The New Super Edition Is A Mess – Sunny's Spiel | Warriors Analysis

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This is not a normal video.
I have scripted it but I will be doing exactly one take and I won't be editing very much,
first because I don't have a lot of time and second because I don't think this is a book
deserving of much time.
However, I do want to get my thoughts out about it because this book is the latest in
a long line in a chain of bad books and bad choices and I would like to talk about that
in a longer format than short note posts.
So…Onestar's Confession Time.
This was a controversial book before it was even released,
but save for the excerpt released on the website last month and the one leaked passage that
a lot of people saw, I have avoided looking into or judging the book as a whole, until
now.
Spoilers are ahead.
All right, for anyone who might not have read the book or gone away despite my warnings,
I'll give a very quick summary.
Long story short, after Onestar and Darktail's deaths, Onestar is asked to think back on
his life while Tallstar and some other Starclan cats decide whether or not he belongs in Starclan.
And…he does that.
What we get is supposedly a full summation of Onestar's life, from his apprenticeship
under Deadfoot where he ventures into the Twolegplace alongside the kittypet apprentices
Windclan tried out, to the clans leaving the lake and him leaving Smoke and Darkkit, to
his clashes with Mudclaw and then Firestar, and finally to his downfall when Darktail
arrived.
The format is no different from a regular book, but this time it's apparently Onestar
thinking about his life, and when that's done, he concludes he's not all bad, Tallstar agrees,
and he goes to Starclan.
The end.
I'll start off with this.
Onestar's Confession is a completely useless book.
The main points of this story were told in Starlight in April of 2006, about 16 years
ago, Shattered Sky in April of 2017, about 5 years ago, and Winds of Change in June of
2021, about one year ago.
We did not need to hear the New Prophecy and A Vision of Shadows stories *again* so soon
and with so little added, which is an unfortunate pattern in a fair chunk of the recent supplemental
material.
Meanwhile the pieces that actually would have been new, Brokenstar's exile of Windclan,
Onewhisker's relationship with Smoke, his relationship with Fireheart, how that relationship
changed with Firestar to the point of the Eclipse battle, his opinions on the Dark Forest
trainees and why he chose Harespring as a deputy, all of that is blatantly skipped over
or trimmed down to such a point that nothing is gained from it other than what we already
knew.
We learned about three new kittypets: Bailey and her kits Brushpaw and Tansypaw, or rather
Melody, who were all nice…slices of characters, and were fun for what they brought, but since
they all only had a few chapters to exist in, they didn't get to show off a ton of who
they were and were mainly there for the sake of one character's motivation.
And, of course they had to exist for a brief period, because they were retconned characters.
We knew they couldn't become full warriors as soon as they got their apprentice names
because they weren't shown in the allegiances for the first and second arcs.
But bad pacing and not giving time to relationships are issues that underline so many of the problems
in this book and that's something I'll continue to bring up as we go along.
I also can't continue without addressing the elephant in the room: the various elements
solidified for the family tree in this book, especially those to do with Onestar.
Some were done, sloppily, in the excerpt we got on the website, though mostly in the other
clans, Thunderclan unfortunately included.
Graystripe and Darkstripe are now officially brothers and both kits of Willowpelt guys!
No matter how little it makes sense.
Over in Windclan, Ashfoot and Morningflower are now Onestar's siblings (but they actually
made a mistake since the original author post about this made Ashfoot and Morningflower
older and this book made them littermates, which is not a meaningless choice as it makes
Fireheart and Onewhisker stupidly far apart in age when they were implied in the first
arc to both be new warriors on parallel paths).
However, even past the excerpt we had plenty more problems.
Whitetail was canonized as Onestar's second mate and Heathertail as his daughter.
This means that Onestar became mates with his former apprentice, a fact that the book
decides to explicitly point out in a very poorly worded passage, and Breezepelt and
Heathertail are officially both mates and cousins, something that the book never even
acknowledges, as is the case with many romantic relationships that were accidentally written
to be between family members in this series.
But as usual, none of this was necessary, and it absolutely could have been retconned
or ignored altogether since none of it was in the books before.
Whitetail was implied to have shared a nest with Onestar once, but this easily could have
been ignored, or her being Onestar's apprentice could have been ignored.
They could have easily left Onewhisker as an only child, explaining his name along with
stopping his daughter from marrying her cousin.
That said, it was also kind of inevitable that the team would decide to do this given
their past choices.
For a few years now, in just about all of their supplemental material, they have been
adding as many old author statements turned website family tree facts into the books as
possible, without giving any of them second thoughts or even looking back at the original
statements that the ideas distantly came from.
Whether it's a point of pride, covering their backs, carelessness, laziness, or trying to
maintain promises they made to make the website seem more official, this is the road they
have been taking and they don't seem to be turning back.
So from this point of the video onward, I will be doing my best to ignore the family
tree add-ins as much as possible.
The book has far more problems than just that, and they all warrant some amount of discussion.
Firstly, the prologue and epilogue, which I'm going to discuss together since they chronologically
happen right next to each other, immediately after Onestar and Darktail's deaths.
Both of them are put in a sort of field neutral zone where they are to be judged.
Darktail is immediately pulled away, to the Dark Forest by Ashfur we would assume, but
also possibly to the Dark Forest by Starclan who somehow have power over rogues now.
Onestar is then faced with Tallstar and asked to reflect on his life while Starclan discusses
what to do with him.
You might think this is a return of the trial system from Squirrelflight's Hope, but you
would be wrong.
Onestar doesn't present a case to anyone, and the remainder of the book telling his
life is not anything he says aloud or even anything that is analyzed by whatever unseen
panel may be judging him.
Onestar himself doesn't even get to see anyone besides Tallstar in this time, and all Tallstar
asks is that Onestar think a little.
When he comes back, after an unknowable period of time, he immediately agrees that Onestar
has "tried so hard to atone for [his] mistakes" and that has earned him his place in Starclan.
Heh…heheh yeah right tell that to Juniperclaw.
The rules of what gets you into Starclan or the Dark Forest are so completely obfuscated
and contradictory at this point that I really couldn't tell you one way or the other if
Onestar deserves to be in Starclan or the Dark Forest.
Honestly this book's very inclusion of Onestar's judgment and reflections may only muddle the
point more.
But I can say that the life the rest of the book showed me did not convince me of his
just placement.
And that's really what it had to do, because this book isn't a case for cats in Starclan.
It's a case for the readers to say he deserves Starclan by the end of the book.
We open the first numbered chapter with a training scene between Onepaw and his mentor
Deadfoot, and the skill they choose to focus on is careful stalking and using the direction
of the wind to catch prey, with Deadfoot specifically pointing out how running after rabbits isn't
the only way to catch them.
Windclan is specifically supposed to be a clan where you are better off running after
prey and utilizing your speed in the open moors to outrun your opponent.
What Deadfoot is teaching is Thunderclan skills, or what has become the default for the Erins
to always go with when they need a training scene.
It's not a massive thing by any means but, as with many problems in this book, it's the
continuation of a long ongoing problem.
In this case, where even the hunting techniques, one of the only remaining differences that
supposedly exist between the clans, become uniform.
Now one thing that actually is new here is some new characters: a brave kittypet named
Bailey who wanted her kits to be strong and self-sufficient so they could defend themselves,
as she had against a badger.
In service of this, she brings her kits, Leo and Melody, to the clan and they are apprenticed
as Brushpaw and Tansypaw.
Brushpaw is more eager about being in the clan and becomes a good friend to Onepaw while
Tansypaw really doesn't like having to hunt or fight and wants to return to her twolegs,
but doesn't since her mother and brother don't want to leave.
As I said earlier, these guys are fun, but they are here for exactly two purposes.
First, they introduce Onepaw to the twolegplace and the…ahem, "pretty kittypet" Smoke and
regularly bring him back for the extent of their apprenticeships so Onepaw can get acquainted
with the kittypets there, which of course is shorthand for "he really only speaks repeatedly
to Smoke."
Their second purpose has to do with Windclan and Onewhisker's overall opinion of how kittypets
fit into clan life.
As one of the motivations for Onewhisker to leave Smoke and Darktail behind, the Erins
wanted him to believe without question that kittypets couldn't be warriors.
To do this, they had both Brushpaw and Tansypaw fail their assessments, mostly because they
spent too much time visiting the Twolegplace with Onepaw and not enough time training,
and subsequently had Tansypaw leave, Brushpaw die in a spat with Shadowclan, and Bailey
leave after that.
Now, call me crazy but maybe "no kittypets could ever be warriors" isn't the lesson you
should take from three talented cats leaving in different ways, but when have the clans
ever been rational about that sort of thing?
Partially as a result of this plotline, they also wanted (as they have often wanted in
the recent works) for Onepaw to face a lot of opposition in his clan to the ideals he
had as an apprentice, meaning that most of Windclan, especially Tallstar, were all very
impatient and arguably unfair towards the kittypet apprentices, and all were completely
unconvinced that a kittypet could ever have something valuable to offer as a warrior.
Given who Tallstar's best friend was as a young warrior, or how much he respected Firestar,
or in general how tolerant and patient he was, this is a particularly disappointing
casually of the recent mob mentality trend that has persisted even into the main series
where any cat who isn't a protagonist will go out of their way to hold onto illogical
opinions that often go against established characterizations solely for the sake of making
the protagonist face adversity among their clanmates or other clans.
That said, I'm at least glad that these kittypets each got some level of characterization and
decent, unique sendoffs for each of them.
Now, if you're looking ahead, or, you know, thinking at all, you may be wondering “Hey,
Sunnyfall?
How could Onewhisker ever come away with the idea that kittypets can't be warriors when
one of his best friends in the first arc, Fireheart, proved right in front of him that
a kittypet could become a fantastic warrior?”
Well I'm glad you asked, because the book promptly answers that by…skipping over the
entire period where any of that would be relevant.
Actually, here's a helpful list of some of the things the book completely timeskips
over: Brokenstar's takeover of Windclan territory, Windclan's time in exile, Windclan's
rescue and Onewhisker meeting Fireheart, Onewhisker being given and training Gorsepaw, Onewhisker
being Fireheart's friend and seeing the tom grow, Onewhisker losing Gorsepaw, Onewhisker
and Fireheart each crossing borders to help each other and their clans, Onewhisker developing
any relationship with or even concept of Smoke beyond several mentions that she's pretty,
Onewhisker beng given and mentoring Whitepaw or figuring out who his apprentice is at all,
Onewhisker having any further relationship with his sisters after that first chapter,
and the Bloodclan battle where Firestar saved his life.
Boy that sure seems like an awful lot of very relevant material that was skipped over completely.
A lot of it could have even been particularly pivotal to Onewhisker's opinion of kittypets,
or even more directly to his later relationships with Firestar, Smoke, Ashfoot, and Whitetail
and the choices he will make based on them.
Sure would have been nice to see any of it.
Well don't worry, there's a perfectly good and logical reason for skipping all of
this work and having some truly abysmal pacing in this book: If we saw any of Shadowclan's
takeover or Gorsepaw's mentorship, they couldn't avoid showing us a relationship
with Fireheart; if we saw a relationship between Onewhisker and Fireheart, he would unquestionably
have had a better opinion of kittypets and not realistically turn Smoke away for that
reason; if we saw any of his mentoring Whitepaw the reader would have that in their mind when
she became his mate later; and if they showed any more in-depth relationships or personalities
for Smoke or Ashfoot they would have to…do work and flesh out she-cats who clearly only
need to serve the purposes of “mate” and “deputy” respectively.
Even outside of that, there are several weird jarring timing bits like skipping straight
to Brushpaw being dead the very sentence after Onewhisker hopes he'll be okay as he lays
injured or going straight from the chapter where he resolves that kittypets aren't
cut out for this to the chapter where he begins with “oh, I was wrong obviously because
look there's a Firestar right there.”
There's no cohesion, another theme in many recent works, with Leopardstar's Honor being
another very bad example in this regard.
Regardless of the…ahem, mixed benefits of skipping over key material to avoid writing
it at all, the story post-timeskip has a lot of work to do.
Firestar is already a leader which means the book has to retroactively tell us that it's
so great how a kittypet became a leader and how Firestar is such a great cat and friend
with all those great times they had together off screen.
Next on the block of rapid retroactivity we have Whitetail and it is time for the infamous
paragraph.
This deserves a section to itself really, even though this is genuinely the only time
it is mentioned in the book.
Whitetail expresses affection towards Onewhisker.
Onewhisker is surprised and says he remembers her being his apprentice (which he has to
say since we never saw it in the book) and that she has now been a strong and independent
warrior for a long time now, at least a year or so if Thunderclan's growth timeline is
an indication.
Onewhisker then says she is pretty.
Later in that chapter, after another short timeskip, Whitetail confesses to him, he agrees
to be her mate, and they get together.
All of this is post-Smoke so Onewhisker doesn't believe there is a conflict there and there
isn't any crossover between the relationships as far as we can tell.
Whitetail has no discernable personality traits beyond being nice and liking Onewhisker, and
this will never change.
Now, this passage is *very* poorly worded, on account of having to shove all the information
about their mentor-apprentice relationship into the same introduction paragraph where
you're learning she exists or that she likes Onewhisker.
However, there is no evidence of manipulation or romantic intent on Onewhisker's part,
considering we literally have no idea what they're dynamic was like before this exact
moment, and I don't think this is a Spottedleaf and Thistleclaw or a Dustpelt and Ferncloud
situation as people have been fearing.
What it is still though, irrefutably, is a relationship where the former apprentice gains
a crush on the former mentor and the former mentor reciprocates, which can have some nasty
implications when put through a real-world view.
The only way this exact problem could have been solved was either not making them mentor
and apprentice, or not making them mates, and neither of those options were taken.
Beyond that, considering how touchy and close-to-home this subject is for a lot of people, I would
like to move on and leave it up for debate.
But once again, the number of iffy relationships in the series is a longstanding problem that
this book only takes the next step in increasing.
On the topic of another dry relationship with Onewhisker, it's Smoke time.
When she first tells him she is expecting kits, plans to keep being his mate, and expected
that he would eventually come live in the Twolegplace with her, Onewhisker reacts with
genuine shock.
This is the first time we've seen any of their romantic relationship at all, and it's
after Onewhisker has already broken off whatever this was and started something with Whitetail
instead.
The surprise exhibited by both parties in the conversation makes it sound like this
really is the first time they are discussing the possibility of serious or committed relationship,
but it sure would be easier to tell how much deceit, affection, commitment, or casual intimacy
there was if we saw any of it.
Smoke too, by the way, has no discernible personality beyond being nice, pretty, liking
Onewhisker, and then disliking Onewhisker.
If you've seen my analysis on Gender in Warriors, you'll already have an idea of
how much I dislike these supposedly prominent she-cats having no personality or relevance
beyond stock niceness and a relationship with a tom.
Now, Onewhisker is actually meant to be wrong here and the book will blame him for giving
up on Smo-well at least on Smoke's kit for the remainder of its time, so it seems like
this would be the easiest area in which to remove sympathy and have Onewhisker just back
down to pressure or cowardice or delusion and abandon them needlessly.
However, they actually did give Onewhisker good reasons to deny Smoke and Darkkit a place
in Windclan because they placed her plea right where Windclan was starving and trying to
leave the forest.
They even have him hammer in through his own thoughts that he truly wishes he could take
them, and it really is impossible.
There could have been multiple motivations involved, but this is the one they cite.
His biggest problem now becomes lying to his clan about this event instead of having the
relationship or turning her away to begin with.
Oh, and since we're nearing the halfway point of The New Prophecy's section now,
it's time for a Tribe cameo!
Did you know that Onewhisker appears in a vision sent to Stoneteller from the Tribe
of Endless Hunting?
Did you know it actually ends up happening twice and the second message is sent to the
Crag Stoneteller?
Boy is that wholly unnecessary!
Not all of the protagonists need to be the center of a super special prophecy guys, and
you especially don't have to hijack another culture again to prop up your main character.
Both adding needless prophecies to make the main character seem special and hijacking
the Tribe to prop up the clan in one way or another are, once again, longstanding problems
in the series that Onestar's Confession only serves to worsen.
Uh other miscellaneous things…Ashfoot being Onestar's pick for deputy loses so much
weight when she's his sister.
If she was just chosen for being a good, rational warrior like we all could have believed before
it would have been lovely.
Mudclaw actually stops in this version to make an appeal to Onewhisker and ask him to
give up the deputy position to him willingly, which the sulking, vindictive Mudclaw we saw
in Winds of Change definitely never did and never would do.
Wrenflight gives Onestar a life for love which is another mother giving a life of love to
the pile while not one father has ever done that.
Stagleap, Onestar's dad, gave him strength by the way.
I did actually like the life Gorsestar gave for sense that others call common sense, and
the inclusion of Gorsestar in general, but this ceremony included two different Dawn
of the Clans cameos and we've had at least one in a majority of supplemental material
lately even when it doesn't make sense.
Okay back to the main stuff.
The transition from Onestar the kind guy still trying to uphold his older values to the guarded
leader trying to protect Windclan (and really himself) by hating Thunderclan and Firestar
does go a little too quickly, but I'd say it's one of the better done key elements
of the book since they made sure to show it as an act in the first gathering, with Onestar
constantly thinking over what to say to maintain his firm exterior.
That said, one of the most prominent points in that character arc is the battle in Eclipse
where Onestar attacks Thunderclan's camp over their supposed haughtiness and Firestar
finally gives up on getting his friend back and we don't get that at all because *it's
time for another timeskip!* This time we'll be flying past the whole of Power of Three
and Omen of the Stars because who cares about Onestar's increasingly unstable relationship
with Firestar, the death of Ashfoot, or why Onestar would have ever made the decision
to promote Harespring as deputy if he thought so firmly that he was a naive fool?
All of this is irrelevant.
It's time for Onestar to take a quick journey by himself back to the old territories to
find Smoke!
This is a thing leaders can do on a whim I guess!
So he goes back and it turns out Smoke already died to a monster and Darkkit, Darktail now,
was already becoming a terror around the twoleplace, killing at least one kittypet, attacking a
twoleg kit, and generally becoming feared or hated by everyone even after his twolegs
tried to kick him out and he and Smoke became strays.
Darktail then made a habit of picking fights with everyone, be they helpful or harmful,
and after Smoke's death he left and hasn't been seen since, which we know means he went
to form the Kin.
Bit of a side tangent here, Onestar knowing that Darktail was his son in the first place
at least *feels* incongruent with the main series, because in A Vision of Shadows it
looked like Onestar only learned Darktail's identity when Darktail whispered to him at
the beginning of Shattered Sky that he was his son and that Onestar would be sent to
the Dark Forest for abandoning and then murdering him.
That would be why he was so adamant about taking down the random batch of rogues before
that took a life from him and killed two of his warriors, but when Darktail whispered
to him he turned and fled, and only gave up the information when Darktail nearly spilled
his secret for him.
It's not a blatant contradiction but it does seem awfully odd for him to now just
be afraid of going to the Dark Forest for killing Darktail…or otherwise just afraid
of dying, and the hole now shows in that, even in his head, Onestar says he doesn't
know why he called Windclan to retreat which is…not good considering how impactful that
action is.
First off, maybe we should think about whether or not Onestar is to blame for Darktail's
deeds, because that would be the only reason that killing him would be anything other than
saving the clans at this point.
Darktail is set up to be just a bucket of evil who was meant to be evil from the moment
Onestar abandoned him, which is a habit Warriors has with a lot of their big bad villains that
I don't care for, and once that once again has been used as a crutch for years.
Smoke trained Darktail to hate the clans a bit but then he was also an absolute menace
to the housefolk he lived with and the entire kittypet population in the area which I doubt
Smoke would have trained him to do, and his behavior isn't all Onestar's fault either.
Onestar definitely shouldn't have abandoned him and that was wrong but also leaving someone
with their mother is not the same as raising them to be a serial murderer and a sadist.
Darktail attacking the twolegplace, getting kicked out of his home, setting up the Kin,
driving out Skyclan, taking over Shadowclan, taking captive of Riverclan and generally
terrorizing the clans have Onestar as Darktail's motivation, but definitely not the only cause.
Onestar doesn't seem to agree, as he keeps laying every new evil deed of Darktail's
down at his own paws as another consequence of his past mistakes.
But I wouldn't say Onestar is at fault for Darktail taking over the clans.
However, I would say he's at fault for a lot of other stuff that the book somehow doesn't
manage to condemn him for.
Let's examine that second possibility now, that Onestar is just afraid to die, something
that the book supports to an extent.
Onestar is apparently prepared to die as punishment, but not to be punished eternally in the Dark
Forest, never having the chance to confess to his family and be forgiven.
That is direct paraphrase from Onestar's own thoughts.
So…this guy is a jerk.
He absolutely could confess at any time while he's alive, and forgiveness isn't something
he's owed, especially if he, even now, refuses to tell them.
He moans to himself constantly through the last section of the book about how he can't
tell them because it's too difficult but that doesn't suddenly make it not his fault
or not his choice.
Just tell them.
That's your responsibility, whether or not it's pleasant.
Later he wonders dramatically if this was always how his life was meant to end, with
his mistakes catching up with him and…well yes, friend.
You cannot just forget your mistakes.
Actions have consequences, far reaching ones that we can't always predict.
Don't act like you're the unique victim in having experienced this train of cause
and effect.
He then has the gall to go over all of his good relationships ~that the book completely
skimmed over cough cough~ and say that in the end, only his failure with Smoke and Darktail
mattered.
No, no that is not correct.
That is self-pitying nonsense.
Just because some of your actions do matter doesn't mean others don't.
You were Firestar's friend, *and* you hurt him a lot.
You were Whitetail's mate, *and* you lied to her through your whole relationship.
You led Windclan successfully to the lake *and* you turned them into a rabid stubborn
mob who hiss at the first sign of a paw over their border and refuse to help anyone ever.
You did some good things sometimes, Onestar, and you were occasionally an okay person.
But no one deed is ever going to go away, and no one deed is ever going to define your
whole life on its own either.
You know, Rowanstar says he retreated because he's a coward, and in examining Onestar's
own thoughts I can conclude that's an accurate assessment.
A selfish coward, to be specific.
He was scared of tarnishing his family's opinion of him.
He was scared of facing death.
He was scared of consequences to his actions.
He was scared of his clanmates hating him.
That's pretty much a coward all around.
And for the record, trying to turn your morally questionable main character into a pitiable
victim by pretending they have no choice but to do the bad things they do is also a frustrating
recent trend in the series, particularly Leopardstar's Honor and Blackfoot's Reckoning as I discussed
previously.
Onestar is also stupidly prideful and gets increasingly reluctant to get help from anyone,
including an absolute refusal to listen to his deputy, his medicine cat, his daughter,
his mate, or the other clan leaders as he stubbornly refuses to give Shadowclan the
necessary herbs as recompense for keeping the rogues, which in this book has the primary
motivation of wanting to avoid his past rather than protect his clan.
Fantastic.
Onestar's Confession, you have successfully made an unsympathetic protagonist.
Time to point out to the reader that he's wrong and get him some comeuppance.
Ah okay great here's the part where, after never telling his current mate Whitetail or
his daughter Heathertail or anyone about his relationship with Smoke and Darktail or his
reasoning for not saving Shadowclan lives, he is finally forced to confess by Darktail
and…uh, Whitetail forgives him literally in an instant.
She says she minds that he didn't tell her anything sooner, and yet there are absolutely
no consequences or hard feelings involved in this.
She has no feelings.
She has no personality.
Her only trait is “I love Onestar” and she keeps this after his betrayal.
What is wrong with you.
But at least Whitetail gets to comment on it.
Heathertail had nothing at all to say about her father keeping this secret or that murdering
tyrant across the lake is her brother.
She says absolutely.
Nothing.
Actually Heathertail through this whole book is conspicuously absent.
Her name is mentioned 39 times, most of which are just Onestar reminding us his daughter
exists, her name is Heathertail, and Onestar definitely loves her.
(For the record, half-hearted relationship inclusions are also a long-standing trend
in the series that this book does nothing to help.)
She speaks on exactly three short occasions: once telling Onestar that she and Breezepelt
are mates, once on the request of Kestrelflight to ask Onestar to give Shadowclan the herbs
they need, and once the night after his confession and before his death just to make sure he
doesn't plan on dying and say absolutely nothing about Darktail.
Onestar's family still cares for him and wishes him the best because they are flat-out
not allowed to have any more complex feelings than love.
And so we reach the end, where Onestar concludes that, while he has made some errors, he thinks
he has worked hard and will work hard to atone and…uh nope, you did one grand gesture and
died buddy.
You made it up to precisely no one.
None of the lives lost in Darktail's rampage or Smoke's life lost to the twoleg's or
Darktail's childhood or Whitetail and Heathertail's opinions of you have been fixed by dying to
save the clans.
You kind of need actual struggle and prove directly to the people you hurt that you're
changing or trying to make up for your mistakes for that to work.
You have learned absolutely nothing and we walk away with the book really hoping that
you still like Onestar and think he's right.
That said, I actually am happy with the comic at the end, for what it was.
I think Firestar is the cat most likely to go soft on him, so it's probably accurate
that he summed up Onestar's mistakes as “refusing to own up to his mistakes,”
and I did like that Onestar's life for Harestar was honesty.
It is customary for the previous leader to give one of the next leader's lives, and
of the good traits Onestar could think of to help him in his own leadership, I do think
honesty could have solved a lot.
He was dishonest from the start, sneaking away from his clanmates to speak with the
kittypets, lying to the kittypets about how grand his adventures were, lying to both of
his mates about different things, and putting on a series of fronts for the entirety of
his leadership to hide himself, his past, or his weakness.
Onestar's Confession is not the worst book in the series, and I wouldn't claim it to
be.
But it is a bad book in part because of how many recent and longstanding poor choices
and trends come to a head here.
It is, in many ways the culmination of over a decade of mounting bad decisions and lazy
writing choices that have built up and made a worthless and morally iffy story.
Just don't read it guys.
Please.
Spare yourselves the 500 pages.
I only spent so much time talking about it myself as some sort of cathartic closure exercise,
because this isn't just about Onestar's Confession.
I'm tired of the continuous choices to write supplemental material about the same cats
and period we've seen three times before.
I'm tired of the shallow relationships that only do the bare minimum to even tell you
these guys know or care about each other.
I'm tired of the fudged morals around so many cats because they can't actually make
the characters good people but really want them to look good.
I'm tired of the choices to listen to decade-old offhand author statements funneled in through
the wiki and then directly onto the Warriors website rather than thinking carefully about
what would fit the characters and their relationships.
I'm tired of talking about the old eras in general because each time you touch it
you have to change something and it becomes worse.
I'm tired of noticing exactly the same mistakes in different contexts and severities for so
many different books, and I don't know that I'll be talking about them again unless
one of them actually tries to be something new instead of playing it safe and failing.
This isn't me quitting Warriors or the channel.
I will still be reading the books and talking about them, but I probably won't make a
new video to talk about every piece of blundered supplemental material.
I'll cover the main story line and any other works that manage to be inventive or break
the trends they set up, and otherwise I'll just talk about things in the rest of the
series that I still enjoy, or that cause me to think.
Since this is still technically a Sunny's Spiel, though definitely more spiely than
normal, thank you for watching, and always remember that if you have to cut out large
swaths of your story to cover up errors, you should really just redraft your book.