Loudclaw’s Glance: The Prophecies of the Warriors by Shockfrost

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Shockfrost discusses why none of the Warriors prophecies are necessarily new

It’s been some time since I wrote an article, of course, but I know my own power; I can do it again.

(I still have access to the first if necessary.)

Here, I will be discussing certain aspects of prophecies… was The New Prophecy really a “new” prophecy? Were any of them “new”?

No.

None of them were new.

I am going to turn the discussion, for a moment, to a different franchise; Metroid. The Chozo were seers, especially those from Tallon IV; they had left behind their tech and began anew.

Kind of like how the Clans started, leaving everyhing behind to start anew…

The Chozo were able to tap into the universe’s secrets because they had become “one” with the universe. Let me explain something quickly. StarClan, the Tribe of Endless Hunting, both are linked. Yes, you know this. But once they must have been one, to be of similar roles, for StarClan to be formed in the role it took so quickly. This also means that in order to pass on a prophecy… the Tribe of Endless Hunting and StarClan alike must be, in a sense, similar to the Chozo.

If you consider it, there was a point in one of the books (It’s been a while, you’ll have to tell me which one if you know) that it was stated that all Prophecies started from the beginning, the first sunrise of the Clans, of the Tribe, of the Ancients. Prophecies to foretell everything of the Clans, Tribe, and Ancients… their birth, Bluestar taking leadership, Rusty venturing into the forest for the first time… the Three… Even their death, which may eventually happen… that was foretold as well.

So is it really free will that guides the characters in Warriors, or is it all predestined fate? Even from the dawn of them all, was Rusty destined to enter that forest in ThunderClan for the very first time, was Gray Wing always destined to join the cats to the forest? Was Hawkfrost always destined to die the way he did?

This they were, but there was an element of free will to them. There is no ‘ignoring’ a prophecy, because it will always force itself upon the forest when it is time to break.

These prophecies were not new, and they bind the paws of every warrior to their path. Their destiny was always preset… Tigerstar destined for evil. Firestar for good. But even so, we cannot know what they will do… that is the rule of prophecy.

Thank you. I will determine my next article soon.

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11 comments

Leave a Reply to Emberpaw (Emberfang) Cancel reply

  • Great article and a very interesting thing you’ve found there!

    From my point of view, it’s impossible to “break” a prophecy!

    Let’s take the “Blood will spill blood”-prophecy. If we’d imagine Brambleclaw would have actually killed Firestar there, would the prophecy have been broken?
    No. It’s not in Brambleclaw’s (or in that case -star’s) charakter to rule over other cats the way Hawkfrost and Tigerstar had planned it. There would have been another time where Bramble came to his senses and fought against Hawkfrost, killed him and then peace would have been restored.
    And the prophecy would have been fulfilled, just in another way.

    I imagine destiny like a written story in a book. In some passages it’s very clear what happens and the reader has to follow the autors words, there is no freedom for imagination.
    Like when StarClan had foreseen, that Cinderpelt’s death was close to come. Noone could have changed this, it was safe to happen.

    In other parts the book just loosely describes the story and anyone has a different opinion about what’s going on and it all still fits the story in generall.
    Like my example from earlier. The book would say ‘After being appointed as deputy, Brambleclaw would fight against Hawkfrost and everything turns back to normal.’ What would happen to Firestar, or before they fight would be completely open!

    In my modell of destiny prophecys are like spoilers for the book. Like when someone says: “Hey, did you know {charakter xy} dies at the end!” Then we know {xy} would die, but we’d have no idea how, we just know that it will happen for sure.

    This is how I think about topics like destiny or stuff like that. Hope it wasn’t too confusing! ;P

    • That’s what I was getting at here. But I was using the term “break” like a storm; a storm will break, and it will not be stopped.

      Your model of destiny wasn’t confusing, to me I have good clarity of what you meant.

      Thanks for the comment.

  • WARNING: COMMENT CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR ALL BOOKS INCLUDING AVOS AND MOTH FLIGHT’S JOURNEY!!!!!!
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    No offense, but I’ve always strongly disliked this idea of “you can’t escape fate” which keeps popping up in Warriors. The way I see it, of course there’s free will, and of course you control your own destiny – you control your own body and actions, and therefore you control your fate, other than how the actions of others effect you, which you can’t control. Tigerstar could have been good, but he /chose/ to be bad. Firestar could have been evil, but he /chose/ to be good. Even Bluestar said it at one point, that the Clans had free will and were not the playthings of StarClan or destiny.

