Why was Sulu played off as a normal person but Chekov as a caricature?

[T'Girl]

Re: Why was Sulu played off as a normal person but Chekov as a caricat

Best thing I learned is half of the Enterprise bridge crew is Russian Jewish in origin, even the alien

I thought Shatner was a Canadian Jew.

With the "you couldn't pronounce it" business, I always imagined Spock's first name was similar to Superman's pain in the ass, Mr. Mxyzptlk.

My take is that Vulcans can hear in a wider audio spectrum than we do, they can hear sounds we can't. Some of the family name is "missing" to Humans.

Amanda through the years has learn to make sounds, pronouce words, that she actually can't hear herself.

It's like when we make sounds so high pitched that we can't hear what's coming out of our mouths, but dogs will react to. To another Human it just seems like you're slowly exhaling.

 

[Armored Saint]

Re: Why was Sulu played off as a normal person but Chekov as a caricat

Best thing I learned is half of the Enterprise bridge crew is Russian Jewish in origin, even the alien

I thought Shatner was a Canadian Jew.

And as most of Canadian Jews, his ancestors were from Central and Eastern Europe, but yeah, It seems than for many people, Eastern means Russia. Sepharadic Jew from North Africa arrived later in the 20th century. So yeah, Montreal Ashkenazic Jews gave us bagels, smoked meat sandwiches and Captain Kirk, so not bad at all.

 

[GalaxyX]

Re: Why was Sulu played off as a normal person but Chekov as a caricat

Best thing I learned is half of the Enterprise bridge crew is Russian Jewish in origin, even the alien

I thought Shatner was a Canadian Jew.

And as most of Canadian Jews, his ancestors were from Central and Eastern Europe, but yeah, It seems than for many people, Eastern means Russia. Sepharadic Jew from North Africa arrived later in the 20th century. So yeah, Montreal Ashkenazic Jews gave us bagels, smoked meat sandwiches and Captain Kirk, so not bad at all.

Hmm!!!! Smoked meat sandwiches!

 

[TheAdmiralty]

Re: Why was Sulu played off as a normal person but Chekov as a caricat

Sulu's being a "normal" character was very important as it was pretty rare to see an authentic Asian-American depiction in media at that time (i.e, no heavy accent, speaks English well). Some of the jokes at Chekov's expense were just about him being the green rookie others (about his accent and nationalism) were Cold War era baggage. Having a Russian working alongside American characters was a pretty big deal just in and of itself and them making him a little bit of a parody doesn't diminish that.