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Post by Rainsplash on Jan 24, 2021 8:15:58 GMT -5
While many still hate Breezepelt, I've seen plenty of people who love and defend Nightcloud - sometimes obnoxiously.
Nightcloud, like Breezepelt, is shown to be the innocent, too-caring mother in Crowfeather's Trial, which is done horribly, by the way. She's still angry about Crowfeather not being the coddling, I'm sorry, interested, close father to Breezepelt, and they have broken up. She acts so cool, it almost convinced me she was actually really nice. Her character is just boom - nice now.
She never apologizes for the things she had done. For instance, digging her claws into Crowfeather's pelt while dragging him away from helping an injured cat/Leafpool. She wasn't the victim. She was snappy and snarling just like Crowfeather, and her coddling caused Breezepelt to become spoiled, and eventually get angry, so angry, when he doesn't get things his way.
You can see it like that: Nightcloud spoils Breezepelt too much, and she coddles him. Encourages him that no other cat is better than him, and he's the best. She feeds Breezepelt fake information and gossip about Crowfeather, except his half-Clan relationship, because that isn't that pleasant to Nightcloud, either. Then Breezepelt is frustrated because Crowfeather doesn't give the same coddling treatment as Nightcloud, and is more frustrated when he finds out his father was a traitor. He didn't get things his way, and he goes crazy.
Nightcloud should've gotten a better redemption than her being sassy and being smart, correcting Crowfeather all the time.
It's like she didn't do anything wrong, and she was this poor person who was all nice but was simply used by Crowfeather, when all she did was love Crowfeather.
No, she did not. She used him for kits, and she never loved him. They never did, and she confirms it in Crowfeather's Trial. She doesn't say "You never loved me". Instead, she says, "We never loved each other." or "We don't love each other. Maybe we never did."
I wish she'd get a better redemption, when even in AVoS, which is the recentest arc I have read, she's snappy.
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Post by Twilight Sparkle on Jan 24, 2021 8:25:39 GMT -5
The whole situation between Crowfeather, Nightcloud, and Breezepelt? I think they're all perpetrators and victims.
Crowfeather might be subject to sadness and prickliness due to losing two mates beforehand, scared of loving any cat, but he neglected his son and didn't take care of his family.
Nightcloud was protective of her unloved son, used by Crowfeather only to prove his loyalty to WindClan, but she coddled Breezepelt too much and seemed possessive of Crowfeather, despite not loving him and only using him for kits.
Breezepelt may have been hurt and resentful by his parents' actions, but the path he chose to attempt murder on Jayfeather and Poppyfrost was a horrible one, for he was trying to hurt innocents.
However, even if the redemption was done badly in CT, they've all made up and seemingly forgiven each other--or at least are on better terms. I wish we could see how they're getting along now.
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Post by 🔥Firestar🔥 on Jan 24, 2021 9:10:25 GMT -5
I think that the reason Nightcloud was suddenly said to be nice and caring is because her character became a victim of perspective. She's portrayed as being the "crazy ex" or to be some sort of competition beetwen Leafpool and her. The biased narrative told through ThunderClan's eyes told us she was cold, jealous, spiteful and hateful. But when we take a look at her inside WindClan's eyes, she's actually a loyal, motherly and honorable warrior, who works hard for her Clan, and takes no nonsense. Nightcloud was taken adventage of — She got used as a tool by Crowfeather to remain loyal to his Clan. Nightcloud genuiely belived that he loved her, so she returned the feelings and was rightfully angry when he didin't show much love to her son. She's also understanding and but tough.
Helicopter parenting isin't healthy — But Nightcloud saw her own son not being given enough love by his father, and this resulted in Nightcloud giving him all at once.
But i really wish she also owned up to anything she did, like clawing Crowfeather's back, or some questionable behaviour against her TC kin. She isin't 100% innocent or 100% guilty. I feel like she should also have had a redemption arc on CT, instead of everything, literally everything being Crowfeather's fault.
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Post by ᏞᎪᎠᎽ Ꮎf fᎪᏁᎠᎾms ミ☆ on Jan 24, 2021 14:42:39 GMT -5
like i said before. both nightcloud and crowfeather were in the wrong. nightcloud isn't some sad victim. crowfeather isn't some evil abuser either. both were in the wrong. they both used one another equally. crowfeather used her to improve his image and she used him to have a family. nightcloud was never the right cat for him. clearly, crowfeather likes kind and gentle she-cats who can help him like how both feathertail and leafpool were helping him become better and become happy...nightcloud wasn't gonna do that for him. and nightcloud fed breezepelt poisonous lies about crowfeather. nightcloud also boosted breezepelt's ego and coddled him, making him ignore consequences for everything in his life...since no one was around to help crowfeather cope or improve anymore, he wasn't emotionally strong enough to get close to his new family which further hurt breezepelt's development.
both were bad. the only victim is perhaps breezepelt since his upbringing led him to believe in things that got him to choose his path in OotS. it's still all breezepelt's choice of course, but his parents clearly didn't do him any favors in how his mindset was developed...
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Post by tallshadowstar on Jan 24, 2021 16:30:07 GMT -5
I think Nightcloud gets too much grief from both the authors and the fandom, and I'll go to bat for her. She's not a perfect character and has deep flaws, but these traits also make her interesting.
