Hidden Gems in Chekov's Choice
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| Nightmares in “Chekov’s Choice” |
He’d said, “I mentioned to Marv Wolfman, who’s the editor, the fact that Chekov wasn’t even getting a decent role in the comic book, never mind in the movies, and he said, ‘Why don’t you write one, and make Chekov the hero?’
“It’s called ‘Chekov’s Choice,’ and he has to make a choice between love—or the woman he considers his love—and the safety of the ship. It’s one of those stories of personal conflict, and I think it’s very much in keeping with the feeling of the series.”
During his convention appearance that day, Koenig described talking to Marv Wolfman about perhaps writing a story for the comic. “I said, well, ‘There are conditions: Chekov has got to get the girl, he’s got to be totally in control of the situation, and his decision affects the lives and deaths of 400 people aboard the Enterprise. And he’s got to be featured on the cover.’ There’s nothing ego-maniacal about those (laughs).”
In the story, Chekov was distraught after the Enterprise was unable to rescue the crew of a doomed spaceship. Kirk couldn’t sleep, and Chekov had repeated nightmares. As aliens pressured the crew with illusions, a mob-mentality compelled some of the crew to take over auxiliary control and disable helm control, just as the ship was heading toward an asteroid.
Tucked in a corner of that story was a full-page montage depicting Chekov’s nightmares, which I'd forgotten about until I reread the story recently. The page provided a great deal of previously unrevealed backstory for the character. Describing his dreams, Chekov said that he saw repeated images of the doomed aliens and of himself, but also he saw images of the suffering of his father, the girl that he loved, his captain, and his closest friend. I matched up the images with his descriptions:
In the middle, Chekov wept at the sight of the doomed aliens.
At the top right, we saw his father Andrei Chekov trapped in a burning house. Did this tragedy happen or was it some symbolic separation between Chekov and his father? If it happened, what caused the fire? Did his father survive?
At the bottom right, the girl that Chekov loved, a blonde woman. That’s interesting because Irina Galliulin (from “The Way to Eden”) had dark hair. So did Julia Crandall, a woman with whom Chekov had a doomed relationship in “No Compromise,” a DC Comic published nine years later. So who was this mysterious blonde love of Chekov’s life? And what tragedy befell her?
In the middle, the two yellow disembodied heads I took to be images of Kirk under stress, perhaps with the left image representing Kirk aged in “The Deadly Years” and the right image of Kirk today, stressed by the doomed alien ship.
Bottom left, we saw Chekov being tugged symbolically by two officers, with I think Ensign Burns on the left (who would later shoot Chekov with a phaser) and an unnamed blond officer who earlier that day yelled at Scotty in Chekov’s defense.
That left the middle left image, in which Chekov apparently was unable to stop a Klingon warrior from shooting his best friend in the chest. That looked like it could be Sulu, or it could have been another person. Was it Sulu? Who was the Klingon? What caused the fight? Was Chekov there in person or symbolically unable to help his friend?
Whether these events really occurred to the character, or Chekov had just dreamed of bad things happening to people that he cared about, was left up to the reader. Either way, though, these forgotten moments of Chekov’s past seemed like hidden gems. I’d love to read more.
(Image ©1985 DC Comics, licensed from CBS Paramount Television)
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