer - S-CDR T'Pol (Vulcan)
Engineering Officer - LT CDR Charles Tucker III
Tactical Officer - LT CDR Thy'lek th'Shran (Andorian)
Security Officer - MAJ Malcolm Reed
Navigation Officer - LT Lenelle (Deltan)
Helm Officer - LT JG Travis Mayweather
Communications Officer - ENS Hoshi Sato
Physician/Surgeon - DR Phlox (Denobulan)
I'm sort of fence-sitting here (and it's not good for the crotch, I tell ya!). The Romulan War IMHO ought to be a "gimmick" story - war as such has already been done, yet OTOH the Romulans have this one interesting thing to offer, their "secret identity" schtick. A secret war would be something new and potentially interesting...
...The big question is, could it carry an entire season, or just a two-parter?
Had S4 or S5 done another two- or three-parter with these characteristic nods to established canon and fanon ideas, this time concentrating on how the Romulan identity could remain secret despite a bloody war, it would probably have been badly received. The Klingon ridges already got this treatment, which felt like "cool, that was weird enough, but they brushed it under the carpet with one sweep and now we can have no more of that!"... Dead-ending the Romulans that way could ultimately feel unsatisfactory, even if the gimmick itself was very cleverly played and provided three hours (or more like three times half an hour with current signal-to-commercial ratio
) of gripping entertainment.
Timo Saloniemi
...The big question is, could it carry an entire season, or just a two-parter?
Had S4 or S5 done another two- or three-parter with these characteristic nods to established canon and fanon ideas, this time concentrating on how the Romulan identity could remain secret despite a bloody war, it would probably have been badly received. The Klingon ridges already got this treatment, which felt like "cool, that was weird enough, but they brushed it under the carpet with one sweep and now we can have no more of that!"... Dead-ending the Romulans that way could ultimately feel unsatisfactory, even if the gimmick itself was very cleverly played and provided three hours (or more like three times half an hour with current signal-to-commercial ratio
) of gripping entertainment.Timo Saloniemi
I think they could've done the war as a TV movie or straight to DVD kind of deal between seasons and then just start the new season with the new status quo. Could've been an interesting way to change up the lineup midseries, if need be. It also could satisfy, perhaps, the fans who wanted the Romulan War but at the same time not allow the series to become all about war.
Though if it had been up to me, I would've probably spent the first two seasons building up the war. Then either do a miniseries or a STV movie(s) detailing the war. I had thought about maybe spending seasons 3 and 4 on the war, dividing up the season (each 12 or so episodes would equate to a year, so you could cover two years of the war during Season 3 and the last two years during Season 4), and then spend the last three seasons (assuming ENT would've made it to seven), building up the Federation.
Though if it had been up to me, I would've probably spent the first two seasons building up the war. Then either do a miniseries or a STV movie(s) detailing the war. I had thought about maybe spending seasons 3 and 4 on the war, dividing up the season (each 12 or so episodes would equate to a year, so you could cover two years of the war during Season 3 and the last two years during Season 4), and then spend the last three seasons (assuming ENT would've made it to seven), building up the Federation.
I don't know if the Romulans could actually have replaced the Xindi, because at least with the Xindi we didn't know what was going to happen. (Well, aside from Earth not blowing up! 
)
They could have had some sort of involvement though, I would have enjoyed that. Season three is my favourite season of ENT, but how is saving Earth from the Xindi dealing with the prequal concept? Throw the Romulans into the mix and then we have relevance.
) They could have had some sort of involvement though, I would have enjoyed that. Season three is my favourite season of ENT, but how is saving Earth from the Xindi dealing with the prequal concept? Throw the Romulans into the mix and then we have relevance.
What is "relevence" here? Trek's never been one big storyline, it's been lots of small stories that all happen in one gigantic "vague history". The only exceptions are cute bits of fanwank like "Trials and Tribble-ations" and "Flashback" - and truthfully, while fun, they're completely superfluous. A Romulan War wouldn't have added anything to it's only prior mention in "Balance of Terror", whose assumptions of the 22nd century and the "theoretical" cloaking device were aready rendered fatally broken by "Broken Bow", "Shockwave" and "Minefield"
...Not to mention "Unexpected". Nothing theoretical about invisibility...
...But despite this, ENT actually managed to milk this Romulan peculiarity for some unexpected dramatic effect, when Romulan ships were shown capable of altering their visual appearance and causing confusion among their enemies. That was quite a storytelling feat!
Unfortunately, the masquerading trick was more or less milked dry there, in that as such enjoyable three-parter. And that not only leaves the "secret identity" as the only remaining Romulan defining factor of dramatic interest - it directly undermines it by preemptively using all the dramatic oomph of this very plausible way of hiding one's identity behind a mask.
Oh, well. At least we can now speculate that the "secret identity" aspect of the Romulan War was indeed due to such use of masks (on starships and possibly on personnel as well), even if this isn't explicated on screen. And since our heroes identified this trick back in 2154 already, it need not be a decisive strategic factor at any later timepoint. It's just like the time-honored trick of flying the wrong flag: something the villain might do, something that was very common in one particular era of conflict, and something that various developments (mainly in ID tech) have made impracticable.
