Age Difference between Trip & Malcolm - Does Rank Dictate Fanfic

[Xabitrip]

Apologies if this question has already been asked/discussed on this forum but there’s something that has got me wondering now that I’ve read quite a few Enterprise fanfics.

Was there ever any mention in the series of how old Trip/Malcolm were, I can’t remember any, the reason I ask is that every fic I’ve read that mentions age difference, it is always assumed Malcolm is younger. Now is this because of the difference in rank, cause I always thought that Trip got his rank early due to his work on the warp 5 engine and that he was the youngest to ever make commander, maybe wrong on that though. Don’t ask me why, but until I started reading fic, I always assumed that Trip was the younger of the two, even before I found out that Connor was 7 years younger than Dominic anyway. Anyone know the reason why Malcolm is always assumed to be the younger in all fic? It might actually make interesting fic writing to make Trip younger than Malcolm, questioning the difference in their rank.

 

[MajorReed]

Apologies if this question has already been asked/discussed on this forum but there’s something that has got me wondering now that I’ve read quite a few Enterprise fanfics.

Was there ever any mention in the series of how old Trip/Malcolm were, I can’t remember any, the reason I ask is that every fic I’ve read that mentions age difference, it is always assumed Malcolm is younger. Now is this because of the difference in rank, cause I always thought that Trip got his rank early due to his work on the warp 5 engine and that he was the youngest to ever make commander, maybe wrong on that though. Don’t ask me why, but until I started reading fic, I always assumed that Trip was the younger of the two, even before I found out that Connor was 7 years younger than Dominic anyway. Anyone know the reason why Malcolm is always assumed to be the younger in all fic? It might actually make interesting fic writing to make Trip younger than Malcolm, questioning the difference in their rank.

According to Memory Alpha, Trip was born in 2121. Doesn't say when he got the Commander rank, though. However, canon never stated (or hinted at) Malcolm's age.

I think that the age difference comes from the rank, since you get promoted based on your performance in the field. Most fanfiction that I read don't mention either of their ages, or even hint at a difference.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Kirk was younger than McCoy, Scott and possibly Spock and he out ranked them.

 

[Alrik]

Kirk was younger than McCoy, Scott and possibly Spock and he out ranked them.

Wasn't Kirk one of the youngest to make Captain at the time. I thought I remembered that from my childhood, but that was a long, long, looooong time ago.


As far as peception of age, Archer and Tucker were supposed to have gone way back together. So unless Archer was a lot older than Trip when they met and became friends, the impression seemed to be that Trip was closer to Archer's age.

I think the other big factor was the Trip came off a very confident and in control. Malcolm, not so much. So maybe there was a perception Mal was younger because he didn't have it together as well as Trip did.

 

[JoeZhang]

Malcolm was an odd character it always felt like it was written for someone ten years younger than the actor.

 

[c0rnedfr0g]

^^ from MA

Not only the youngest captain in the fleet's history at that time, Kirk was slated to command one of the twelve Constitution-class starships, the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701).

Not sure where/when that was mentioned onscreen.

 

[SFRabid]

As far as peception of age, Archer and Tucker were supposed to have gone way back together. So unless Archer was a lot older than Trip when they met and became friends, the impression seemed to be that Trip was closer to Archer's age.

Archer and Trip met during the testing of the warp engine. In the episode First Flight when Trip defends the design of the engine and says the problem with the first test is the mix. He introduces himself to Archer. Archer later buys him a drink and they become friends. I never thought of them as the same age because he came across as a young engineer and Archer was an established pilot in the program.

 

[Xabitrip]

Kirk was younger than McCoy, Scott and possibly Spock and he out ranked them.

Wasn't Kirk one of the youngest to make Captain at the time. I thought I remembered that from my childhood, but that was a long, long, looooong time ago.


As far as peception of age, Archer and Tucker were supposed to have gone way back together. So unless Archer was a lot older than Trip when they met and became friends, the impression seemed to be that Trip was closer to Archer's age.

I think the other big factor was the Trip came off a very confident and in control. Malcolm, not so much. So maybe there was a perception Mal was younger because he didn't have it together as well as Trip did.

Definitely, I always saw Trip as the more confident of the two, but that just confirmed to me that he'd gained his promotion to Commander at a much earlier age than would be normal, especially after viewing First Flight.

Malcolm was an odd character it always felt like it was written for someone ten years younger than the actor.

I do sometimes thing they mis-cast Malcolm but only because of the age issue, DK was perfect in the role otherwise. Possibly the age issue was something they just didn't think about or expected to be questioned.

As far as peception of age, Archer and Tucker were supposed to have gone way back together. So unless Archer was a lot older than Trip when they met and became friends, the impression seemed to be that Trip was closer to Archer's age.

Archer and Trip met during the testing of the warp engine. In the episode First Flight when Trip defends the design of the engine and says the problem with the first test is the mix. He introduces himself to Archer. Archer later buys him a drink and they become friends. I never thought of them as the same age because he came across as a young engineer and Archer was an established pilot in the program.

I actually saw a bigger age gap between Archer and Trip than that between Trip and Malcolm. Yes, Archer and Trip became firm friends during the test flight when, in my view, Archer saw the potential this young engineer had and basically took him under his wing in a mentoring capacity, with the friendship blossoming from there as often happens.

 

[JiNX-01]

From the "bible" for Enterprise, which was clearly amended substantially in several ways:

Jackson Archer: early 40s
Charlie "Spike" Tucker: early 30s
Malcolm Reed: late 20s
Joe Mayweather: mid 20s
Hoshi Sato: late 20s
T'Pau: Age isn't revealed (tho' T'Pol tells Trip in Zero Hour that she is going to be 65 on her next birthday).
Phloxx-tunnai-oortann: No age given.

 

[Penguin]

I once posted that I believd that Archer was about 46-47 in Broken bow. Hopeful romantic corrected me by saying the official age given for Archer was 43 and I believe 32 for Trip. In any event Archer was at least a decade older than Trip in the series.

Actually the age of the Acrors were Bakula 48 at the satrt of the series and Trinneer was 34. Again a decade or more.

Actually connors last brthday he was 40. Series ended four years ago which would have mde him 36 and the series ran four years which meant he was 32 at the start of the series.

 

[Xabitrip]

I once posted that I believd that Archer was about 46-47 in Broken bow. Hopeful romantic corrected me by saying the official age given for Archer was 43 and I believe 32 for Trip. In any event Archer was at least a decade older than Trip in the series.

Actually the age of the Acrors were Bakula 48 at the satrt of the series and Trinneer was 34. Again a decade or more.

Actually connors last brthday he was 40. Series ended four years ago which would have mde him 36 and the series ran four years which meant he was 32 at the start of the series.

What probably made it more annoying to me was the fact that by the time I was watching ENT on a regular basis I already knew the age differences of the 3 actors in question, ie Bakula (dob 1954), Keating (dob 1962) and Trinneer (dob 1969) and, as such, my sub-conscious thought of their characters at similar ages. I know there will be many who think it doesn’t really matter and that its only small in the scheme of things but it does annoy me when they had a perfectly good opportunity to highlight Trip’s speedy climb up the promotion ladder at such an early age. As I said earlier, the mentoring relationship between Archer and Trip is very feasible given such an age difference. What they could have brought into it was possibly some resentment on Reed’s part between him and Trip with regard to the difference in rank.