I'll be honest, I wasn't really expecting to reach this milestone so soon.

Sorry this video is coming a little later than I actually hit 10,000 subscribers; I

did make my preparations as early as possible but I evidently miscalculated when I would

need it finished by.

I suppose now, though, this can be a bit of a holiday treat!

Thank you all, so much for helping me get this far.

As something of a celebration, I'm going to be talking about a particular character

that is at the center of much of my love for the series as a whole.

It's going to be a bit of a long one, because of how much I have to say about it, both in

canon and the realm of my mind.

I don't think it's a secret that I adore Hollyleaf.

She is my favorite character, not just in Warriors but across all media I've consumed,

and my feelings about her have only grown as I've had more years to think about her

in her canon portrayal, potential alternative routes for her journey to take, and more recently,

how to go about changing her character and story slightly for Paws of Stars to make her

everything I ever dreamed for her to be.

Fair warning that this video will talk about the direction I think Hollyleaf's story

was going in, the points that could have changed, and my interpretation of her character, and

all of that will very much be spoilers for what has already been released for Paws of

Stars, albeit absent of context.

If there was one thing that kept me unquestionably tied to and in love with the arcs I'm now

rewriting in the decade leading up to Paws of Stars, it would be Hollyleaf, in the stories

I saw for her, the lessons she taught me, and the impact she had on my life and view

of myself.

There's a reason I love her so much.

Even when we first met her as a kit, Hollykit already had a strong personality.

She was a stickler for the rules and pretty ambitious as well, wanting to be a medicine

cat primarily because of how prominent and essential it would make her in the clan.

Yet she also got into play fights with her brothers against her better judgment and followed

them to find a fox cub, outside of camp, even when she knew it was explicitly going against

orders from the warriors and warrior code.

As an apprentice, she finds the job of a medicine cat to be much more difficult and herself

to be more squeamish than she had expected, but she doesn't immediately give up, even

as she finds little to no satisfaction or success in it.

Her brute force method continues until Brook intervenes and explains, using an anecdote

from the Tribe, that maybe she should follow her talents rather than work endlessly at

something she both isn't good at and that doesn't bring her joy.

She also reminds Hollypaw that respect and importance come from proving yourself as an

individual, not by holding an important position.

In canon, Hollypaw had also been exposed to fighting at this point and found it to be

both exhilarating and something that she was naturally gifted in, which further pushed

her into agreeing with Brook, but even in my version where she was trying to spend as

much time in the medicine den as she could and was still failing, the idea of a life

that might be easier and more fulfilling for her is enough to finally convince her to train

as a warrior instead.

However, in my version, this also comes with the promise that she'll still make herself

important, as a warrior, an arbiter of the warrior code like she had been as a kit, and

maybe even a mentor, deputy, and leader one day.

Canon then sees her, the strictest code-follower we've seen yet, disobey the code and her

leader to sneak onto Riverclan territory, talk to her friend Willowpaw, and find out

what's wrong in Riverclan.

From what we have seen so far, Hollypaw is someone who cares deeply about following the

warrior code, but often breaks it herself if she can find some justification to.

She wants to help others but finds fighting and critiquing others to be much easier.

And, while she goes on quite a lot about wanting to do good and just help her clan as much

as she can, what she consistently places value and passion in isn't selfless aid, but importance

and glory.

She doesn't just want to help, she wants to succeed and be looked on favorably for

it.

This isn't even something she wholly recognizes herself, which can lead to a lot of hypocritical

behavior, such as her continuously berating Lionpaw for meeting Heatherpaw when she did

something that is at least similar, though not identical, with Willowpaw herself.

Now, some would say, even with some level of accuracy if we're referring to the canon

material, that Hollypaw's portrayal so far has been and continues to be inconsistent,

and a marker of the Erins' inability to grasp who she was yet; Vicky has openly admitted

since that she only came to understand Hollyleaf around the time of Eclipe or Long Shadows,

which was far too late to build up any foreshadowing or grounding in a character arc that could

have used that murder as its midpoint.

I wholly accept all of that, but it's also the very reason I was drawn to Hollypaw this

early.

Whether by accident or on purpose, Hollypaw has a series of different motives, some known

to her and some not, that are causing her to act in contradictory ways, and that is

wildly intriguing to me.

The way I see it, Hollyleaf's core motive is being recognized, respected, or loved,

and different influences in her life have taught her the ways in which that is achieved.

Ferncloud & Dustpelt, who I believe could have both been larger parts in her life since

Squirrelflight didn't spend as much time in the nursery, taught her that respect came

from upholding the warrior code.

Squirrelflight, Brambleclaw, and even Firestar showed her that heroism is what gets you respect,

and they also gave her a nobel legacy to uphold, one she is choosing to take on rather than

one being thrust on her…Nightheart.

But clan culture itself also influences her.

It tells her that some roles are simply more valued than others, like medicine cats and

deputies, and that your value as a cat is in what you can give your clan.

As a result of this, Hollypaw ends up with a lot of ambition.

But where is it meant to be directed?

She doesn't, at least yet, have a motive to be anything in particular other than important

(much like Brambleclaw, actually) but she locks on to being a medicine cat primarily

because it's the earliest way to make yourself different and important.

Failing that, she finds she likes fighting.

Is she good at fighting?

Other cats say so.

Well then she'll get as far as she can with fighting!

She'll be the best warrior now and, again, in my version, the arbiter of the code.

