87
votes
Accepted
Why are Tucker and Malcolm not dead?
Current NASA spacesuits are filled with 100% oxygen at around 4psi so filling a spacesuit with pure oxygen is no issue assuming the pressure isn't too high. reference
The actual percentage of gas ...
- 2,349
65
votes
Accepted
What's that ship in the opening credits of 'Star Trek: Enterprise'?
This is the S.S. Emmette, designed by Doug Drexler.
This time for real! Here it is, one of the most mysterious of all the
Enterprise ships, the S.S Emmette. Teasingly seen in the notorious
title ...
- 652k
60
votes
What was the highest rated episode of Star Trek?
You can see the Nielsen ratings for ALL modern Star Trek episodes (TNG, DS9, VOY, and ENT) plotted together on this handy graph from here:
Which confirms Richard's answer (the highest outside of TOS ...
- 133k
50
votes
Accepted
What was the highest rated episode of Star Trek?
The series premiere for TOS (The Man Trap) opened with a Nielsen rating of 25.2 (albeit facing dramatically less competition than future shows). This is a figure that would never again be matched by ...
- 652k
42
votes
Accepted
In which (if any) Star Trek episodes does that show’s captain not appear?
For future reference, Memory Alpha has categories that can help with this kind of query; they're grouped together as "Regular cast non-appearances".
Using the resources there, it seems there ...
- 2,074
38
votes
Accepted
Why aren't T'Pol's eyebrows like typical Vulcan eyebrows?
Quoting from here
Michael Westmore was the makeup designer and supervisor and said, "Jolene was a Trek fan and she hated that they didn't give her usual Vulcan ears and eyebrows. So in season ...
- 496
37
votes
Is there a canon reason why Klingon and Romulan vessels are so similar in shape?
Because they traded technology
From the Memory-Alpha write-up for TOS: The Enterprise Incident
Kirk then inexplicably orders helmsman Sulu to take the Enterprise
across the Romulan Neutral Zone ...
- 3,593
36
votes
In which (if any) Star Trek episodes does that show’s captain not appear?
William Shatner as Kirk did not appear in the animated episode, The Slaver Weapon. Its the only time in the first block of Star Trek history (not including the new shows) where the Captain did not ...
- 351
35
votes
Accepted
When was the Verteron Array built exactly and why wasn't it used against the Xindi when they were about to destroy earth?
Whether or not the Verteron Array was complete by the time of the Xindi attack, there is a very simple reason why it could not have been used to stop the Xindi device:
The Earth and Mars were on ...
- 110k
34
votes
Did 9/11 have any effect on the Star Trek franchise?
Star Trek Films
Damen Lindelof advises of the 9/11 inspiration in Star Trek (2009), used to build the new film franchise:
On fallout "ripple effect" of the destruction of Vulcan
While ...
- 11.3k
33
votes
Accepted
How much does the Enterprise increase/vary in size between models?
Here is a picture of the Enterprises lined up together; the last one is the new version of the Enterprise from the post-2009 movies:
The first is the NX-class Enterprise from the Enterprise series; ...
- 65.8k
33
votes
Accepted
Does James T Kirk know about Jonathan Archer?
Yes, Kirk must know about Archer, and it is NOT implied in The Original Series that Kirk is the first to explore deep space with warp technology.
It is never suggested in The Original Series that ...
- 110k
31
votes
Accepted
Is the Mirror Universe the same one across all Star Trek shows?
As far as we can tell, it's the same Mirror Universe
Though it's possible there are at least two.
The first is the one we initially visit in "Mirror, Mirror", which is clearly the same one ...
- 161k
31
votes
Accepted
How can an address refer to the "USA" if no countries exist in Star Trek?
Enterprise takes place before the formation of the Federation in 2161. It's still possible that people would identify places by the country that place was in (Paris is both a city in France and a town ...
- 50.2k
29
votes
Accepted
What is the purpose of the Enterprise tail fin?
I'm actually going to list this in contrast to CBredlow's - but like the blueprint in that answer, this isn't necessarily 'official' canon either, although, the two images below and their explanations ...
