[Briarlight lies in the medicine cat den with Jayfeather by her side, the latter with his tail curling over her back]

My Top Three Favorite & Least Favorite Ships by Turnipkit

Turnipkit lists their favourite and least favourite ships from the series.

Art by Hoverpelt

Hey, Turnipkit here with her first article! This will be about my top three favorite and least favorite ships in warriors. Both canon and non-canon ships are on the list. I’ll also be including underrated ships that deserve a lot more love, so hopefully you guys will like them. Now, let’s get on with it!

Ships I love:

3- Twigbranch x Finleap.
Now, I often hear this one getting a blast for ‘oohhh finleap’s forcing her to have kits,’ and I’ll get to that. But let’s begin from the start. Twigpaw’s feeling lonely in SkyClan. She misses ThunderClan, where cats adored her and treated her with nothing but kindness. But, she has a bright light that shines through it all: Finpaw. Another SkyClan apprentice who can’t help but make her smile. They love each other’s company and Twigpaw comforts Finpaw when he loses his tail. They’re best friends, and the other apprentices can see that when they become warriors, they might become more. They both care for each other deeply, and when Twigpaw decides to go back to ThunderClan, Finpaw’s love for her is strong enough that he decides to go with her. Back in ThunderClan, they both complete their training under Larksong and Sparkpelt respectively. When they become warriors, they’re closer than ever. But, something changes. Finleap wants to start a family, while Twigbranch is unsure. She doesn’t feel ready yet. This goes on for a while, and Twigbranch rightfully breaks up with him because of it. This is okay. They’re tense for a while, and Finleap considers going back to SkyClan, but ultimately apologizes to her and says that he’ll wait as long as Twigbranch wants to, maybe never even have kits, and that his place is with her in ThunderClan. I just really like that Finleap grew to accept that she didn’t want kits, and loved her anyway.

2- Briarlight x Jayfeather.
I absolutely adore their dynamic. Jayfeather’s a sarcastic and blunt cat, but his bond with Briarlight is strong and her bright and friendly attitude makes him happy. It softens his rough edges and helps him open up to the cats around him. While Briarlight never becomes a medicine cat herself, in the books it shows that she helps Jayfeather sort herbs and calm patients. I like to imagine that while sorting herbs, Briarlight tells him all about her dreams and the latest gossip in the clan. Jayfeather always loves her company, and when she dies he’s left with guilt, blaming himself for her death. He cared for her so much, and she cared for him. That, my friends, is a good ship if I’ve ever seen one.

1- Squirrelflight x Leafstar.
This is mainly based on their relationship in Squirrelflight’s hope. I love this ship so much though. Here’s the setting: Squirrelflight is upset and tired of Bramblestar treating her unfairly, and honestly doesn’t care anymore. She knows that she is doing the right thing by finding territory for SkyClan that Leafstar likes, so she grabs Leafstar and they set out for the territory. Leafstar and Squirrelflight talk for a bit, growing a strong bond of friendship with each other. When they get ‘captured’ by the sisters, Squirrelflight teaches Leafstar to be kind to these different cats, and Leafstar grows to respect them. Squirrelflight and Leafstar sit around for a few days, their bond only growing. When they eventually return, Squirrelflight and Leafstar are the only two to speak out for the sisters, because of their experience with them. The two she-cats only bond together more, because of the shared experience. I really think these two have good chemistry, and I ship em pretty hard.

Now, we go on to my top 3 least favorite ships. Sit back and relax, because this ones gonna be a trip.

3- Dappletail and Stormtail.
I hate Stormtail, so much. My hate cannot be contained by just a paragraph, but I will try. So, let’s get on with it. Stormtail lies to his mate, Moonflower, about battling against WindClan purposely, while telling Dappletail, not his mate, the correct strategy, like he actually wanted Moonflower to get killed! While Moonflower goes and gets killed by Hawkheart, Stormtail is just standing by, helping Dappletail. Oh yay, Moonflower’s dead now. Now that Moonflower’s dead, Stormtail goes all out. Only shares fresh-kill with Dappletail, walks side by side with her all the time, and they practically become mates, except they don’t, because, well, they don’t. But thank goodness they didn’t. I have nothing against Dappletail personally, except that she stood by and let Stormtail flirt with her while his mate and kits needed him. I despise this ship.

2- Bumblestripe and Dovewing.
Now, come on here. Don’t try and convince me this is a good ship. Dovewing was clearly disinterested in Bumblestripe, and he should have respected that. Instead, he used other clan members to manipulate her into going along with his advances, was possessive and manipulative to her, and was just flat out creepy. Look me in the eyes, and tell me ‘sleeping in the apprentices den with Dovewing and Ivypool because for some reason there was a leak that only affected meee’ is legit. Bumblestripe did that so he could.. sleep near Dovewing. He even trashes his most important relationship, the one with Blossomfall, so he can have the excuse to play-fight his crush. He uses the other cats in his clan (Cinderheart, Rosepetal) to force Dovewing into going along with him, like she’s supposed to like him just because she’s a she-cat and he’s a Tom. it’s a toxic ship, and I don’t like it.

