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Post by scarletflames on Jan 24, 2022 19:39:40 GMT -5
I hate Skyheart, because I just cannot get past how she behaved as a kit during Leopardstar's Honor, even though her personality wasn't as cruel as an adult (or when she was an apprentice, for that matter). I really hate how her character was handled in that book. It feels like she became a completely different character after this terrible scene early on, and her character change doesn't feel real to me. First scene: "Before she could finish, Skykit grabbed her scruff with her forepaws and pushed her head under. Water rushed up her nose and into her mouth. Panic pulsed beneath Leopardkit's pelt. She thrashed her paws in the water, trying to struggle free from Skykit's grip. But Skykit was two moons older and stronger, and suddenly she realized she was helpless. Flailing desperately, she fought the instinctive urge to breathe, as her pounding heart tried to claw its way out of her chest. Then Skykit let go. Leopardkit pushed up with her paws and burst dripping from the water. She shook her head and then her body, spraying water among the reeds. She coughed, regaining her breath, and then glared at Skykit. "What was that?" She could hardly believe Skykit could be so nasty. Skykit glared at her. "That's for telling Sedgekit where I was hiding!" pg. 14 (later in that scene, from pg 14-15)
"Skykit hadn't finished. "You only get special treatment because Brightsky died," she mewed. "If you hadn't killed your own mother, the rest of the Clan wouldn't even bother with you." "I didn't kill my mother," she hissed back, feeling her claws stretching out. "That's not what I heard around camp." Skykit's green eyes twinkled with a malicious glee. "I heard your mother was sick when you were born. What could have made her sick? Probably a rotten kit, that's what!" (and that scene ends with Skykit saying, on page 15) "You're going to end up in the Dark Forest," Skykit snarled, "with all the other murderers." Aside from Mudfur realizing Leopardkit was being bullied about Brightsky and comforting her, there was no consequences for Skyheart after that scene. Leopardpaw wound up with trauma around water, to the point to where she was a drypaw for most of her apprenticehood because of Skyheart's malice towards her as a kit. So this scene much later in LH made me want to scream: "Skyheart dived after her while Loudbelly slid into the shallows and swam close to the bank. "It's hard to believe you used to be a drypaw," she teased as she surfaced beside Leopardfur. "I was barely a kit!" Leopardfur splashed her with her paw, and Skyheart darted away through the frothing water, her eyes shining." pg. 321 And Leopardstar seemingly forgiving Skyheart really bothered me, since Skyheart not only didn't show empathy or remorse, but seemingly didn't even remember that incident when they were kits. I know this was probably realistic writing, in the sense that it basically lines up with the phrase, "The tree remembers, but the axe forgets," but Skyheart being that over-the-top cruel as a kit, only to seemingly become a completely different character afterwards, really annoys me. I don't recall if any other kit in Warriors was as cruel as Skykit. I know Shrewkit was a bully, but I don't recall him drowning Tallkit. I wish Skyheart didn't have the suffix "heart." as a warrior, because after that scene, she didn't seem to have a heart, at least, not enough of one to deserve that suffix. If the Erins had to make a character do Skyheart's actions, I wish it could've been Blackclaw, since I already dislike him, and him being a bully as a kit wouldn't surprise me. But what do you guys think of Skyheart? Did that scene in LH change how you thought of her? I didn't even remember her from any other book, even though I'm sure she was in TPB, and probably Tallstar, Bluestar or Crookedstar's SEs.
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Post by Hollyfall on Jan 24, 2022 20:16:12 GMT -5
She grew on me as she got older, honestly. She clearly grew out of whatever sociopathic tendencies she had and got on good terms with Leopardstar to the point where Leopardstar considered her a friend. She also showed some pretty strong moral fiber by arguing with Leopardstar over stolen prey, and even trying to defy Tigerstar.
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Post by ✲ριкαƒυєу✲ on Jan 24, 2022 21:30:34 GMT -5
It bothered me too when they just glossed over that. It was really disgusting and sociopathic on Skyheart's end, and I wish it wasn't just forgotten about
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Cloudstorm
Don’t let it kill you. Even when it hurts like hell.
