Oh, those wacky vision quests. With my luck, my animal guide would be a dead parrot.

What's that? He's dating Seven? Not listening, not listening...

I wouldn't have had a problem with him dating Seven had it happened 3 or 4 or 40 episodes earlier.

I guess Beltran's legendary hatred of the scripts/storylines contributed to his absolute suckitude in the last two or three seasons. I mean, really. Homeboy was e-mailing it in.

To be fair, he was e-mailing lines like, "Shields at 50 percent" and "Damage report".

"Akoocheemoya. We are far from the land of our fathers."

That must be one of the most condescending lines ever uttered in Trek (by Janeway). Hated it.

To me Chakotay is the Riker of Voyager, in that he is a middle-aged vaguely puffy guy I don't care about. He really had nothing going on. No edge. Like Harry Kim but without the comic relief elements. Chakotay is always just there, being supportive of whoever needed it when necessary. He's the former Marquis leader, he should have been a much stronger presence.

The only time he was interesting to me was in the scenes where he displayed his quiet, undemanding devotion to Janeway. That was a good, somewhat unconventional 'ship. Otherwise Chakotay = blah. I recently watched "Timeless", where they have Chakotay in love with never-before-seen Starfleet woman of the future. Any other character that would have been revealing but it was Chakotay, so I barely even registered his presence in the episode.

I also didn't care for any of the episodes about Chakotay's religious life. Chakotay talking about his cultural heritage is OK, I guess, but the bits about his spiritual life didn't seem to fit in with what I think as the Star Trek future. He's human, and has a Starfleet background. So when he tried to show - was it Torres? - her spirit guide, that was just kind of weird. I'm not sure what they were going for there.

That about sums it up for me on Chakotay.

He was dull, dull, dull. His scenes with Janeway elevated him to moderately dull. As a former Marquis leader I would have expected more conflict. The only one I remember him having a problem with was Tom in the early years, but this just annoyed me more than anything else.

The only time I found him remotely amusing was when he wondered if any of his previous crew was loyal to him. I believe this was after the Seska was reveal to be a Cardassian.

.

Chikotay always seemed to be a way for TPTB to see "HEY LOOK AT THIS! HE'S A NATIVE AMERICAN! IN THE FUTURE! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?" He never seemed like a real person. Part of that was Beltran's acting, part of it was the writing.

In some ways I could see Beltran's complaints about the writers giving his character such short shrift. OTOH, he did so much bitching and moaning about it it became a running joke of the "here he goes again" variety.

I guess he didn't realise it could have been a lot worse. Mr. Beltran could have toiled in obscurity in regional theater and the occasional indie, instead of being a regular on a prime time TV show that ran seven years and reaping the financial rewards of that employment. As well as a loyal fan base that actually likes him in spite of his ingratitude.

There are fans who like him? By series end, I fucking hated him. I began to hate him the way lis hates Search for Spock, the way Ann Coulter hates liberals, and the way Bermaga hates continuity (and common sense). By the time he began using shoe polish in his hair, I wanted him jettisoned out the closest airlock. Or phasered. Repeatedly.

I love how I've become a benchmark for hatred. Heh.

I think I could have liked Chakotay. There were glimmers- Be'lanna's crush (that was referred to, like, once), his antipathy for Tom, the whole bathtub-building incident. But he became the one-note "spiritual guy" and it was all wasted.

I liked him with Be'lanna in the begininng. By the end it was bad. What was his thing with boxing and contact sports? I tend to fault the writters more than the actors on this show because the writing was so bad. The premise for this show was great. Sending out a mix crew of Marquis and Starfleet to unexplored part of the galaxy. The writing was never really there. I did like him at start with his whole getting fucked over by Tuvok and Seska. I know Beltran ended up hating the show and all but he should have left. Having him die would have been awesome because really someone on the senior staff should have bought it.

He hated the show? Why?

Because by the end he wasn't getting any plots and his lines were reduced to reporting the status of shields and stuff. Beltran was as aware as any fan of how boring Chakotay was, and he didn't feel he was given any opportunities to fix that.

Of course, the blame can fall either way. Reportedly, he never contributed ideas for the character to the writers. Other actors did, and the writers liked the ideas, so those actors got more screentime.

I think it was just an all around bad mix. I really can't understand how actors don't give input if the writers and producers are asking you.

Thanks for the info. I never noticed that his role was reduced (possibly because I didn't pay much attention to his character).




I'd say it's safe to assume that Kes is dead. She may not have been senior staff but she was a main character.

If Kes is dead it has more to do with her biology than anything else. Having one of the senior getting killed would have gone along with the theme of them being strandard in the Delta Quadrant. I always thought it odd that they just forgot about all the Marquis tension. Most of those ppl didn't have Starfleet training. At the start they always went to him with stuff. This show to me will always be an execelent idea that was horribly done.

