nuTrek Continuity and the USS Franklin

[Crazedwraith]

Is Enterprise considered in continuity with the NuTrek films?

There are signs that it is. An Admiral Archer and his beagle was mentioned in the 09 film and there's a model of the NX Class in "Into Darkness" , and of course there's the Franklin and a MACO and the xindi war mentioned in Beyond.

But the details for the Franklin are well.. wrong. It has a higher nx number than the Enterprise and it also has the USS prefix that enterprise doesn't use. Which suggests a newer ship.

But it was the first ship capable of warp four (NX was warp 5) and it's transporters are only for cargo.

Tv Tropes people seem to hypothesis that it was older than the NX-01 and just kept in series for much longer but this to me would be contradicted by the higher registry. (Not a perfect guide but I'd think better at lower numbers) and the cargo transporters. If it had been kept in service. They'd surely have refitted them to person-capable standards.

I'd actually think that ENT isn't in the nufilm's canon. Or rather only in a 'broad strokes' sense where the events that are actually mentioned happened but not all of it and not in the same way.

[Knife]

Guess it would depend on when the Franklin was MIA as opposed to ENT time line. If the Franklin went missing after some of the events of ENT, then it's just a matter of the ship being upgraded over time before it's last mission. If it's before, you have a continuity issue.

[Zor]

This is pretty easy, the Franklin was build some time before the NX-01 (probably around 2145 or so) and while it was a big deal in terms of engineering (hence why Scotty was interested in it) it's limitations and went missing some time after the foundation of the Federation.

Zor

[Crazedwraith]

This is pretty easy, the Franklin was build some time before the NX-01 (probably around 2145 or so) and while it was a big deal in terms of engineering (hence why Scotty was interested in it) it's limitations and went missing some time after the foundation of the Federation.

Zor

You've not even attempted to address the inconsistencies I mentioned and the flaws with the built before/lost after the nx01 era.

[Shroom Man 777]

They could have reset the alphanumerical designations. NX-01 Enterprise could be newer than NX-326 like how the B-1 Lancer is newer than the B-52, B-29, whatever.

[Knife]

Indeed, I would assume after the Earth Romulan War, but even before the actual Federation or during the formation, the Earth Space Navy could have reorganize.

[Juubi Karakuchi]

In the movie, Balthasar Edison claims to have fought in the Xindi and Romulan Wars. It is also mentioned that the MACO corps (of which he was a member) was disbanded after that; planting a seed of bitterness within him that would flower during his stranding. On that basis, Franklin should be a newer ship than the NX-class from Enterprise. It's also noticeably different in appearance to the NX-class, both internally and externally.

The date given for Franklin's disappearance is 2164; whereas the events of Enterprise run from 2151 to 2155.

Going on preponderance of the evidence, I would say that it's a newer design. However, the technological disparity is hard to ignore, since the features in question (maximum speed and transporters being cargo only) were both mentioned out loud and relevant to the plot. Scotty specifically describes Franklin as being the Warp 4 prototype, and tells McCoy that he was transported through a cargo transporter (a scene admittedly played for laughs). This is too overt to dismiss as a typo unless the writers say so.

But even if the Franklin was indeed an older design (and the alphanumerical designations were changed, as Shroom Man 777 claims) there is the problem Crazedwraith pointed out; namely why the technologies in question weren't updated to more modern standards.

To bring it all together. If it's a newer design, why wasn't the technology up to standard? If it's an older design, why wasn't the technology upgraded? And why does the alphanumerical designation imply that it's newer?

On the face of it, I think we have to accept that Franklin is an older ship, based on what was clearly stated in the movie. The designation can be explained as a post-Romulan-War reorganisation of Starfleet, with Franklin being bumped down the pecking order due to its age and having been recommissioned. As for why the technology wasn't upgraded, we're down to speculation.

