Pavel Chekov
Pavel Andreievich Chekov (Russian: Павел Андреевич Чехов) is a member of the crew of the Starship Enterprise in Star Trek, stereotypically Russian in every respect, except for inexplicably always pronouncing the letter v (в) as though it were a w.
Chekov's role in the fiction, apart from being a junior-level officer who could be induced — by hypnosis, alien spores, a stasis beam, being reduced to a dehydrated porous cuboctahedron solid the size of a human fist, or the sudden reappearance of an ex-girlfriend — to lose his mind and mutiny for a period never exceeding 55 minutes, was to illustrate that Russians are unable to do English correctly.
Youth and education[edit]
The Wikia Star Trek wiki GetALife.org tells us that Chekov was the son of Anton Chekhov but did not share his father's love of writing ponderous classics. Instead, he attended Starfleet Academy, where he graduated with the rank of non-expendable extra. This ensured that whenever he was killed off, such as by the telepathic Melkotians at the O.K. Corral, he would be brought back to life by a double-dose of deus ex machina.
Career[edit]
Chekov joined the crew of the Enterprise at the age of 22, in the springtime of the year 2267. (This is the season when tulips start to bud in deep space.) He became a totally forgettable member of the bridge crew (often serving as the "dummy" of the foursome), although Khan Noonien Singh (pictured) told him in one of the movies that he never forgets a face, evidently including a face that was not on the starship in the episode where Khan was.
Chekov usually served as navigator, but could take the place of Spock, either at the science station or rattling off interminable inanities. Chekov was highly excitable, a trait that in one case saved his life from the rapid-aging beam and meant that he did not have to consume any rapid-age-removing elixir.
Personal[edit]
For Star Trek fans who took a romantic interest in Chekov despite his curious lack of a constant personality, Chekov has an ex-girlfriend, Irina Galliulin. She became a flower child who hijacked starships, whereas Chekov became a martinet who piloted them. This gave the ladies a token human-interest side-story on the way to Galliulin hijacking the Enterprise. At the end of that episode, they discuss their incompatibile temperaments (in English, for some reason, which both pronounce with compatible ineptitude) and part ways, Chekov preferring to stay on the starship than to complete the paperwork to periodically visit Galliulin in prison.
Chekov has stereotypical Russian traits, such as believing that every English-language classic novels was written in St. Petersburg, which despite it being the mid-2200s, he refers to as Leningrad. He showed a preference for vodka on the set, which conveniently obviated the use of food coloring for his servings of water.
After the five-year mission of the Enterprise, Chekov left for Babylon 5 and his personality changed. He began to frown, developed psychic powers, and started dressing in black — all from finding out that the helmsman he had sat next to for three years was gay.