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Post by Cloudstorm on Jan 24, 2022 21:51:12 GMT -5
She grew on me as she got older, honestly. She clearly grew out of whatever sociopathic tendencies she had and got on good terms with Leopardstar to the point where Leopardstar considered her a friend. She also showed some pretty strong moral fiber by arguing with Leopardstar over stolen prey, and even trying to defy Tigerstar. All this^ . And while I would of appreciated if they hadn’t glossed over it afterwards, and shown us a scene of her taking accountability, apologizing and being remorseful and all that jazz, this is Warrior cats and those types of details usually fall to the wayside, and one just kinda has to get used to it I suppose.
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Post by cable on Jan 24, 2022 22:17:55 GMT -5
so when im uncomfortable or nervous, i tend to laugh. it didnt help that skykit, like…. waterboarding her (???!??!?) came out of nowhere. so reading that was just me sending images of the text to my friends in shock and a lot of awkward laughing, because the scene just felt so unreal on top of everything else. i feel like a description of this scene out of context would be one of those things that would get passed around in the early days of fandom. “in one book, a child waterboards another child for tattling on her during hide and seek”.
yeah….. weird as hell moment. i agree that her change kinda came out of nowhere. i dont like her at all.
obligatory side note for “empathy =/= compassion” and people with high empathy can be total bastards and vice versa
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Post by cable on Jan 24, 2022 22:39:54 GMT -5
so i went looking for my live reactions in a discord server and found this
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Post by Saint Ambrosef on Jan 24, 2022 23:25:00 GMT -5
sometimes little kids actually are this cruel, though, and because they're so developmentally immature they don't actually understand the seriousness of their actions. they'll forget a lot of the horrible things they did as a kid because they literally couldn't comprehend the wrongness of it at the time. little kids aren't sociopathic, they're just lacking the empathetic development that comes with neurological growth and experience.
for example: i've got a 5 yro nephew who struggles to regulate his emotions. there was a time one of his three brothers like, took his toy (not nice but yknow) and he just exploded. full on punching and pummeling and screaming in anger. just the urge to inflict pain. he forgot about it a week later, although his brother didnt. he's much better at handling emotions a year later.
it's actually pretty realistic for Skyheart to seemingly have forgotten what she did to Leopardfur as kits. and it's also realistic that she grew up and abandoned that impulsive cruelty as she matured and emotionally developed. she's a "completely different character" because people are not the same at 20 or even 10 as they were at 4-5. imo, it's a bit silly to judge an adult character as heartless because they lashed out once as an immature child lacking adult empathy skills.
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Post by crowspirit on Jan 25, 2022 0:43:05 GMT -5
I don't like her, because she acted so cruel and borderline sociopathic as a kit. That I could live with, since children can be really horrible, but she just never apologized to Leopardstar and they just got along as adults. I don't think Leopardstar even mentioned it when they interacted again. This was a missed opportunity for a really interesting dynamic, where Leopardstar learns to trust Skyheart, after what she'd done to her and they slowly become friends. But it just never happened, and that's why I dislike her.
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Post by Skypaw13 on Jan 25, 2022 1:39:15 GMT -5
What, y'all have never had a friend forcefully shove your head underwater at a pool party? I have. Sucked in the moment, but I got over it, just like Leopardstar did.
The bullying's a little much, but what SE kithood bully isn't over the top? Erins really gotta drive in that "SE main character's kithood sucked!" line
I don't particularly like Skyheart by the way. I just agree with Saint that judging an adult based on what they did when they were five is probably a bit silly.
(Also not saying the behavior's okay just because it happened to me. I would rather the incident have not happened. I'm just saying it's realistic for everyone involved to seemingly forget about it-- both antagonist and victim)
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Post by cable on Jan 25, 2022 2:01:14 GMT -5
What, y'all have never had a friend forcefully shove your head underwater at a pool party? I have. Sucked in the moment, but I got over it, just like Leopardstar did. The bullying's a little much, but what SE kithood bully isn't over the top? Erins really gotta drive in that "SE main character's kithood sucked!" line I don't particularly like Skyheart by the way. I just agree with Saint that judging an adult based on what they did when they were five is probably a bit silly. (Also not saying the behavior's okay just because it happened to me. I would rather the incident have not happened. I'm just saying it's realistic for everyone involved to seemingly forget about it-- both antagonist and victim) i think the sticking point is that we’re reading a book and skyheart has only like 600 pages to warm herself back up to the audience, who will definitely remember her bad first impression, as opposed to children who are going to forget over time. and the writing doesnt do much to endear her, instead trying to slot her back into a normal friend dynamic, which yes is more realistic, but the audience remembers all the horrible things she said to leopardkit and theyre probably going to resent that or be too put off to just accept her hanging around. i agree calling her a literal sociopath is way too much though.