The Warp drive can be explained by how integral it is to the overall design. Can you upgrade the Warp drive by swapping out the nacelles? Or do you have to upgrade the Warp core as well? And the power conduits too? It is plausible that to upgrade Franklin from Warp 4 to Warp 5 would require such a radical rebuild as to be not worth the time and resources. This is also convenient from a narrative perspective, as it would feed into Edison's resentment and sense of being put out to pasture; they fobbed him off with an old hulk.

As for the transporter, we may be reading too much into Scotty's words. He only mentions in passing that 'these old transporters were only ever used for cargo', and in a scene that seems to be playing on McCoy's personality issues for humorous effect. It does seem strange, in hindsight, that a serving starship would have strictly cargo-only transporters; especially when Scotty might just be messing with McCoy.

A simpler explanation would be that if Starfleet wasn't going to upgrade the Warp drive, it wasn't going to upgrade the transporters either.

[Shroom Man 777]

If Starfleet was producing newer ships in their wars, then they might've decided not to upgrade older ships that were more likely to be destroyed or combat, or like eventually replaced with newer ships hence making upgrades pointless.

We see this happen in modern militaries all the time.

If the Franklin was relegated to some coast guard-like patrol duty... without upgrades, with budget priority given to the new ships... then 'eh.

Or the transporters Scotty used were older cargo transporters, but that doesn't mean the ship didn't have newer personnel-transporters, for all we know off-screen Scotty tried to reactivate personnel-transporters but they were too worn down and he could only reactivate the more rugged cargo transporters. If personnel-transporters were relatively new during Franklin's time, then it might make sense that IF the Franklin DID get said transporters, that they might've been the less reliable earlier versions and the cargo transporters might've been more reliable than them.

[FedRebel]

Is Enterprise considered in continuity with the NuTrek films?

Yes, only exception is "These Are The Voyages"

There are signs that it is. An Admiral Archer and his beagle was mentioned in the 09 film and there's a model of the NX Class in "Into Darkness" , and of course there's the Franklin and a MACO and the xindi war mentioned in Beyond.

...and you just figured it out? Paramount pretty much up and said in '09 that Enterprise was still canon

But the details for the Franklin are well.. wrong. It has a higher nx number than the Enterprise and it also has the USS prefix that enterprise doesn't use. Which suggests a newer ship.

But it was the first ship capable of warp four (NX was warp 5) and it's transporters are only for cargo.

It was probably a recommissioned boneyard hulk

NX-326 was logically a renumber for when the hull reentered service for the war
It continued service when the coalition federalized and Starfleet became the new government's fleet, hence the USS

[The Romulan Republic]

Technically all of it is still canon, isn't it? The 2009 film portrayed the new films as being in a parallel reality existing beside the original one, not necessarily replacing it. And one that only exists because of the original time line, at that.

Which fits fine, because numerous parallel universes existing (not just the Mirror Universe) was already established in canon as far back as TNG. We just have a series set full-time in one now.

[Gandalf]

Perhaps the NX-01 is itself a reused hull number, to honour the first Warp 3 ship or something. Then once they got to be proper Federation ships as opposed to Earth's Starfleet, they started tacking letters on to the end.

[Lord Revan]

IIRC there was talk of an NX-program as an alternative name for the warp-5 engine during ENT so it's possible that NX-01 thru NX-??? where assigned to the NX-class before any of them were built or even the final design was locked down, then rest of the Starfleet ships were given numbers above the final NX-class. Another possibility which I personally prefer is that "NX-???" was orginally exclusive to the NX class so NX-01 would mean "first ship of the NX-class" with other ships having their own exclusive letter code but after the United Federation of Planets was formed (and with possible additions of ships from Andorian, Tellerite, Vulcan and other assorted allies) this system was streamlined to the classic NX/NCC system used in TOS and beyond I suspect that Enterprise was able to keep the "NX-01" hull number with rest of the fleet getting assigned their own NX/NCC numbers based on their position on the fleet roster rather then any chronologial conserns.