Enterprise 20th: Ranking every major character from Star Trek: Enterprise
By Chad Porto
10. Admiral Maxwell Forrest
Admiral Maxwell Forrest was the flag officer in charge of the NX project, the original design model for the U.S.S. Enterprise. As such, he oversaw the project in alignment with the Vulcan High Command. It was this combination that ultimately agreed to put Vulcan officer T’Pol on the Enterprise to provide Captain Jonathan Archer with a point of contact of sorts with the Vulcans, and to allow the Vulcans to monitor the ship and its progress.
Aside from the fact that fact and that it was Forrest who picked Archer to captain the ship, his character didn’t serve much purpose within the series, other than as exposition to set up the events of a story.
He had no real backstory, no real history and it was Forrest’s actor Vaughn Armstrong who essentially came up with the backstory for the character. Armstrong imagined Forrest as a guy who worked his way up from engineering to working on the NX project.
It’s no surprise the character had no backstory or history to him, as he was never supposed to be a recurring character after he appeared in the pilot. By the time his last appearance rolled around in the Forge, he had appeared in 14 episodes.
The most interesting about his character was that he was named after Star Trek original series actor, DeForest Kelley.