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Post by 𝐛𝐥𝟒𝐜𝐤𝐬𝐨𝐥 on Jan 25, 2022 4:16:55 GMT -5
Probably one of the worst bullies in a SE. Shrewclaw was bad and pretty harmful towards Tallstar, especially in that one specific scene after Heatherstar banned tunneling from WindClan, but Skyheart's actions were just really horrifying to read about. Leopardkit did absolutely nothing to her except telling another kit where Skykit was hidden, and her response to it was just absolutely inappropriate.
It bothered me that Leopardstar forgave her so easily. I can't help but hate her, because her actions were just too far.
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Post by Twilight Sparkle on Jan 25, 2022 5:51:49 GMT -5
Neutral. While I hate any form of bullying, no matter how young, I can say that Skyheart has grown out of it and seems to be a decent cat now. If it weren't for that incident, I'd say dislike, but seeing as she is later on in her life, I'm only neutral on her.
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Post by Saint Ambrosef on Jan 25, 2022 12:26:14 GMT -5
and the writing doesnt do much to endear her, instead trying to slot her back into a normal friend dynamic, which yes is more realistic, but the audience remembers all the horrible things she said to leopardkit and theyre probably going to resent that or be too put off to just accept her hanging around. this is probably just a personal opinion, so feel free to disagree, but i'm not sure i agree that the writing doesn't do much to endear her. As an apprentice, Skypaw was self-assured and liked to tease, but also noticeably kinder than when she was an immature little kit. There's the scene when Mudfur comes back injured from his Sunningrocks battle and Leopardpaw worries, and again later when she's shocked about him becoming a Medicine Cat, Skypaw offers encouragement, support, and sympathy. To me, that showed she'd emotionally developed since she was a kit, and it made it believable that they developed a friendship.
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Aroace
#ffa100
Name Colour
𝕱𝖑𝖚𝖙𝖙𝖊𝖗𝖋𝖆𝖑𝖑
Villain Enjoyer
Taking a break from the forums because my cat died. Will probably be back mid to late October.
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Post by 𝕱𝖑𝖚𝖙𝖙𝖊𝖗𝖋𝖆𝖑𝖑 on Jan 25, 2022 13:22:10 GMT -5
I hate any form of bullying and also had a bad experience with a bully and a toilet while in school (if you know what that means). Children can truly be nasty to each other just like adults.
But that being said, Skyheart was a literal kit when she basically waterboarded an equally young Leopardstar and was shown to have already grown out of such heinous behaviour as an apprentice. I'm glad she did although a proper apology to her would have still been great. Oh well, a Neutral it is from me in regards to this character.
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Post by Chicken on Jan 25, 2022 14:59:25 GMT -5
I understand about people acting certain ways as kids and not being able to control their emotions and what not. However, from a story stance, I found it a bit annoying, like I thought for once we'd have a she-cat who was a bad cat just because she's an ass, but they had to go and make her be like one of the most morally correct ones when she's an adult, which is cool for her, but Idk I want to see more antagonistic she-cats, and I thought we would get that with her, but they did a complete 180 with her character, which I know is something that can happen IRL, but my own personal bias makes it where I don't like Skyheart or her arc much. I didn't read Leopardstar's Honor btw, but I did read the spoilers, so I could be missing some context, so if I am, then sorry about that.
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Asexual
#07B04C
star_black.png
Name Colour
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 25, 2022 17:15:08 GMT -5
Dislike. I'm glad that Skyheart changed but I still wish she'd at least have apologized to Leopardstar than suddenly changing.
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Post by *Ottersplash* on Jan 26, 2022 0:56:41 GMT -5
I'm kind of neutral? She was like..4 or 5 when she did the really atrocious thing and then grew out of it? By the time she was a teen and adult, it seems like she was supportive and normal.
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