Is Chakotay just weak-willed?

[WarpTenLizard]

It's long been said that Chakotay flipped from Maquis commando to Starfleet officer too quickly, especially for someone who joined the Maquis for such personal reasons. But that's just the icing on the cake.

In the Season 2 episode "Resolutions," he is very quick if not eager to give up hope and spend the rest of his life marooned with Janeway, over a mosquito bite. And at this point in the series, he thinks the Maquis fight is still on back home, and that Seska is pregnant with his kid. Never mind B'Elanna, his close friend, and his Maquis crew.

Season 3: "Before and After" shows us a Voyager with Janeway dead and Chakotay as the captain. Eight or nine years in, Voyager's still stuck in the Delta Quadrant. Apparently Captain Chakotay wasn't as determined to get Voyager home as Captain Janeway was.

In the alternate future of "Endgame," it's implied that Chakotay fell into some kind of lifelong depression after losing his wife of three years... who he apparently broke up with after the Admiral changed history and got them home early.

On the subject of Seven of Nine, he decided pretty early on that there was no hope of saving her humanity, and took years to change his mind. (He apparently went from "She can never be saved" to "I can't live without her!" to "Seven of who?" but maybe that's a plothole for another day.)

And now on "Prodigy,"

Spoiler

we have a plotline where some dumb teenagers get him stranded on a planet, and he gives in to being marooned for 10 frelling years.. despite crash landings and maroonings being an almost regular occurrence for his crew back in the Delta Quadrant... and then it turns out his feathered XO's remains, along with the means to escape, were just one mountain away from where he was camping out. He never thought to try looking very hard for Big Bird despite missing him so much.

For a Maquis rebel, Chakotay seems to give up surprisingly easily. Is he just weak-willed?

 

[Dukhat]

Couldn’t this have just been in the other Chakotay thread?

 

[Akiraprise]

/\ Maybe?

Although I guess this is potentially more of a discussion of the character as written and not how we'd change the writing.

So, is Chakotay weak willed? I'd say no. I think he is pragmatic and chooses not to agonize over what could be but rather lives in the moment. He flips from Maquis commando to Starfleet first officer because what other choice was there for him and his crew? Try to steal the ship outnumbered 4-1 when he knows Starfleet won't treat them poorly? I think he's more risk averse than Janeway. If there's a potential vessel destroying anomaly that offers a shortcut home or a safe course around he's more apt to go around. They worked on the bug bite for weeks/months. He accepted his fate and moved on. He's stubborn at times, and he's certainly no push over when it comes to the hostile threat of the week, but I also feel like he's a kind of shrug the shoulders kind of person, let's deal with the current malfunction in life, and move on.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

He's very adaptable, I suppose - accepting of his new realities and working within their boundaries to carve out a meaningful life.

I suppose once you finally return to the relative safety of home or any shelter, really, losses are more jarring than if they happened in a dangerous place, where you expect trouble. Imagine a family that left a war zone or severe persecution in their home country only to lose a member to a traffic accident or a sudden illness in their new "supposed to be safe" home.

 

[Oddish]

Season 3: "Before and After" shows us a Voyager with Janeway dead and Chakotay as the captain. Eight or nine years in, Voyager's still stuck in the Delta Quadrant. Apparently Captain Chakotay wasn't as determined to get Voyager home as Captain Janeway was.

On her first "go-round", Janeway took 23 years to get Voyager home. Captain Chakotay is in Year 8.

Chakotay is weak-willed the way Janeway is schizophrenic, Harry is endlessly naive, B'Elanna is constantly re-learning the same lesson, and Neelix is obnoxious comic relief: the character was in the hands of showrunners who were frankly pretty lousy at their job.

 

[Sumire]

On Prodigy Chakotay had what he thought was a pretty valid reason for

Spoiler

staying marooned. He thought he was protecting Starfleet from the living construct — a virus that was specifically created to cause Starfleet to tear itself apart. He was willing to isolate himself for the rest of his life rather than risk that.