Rather than even necessarily wanting a position of power, like Brambleclaw, Hollypaw grasps

tightly to what is unique about herself, which is why Brook's talk spoke to her so deeply,

as it showed her a path to getting her recognized and loved.

Her time as a medicine cat and refusal to give up even when she wasn't getting anywhere

also demonstrated that she's very stubborn, something she probably picked up from both

of her parents, which leads her to follow relentlessly down the path she is constructing

for herself as soon as it is formed, both in actions and thoughts, and even when she's

actively going against the code that is a part of that identity.

Remember that the true goal is being recognized, so saving the clan from a fox cub, saving

Riverclan, stopping a war between Riverclan and Windclan or, later, Thunderclan and Windclan,

all of these take priority over the code because they would make her the hero if she succeeds.

Now, you might simply not like this characterization as it stands, and find Hollypaw's behavior

or effect on characters like Lionpaw to be grating, annoying, frustrating, or even mean.

That's absolutely fine.

Not every character is going to appeal to every person, but if you can get past her

at this stage, you have the opportunity to see her grow.

There is a very complex individual here if you piece her together and characters that

have this level of contradictory motives and aimless, amoral drives have a strong potential

to break and be repaired in a way that is not only interesting, but moving, as this

is the sort of slip anyone could fall into, not just fantasy people who are “born evil”

like Brokenstar.

So now that we've settled the baseline of her characterization and potential, let's

talk about her relationships.

As I said in my ahem, *very* old video, Hollyleaf has more interpersonal relationships than

either of her brothers, and is generally an active, outgoing, extroverted cat who seeks

out interactions and relationships with others frequently.

I believe this could easily tie back into her desire to be recognized, as the more people

you're friends with, the more people are likely to notice and like you, but it also

just feels good to be surrounded by others sometimes.

Cinderheart and Willowshine are her only concrete friends, in canon, outside her family and

even they faded in and out at different periods of her life.

Hazeltail interacted with her extensively, but only for the duration of Sunrise, and

most of her other connections, at least her positive ones, are brief.

I obviously endeavored to give every cat in my rewrite a greater network of connections

and more consistent interactions with those connections, but for Hollyleaf in particular,

how she deals with her connections is often telling of her mental state.

When she is at her best, she will actively seek out her friends to help and be praised

by them, but if she is doing poorly, she draws away from them since, as I mentioned earlier,

she places her value as a cat in her ability to give to her clan and live up to the legacies

and expectations set up around her.

This is why I not only solidified her existing friendships and the semi-parental relationship

she had with Ferncloud, now Ferncloud and Dustpelt, but also gave her Thornclaw as a

mentor rather than Brackenfur, because he is someone she could connect to much more

deeply and whose relationship with her would have quite an interesting progression because

of her medicine cat training, his harsh work ethic, and eventually, her murder of his best

friend Ashfur.

I discussed this decision and Thornclaw's own story with greater depth in his own dedicated

video, but I will save further details for a later day.

While I'm on the topic of relationships, I probably can't avoid talking about her

relationship with Sol, but this is something I went into much more extensively in my video

on the tom in question.

At this point you might notice just how many of my videos and interests have been dancing

around the topic of Hollyleaf all this time.

Sol works as a perfect foil for Hollyleaf at multiple important stages of her journey

as another powerless orator who seeks personal glory and validation while hurting others

along the way.

Her falling into actions that he would take or finally breaking from his chain and choosing

to go against him work as a great symbols of her current progression and growth.

But of course you can watch the Sol video if you want more details on that.

Moving to another point then, over the years I've often heard that Hollyleaf's murder

of Ashfur and actions at the gathering don't make sense because she killed Ashfur to keep

the secret of her parentage but then told it herself.

I think this misconception may have originated in the more animation-focused part of the

community since, when you squish so much of Hollyleaf's story into one two to four minute

period, it does look like a quick transition without the opportunity for details of the

situation or motives based on them to have shifted.

However, the reality is that an entire book, exactly a moon of time from one gathering

to the next, passed between Ashfur's murder and Hollyleaf revealing their secret at the

gathering, and even in canon, one very important piece of information was revealed in that

time: who Hollyleaf's parents were.

Ashfur only discovered that Squirrelflight and Brambleclaw weren't their birth parents.

When Hollyleaf killed him, she was preventing a random, unnecessary scandal that would start

rumors about Thunderclan's, and her, true character without any need.

No one actually knew who their parents were.

It could have been two other Thunderclan cats who just broke up and decided not to stay

together; it could have been random cats outside the territories who left their kittens by

the border.

There were a number of possibilities that wouldn't ultimately be as bad, for Hollyleaf

and her brothers at least, and that would still get their names tossed around among

the other clans for no reason.

That doesn't mean that she was *right* in killing him though, as I've seen other people

say.

If she, or anyone, had come to Firestar, Brambleclaw, Sandstorm, Dustpelt, anyone really about exactly

what had happened with Ashfur in the fire, I highly doubt that most of those cats who

know them so well and trusted them so deeply would condemn them, and as authority figures

they would have a higher chance of giving Ashfur a proper punishment that didn't have

to be and probably wouldn't have been death.

Hollyleaf chose to kill him rather than go to others for help because she's stubborn,

independent, and didn't want *anyone* to know Ashfur's secret, including her clan

leader and friends.

She killed him because it was the easy way out.

But when they learned that her parents were actually a medicine cat and a cat from another

clan, things changed.

Her birth had actually broken both the medicine cat and warrior codes, which by her logic