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In honor of the release of the upcoming new Star Trek movie, and my review of the new Star Trek game (posting later this week at GamerDad.com), here’s a list of my top five favorite Star Trek characters!

You know what’s funny is that I don’t even LIKE Star Trek.  I’m really more of a Star Wars fan, but that’s only because Star Wars was bigger in the 80’s when I was a kid.  Plus, Star Wars movies had more action and toys and the spaceships didn’t look like pancakes with feet.  And they actually DID stuff in Star Wars instead of sit around in their spaceships waiting for the alien of the day to show up.

But even though I don’t like Star Trek, I know enough about it to write a whole blog and think about five characters in it that are neat.  How do I know so much even though I’m not a fan?  Well, my college roommate was a big Trekkie, so I had to sit and watch all the shows when they came on.  But it really wasn’t that bad.  If that’s the worst I had to put up with from my roommate, than he was still a pretty darn good one.  And he was!  He was my roommate for all four years of college, and a friend in high school and middle school before that.  I’m sure that he had to put up with worse stuff out of me than I did of him.  It’s too bad I don’t hear from him anymore.  Anyway, I also have relatives and stepparents who are into Star Trek, too, so that helped me know more, too.

I know about all the Star Trek shows, so let’s see if I can remember them all.  There was the really old and boring one from the 60’s.  Then in the 80’s and 90’s we had The New Generation which was really popular, but I still thought it was boring.  After that was Deep Space Nine, which was the most boring Star Trek of all because they didn’t even go anywhere.  Then came Voyager, which I liked a little better (meaning, I watched a couple of episodes before stopping), because they did go places.  And finally was Enterprise, which had that Quantum Leap guy as the captain and a really mean Vulcan lady.  And that’s all I know about the TV shows!  Did I miss any?

I’ve also seen all the Star Trek movies.  Why would I do that, since I don’t like Star Trek?  Well, it’s like Sonic the Hedgehog.  I don’t like most Sonic games, but there are a few that I do enjoy, so I’m always willing to give them a try to see if I like them.  Same goes with the Star Trek movies.  Don’t like most of them, but there are a few that I like, so I don’t mind giving them a try, either.  I liked the fourth one where they had to save whales in the 80’s because it was silly and funny.  First Contact was also really good.  The last Star Trek movie, which had a totally new cast and a retelling of the original story, was also fun in a mindless summer movie sort of way, with lots of action and explosions.  So I’m willing to give the new movie a try as well.

And even though I don’t like Star Trek, I do like me a good Star Trek parody.  In the 70’s, Filmation did a Star Trek cartoon.  It really wasn’t a parody, but the animation and writing were so bad it almost could be!  They re-ran it on Nickelodeon when I was little, and back then I did think it was kind of cool.  But then, I was a kid and didn’t know any better.  Speaking of cartoons, a lot of my favorite ones have done hilarious Star Trek parodies, such as Muppet Babies, Eek the Cat, VeggieTales, Dexter’s Laboratory, and Animaniacs.  But I think the best Star Trek parody was one episode of Futurama.  If you’ve seen it, you probably know which one I’m talking about!

Anyway, enough introductions.  Let’s get on to my top five favorite Star Trek characters!  I’m sure I’ll cause many a Trekkie to become disgusted, if I haven’t done so already!

1. Chekov

Actually the reason why Chekov is my favorite Star Trek character has nothing to do with him at all.  Although it was probably a big deal back then to have a Russian character in the cast what with all the Cold War stuff going on back then.  No, the reason why he’s my favorite is because I named a cat after him.  You see, when I was a kid, I got a Russian Blue cat and I wanted to give him a Russian name.  But I couldn’t think of any.  Don’t blame me, I was just a kid!  But then my dad suggested Chekov so I went with that.

I don’t really have any pictures of what Chekov looked like, but if you do a search for the Russian Blue cat breed, you can pretty much see what he was.  Only thing fairly unique to Chekov was that he was a very long cat.  His tail was as long as the rest of his body, and when he’d lay on top of the recliner, he’d streeeetch out so he reached both ends.  He looked like a weasel when he did that.

