The character made his first appearance on 14 November 1989, when he arrived in the village alongside the rest of the Tate family – his father Frank (Norman Bowler); stepmother Kim (Claire King); and younger sister Zoe (Leah Bracknell).

Towards the end of his story arc, Chris learned that he had an inoperable brain tumour and used this opportunity to get revenge on Charity for cheating on him with her cousin Cain Dingle (Jeff Hordley).

After wasting all of his money to ensure that Charity would be left with nothing, Chris committed suicide to frame her for his "murder" – with the character making his final appearance on 18 September 2003 as a corpse following his death an episode earlier.

"[3] Chris Tate first arrives in Beckinsdale in November 1989 when his father, Frank (Norman Bowler), and stepmother, Kim, buy Home Farm.

They briefly split up over Chris's gambling habits after he lost his motorbike in a poker match to Alan Turner (Richard Thorp), but reunite and marry in November 1991.

The marriage begins to break down a year later when Chris finds out that Kathy knew that Kim was having an affair with village toff the Honourable Neil Kincaid (Brian Deacon).

Kathy, unhappy with his actions, begins an affair with American wine merchant Josh Lewis (Peter Warnock), and plans to leave Chris by the end or 1993.

He forms a bond with her best friend Rachel Hughes (Glenda McKay), whose brother, Mark, died in the plane crash, and she begins giving him swimming lessons.

On 7 December 1995, Chris and Rachel get married – though Joe's brother Jack Sugden (Clive Hornby) and his wife Sarah (Alyson Spiro) are the only attendees due to Frank's refusal to attend the ceremony.

Trouble emerges when Kim gets into a business partnership with a seemingly-legitimate aristocrat named Lord Alex Oakwell (Rupam Maxwell), who later turns out to be illegitimate when he causes the death of Zoe's best friend Linda Fowler (Tonicha Jeronimo) on the night that Kim is celebrating her engagement party with her would-be second husband Steve Marchant (Paul Opacic).

In 1998, Chris is pleased to learn that Kim and Steve are planning to sell Home Farm due to their financial problems not long after the pair get married.

He seeks help from Lord Alex Oakwell's former wife Tara Cockburn (Anna Brecon) in her partnership with the Tates to grant him ownership of Home Farm.

A few months later, Chris seeks his chance to get revenge on Kim for his father's death when both she and Steve end up facing a potential prison stint for stealing a horse from their business rival, which, as a result, got Kathy hospitalized.

At one stage, she helps him reclaim Home Farm from the attempted usurpation of ownership from conman Eric Pollard (Chris Chittell) and his old lover Stella Jones (Stephanie Schonfield).

In 2000, Chris faces another major crisis when one of his lorries ends up colliding with a village minibus – thus causing a devastating road collusion that leaves Kathy among several residents critically injured.

Kathy survives along with some others, but four people are killed in the crash, including local resident Butch Dingle (Paul Loughran) and one of Chris's drivers named Pete.

Despite the tragic circumstances, Chris opts to keep his business afloat even if it that means resorting to claiming negligence for his company's role in the accident.

However, despite facing potential public backlash for this, Chris adamantly stands by his decision – which instigates his feud with Butch's cousin and the village's would-be hardman Cain Dingle (Jeff Hordley).

Their conflict first emerges after Chris causes disruption in a press statement regarding the accident, when he orders two of his henchman to target Butch's stepmother Lisa (Jane Cox) after she admits to her involvement in the lorry crash.

In 2001, Chris embarks on a relationship with Cain's other cousin Charity Dingle (Emma Atkins) – a former prostitute – and they soon plan on getting married towards the end of the year.

This works successfully until Zoe eventually learns the extent of Chris's vendetta and, also discovering that Scott had never raped anyone to begin with, pays Yolanda to drop the charges.

When Chris learns about this, he grows increasingly paranoid with the thought that Charity would cheat on him with Cain, and that their parenthood of Debbie would complicate things in the process.

At first, Terry realises that Chris's paranoia is getting out of hand, but this later turns out to be true when the pair end up catching Charity giving Cain a passionate kiss.

Chris's reaction to Charity's affair with Cain is partly sidetracked when his paranoid behaviour evokes a starting discovery – that he has an inoperable brain tumour with only months to live.

In 2017, Chris's now-adult son Joe (now Ned Porteous) appears in the village – first seeming to be a successful entrepreneur named "Tom Waterhouse" who begins dating Debbie.

[6] He came in third in CBS Drama's 2018 list of the Top 5 Soap Opera Villains, with the author noting that: "Chris was originally a decent chap but after a plane crash rendered him paralysed from waist down he turned into a bitter person and even in his dying breaths whilst committing suicide he framed his wife for murder.