History Main / ChekhovsSkill

See WorkplaceAcquiredAbilities when a character has developed necessary skills in his professional career. See also SomedayThisWillComeInHandy, CrazyPrepared, ChekhovsClassroom. May overlap with PlotTailoredToTheParty, but not necessarily. If the skill was initially perceived as useless, it could also fall into HeartIsAnAwesomePower.

* Steve Jobs took a course in calligraphy at college. It later proved invaluable in Apple pioneering the Graphical User interface. Now think of how far CGI has gone ahead since that development.
** Specifically, Jobs insisted on making the fonts on the Macintosh completely WYSIWYG adjustable. This earned the new machine an instant place in the heart of the publishing industry and proved that [=GUIs=] were more than just window dressing.

* ChekhovsSkill/AnimatedFilms
* ChekhovsSkill/LiveActionFilms

This is a counterpoint to SuddenlyAlwaysKnewThat, as proficiencies are gained and learned rather than mentioned or pulled out of [[AssPull thin air]]. Taken to extremes, Chekhov's Skill can be used to {{justif|iedTrope}}y ImplausibleFencingPowers or turn the FarmBoy into a [[GunKata gun toting]] {{Badass}}. In frustrating cases, it might go the way of ForgottenPhlebotinum and never see use again. Used well, it can lead to some satisfying [[HeroicBystander heroics from unexpected places]].

* Air Canada Flight 143, known as the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli_Glider "Gimli Glider,"]] ran out of fuel mid-flight due to to a combination of technical failures and ground crews making errors converting from imperial to metric units when refueling the plane. The loss of both engines effectively turned the plane into a glider. The captain, Bob Pearson, happened to be an experienced glider pilot. He managed to land the plane safely at Gimli, an abandoned air force base turned into a drag strip.

* In mathematics, the associativity and commutativity. You learn them at primary school and then they don't show up again… until you learn about matrix algebra or hypercomplex numbers, which need not be associative or commutative.
* Even if it's been ''decades'' since a person's taken a foreign language in high school, it can still resurface and come in handy.

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** Specifically, Jobs insisted on making the fonts on the Macintosh completely WYSIWYG adjustable. This earned the new machine an instant place in the heart of the publishing industry and proved that GUIs were more than just window dressing.

See WorkplaceAcquiredAbilities when a character has developed necessary skills in his professional career. See also SomedayThisWillComeInHandy, CrazyPrepared, ChekhovsClassroom. May overlap with PlotTailoredToTheParty, but not necessarily.

See also SomedayThisWillComeInHandy, CrazyPrepared, ChekhovsClassroom. May overlap with PlotTailoredToTheParty, but not necessarily.

** Astronaut Jim Lovell, during his flight on Apollo 8, remarked that he could use a portion of the Earth as a reference point to control his spacecraft's attitude should his guidance computer fail. During his Apollo 13 flight, an explosion forced the crew to shut down their guidance computers to conserve power. When he had to fire his engine to correct his craft's trajectory, he used the very same technique he came up with a year and a half earlier.

Training in any kind of skill, ability, or knowledge that will likely later [[SomedayThisWillComeInHandy come in handy]]. Much like ChekhovsGun, ChekhovsSkill covers instances where a character takes time in-story to become proficient at something.

If the hero takes time to teach his [[LoveInterests sweetie]] a self-defense Judo throw during the beginning, expect this DistressedDamsel to throw the {{Mook}} [[StandardFemaleGrabArea holding her]] into a SharkPool during the climax.

This is a counterpoint to SuddenlyAlwaysKnewThat, as proficiencies are gained and learned rather than mentioned or pulled out of [[AssPull thin air]]. Taken to extremes, ChekhovsSkill can be used to {{justif|iedTrope}}y ImplausibleFencingPowers or turn the FarmBoy into a [[GunKata gun toting]] BadAss. In frustrating cases, it might go the way of ForgottenPhlebotinum and never see use again. Used well, it can lead to some satisfying [[HeroicBystander heroics from unexpected places.]]

ChekhovsSkill can also be used as a catalyst for other plot elements by having one character teach another, and getting some good CharacterDevelopment out of it as well. Or even drive a plot as [[SeekerArchetype the seeker]] looks for a {{mentor|Archetype}} to teach them ChekhovsSkill. If the skill is too complicated to be perfected so quickly, see InstantExpert.

See also SomedayThisWillComeInHandy, CrazyPrepared, ChekhovsClassroom.

-->'''EECOM''': [[http://youtu.be/eWQIryll8y8 Flight, tell them to take the SCE to 'Aux']].

* Air Canada Flight 143, known as the "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli_Glider Gimli Glider]]", ran out of fuel mid-flight due to to a combination of technical failures and ground crews making errors converting from imperial to metric units when refueling the plane. The loss of both engines effectively turned the plane into a glider. The captain, Bob Pearson, happened to be an experienced glider pilot. He managed to land the plane safely at Gimli, an abandoned air force base turned into a drag strip.

-->-- '''{{Seanbaby}}'''

If the character is shown training for a skill but repeatedly fails at it until everything depends on them getting it right, that's CrisisMakesPerfect.

* In mathematics, the associativity and commutativity. You learn them at primary school and then they don't show up again… until you learn about mtrix algebra or hypercomplex numbers, which need not be associative or commutative.

* ChekhovsSkill/{{Anime And Manga}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Comic Books}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Fan Fiction}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Animated Films}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Live-Action Films}}

* ChekhovsSkill/{{Live-Action TV}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Video Games}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Web Comics}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Web Original}}
* ChekhovsSkill/{{Western Animation}}

-->'''EECOM''': [[http://youtu.be/eWQIryll8y8 Flight, try SCE to 'Aux']].

-->'''EECOM''': Flight, try SCE to 'Aux'.

* In an interesting real life example, Astronaut Jim Lovell, during his flight on Apollo 8, remarked that he could use a portion of the Earth as a reference point to control his spacecraft's attitude should his guidance computer fail. During his Apollo 13 flight, an explosion forced the crew to shut down their guidance computers to conserve power. When he had to fire his engine to correct his craft's trajectory, he used the very same technique he came up with a year and a half earlier.
** Another NASA example: When Apollo 12 was struck by lightning during launch, it looked like they were going to have to abort because no one knew how to get the fried guidance computer back online. No except John Aaron, who had happened to have seen the same error during a test a year earlier and tracked it down in his spare time, and knew the simple but incredibly obscure procedure that would restore telemetry.
-->Flight, try SCE to 'Aux'.

* Air Canada Flight 143, known as the "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli_Glider Gimli Glider]]", ran out of fuel mid-flight due to to a combination of technical failures and ground crews making errors converting from imperial to metric units when refueling the plane. The loss of both engines effectively turned the plane into a glider. The captain,Bob Pearson, happened to be an experienced glider pilot. He managed to land the plane safely at Gimli, an abandoned air force base turned into a drag strip.