    I liked how the first series handled it best, probably – the prophecy was fulfilled not because “destiny says so,” but because Firestar was a brave, kind cat who was the sort of cat who would try to save ThunderClan. Plus, even though he knew about the prophecy, he didn’t know exactly what it meant and therefore couldn’t work against it or for it very well, and Tigerstar never knew about it. Plus, that prophecy was pretty vague – it just meant he was the cat who would save ThunderClan, it didn’t say how he would do it

    The second series handled it alright as well. The first prophecy directly required the chosen cats being told about it and being told what to do, and they certainly could have thwarted it at any time by choosing to turn back, or if they had all died or something. The “blood will spill blood” one was also fulfilled because none of the main players knew about it or what it meant – if Hawkfrost knew the prophecy meant he was going to be killed in a fight with his brother by the lake, he could have actively thwarted it, maybe by avoiding ever being in a one-on-one fight with his brother by sending some of his followers to kill him or something.

    The third series was mostly alright with it, as was four and five, but there were some moments which irritated me. I especially hated it when they used the “you can’t escape destiny” thing to force Jayfeather into being a medicine cat. No one ever gave him a real chance to be a warrior – he spent most of his apprenticeship under Brightheart stuck in camp as punishment for sneaking out, and I don’t think we ever saw a single hunting or battle training session between them. Of course he lost his fight with Owlpaw – not just because he was blind, but because he had no training!

    He wanted to be a warrior so badly, and if someone had just given him a chance I’m 99% sure he could have been one. But Leafpool and Spottedleaf basically bullied him into becoming a medicine cat, and their only reason other than his blindness was “because destiny says so,” which was always so frustrating to me. They should have actually given him a chance, and let him decide his own path.

    They did the exact same thing with Alderheart, which seemed really out of character for Jayfeather. He knew how much it hurt to be forced into a role he never wanted, and yet he was willing to do it to Alderheart? At least it turned out better for Alderheart – he actually likes being a medicine cat. But he should have been given the choice.

    And I really disliked how the later books in DOTC seemed to have this “destiny made you do it” attitude towards Clear Sky’s terrible actions in the first three books. Quiet Rain hated her son when she learned how many cats he’d gotten hurt, but in her last moments, she forgave him because StarClan told her “he couldn’t help it, it was always destined to happen this way.” Uh, excuse me? No. Forgive your son because he’s worked to make up for it and he’s a better leader now, that’s fine. But don’t act like it somehow wasn’t his fault that he chose to stole territory and kills cats in a useless battle that he started. Star Flower did the same thing, which is why I can’t stand her. She acted like Clear sky had always been a good leader who made tough decisions that were for the best.

    Another bit that annoyed me was when everyone acted like it was destiny that Micah died the way he died in Moth Flight’s Journey, and that no cat could have changed it even if they knew about it. Of course they could have, quite easily in fact – just tell Micah not to go up in that tree, and he won’t die falling from it. Simple. He may have died another way, or he may have refused to listen, but it’s an easy way to avert that “destined” fate if known about.

    I liked the way the Harry Potter universe handled prophecies better – yes, prophecies existed in their world, but if the subjects of prophecies knew about them, they could take action to thwart them and succeed. Thus, while prophecies were legitimate when they were first seen, several never came true because of the choices people made.

    I’m going to regret saying this, but even the Twilight books handled this concept in a decent way. Blech, it feels so wrong praising the Twilight series for anything. But I did think that Alice’s way of seeing the future was more fitting of the idea of free will. She could read the future, but the future was always changing based on the choices people made, and so her visions were always shifting as new choices were made.

    Sorry for the mini essay I’ve posted here. XD

  • Great article, Shock! Glad to see your article finally published! Also, as usual with articles, I was just skimming over it so I got completely lost at the mentions of the Chozo (even when I went back and read what it was, I still don’t know what the Chozo are and I’m fairly sure that I don’t really wanna delve into the Metroid Wiki to find out as it will only lead to more questions) sooooooooo 😛

    • Spoilers for Warriors and Metroid alike.

      I brought up the Chozo because, while they are from Metroid, they have a similar capacity for prophecy. Each of theirs came to pass in time; for instance, in Prime, they foresaw that the “Entrusted One” (Samus) would come to stop the “Great Poison” (Phazon). This was in their Lore. What they are is a race of avians who are seers, at one with the universe and technology, and are peaceful.

      I’ll bring up the Blood spilling blood prophecy again; StarClan had a similar capacity. They gave Leafpool the vision of blood flooding the lake, and the speech of “before there is peace, blood will spill blood, and the lake will run red”. Blood spilling blood; Brambleclaw killing his halfbrother. Neither group knew EXACTLY what was to come, but they had an idea, and they tried to aid its speedy passage…

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