At least the current novels have used the concept to good dramatic effect without making it the absolute centerpiece and kingpin of "What Was the Romulan War All About?". They also mix other plausible "combat-technical" ideas there, some of which are associated with Romulans in other contexts (such as preceding Diane Duane novels that actually describe a different, later time period of conflict). In this respect, the books are a nice read, and if onscreen Trek ever does Romulan War, it might be desirable to have the writers be influenced by having read these books. If the books themselves fall, it's for completely different dramatic reasons and storytelling tricks... IMHO.
Timo Saloniemi
...But despite this, ENT actually managed to milk this Romulan peculiarity for some unexpected dramatic effect, when Romulan ships were shown capable of altering their visual appearance and causing confusion among their enemies. That was quite a storytelling feat!
Unfortunately, the masquerading trick was more or less milked dry there, in that as such enjoyable three-parter. And that not only leaves the "secret identity" as the only remaining Romulan defining factor of dramatic interest - it directly undermines it by preemptively using all the dramatic oomph of this very plausible way of hiding one's identity behind a mask.
Oh, well. At least we can now speculate that the "secret identity" aspect of the Romulan War was indeed due to such use of masks (on starships and possibly on personnel as well), even if this isn't explicated on screen. And since our heroes identified this trick back in 2154 already, it need not be a decisive strategic factor at any later timepoint. It's just like the time-honored trick of flying the wrong flag: something the villain might do, something that was very common in one particular era of conflict, and something that various developments (mainly in ID tech) have made impracticable.
At least the current novels have used the concept to good dramatic effect without making it the absolute centerpiece and kingpin of "What Was the Romulan War All About?". They also mix other plausible "combat-technical" ideas there, some of which are associated with Romulans in other contexts (such as preceding Diane Duane novels that actually describe a different, later time period of conflict). In this respect, the books are a nice read, and if onscreen Trek ever does Romulan War, it might be desirable to have the writers be influenced by having read these books. If the books themselves fall, it's for completely different dramatic reasons and storytelling tricks... IMHO.
Timo Saloniemi
I don't think they could go an entire season on the Romulan war while dancing around the "never seen a Romulan face" limitation. For new Trek fans this would have gotten old fast. Hard core fans are willing to follow the "They said it once in an episode 40 years ago so we have to go by it" rule but new fans are not so stringent.
The Romulans have been around for decades and they're still an underdeveloped alien species with a vague identity and no sense of purpose beyond being the "evil Vulcans". Frankly, I found the Xindi or the Sulibans far more interesting.
To be sure, the "secret identity" thing could be kept interesting if it were in the heroes' interest to protect the secret. After all, one of them is Vulcan, and the revelation that the cruel enemy is a Vulcan sub-group would obviously be disastrous for the alliance fighting the Romulans.
That would probably mean a repetition of the Xindi concept: the heroes would have to be somewhere behind the lines, with unique knowledge of the enemy, and with limited means of interacting with their own superiors and allies. And repetition is never good unless you're a Cardassian...
Timo Saloniemi
That would probably mean a repetition of the Xindi concept: the heroes would have to be somewhere behind the lines, with unique knowledge of the enemy, and with limited means of interacting with their own superiors and allies. And repetition is never good unless you're a Cardassian...
Timo Saloniemi
I don't know if the Romulans could actually have replaced the Xindi, because at least with the Xindi we didn't know what was going to happen. (Well, aside from Earth not blowing up!
They could have had some sort of involvement though, I would have enjoyed that. Season three is my favourite season of ENT, but how is saving Earth from the Xindi dealing with the prequal concept? Throw the Romulans into the mix and then we have relevance.
I see what you're saying, and I agree that there was greater mystery with the Xindi in terms of their fate, but I think the Romulans have more weight with the fans and the franchise. Also, there were still intriguing questions regarding the Romulans that could've kept the suspense factor going. We don't know why the war started, how it was fought, how it was won, how the Romulans kept their identities secret, etc. We also wouldn't know what happened to the ENT crew or their allies like Shran.
ENT could've, and should've been the series that fleshed out the Romulans, but failed to do so. I thought the Xindi were pretty interesting, but outside of surface things I think the Suliban were undermined because they were just underlings for Future Guy, without at least having the cool five species thing that the Xindi had. They also seemed more dependent on Future Guy than the Xindi did on the Sphere Builders.
I wish the ENT writers had spent more time making the Romulans distinctive instead of spending it rehashing the Klingons or bringing in the Suliban or Xindi. I don't the Suliban were all that fleshed out and were largely left by the wayside after the first season. The Xindi were more developed.
It's a shame that neither the Suliban nor the Xindi had anything to do with the Romulans. Perhaps a better planned Temporal Cold War with Future Guy as a Romulan, like most people seemed to think, could have been a good way of getting them involved in a less predictive way.
When I saw the new Trek film I wondered if Nero could have been Future Guy.
When I saw the new Trek film I wondered if Nero could have been Future Guy.
No, The Next Generation should have been the series that fleshed out the Romulans. They were featured quite extensively and we learned next to nothing about them. It was a missed opportunity, and after that it was too late.
I thought TNG did a decent job with the Romulans - they were only in two episodes of TOS remember. And then they didn't really have any presence until DS9 dragged them into the war. ENT could have been a good way to look at the Romulans in a way similar to how we were looking at Vulcans again.
Yeah, their development, bar The Aenar, was one of the best things ENT did. 
Similar threads
