10 Dumbest Things In Star Trek: Enterprise

The subsequent novels in the Enterprise era demonstrate how misaligned the series was to the fanbase by the time the final bell tolled. Trip's death in These Are the Voyages is one of, but not the only, stumbles at the finishing line. Yes, a second reference to These are the Voyages!

Seemingly the Bobby Ewing event of the expanded universe, Trip might as well have stepped out of the shower in the first Enterprise novel and eradicated the final 45 minutes of the series. Killing him off inside a holodeck recreation provided a neat get-out clause, but the death lacked any sincerity or emotional kick that accompanied Dax, Tasha Yar or even Airiam in Discovery. It felt like a tacked-on moment for sensationalism rather than for the movement of the plot or characters. Trip really didn't need to die, and his decisions are oddly out of sorts for the chief engineer, given his experiences only the episode before in Terra Prime. 

The novels aligned Trip with Section 31, who were supposed to be super secret and not have their existence "revealed" until the DS9 era; however, their fingerprints are all over Enterprise, with Malcolm Reed being a former operative. In fact, he even reveals his background to Archer in Divergence. Alongside the Ferengi and the Borg, it may tie the franchise together, but it also makes later reveals in the timeline make the 24th-century characters seem horribly misinformed or unable to check a database. 

Yes, a lot of the information from the Enterprise period might be classified, but there are no references to any of this data being hidden or unavailable, and Archer is fully aware of their presence. Just a few careful lines in the script would have easily meshed canon together with no worries.