 

[WarpTenLizard]

On Prodigy Chakotay had what he thought was a pretty valid reason for

Spoiler

staying marooned. He thought he was protecting Starfleet from the living construct — a virus that was specifically created to cause Starfleet to tear itself apart. He was willing to isolate himself for the rest of his life rather than risk that.

True. But he still gave up far too easily IMHO.

 

[Sumire]

The propensity to leap to a “I’ll martyr myself!” solution seemed, to me, to be rather common among Voyagers.

(As a proponent of mental health support systems I am no doubt rather biased but I fervently believe Voyager needed a ship’s counselor.)

 

[GulBahana]

Well, the Maquis didn't really have a purpose in the Delta quadrant.

 

[Farscape One]

It's long been said that Chakotay flipped from Maquis commando to Starfleet officer too quickly, especially for someone who joined the Maquis for such personal reasons. But that's just the icing on the cake.

In the Season 2 episode "Resolutions," he is very quick if not eager to give up hope and spend the rest of his life marooned with Janeway, over a mosquito bite. And at this point in the series, he thinks the Maquis fight is still on back home, and that Seska is pregnant with his kid. Never mind B'Elanna, his close friend, and his Maquis crew.

Season 3: "Before and After" shows us a Voyager with Janeway dead and Chakotay as the captain. Eight or nine years in, Voyager's still stuck in the Delta Quadrant. Apparently Captain Chakotay wasn't as determined to get Voyager home as Captain Janeway was.

In the alternate future of "Endgame," it's implied that Chakotay fell into some kind of lifelong depression after losing his wife of three years... who he apparently broke up with after the Admiral changed history and got them home early.

On the subject of Seven of Nine, he decided pretty early on that there was no hope of saving her humanity, and took years to change his mind. (He apparently went from "She can never be saved" to "I can't live without her!" to "Seven of who?" but maybe that's a plothole for another day.)

And now on "Prodigy,"

Spoiler

we have a plotline where some dumb teenagers get him stranded on a planet, and he gives in to being marooned for 10 frelling years.. despite crash landings and maroonings being an almost regular occurrence for his crew back in the Delta Quadrant... and then it turns out his feathered XO's remains, along with the means to escape, were just one mountain away from where he was camping out. He never thought to try looking very hard for Big Bird despite missing him so much.

For a Maquis rebel, Chakotay seems to give up surprisingly easily. Is he just weak-willed?

It's not a stretch for him to accept being a Starfleet officer again early on... he DID make it to Lt. Cmdr. before he left for the Maquis, and even left his tribe to get into Starfleet. He left Starfleet to fight on honor of his father, but he still had all those years in Starfleet that helped shape him.

Regarding "RESOLUTIONS", you're forgetting that they were in stasis for weeks while The Doctor worked every second trying to find a cure. And while Janeway was looking for a cure on her own while down there, he was doing things to make life easier for them. (Like building her a bath tub.) Science was never his strong suit... at least, not the science that would have made any difference in their situation. So he focused his energies on what he could do... make life better, easier, and more comfortable there.

Regarding "BEFORE AND AFTER", we can't really say he was less determined than Janeway to get them home because we had such a tiny amount of time spent in that future. Most of the big jumps toward the Alpha Quadrant tied directly to "SCORPION".

1. Kes - her 'gift' of 10 years closer to home was clearly a direct result of her exposure to Species 8472 and their telepathic connection. That obviously didn't happen in that timeline.

2. Arturis - since Chakotay would NOT have made a deal with the Borg, he would have no reason to seek revenge against Voyager, and because of that, the crew would not learn about the quantum slipstream drive, which means they wouldn't do the next thing.

3. Quantum slipstream - without this, that huge jump that shaved about 20 years off their trip didn't happen.

4. "DARK FRONTIER" - this would not have happened for two reasons. Seven was not rescued, so all the knowledge needed to do the transwarp coil raid would not be theirs to take advantage of. Plus, Chakotay would not have actively sought out a Borg ship. That was anothet 15 years closer to home.