1- Jayfeather x Half Moon.
nononono. This ship, it’s just so forced. With this one, I’ll do a setting to further explain my point. So Rock takes Jayfeather back in time and makes him Jay’s Wing, an ancient cat just arriving from out of the tunnels. He meets all the cats, but one sticks out. Half Moon. The classic forced anime love interest, trying to worm her way into our top 10 favorite ships list. She immediately makes it clear that she feels affection for Jay’s Wing, and Jayfeather is Kinda just like ‘Well, I don’t like this cat, but if I’m gonna stay here then why the heck not.’ It’s a big butchering of his character, because the Jayfeather I know is too loyal to the medicine cat code to even put a paw step out of line. Half Moon treats him like her mate, and immediately is like ‘yeah let’s go start a family’, and Jayfeather just goes along with it, and it makes absolutely no sense with his character. Eventually, they go to the mountains, and Rock kicks Jayfeather back to the present. Time skip to Sign Of The Moon, and Jay’s Wing is back. Half Moon is back too. Nothing really important happens besides Half Moon forcing herself onto Jayfeather and trying to force me to ship it until Jay corners her in the fancy ancestor cave and tells her to be stoneteller. Half Moon’s all sad and goes like ‘but I wanna have ur babies’ and for some reason Jayfeather says ‘I’d want to have kits with you too’ BUT LIKE??! he’s known her for not even a cat-day. Where’s my cranky loyal Jayfeather? It’s butchering his character. I can hardly recognize him! So yeah, Jayfeather leaves and all, but still thinks he loves Half Moon. Like, um, no. Why?? It’s just severely underdeveloped. Also, note: Half Moon loves Jay’s Wing, not Jayfeather. Even if Jayfeather is a reincarnation, they are two different cats that should have different feelings. So, yeah. That’s why I dislike Jay x Half.

Honorable Mentions:

(Ships I Hate)
Bramblestar x Squirrelflight
Ivypool x Hawkfrost
Thunder x Violet Dawn
Graystripe x Silverstream

(Ships I Love)
Gray Wing x Turtle Tail
Crowfeather x Harestar
Star Flower x Skystar
Crookedstar x Willowbreeze
Alderheart x Puddleshine
Ivypool x Fernsong

Whew, that was a lot! I hope you enjoyed the article!

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24 comments

  • i think that Leafstar x Squirrelflight was never a thing, they just became close freinds, and i’ve never heard of Alder x Puddle. i think some of these are close freindships such as Jay x Briar. Jay would never step a paw out of the medicine cat code. same with crow x Hare. personally, i love Gray x Silverstream. but i completely agree with hating Storm x Dappletail! on Jay x Half moon tho, I agree and disagree, it completely goes against Jay’s personallity, but he might be trying to act like the first Jay. but over all, great article!

    • Just because the ship isn’t canon doesn’t mean people can’t ship it.

  • I like this list!! I never looked at Finleap and Twigbranch in that way. Also, I never thought of Leafstar and Squirrelflight, that’s an amazing ship! makes my lesbian heart happy. My fave Squirrelfligth ship though is Squirrelflight x Daisy. My fave canon ships are Firestar x Sandstorm, Brackenfur x Sorreltail, and Hawkwing x Pebbleshine, and my fave headcanon ships are Ivypool x Blossomfall, Squirrelflight x Daisy, and Tallstar x Jake

  • I completely agree with the ivypool ships! Ivyhawk is a TERRIBLE ship and she totally deserved someone who actually loved her like Fernsong

  • I agree with most of these but Fin+Twig, Twigbranch was clearly saying she didn’t want kits but Finleap just kept pushing, saying absurd things and just overall being a whiny cat, they had apprentices for StarClans sake! And after when he kept loving her despite this, it was just because he realized going back to SkyClan, and losing Twigbranch, he only valued her as an object and not as a cat with any feelings.

    I also disagree with Bumble+Dove, at one point in the books Dovewing was being a brat to Bumblestripe, and afterwards she followed him down to the lake and they had a really sweet talk and visited Bumblestripes, special place which was really cute! It even says in the book that she enjoyed hanging out with him. Also, I thought it was cute he wanted to hang sleep near Dovepaw, keep in mind that Ferncloud had KITS when she was an apprentice but no one bats an eye at HER!!!

    Just my opinion, great article!