Nightcloud is actually a decent cat in PO3 (pre-Sunrise), which surprised me when I was re-reading the books. In The Sight, she actually scolds Breezepaw for his arrogance and praises Lionpaw for helping WindClan fend off a dog attack. Later in the book, when Lionpaw and Breezepaw are nearly buried alive, she makes a point to thank Jaypaw for saving her son, and stays with both in the ThunderClan medicine den so she can look after them. She actually does read like a caring, concerned mother, albeit a very overprotective one. She doesn't seem possessive of her husband, either - her jealousy and anger only comes up when Crowfeather and Leafpool are speaking to each other, and even then we only know that she's feeling this way since Jaypaw can sense it. If anything, Leafpool comes off as the more possessive one in this arc. I like her too, and I don't want to tear her down to build Nightcloud up, but she isn't exactly subtle in her interactions with Crowfeather:
""I would give my last drop of blood to save your kit," Leafpool meowed softly to Crowfeather. "You know that." Jaypaw flinched at the tension between them, pricking the air like rain. "Our kit was lucky that Jaypaw was here." Nightcloud's comment was edged with sharpness." (The Sight, p. 354)
Nightcloud's character does shift in OOTS, though. She becomes noticeably more hostile to ThunderClan (and outsiders in general), and her anger at Leafpool and her children becomes much more prominent. This is the arc that makes me understand why people hate her, and I agree that she's at her worst here.
Her most major scene in this arc is probably the one where she claws Crowfeather, and it gets taken out of context fairly frequently. Here's what happened preceding it: Breezepelt chases a rabbit onto ThunderClan territory, where Lionblaze kills it and claims that it's his. Breezepelt attacks Lionblaze, and Crowfeather and Nightcloud look on. Leafpool (who is a warrior at this point) arrives and asks how Crowfeather can watch his sons fight; Nightcloud spits back that he has only one son. Leafpool tries to break up the fight herself, and Breezepelt attacks her instead of Lionblaze. Crowfeather grabs Breezepelt and flings him off of Crowfeather, and he and Leafpool exchange some harsh words until Nightcloud claws him off of her.
This context is important: Crowfeather has just aided an enemy warrior over his own Clanmate, during a period where all four Clans are recovering from a drought and subsequent starvation. The enemy he aids is also his ex, and the cat he flung off is his son. I think Nightcloud has a right to be angry in this situation, though she definitely shouldn't have been so rough.
Nightcloud becomes far less relevant in AVOS and TBC so I won't bother bringing up her appearances there. I also haven't read Crowfeather's Trial in a long time, and I think I need to re-read it before I can comment. As for what I'd do differently for her redemption, I think that she doesn't have to stop being snarky or tough, since that's her personality. But I would've liked to see her reflection on her attitude towards Leafpool and her children, and come to the conclusion that she was too harsh on them. Maybe she could remember the time where Jaypaw saved Breezepaw, and when she looked after Lionpaw, and realize that she was wrong to hate them for the actions of their parents.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 24, 2021 21:22:52 GMT -5
As a character herself, I mean, she's the type to be reasonable if you're on their good side and an absolute monster if you end up on her bad side. Which, alone, isn't too problematic and there are loads of people in the world and probably people on this forum who have that personality and I mean, it's fine. It's a realistic character. And people like that can still be good people who make good contributions to society- as clearly Nightcloud did and does. And in the clan- and in society as a whole irl- what matters is that you are loyal to and benefit your community. And she's clearly a loyal warrior who has fought for and fed her clan her entire life.
But it can turn into a problem when that bleeds too much into parenthood, as when you constantly vent hatred towards certain people around your kids their whole life- they too can develop an attitude of hating those people and having that personality unless they learn otherwise. Does it make it guarenteed? Not necessarily. My grandma has that same exact personality as Nightcloud and it's taken years and years of biting her lip and trying not to be like that for my mom to avoid those tendencies after living with it growing up. So I'm definitely not of the opinion that Nightcloud's behavior was guaranteed to cause Breezepelt to be the exact same way. But he pretty much did, and he ultimately took things a step further by turning those hateful words into weapons and trying to physically hurt them. Is Nightcloud responsible for what he did in action? No, that was on him. But she helped plant the hate, which Breezepelt failed to discard. Not to say she didn't teach him respect- she's shown to try to teach Breezepelt to be respectful to practically anyone else other than the Leafpool crew, so him going haywire and about to attack his clan was far from what she taught him. She taught him better than that at least.
How she handled her relationship with Crowfeather is a bit mixed because there's partially contrasting accounts from different sources from her only getting with him for kits to them actually having a decent relationship at first, so honestly at this point I don't feel like judging her based on her relationship cause it's just too conflicting to me- besides it being clearly toxic at times. That isn't debatable. But since divorces are messy as they already are, I'd rather just take it out of analyzing her individually.
So idk at the end of the day, she's a flawed character with a more difficult personality who's loyal and dedicated to her clan yet did some mixed parenting, some of which that I personally don't approve of (though I'm also biased due to what I mentioned above with my own family), and while she may have planted the seeds of what Breezepelt would do in the end he was his own cat and in the end he did everything on his own terms. Regardless of his motivation.
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Asexual
#07B04C
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Ṣanɗypaw™
The Shiny User
🎵Guess that's just the way it goes, easy come, easy go🎵
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Post by Ṣanɗypaw™ on Jan 24, 2021 22:43:56 GMT -5
Reading these replies makes me think that if everyone else in this fandom stopped seeing the CrowNightBreeze situation as black and white, and tried to see it as more complex, with no cat being only the perpetrator or victim, a lot of ugly debates could be avoided and that situation could really be cleared up.
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Post by Lizard 🦎 on Jan 25, 2021 0:16:46 GMT -5
I like Nightcloud, but I will not defend her actions. She was in the wrong by how she behaved, and nothing changes that.
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