Chekov was a smart cat, too!  I taught him all sorts of tricks.  He’d play fetch with those little spongy golf ball sized cat toys. Any cat owners out there know which ones I’m talking about.  I also taught him how to open closed doors by jumping up and turning the doorknob.  I almost got him to where he could use the toilet instead of the litterbox, but I was worried he might fall in the toilet when we were away, so I stopped teaching him that trick.

Chekov was also very well behaved.  If he did anything wrong, I’d usually only have to tell him “No” once and he would never do it again.  Spraying him with water wouldn’t work, as he’d just stand there with his mouth open, ready for a drink.  We even took him on a road trip from Texas to Alabama once, and he did great!  And most cats and cars don’t mix!

He was also my gaming buddy, too.  When I’d play NES, he’d either sit in my lap and try to bat at the big red buttons on my NES Advantage, or he’d stand at the TV and swat at the moving sprites on screen.  Definitely one of my favorite pets.  If I ever got another cat, I’d try to get a Russian Blue (from a rescue place of course).  And I’d know just what Russian name to give him this time: Karnov!  Of course, I certainly won’t be getting a cat any time soon with our dog Venus around.  But that’s OK; Venus is great in her own right.  At any rate, that’s why Chekov is my favorite Star Trek character.  Any time I watch one of the old Star Trek shows or movies with the old cast, and they address Chekov, I expect the response to be “Meow.”

2. Tribbles

Even if you don’t know much about Star Trek, you probably know what Tribbles are.  Those cute little fuzzballs from one of the more famous classic episodes.  I think it would be cool to buy a Tribbles toy, but I’m not paying that much for an oversized dust bunny!  One time in college, my roommate was watching Deep Space Nine.  But it ended up being one that I liked, too, because it had the old Tribbles episode in it.  The plot involved travelling back in time to that moment in the original show, and they cleverly used bits from the old show in the new one.  It was pretty neat.  I should add that if my roommate wanted to watch Star Trek and I didn’t, oftentimes I would just play a Game Boy game or do homework or whatever, so it wasn’t like I was forced to watch his shows or anything like that.

3. Spot the Cat

In the New Generation show, one of the characters was an android and he had a pet cat named Spot. I thought that was pretty funny so his cat is one of my favorites.  One time in one of the Star Trek movies with the new cast, everyone kept leaving the bridge to go help solve some impending disaster.  Captain Baldy first gave Beardy control of the bridge, and so on.  Pretty soon I think the counselor had control of the bridge!  At that moment, I turned to my college roommate and said that if this keeps up, Spot the Cat is going to be in charge!  That made him laugh!

4. Hologram Doctor Man

I watched Voyager for a few episodes before stopping, and one of the funnier characters was a doctor guy who was actually a hologram.  Personally I think he was a real person, but he was just really lazy. “All crew members must come to deck 6 immediately to beat up some bad aliens, now!” “Oh, I can’t, I’m just a hologram and can’t leave this room.  Oh well.”  He did have a funny cameo in the First Contact movie, though.

5. 789

After I stopped watching Voyager, my college roommate told me that later on, they added a new character.  I guess they wanted to boost ratings by introducing a pretty female character in a tight outfit.  But uh oh!  She couldn’t act very well.  That’s OK, they just made her be a robot Borg so she could just talk like a robot.  Problem solved.  I don’t remember seeing this character much, but everything that came out of her mouth was hilarious and cracked me up.  I’m not even sure if I’m getting her name on the show right, though.  Sounds like a joke punchline.  Why was 6 afraid of 7?  Because 789!  Her name could’ve been 345 or 915 for all I know.  Maybe one of you smart Trekkies can fill me in.

And that’s all for now!  In the comments section, tell me your favorite Star Trek characters and feel free to correct any mistakes or gaps I made in my blog, as I know there are some.  I just don’t feel like doing any research.  Later!  --Cary