Is Enterprise Canon?

[StarshipDefiant]

It's canon, and I've yet to see a plausible argument as to why it shouldn't be. And, no, the ship name and the fact T'Pol didn't have slanted eyebrows in the first two seasons do not count. My problem with the canon and not canon debate tends to come from the fact that people look for a reason why it's inconstant (T'Pol's eyebrows aren't slanted, she was in Starfleet, the ship is named Enterprise). I can admit, the show had issues, but it's not the first trek series to have done so. I'm sick and tired of Enterprise being treated like it's the series that killed trek, or that it was a total fuck up every step of the way since day one. The other shows have created plenty of issues (TNG's the Klingons joining the Federation, anyone?)

Honestly, I give the its not canon crowd very little credit, considering some of the things they bitch about. Again, as others said, TOS was inconsistant with itself (somewhere), TNG didn't mesh with TOS 100%, DS9 didn't mesh with TOS and TNG 100%, VOY didn't mesh with TOS, TNG, or DS9 100%, it happens. Sure, it sucks, but it happens. Also, a lot of the "its not canon!" people tend to cite facts that are not at all canon to begin with, so...

 

[Herbert1]

The showrunners are pretty much free to do what they want for their own creative purposes.

I that were true, it would mean that canon itself doesn't really exist (I'd be more than fine with that, personally )

No, I am not saying that at all. It is the decision by the showrunner to determine which past events, characters, or things depicted in a previous television series or motion picture are considered "genuine" or "something that actually happened" and which that are apocryphal and didn't happen the way they were previously depicted. The writers writing episode scripts or movie scripts would then have to adhere to this canon.

The writers of licensed Star Trek fiction need to adhere to the canon as best they can because it is required by their editor to do so.

 

[23skidoo]

The whole "it's not canon" argument was basically started by Trekkies with their noses out of joint because a) Berman was still in charge, b) it took the place of the beloved Capt. Sulu series everyone expected and c) it violated FANON bigtime (which is a completely different animal).

Case in point: bashers claimed up and down that the show violated canon by having T'Pol being the first Vulcan serving with Starfleet, claiming that Spock was the first. This claim was proven to be fanon because around this time TOS was coming out on DVD and someone paid attention while watching the entire series and came back stating there was never anything in the original series to indicate this, nor the movies. It may have been stated in a novel or comic book, but per Roddenberry and Paramount, that spin-off material is not canon and therefore the writers of film and TV have no obligation to pay any attention to it.

(That's the other thing. Someone honestly said that anyone writing for Trek had to have read all the novels and comics to make sure everything fit in. What garbage.)

Supporters of the series spent 4 years constantly defending it against people claiming it wasn't canon, and with 100% success rate refuting every point made against it.

The owners of Star Trek say it's canon, so it is canon. That's the end of the argument as far as I'm concerned. The Star Trek franchise is not a co-op.

Alex

 

[Mach5]

Supporters of the series spent 4 years constantly defending it against people claiming it wasn't canon, and with 100% success rate refuting every point made against it.

And yet, five years after the show ended where still here, at square one...

 

[Deckerd]

Yes.

I didn't particularly enjoy it but it was on the screen. It's canon.

 

[Herbert1]

^Fans also objected to Enterprise or Star Trek:Enterprise because the official resource Star Trek Encyclopedia took Star Trek the original series literally and began to speculate about the time of the Romulan War. For the book, Greg Jein was commissioned to create models for the Daedalus-class, based on an unused starship design for the USS Enterprise by Matt Jefferies, and Romulan ships from the war. The Daedalus-class ship Horizon would later be seen in Sisko's office making it seem as though the design was canon. Fans then objected to the depiction of the NX Enterprise and the rest of the starships shown in Enterprise because they didn't look like early Matt Jefferies designs or the Romulan ship that Jein created for the book.

Backstage information over the years has also crept into fandom and tie-in/licensee products that are accepted by fans as canon, that was later contradicted by filmed episodes. Some fans seem to be more attached to the backstage information from the 1960s and so they reject the Enterprise depiction as apocryphal.

Further, licensee products such as the Star Fleet Technical Manual and the FASA role playing materials received the blessings of Gene Roddenberry. Artwork and references to some of these materials made it into the first three Star Trek features and the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Fans presumed wrongly that these materials were the "true" backstory of the Star Trek universe.

 

[Deckerd]

If it didn't appear on a TV or big screen it didn't happen.

 

[Herbert1]

If it didn't appear on a TV or big screen it didn't happen.

That's not entirely true because things that did appear on a TV or big screen are later contradicted and tie-in material has become canon. It's more like we reserve the right to not acknowledge anything that has occured in licensee/tie-in products nor do we promise to pay attention to them.

 

[Mach5]

If it didn't appear on a TV or big screen it didn't happen.

That's not entirely true because things that did appear on a TV or big screen are later contradicted and tie-in material has become canon. It's more like we reserve the right to not acknowledge anything that has occured in licensee/tie-in products nor do we promise to pay attention to them.

As far as I'm concerned, everything I read in books (and liked) did happen, and it will remain so until something that happens on-screen overrules it.

 

[Nerys Myk]

If it didn't appear on a TV or big screen it didn't happen.

That's not entirely true because things that did appear on a TV or big screen are later contradicted and tie-in material has become canon. It's more like we reserve the right to not acknowledge anything that has occured in licensee/tie-in products nor do we promise to pay attention to them.

Tie-ins material only becomes canon when it appears on screen, so the rule applies.

And yes, pieces of continuity can be over written by subsequent material (James R. Kirk for example) but that doesn't take WNMHGB out of the canon. Just that one prop.

 

[Withers]

You know what... I'm willing to say this; if disregarding TOS makes Enterprise make more sense, I'm willing to do that.

Having said that I'm not entirely sure that doing so would make any difference. Would it?

-Withers-​

 

[SeerSGB]

Meh. I'm just to lazy to futz with reconciling it all, I just treat each series canon onto itself-- their own little micro continuities it were.

 

[DonIago]

Every episode occurs in an alternate timeline!

 

[muzzleflash]

^Genius!

 

[cooleddie74]

Sometimes I wonder if the ENT forums aren't in some alternate timeline.

 

[Herbert1]

Does it matter if Star Trek: Enterprise is canon or not? Are they going to re-create the Recreation Deck display and stick in a portrait of the NX-01 Enterprise for Star Trek: The Motion Picture? Are they going to re-loop the dialogue of Spock's description of the Romulan War in "Balance of Terror" in light of the technology shown in Star Trek: Enterprise?

 

[GalaxyClass1701]

Yes there is no denying it all series and movies are canon. And everything makes sense to me because when ever a continuity issue came up in ENT I always told myself that STFC slightly altered the timeline.

 

[OmahaStar]

You know what... I'm willing to say this; if disregarding TOS makes Enterprise make more sense, I'm willing to do that.

And on that basis, no, Enterprise is not canon.

 

[Hopeful Romantic]

Onscreen = canon. Period. Finis. Very clear, concise definition.

Something you don't like, don't agree with, disregard, scratch your head over, can't reconcile, or can't abide, therefore dismissing it as "not canon" = your own personal viewpoint. Which is perfectly fine. But if it was onscreen, it's still canon.

The Great Bird had his own definition of "canon" that evolved over time, but he was God of Star Trek, so he could do that. The rest of us peons are stuck with the first definition.

 

[Tiberius]

I think I should have asked if Enterprise was in a different timeline!