- 39.8k
27
votes
How can an address refer to the "USA" if no countries exist in Star Trek?
Although countries no longer had individual governments by the mid-22nd century, at least some of the landmasses were still referred to by their previous names, even as late as the 24th century.
TROI:...
- 88.1k
24
votes
Accepted
How did Starfleet have an admiralty if it didn't have a fleet?
The "Starfleet" that we see in Enterprise was evolving out of the United Earth Space Probe Agency, which was an international agency set up after Earth's Third World War. It served the same role that ...
- 110k
24
votes
Accepted
Why doesn't anyone mention the obvious about the Vulcan temple?
They do mention it. It gets raised at the highest ambassadorial levels a few episodes later in ENT: Shadows of P'Jem when the Vulcan High Command use it as an excuse to recall T'Pol:
SOVAL: The ...
- 652k
24
votes
Accepted
Why are there no more Denobulans?
There's no canon evidence as to what happened to the Denobulans after Star Trek: Enterprise, but we can make a reasonable guess.
According to Captain Picard's dialog in Star Trek: First Contact, the ...
- 3,835
24
votes
Is there any in-universe explanation of the likenesses caused by actor-recycling in Star Trek?
You're asking for an in-universe explanation for something that doesn't exist in-universe.
For instance, Marc Alaimo plays several Trek characters. In-universe, nobody ever asks Gul Dukat if he's ...
- 3,675
23
votes
Accepted
Why aren't transporters used more often in Star Trek Enterprise?
"The Communicator" in particular
Early dialogue indicates that the sensors on the ship simply aren't accurate enough to lock onto Malcolm's communicator; they only get a definite position ...
- 161k
22
votes
Accepted
Why did Captain Archer compete at boxing?
He didn't
That image isn't from Star Trek Enterprise; it's from Quantum Leap, an unrelated sci-fi series also starring Scott Bakula (who played Archer on Enterprise).
Specifically, the image is from ...
- 161k
21
votes
Accepted
How did first contact with the Klingons lead to war?
Rather than a single incident, it may have been several:
Strike 1: The first contact
The first contact was depicted in ENT 'Broken Bow' and is described by Memory Alpha as follows:
After arriving ...
- 69.2k
21
votes
Accepted
Why is mind meld hard for T'pol in Star Trek: Enterprise?
If you're watching Enterprise for the first time: just keep watching.
If you don't mind spoilers, then the Wikipedia article on T'Pol
(emphasis mine) explains it pretty well.
- 5,235
20
votes
Accepted
Is the backstory regarding the USS Franklin inconsistent or unnecessarily complicated?
It's been officially confirmed that the Franklin predates Archer's Enterprise, see this article:
And if you think this is just our speculation, worry not: we got a note from Dylan Highsmith, one of ...
- 54.1k
19
votes
At what point and why does it become (almost) impossible to transport through shields in the Star Trek Universe?
You posit two questions, so I'll answer them separately:
Why
First of all, consider the technology of the NX-01:
The defensive systems of the NX-class were also not as advanced as
those of ...
- 69.2k
19
votes
How did Starfleet have an admiralty if it didn't have a fleet?
It had a fleet. A small one. NX-01 was special not because it was their first ship, but because it was the fastest, first to get to Warp 5.0, thus it was the first capable of speed high enough to ...
- 10.3k
18
votes
Accepted
Are those stars moving past the window when the ship is at warp?
Main Canon
There are several instances within the script (seen on screen) and the script directions that indicate that the streamers are in fact stars;
Hoshi in Ent: Fight or Flight explicitly states ...
- 652k
18
votes
Accepted
Star Trek episode where the crew is incapacitated on the bridge
This is VOY: One. The episode opens with the crew on the bridge suffering from the effects of a nebula they've just entered. Tuvok manages to cross the bridge and change the course so that it leads ...
- 652k
17
votes
Accepted
Did computers in Star Trek ever rival the typical humanoid brain in sophistication?
Yes!
It could be argued that this had been accomplished as early as 2268 (some 116 years after "Dead Stop", by the M-5 multitronic unit. The M-5 was said to have circuity resembling the human brain's ...
- 12.2k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible