Warriors Most Hated Cats: Were They Really That Bad? by Fallowsong

Fallowsong shares their thoughts on unpopular cats. 

As with all book series’, there will always be some cats that a large portion of the fandom hates. I’m going to take a look back into the series to review these much-hated characters and ask: were they really that bad?

1. Ashfur
People get very annoyed by the ‘he just loved too much’ excuse for Ashfur’s actions. This is understandable, and a part of me agrees, but I don’t believe that Ashfur was evil. Claiming you would kill 3 cats is very different to actually killing 3 cats. Would Ashfur have murdered Jay, Lion and Holly if Squirrelflight never revealed her secret? We will never know, so we may as well give him the benefit of the doubt. It’s also clear that Ashfur regretted his actions, or he wouldn’t be in StarClan.

2. Squirrelflight and Leafpool
I’ve put these two together for obvious reasons. I’ll focus on Leafpool first. People dislike her because she broke the warrior code and then hid it. However, cats like Yellowfang, Bluestar and Greystripe committed similar crimes, yet these characters are generally beloved by the fandom. Of course Leafpool broke two codes, the medicine cat code as well as the warriors one, but as Firestar aptly put, she and her sister had already been punished enough. Squirrelflight lost her mate, Leafpool lost her position, and they both lost the respect of every other Clan cat. Their lives were hellish for many moons until after the Great Battle when they were forgiven. Let’s cut these guys a break.

3. Hollyleaf
Ok, this is the last basic one. I agree that Hollyleaf was a bit annoying when she was like “warrior code this, warrior code that” but I don’t think that’s enough to hate her. Then there’s the whole Ashfur issue. She murders him to keep him quiet and then tells all the Clans anyway? Yeah, not so smart, Holly. But I want to point out that she regretted her actions deeply and didn’t actually think she was worthy of going to StarClan. Plus, Ashfur seems to have forgiven her over this (probably sees that he kind of brought it upon himself), and seeing as he was the one who died, he should be the judge. This fight is pretty old anyway, like the ones above, so let’s just accept that Hollyleaf went to StarClan and that’s that.

4. Ferncloud
What is people’s problem with Ferncloud? As far as I can tell, it’s about her staying the nursery from the time she had her first litter. But as many people don’t realise, this doesn’t mean she didn’t go hunting and didn’t fight in some battles. Besides, at some points she did go to the warriors den for short amounts of time. Her job was valued in the Clan and she died saving Brightheart.

That’s all! Thanks for reading!