Analyzing Firestar Part One: TPB by Jinx

Jinx Analyses Firestar

Hi! Jinx here. This article is about the main protagonist of the series, Firestar. I will follow his life from TPB to POT (As far as I’ve read, sorry, I’ll do a continuation after I’ve read the rest.) So I guess this is part one! (Jeez, why am I being so perky and happy?!) Anyway, there are many mixed opinions on Firestar. This article will be focusing on his character in The Prophecies Begin (TPB). Also, I will be using the names as he progresses (Rusty-Firepaw-Fireheart-Firestar)

Warning! Minor spoilers for TPB!

So, when we first see Firestar (Rusty at this point), the young cat is a kittypet living in a house near White Hart Woods. He would have dreams about hunting, and always talk to his friend (Smudge) about the wild cats he had heard about. Rusty eventually ventures out into the woods a little bit, and a young tom (Graypaw (stripe)) attacks him. Rusty meets Bluestar and Lionheart, they take him in and blah blah blah, Clan cat. Okay, so now, we meet Ravenpaw, he learns to trust Rusty (now Firepaw) and Graypaw and reveals that Tigerclaw had murdered Redtail, the ThunderCLan deputy. Ravenpaw runs away, with the assistance of Firepaw and Graypaw, and he goes to live with a loner named Barley at his barn. That’s the last we see of Ravenpaw for a while. Now, Firepaw and Graypaw rescue WindClan, become warriors and then eventually they banish Tigerclaw. Here is where we start to see the… flaws in Fireheart. Yes, he defends Bluestar against Tigerclaw’s attack, but if you really look, he seems like he is half showing off, at least to me. He said some strong things, but were they too strong? Is it possible that, though he was just as shocked as the rest, he wanted to take Tigerclaw’s place as deputy? Could he be showing how loyal he was to become deputy? Or was he really that loyal, or maybe trying to change the other cats’ opinions of him? Some of them still saw him as a kittypet, far from forest born. Was Fireheart just as ambitious as Tigerclaw, just going about his ambition a different way? Here is the main question: Are Fireheart and Tigerclaw any different? (Other than murder)

Shocking, right? Bet you’ve never noticed the things I mentioned in just one paragraph. But I bet you’re saying “But Jinx, what if he was just loyal? What if he was just being the best warrior he could be?” Well, let’s go on, shall we?

Tigerclaw’s Fury showed me a side of Fireheart I hadn’t noticed before. Maybe it took another cat’s point of view to make me see this: Fireheart is a show-off.
Now, don’t get me wrong. Fireheart is a good and loyal cat, but yes, he is a show-off.
I bet this is some of your faces right now: 😮 “Firestar? A show-off? Never!”
Well, let’s look at the fire (heart) scene in the book. Sorry, no more puns, I’m terrible at them. So, Tigerclaw is watching ThunderClan be demolished by a huge fire. So, pretty much what happens is someone says an elder is still in camp, Sandstorm says to Fireheart “You can’t go back there!” (meaning the camp), and here is the show-offy line. “I have to go back! Don’t worry about me, I must go back!”
What do you think now? Bit of a… eh, I’ve overused show-off but I’m drawing a blank for any other word so, show-off.
So then, Bluestar dies a bit farther in, Firestar takes over, and joins WindClan and ThunderClan together to fight Tigerstar’s (claw) new clan: RiverClan and ShadowClan’s joined Clan, TigerClan. Now they fight, Tigerstar brings BloodClan, BloodClan leader (Scourge) kills him, and Firestar fights Scourge. So, Scourge ripped all nine lives out of Tigerstar with one blow. He used the same move on Firestar, but he only died once. How?! If it was the same move, HOW DID HE NOT DIE?! (See, that’s my normal stubborn, sarcastic, angry, devious, scream-y personality)
So then the orange tom comes back, kills Scourge (R.I.P, I like Scourge) and saves the day. Hooray. Whoopie. Yippity-do. In my opinion, Firestar’s life was a bit too drawn out. I mean, he lived through three arcs of the series, not to mention a ton of novellas and Super Editions.
There is a summary of Firestar in TPB. I will be doing Power of Three next, (skipping The New Prophecy cause we don’t see him much).

–Jinx–