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Star Trek: Picard's TOS Easter Egg Homages Kirk Vs. Romulans
Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Picard Season 1, Episode 4.
Star Trek: Picard episode 4 contains an Easter egg to Star Trek: The Original Series: a TOS-era Romulan Bird-of-Prey, and the episode's climactic battle homages the classic episode "Balance of Terror." The Romulans have gained new prominence in the CBS All-Access series about the twilight years of Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart). The Starfleet legend is trying to save Soji Asha (Isa Briones), the synthetic daughter of the late Commander Data (Brent Spiner), from the android-hating Romulan death squad called the Zhat Vash.
Star Trek TOS, "Balance of Terror," introduced the Romulans, who were revealed to be the oldest enemies of the United Federation of Planets and an offshoot of Mr. Spock's (Leonard Nimoy) Vulcan race. The Starship Enterprise's Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) matched wits with the Romulan Commander (Mark Lenard) and his new weapon, a Bird-of-Prey equipped with a cloaking device that destroyed several Starfleet outposts boarding the Neutral Zone dividing the Federation from the Romulan Star Empire. In a tense, 10-hour confrontation, the Enterprise took on its silent, invisible adversary until Kirk's crew conjured a way to detect the cloaked Bird-of-Prey so that they could destroy it. However, Kirk didn't actually interact with his Romulan adversary via viewscreen or hails until the end of the battle, although the Enterprise was able to catch a visual image of the aliens, which marked the first time humans laid eyes on Romulans.
In Star Trek: Picard episode 4, "Absolute Candor," Jean-Luc took his new crew to the Romulan colony planet Vashti where Cristobal Rios' starship is attacked by the TOS-era Romulan Bird-of-Prey. The ancient ship was captained by a Romulan warlord named Kantar and, between the Bird-of-Prey's phasers and Vashti's orbital defense grid, it's only Rios' expert flying (with help from his ship's emergency holographic navigator) that kept our heroes alive. Thankfully, Picard's vessel got some timely help from Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan), who crippled the Romulan ship before her own ship was destroyed and she beamed aboard Rios' spacecraft.
The fascinating thing about Picard vs. the Bird-of-Prey is that like in "Balance of Terror," the Starfleet Admiral never interacted with the captain of the Romulan starship, who is neither seen or heard in the episode. Just like for most of "Balance of Terror," Rios' ship is under attack by an unseen foe and our heroes have to rely on their wits and their skills to survive the violent encounter until Seven mounted her unexpected rescue. As such, however, Kantar never earns Picard's respect, and vice-versa, the way the Kirk earned the Romulan Commander's. Kirk also didn't need a last-second savior but, to be fair, his Enterprise was much more formidable than Rios' smaller, unregistered starship.
"Absolute Candor" also has another subtle nod to "Balance of Terror" when Elnor (Evan Evagora), Picard's sword-wielding Romulan protector, beamed aboard Rios' ship. Elnor is met with suspicion by Raffi Musiker (Michelle Heard), who dismissed the young warrior as "a Romulan with a stick." This harkens back to how in "Balance of Terror," some of Kirk's crew had a bloody history with the Romulans and they grew hostile towards Spock when they learned the Romulans share a common ancestry with the Vulcans. Even though Star Trek: Picard is a sequel to Star Trek: The Next Generation, it's great to see the show also homage the original Star Trek series that started it all.
Star Trek: Picard streams Thursdays on CBS All-Access and Fridays internationally on Amazon Prime Video.
