Star Trek: 10 Things You Didn't Know About Romulans

Kirk clearly mentions both ROMULUS and REMUS in his opening log, but mere minutes later the "star sector" map on the bridge viewscreen in Balance of Terror gives ROMULUS and ROMII, or perhaps ROM-II (2), as the two dots within the Romulan Star Empire.

The confusion around this (mis)labelling then persisted for years. In 1980, Star Trek Maps gave ROMII as a separate star entirely (a white dwarf), "evidently an early colony of Romulus Prime," but the 3rd edition of The Star Trek Encyclopedia went the other way, stating under the entry for 'Remus' that, "Mr. Spock's star chart gives this planet's name as Romii, although spoken dialog in the episode uses the name Remus." It was only in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds that an end was put somewhat to the debate. In A Quality of Mercy, the star map on the display screen in the conference room had Romulus bracketed by "(Romulus/Remus)" AND Romii beneath it.

That's all academic without Star Trek: Nemesis in which we actually got to see Remus for the first (and, to date, last) time. As Data detailed in his presentation, Remus was the third planet in the system, tidally locked so that one side permanently faced the sun. As Nemesis scriptwriter John Logan detailed in the introduction to the novelisation of Star Trek: Nemesis, the Remans as a species inspired the properties of their planet: "The idea of the Remans being vampire-like slaves, laboring away in the dilithium mines, never seeing the sun, grew out of our desire to create a truly monstrous race."

Are the Remans just Romulans (or ancient Vulcans) with a severe lack of vitamin D? We don't really know. Neither do we know much at all about their fate after Shinzon's failed coup d'état and the supernova.