I just watched "The Fight". The hell? I thought I disliked Chakotay The Thoughtful Supervisor. I thought I had no patience with I Need to Go on a Sprit Journey Chakotay. But Unhinged Chakotay is so much worse than either of those. It came out of nowhere. And it made no *sense*. We see Chakotay flipping out, but we also see what's going on inside his head -- and dude, it's just a boxing match, relax. Reading this thread I'm guess that it's the actor grasping for good dramatic scenes. Didn't work.

The one thing that this episode really brought out for me is that Chakotay has no friends. Everyone likes him well enough, but not so much that they make any effort to protect him from mental hell. He's closest to Janeway, obviously, but she just asked him to go back into the nightmare. I can't think of anyone else on board she would ask that of. Except Tuvok, but Tuvok is made of tougher stuff than Chakotay. With Chakotay she used her sultry voice to ask, I thought that was really telling.

I'm hoping they will pursue the loneliness of Chakotay a little in the episodes to come. Actually, no, I'm hoping that they do as little with Chakotay as possible in the episodes to come. I agree that it would have been so much better if they'd killed him off.

Be very thankful that Beltran did not speak very often to the writers about his role, it has come to light through interveiws that RBs idea of a great story is "Unforgettable and the Fight". It would appear he judges the quality of a story on how much screen time his character is given as these two eps sucked majorly. The Seven/Chakotay romance was also Beltrans idea, one that he began to verbally trash as soon as the writers executed it.
His biggest problem is that he is a lazy actor, it was noted that when he was interested he had no trouble remembering his lines but when he wasn't interested he didn't bother. That's considerate to the rest of his castmates NOT. This may have a bearing on his reduction in lines too as it wastes time and money reshooting stuff ups.

Why didn't they just kill him off then? It wouldn't have made that large a difference, Janeway already valued Tuvok's opinions more than his.

I like "Unforgettable".

If Chakotay had been killed off, they would have lost a non-white character. I don't recall seeing many other Native American characters on TV, so that's one point in favour of keeping him around.

I think there were some pretty good episodes that featured Chakotay heavily - "Resolutions", "Waking Moments" and "Shattered" spring to mind - although I could happily live without "Tattoo" and "Nemesis". I suppose I just have a soft spot for him and his strange line delivery.

They would have been better off with The Rock.

Or any actor who would actually try to act.

I think Chakotay was such a bad character because he was never developed beyond being Native American. I always got a "Ladies and gentleman, an actual, living, breathing Native American - in the future!" vibe when he was onscreen.

I'm wading through Season 4 of the VOY DVD's via Netflix, and I have to tell you that the last two episodes have been pretty good as far as Chakotay is concerned. I thought I'd chime in since this thread is about 95% negative.

Loved: Interaction with Neelix in "Mortal Coil." Sure the whole vision quest wasn't too convincing but the way he empathizes and refrains from judging Neelix, is nice. He doesn't tell Neelix that he's a fool for giving up on his faith, just that faith is often tested. Anyway, I really enjoyed the end scene on the transporter when Neelix's was deciding whether he wanted to live.

Liked: The way he carried "Waking Moments." I thought he was a strong actor here, very much in charge of the situation -- and that his character was willing to get burned to death by a photon torpedo so that his crew could survive was something we had not seen from Chakotay yet. It had only been Janeway ready to sacrifice it all for her crew up until this ep.

I also wanted to mention that I enjoyed the acting/dialogue with the captain in the watch scene of "Year of Hell: Part I"

[shallow]Plus, he's very pretty.[/shallow]

Aw, I always liked Chakotay as well as Robert Beltran. (Well, OK, I like Night of the Comet.) I totally see and understand all the negative points made here. But I don't care. People, he built Janeway a bathtub. A bathtub! That is true love.

Yes, that was the high point for the character, in my opinion. Once they slammed the door closed on that will they/won't they situation, both Beltran and I pretty much gave up on Chakotay.

I loved that episode. <wistful sigh>

[nearly a year later] Geez, I had no idea Beltran was talking shit about the role. As someone mentioned, it's not like he's had the most stellar career; you'd think he'd be grateful for steady work.

Early on he seemed OK. There was an episode where Tuvok had to train four of the Maquis crewmembers who were not working out, and Chakotay sucker punched the gang leader because they were giving Tuvok a hard time. That was kind of fun. It was one of the few times that Chakotay didn't seem like a total milquetoast. I think I would have liked the character better if the writers had fashioned someone who felt more uneasy in his position, someone who had less respect for the rules.

I really really wish they had not paired him up with Seven. Totally not worthy.

I wish that Tuvoc had been the Marquis Captain and Chakotay the Fed spy. The characters would still pretty much act the same but the dynamics of the officers would be different.
If Chakotay and Janeway were old friends their possible ship would have more backstory. Tuvoc could still have been in Starfleet in the past but "rusty". Paris and Chakotay's early animosity wouldn't make Chakotay seem like such a hypocrite.

The story I recently heard was that after that holodeck ep, both he and Jeri Ryan went to TPTB asking if their characters were going to be together so that they could start building moments between them. They were both told repeatedly that it wasn't going to happen. So when he saw the script for Endshame, he went ballistic.

