He's more than that. He's not a noble savage, but was raised "on the reservation," hated it, and left the first chance he could. He wanted to live in the 24th century.
When his Pa died, he felt guilt over his choices in life, and what his father wanted for him, and now seeks to learn about his heritage. He went out and got the tattoo. His dad doesn't have one. He's trying to "atone for his sins" in a way.
Prior to his time on Voyager, he was rebellious, looking for a fight. That's why he joined Starfleet, and that's why he left Starfleet for the Marquis.
I find these interesting characteristics of Chakotay. He's not "The Indian dude," but a "24th century dude," with a lot of regrets in life, trying to discover his heritage. He wants to honor his father in death, after failing to while he was alive.
-my 2cents.
I in fact thought of this backstory when writing my earlier post, but in my head, I mainly filed it under him being native american. That's because it still has everything to do with the "conflict" between, well, western and native American heritage. Creating a backstory based on that is a good idea in itself but it could have been developed further. It seems Chakotay is fairly static over this the course of Voyager's run, his attitude in S7 doesn't seem much different from his attitude in, say S3.
We see a similar element in B'elanna: the conflict between her human and her Klingon side. And it's a strong element too, from which a lot of her other characteristics derive - her fierce temper and her isolation in early Voyager, for example. But she gets backstories in which these elements are explored and she developes as a character-- she is very different in late Voyager. In Chakotay's case, it seems that his backstory was introduced gradually over the first 2-3 seasons or so and then pretty much left there, perhaps only referenced to again in the occasional odd episode. For that reason, I liked
The Fight (an episode that usually doesn't get a lot of praise) because it finally introduced a new element to Chakotays backstory and hopes and fears again -- his fear of becoming a 'crazy old man' like his grandfather-- that could have been an opening to learn yet more about his background, but again, it was abandoned.
But perhaps I'm all wrong in my approach and the main problem is he is too much in Kathryn's shadow, as another poster commented. Come to think of it - and I've read this in another thread too, don't remember where- perhaps there simply isn't enough to do for a First Officer to make him/her an interesting character,
if that's all there is to the part. It's relatively easy to write stories in which a Chief Engineer actually has to do something, even if it is mainly shouting: 'captain, we can't infuse the transmuon particle emitters with hyperion radiation because that will misalign our warp initation temporal sequencing matrix and reinitializing that will cost me at least three hours!' and looking worried over some displays. But giving a first officer useful things to do is much harder, so in 'strong' first officer roles we see they do other stuff as well.
Spock was first officer
and science officer
and functioned as Kirk's rational sidekick (and McCoy as his emotional one). Some say the Riker character was comparatively weak on board because all he mostly really did there was repeating (and perhaps specifying) Picard's orders to the troops- so they had to give him away missions and make him a ladies' man to give him some texture. The only times they actually capitalize on him
being first officer is when he gets caught between his CO and the crew, or when he is faced with the task of replacing Picard and 'competing' with him, such as in
Best of Both worlds. Kira is an example of a very strong character that gets a lot of action and A-stories in episodes, but if you come to think of it, almost nothing of that has actually to do with her being the first officer. Most of it derives from her being a link to the Bajoran culture and government, and her being a fierce character in her own right.
So I still think they could have added a lot more to Chakotay's character. For example, he would have been the natural hub for (resolving) tensions between Starfleet and Maquis "culture" and learning 'his' crew to work together with the Starfleet crew- which is there for a bit in the beginning but dissipates all too quickly.
He came into his own during the Equinox episodes, even Timeless. I'm scared to mention his spirituality but I like it.
