#Erins please let people do bad things without being influenced by the newest flavor of pure evil

[bonefall]

Leopardstar my detested

She has so much promise in TPB and TNP. Ambitious, confident, never lets go of a grudge. May do you a favor... but only if it could benefit her in the long run. She's serious, well-spoken, and intimidating.

What sliver of conscious she possessed lead to her choosing Mistyfoot as a deputy as an 'apology'. The rest of her picked Hawkfrost as deputy in her absence; breaking the code by choosing a cat who had no apprentice, young and aggressive, who wants war with other clans.

It could have set up RiverClan to always be teetering between slipping back into the dark ages, and moving foward into cooperation. Leopardstar was originally a very morally gray character; cared about what she wanted above the law of the clans, or the peace between them... but not completely heartless either.

But that's not what we got, of course

Because the narrative needs to make it that ONLY Tigerstar was a Truly Evil Villain, Blackstar is made into an idiot who can't tell that he's constantly being duped, and Leopardstar loses her brain cells to ignore every warning sign. They're completely stripped of their agency, boiled down into sad sack characters who Really Did Love Their Clans and their greatest "crimes" are caused by someone else.

And that's almost insulting for Leopardstar, who's just one accidental border crossing away from starting an actual war with ThunderClan at the beginning of TNP, but 'graciously' allows WindClan to drink from her river. The same cat who later lets her clan throw Stormfur and Brook out because of a fake sign, while never stepping in when Hawkfrost undermines Mistyfoot's authority. A bad bitch, not the crying loser who sacrificed 1 of 9 lives to a fox because she's sooo sorry she let a guy try to murder two children

#Leopardstar #Warrior cats #Let my woman characters do bad things on purpose #I swear to god one day we'll get a novella that softens Bluestar by saying ghost Thistleclaw made her rename Brightpaw to Lostface #God forbid women do anything but I really mean it #I guess at least in this instance it ALSO happened to Blackstar but... god. They did him dirty too. #Erins please let people do bad things without being influenced by the newest flavor of pure evil