Even if they had done that though, I wouldn't have bought it. Chakotay and Seven is complete bullshit.

Such bullshit the world has never seen. Oh, I was miffed.

Pygmalion goes with Professor Higgins. Dammit.

Yeah, if the actors could've known to protray interest in each other over the last part of the season, I wouldn't have been as pissed. Especially when just three episodes prior to the finale the two characters spent the entire episode together. A look or moment would've been smart for the directors and producers to add. Grr.


Your logic is infallible. ;-)

I wish they had had Chakotay and Janeway together in "Workforce". I know I would have been much more invested in notJaneway's plight had she been in love with a someone other than an alien of the week. I didn't dislike Jaffen (sp?), but I didn't really care about him or that coupling.

I think it would have been much more interesting, and so tragic if Janeway and Chakotay got to experience the relationship they'd been avoiding for so long, loved it and each other and then had to give it up.

It would have been an easy way for the writers to satisfy the large audience these two had and simultaneously maintain the integrity of the characters (not that it hadn't been violated 8 gazillion times before, but whatever).

Word. Chakotay was never more than a Hollywood Indian. Indians are not one unified culture. But Chakotay goes on vision quests like a plains tribe (I remember early publicity material said he had a spirit guide that was a timber wolf, which was later dropped, fortunately). Never in the course of the entire series was it revealed what tribe he belonged to.

When Beltran was cast there were complaints that they should have cast an Indian actor, but Beltran countered that there are large Indian groups in Mexico. Which would have been fine if they had made Chakotay one of those tribes. But they didn't. They mentioned that he had Olmec ancestors, which is convenient since they disappeared 2000 years ago.

Although, many archeologists believe that the Olmecs were the ancestors of the Zoque. Make Chakotay a Zoque or decide on any Mexican tribe: Nahua, Mixtec, Zapotec, etc. I think it would have gone a long way toward developing the character.

I've found my people! To me it seemed that the writers threw some names in a hat and went with the first to that came out. Their relationship just seemed so wrong to me.

Word. They had nothing in comon and speant most of the series being either cold or hostile towards each other, even after Seven's holodeck fantasy life episode.

Another word. If the writers really wanted to form a connection between the two, they should've dealt more with Chakotay's experiences with the "new collective" and how he was the actual one to sever her link with the Borg. But they rarely interacted after that moment.

Heh. Reminds me of the MST3K treatment of Time Chasers, a movie that goes 50 years ahead to a future that looks just like the 1980s the movie was made in. "Food courts....of the future!" "Lesbians.....of the future!"

But yeah, I'm in the first season, and there just doesn't seem to be much there there. I don't have anything against the character yet, but the only interesting thing about him is his possible conflicting allegiance, which they seem determined to kill off by making him absolutely loyal to Janeway and as stiff as any Starfleet officer. If he could get along with Starfleet types this easily -- sacrificing his ship for them, even -- why was he with the Maquis anyway? I guess maybe I'll find out later.

No. You won't.

I'm just catching up on this show, and Chakotay and Seven is just plain creepy.

I don't care what half-remembered experience she has from Unimatrix Zero, he's twice her biological age and if her mental age is 14 or so, it's even more gross.

Taking into account the Doctor's much younger wife in Endgame, I have to think C/7 was born out of the male writers' wishful thinking.

I caught Tatoo on Friday. What a load of santcimonious crap!

You could apply that description to pretty much any Chakotay-centered episode.

Thanks for the warning! I'll be sure to skip any future Chipotle-centric eps that come up in the future.

I wouldn't go quite that far. I just watched Unity last night, and it was fairly Chakotay-centric, but still quite good. It could have been better: having him be mind-controlled at the end was a bit of a cop-out. If his actions had grown out of his internal conflict over his feelings for these two strong women (he likes the bossy ones, doesn't he?), that would have been more interesting, but they wouldn't have been able to push the reset button on his perfect loyalty to Janeway at the end of the episode. It also follows the ridiculous and so-predictable tradition of introducing a new ensign to be killed and destroying yet another shuttle.

Still, it was a good episode, one of the few Voyager episodes that (intentionally) leaves some questions unanswered. Were the colonists justified in using Chakotay to save themselves? Can a Collective be peaceful, or will it inevitably turn to conquest and assimilation? It was good that for once they didn't try to wrap everything up with pat answers right before the credits.

Some of the Chakotay-centric episodes are great - "Waking Moments" and "Shattered" are two of my favourites of the whole series. "Waking Moments" in particular I love because of the way the dreams play out, and I think it's really creepy when Chakotay repeatedly sees the moon.

So from what I can gather from the "Tattoo" episode, Chakotay's people come from some South American rain forest. I suppose no one can decipher the lingo his father was speaking when his party met the rain forest people?

I thought it was more Central America, but that may be the fact that Beltran is of Mexican descent influencing my thought.

But they spoke (subtitled), so I was wondering if anyone knew what people were associated with that language.