The Romulan War: A Star Trek Fan Production is a Star Trek Fan Film directed by Mark Naccarato.
It's a Mockumentary covering the titular Romulan War that took place from 2156 to 2160 between United Earth and the Romulan Star Empire. It also serves as a Fan Sequel to Star Trek: Enterprise and is the creators' interpretation of what Seasons 5 to 7 of Enterprise could have been had the series continued after Season 4. The film adapts the Romulan War arc from the Star Trek: Enterprise Relaunch book series.
In addition to reused footage from Enterprise and fanmade CGI, the documentary also uses in-universe interviews with experts on the war. These experts are historian Dr. Brandon Chambers (played by Ethan Jones), retired Romulan spymaster Kovallus (played by Rob Wilds), Hannah Z. Cochrane (played by Katherine Morgan), and Admiral Matthias Jeffries (played by Jeff Allen).
The project began in 2018. In addition to the film, various webisodes and audio dramas that cover the background and lore of the Earth-Romulan War were released on the creators' YouTube channel
.
Part 1 of the film was released on October 19, 2020 and is available for viewing on YouTube. Part 2 is currently under production and is being crowdfunded on Indiegogo. The creators of The Romulan War also have a website that can be accessed here.
The Romulan War includes examples of:
- Bastardly Speech: When Praetor D'deridex gives a Rousing Speech full of Blatant Lies informing his people about the humans' nuclear strike on Unroth III and calling upon them to aid in the war effort. It's largely successful with at least 70,000 Romulan youth enlisting in the military by the end of the first day alone.Praetor D'deridex: Citizens and subjects... it is with great sorrow that I must reveal to you now a new threat, the likes of which we have never seen before. Humans, a savage and belligerent slave race of the Vulcans, launched a nuclear strike against the peaceful inhabitants of our outpost on Unroth III. More than one million Romulans. Men... Women... Children... were incinerated in their homes as they slept! These alien butchers... these humans must pay for their treachery... and they shall. I call upon you, citizens and subjects of the Romulan Star Empire, to stand with me now as one! Death to the humans and their Vulcan puppet masters! Jolan'tru!
- Call-Back: The film has one to the Enterprise episode "Minefield". After the Centauri Massacre, Starfleet attacks Unroth III, the planet from that episode, since it was where Captain Archer made first contact with the Romulans. Starfleet is able to clear Unroth III's surrounding Space Mines thanks to Archer knowing about the minefield from his previous encounter with them.
- The Cameo: During Hannah's interviews, a photo of her ancestor Zephram Cochrane can be seen in her office's background.
- Continuity Nod: The in-universe filmmakers interview Kovallus on the space station Deep Space Nine.
- Divided We Fall: Earth initially had to fight the war with barely any allies after the revelation that the Romulans have a cyber weapon capable of hacking starships causes the Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellarites to decide that defending their own homeworlds is more important than helping Earth.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: One of the key reasons the Romulans started the war was because they couldn't understand Starfleet's motives for wanting to explore the galaxy. Being a race of conquerors, the Romulans came to the conclusion that Earth must be building a rival Hegemonic Empire under the guise of peacemaking. In the "Preamble to War" webisode, Kovallus explains how scientific discovery and good faith diplomacy were completely alien concepts to the Romulans at the time.Kovallus: The belief was that Earth used peacemaking and diplomacy as a cover for their true objective: an expansionist agenda that was a threat to Romulan sovereignty. You must understand that in this time period some 250 years ago, Romulans did not understand the concept of space exploration for exploration's sake or diplomacy for diplomacy's sake. Pure science, pure diplomacy, these were alien concepts to a conquering empire and it aroused much suspicion among the political class.
- Expy: Praetor D'deridex is a dead ringer for Emperor Palpatine from the Star Wars franchise. He's the unhinged ruler of an interstellar empire inspired by the Romans, dresses in a hooded black cloak reminiscent of a Sith Lord, seeks to rule the galaxy, and is incredibly hammy in his speeches.
- Hack Your Enemy: At the start of the war, the Romulans unveiled a new weapon that allowed them to hack enemy starships and make them fire on their allies. Only Starfleet's vessels are able to resist the cyberattacks thanks to their outdated computer systems (ironically, humans were the only race that the Vulcans had refused to share their computer technology with).
- Heroic Sacrifice: During the Battle of Andoria, the last remaining Romulan dreadnought is about to unleash its nuclear payload upon the Andorian homeworld. The USS Challenger, damaged and depleted of weapons, sacrifices itself by ramming into the dreadnought before it can devastate Andoria.
- MacGuffin: Unbeknownst to Starfleet, Praetor D'deridex had been excavating archaeological sites throughout the galaxy in search of a legendary map that was said to be the key to ruling the galaxy.
- Mockumentary: The fan film is presented as an in-universe war documentary that was released after the destruction of Romulus.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Wanting revenge for the Centauri Massacre, Starfleet sends an assault fleet to the only place they know for certain is under Romulan control: the Unroth system. Upon arrival, they clear the system's minefield and nuke a Romulan mining operation on Unroth III...except it wasn't. What Starfleet really blew up was an archaeological expedition that had already concluded its work and only a dozen Romulans were actually killed in the attack. Under normal circumstances, the Romulan Star Empire probably would've barely noticed or cared about what happened. This ends up being a major propaganda victory for the Romulans as Praetor D'deridex uses the incident to convince thousands of Romulan youth to enlist in the war effort.
- Nuke 'em: Nuclear weapons see widespread use throughout the Earth-Romulan War. The Romulans carpet bomb Alpha III with nukes in what became known as the Centauri Massacre. This enraged the humans and led to United Earth authorizing the use of their own nuclear stockpiles. Starfleet retaliated with a own nuclear strike on Unroth III. The Romulans also came close to nuking Andorian homeworld during the Battle of Andoria.
- Pretext for War: Played with. Although the Romulan military had been duking it out with Starfleet for some time, most Romulan civilians were unaware that a war was even going on beyond their empire's borders. When Starfleet nukes the barely-inhabited planet of Unroth III (in retaliation for the Romulans nuking a major human world), Praetor D'deridex uses the attack to paint humanity as the aggressors and convinces the Romulan public to support his war.
- Pyrrhic Victory: The Battle of Andoria ends in a major defeat for the Romulans and was the first time that United Earth scored a major victory in the war. However, Starfleet and the Andorian Imperial Guard still lose a lot of ships in that engagement, the most notable being the USS Challenger sacrificing itself to take out the last Romulan dreadnought.
- Revenge Before Reason: Early in the war, Starfleet came close to learning about the Praetor's search for the star map when they encountered one of his archeological expeditions at Unroth III. Fortunately for the Praetor, Starfleet was on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge at the time due to the Centauri Massacre and nuked the entire site no questions asked. Kovallus lampshades how if Starfleet hadn't been so consumed by vengeance, they might have uncovered D'deridex's Evil Plan.
