#I'm going to live my life as a feral cat with absolutely no concerns about life and its pain

[morgynemberisagenderfluiddaddy]

Anxiety and depression are killing me and I've decided to JUST NOT GIVE A SHIT ANYMORE

I'm going completely 🎉🎊🌈feral🌈🎊🎉

[oswald-privileges]

ALL RIGHT BUT YOU ASKED FOR IT

Power of Three as a series is just. full of weaknesses, most of which come down to poor continuity and structure. I'm not gonna try and fix ALL of those, bc that'd be laborious as hell, but I will pick out things that I feel are the most egregious as case studies.

What Po3 does have, tho, is an absolutely shining strength in the concept of its three main characters. After twelve books of Blandly Heroic Protagonist Syndrome, Jayfeather is an absolute godsend. He's angry! He's rude! He's unhappy! He's not nice. I Love Him And He's My Son. Lionblaze has his invincible pride (hah) and emergent bloodlust, and Hollyleaf has her moral absolutism and certainty. These are good starting points for characters. Sadly, the lack of continuity undermines what could have been three really good character arcs.

So! I present to you:

HOW TO MAKE "WARRIORS: THE POWER OF THREE" NOT COMPLETELY SUCK ACCORDING TO MY PERSONAL TASTE; A NON-EXHAUSTIVE, NON-CONSECUTIVE LIST BY ME

ONE

- Have there be a persistant, overarching series threat. Sol is a character with amazing villain potential who does literally nothing except hang around, and do exactly 2 Bad Things completely off-screen. This Is Not Good.

- Instead, have him be present from the second book onwards- initially introduced as a friendly but enigmatic outsider who is slowly revealed across the series to be a complete black hole of a personality, a social parasite quietly rearranging whatever community he's a part of to just-so-happen to benefit him as much as humanly possible. His "preach individualism not starclan" methods are not so much values as one strategy out of many. (to those who know me- yes i have a type. no i will not apologise.)

- Maybe his ultimate goal is to dissolve and centralise the clans or something so that he can live out his life as a political puppetmaster in all the cat-luxury he likes. idk it's hard to imagine overall stakes for this rewrite BECAUSE THE ORIGINAL DOESN'T HAVE ANY

TWO

- For gods sake you don't have a series based on the premise of "the main characters develop super powers" and then only have the second power confirmed by the end of the fourth book. I understand the first book mostly focusing on Jayfeather- his powers are obvious from the start, he's got the strongest personality of the three, he gets access to most of the prophecy plot stuff because of them. But you NEED to have the other two show an interest in something concrete happening to them beyond that, and you need to at least hint towards the other two having something unique to them even if nobody clocks it yet.

- Have Jayfeather tell his siblings about the prophecy by the end of book two at the latest. The amount of time he spends noodling around not sharing it with them is inexcusable. It's not that it's out of character for him to hang onto a secret for a bit, it's just that there's no point and it slows everything down. It would be equally in character for him to go to his siblings and be like "look, i'm SPECIAL. well you as well but ALSO ME". Boy starts off as desperate for recognition, what can I say

THREE

- Have Jayfeather discover that StarClan don't withhold signs or information on purpose for the sake of "building courage and faith" or whatever nonsense. Seeing and communicating the future is metaphysically very difficult, so interpreting signs and messages is a genuine skill, or even an art. The cats of StarClan, however, really are just ghosts, much more similar to living cats than the currently living believe. This is the impotus for Jayfeather's discarding of his reverence for StarClan, which remains consistent throughout the series.

- Have Hollyleaf and Jayfeather both still change their cat careers in the first book, but put place more attention on the fact that they basically switched jobs. Have a scene where they end up yelling at each other, because can't the other see how lucky they have it? The tension breaks when they realise they've both lost something important to them- Jayfeather his chance to prove he's as capable as a sighted cat, and Hollyleaf her path to helping her clan in the way she thinks is best. They commiserate together, and reluctantly promise to do the best they can with their lots, so they don't waste the path the other wishes they'd taken. This closeness is eroded over the series as they disagree more and more on the subject of StarClan and its role in their moral choices and obligations.

FOUR

- Speaking of Hollyleaf! I nearly threw my phone across the room when the first Omen of the Stars book claimed that Hollyleaf "worked so hard to discover her power to help her clan". Where, Ms Erins??? I would have LOVED to have seen that!! Hollyleaf expresses absolutely no concern over the details of what power she has/will develop, and only has a couple of scenes even touching on her ambitions to help her clan. She has some vague ideas about becoming leader and like one scene where she gets to do some leadery things, but that never gets followed up on. What does happen is that the whole "warrior code" thing becomes more and more a part of her personality (for no clear reason) until she snaps.

- Hollyleaf going off the deep end is something I wanted so badly to get into and be moved by, because I could see where it comes from! Her moral certainty is fascinating, especially since it's based in something as abstract as the warrior code- which, when you think about it, isn't really... anything. There's no concrete set of rules that make it up, no traditional wording or cat philosophers, not even any fables. It's a handful of agreed-upon, common sense rules- don't cross boundaries, don't take prey that isn't yours, respect your ancestors, and don't murder. That's it!

- So, combining the above points, I think Hollyleaf not being one of the Three should stay, but both the audience and the characters are given good reason to believe she is. By around the third volume, make it so that Hollyleaf has found that her power is to get cats to "Do The Right Thing"- i.e. what she wants them to do. She sneaks off often to see Sol, who teachs her how to use this power. Her siblings are concerned about this new power, having already gotten a glimpse at what Sol can do, but she's confident that she can only use this power for good. Volume-specific plot happens, Sol manipulates her into causing him to win, she is shocked and horrified, and vows to stick ridgedly to what she knows is right i.e. The Warrior Code

- However, the more fervently she tries to stick to this abstract idea, the less it gives her results, the more her power seems to be failing. Believing that StarClan is taking her power away from her, she becomes caught up in a faith-guilt spiral that puts her in the position to snap at the end of the series. By that point it's clear to her siblings that Hollyleaf has no power- she was just very, very good at persuading people to do what she wanted.

FIVE

- Lionblaze is a girl now because I Said So. This Cat Is Trans And There's Nothing You Can Do About It.

- Her relationship with Heathertail stays the same- childhood sweethearts who are torn apart as they begin to understand the nature of the societal divides that exist between them.

- This can be used to contextualise the whole "half clan/outsider blood" thing as a cultural contradiction. In reality, inter- and outer- clan relationships aren't at all rare. They can't be, otherwise the whole society would be inbred out of existence in like five generations. But if at least one society of humans can spend a good 200 years pretending Sex Is Bad And Sinful Actually then cats can have persistant cat-racism in the face of all logic. Heathertail clocks this contradiction, Lionblaze doesn't.

- Her relationship-to-power arc doesn't need changing all that much either, other than starting much sooner and being more consistent. At first, she's completely overjoyed by her power, since unlike her siblings, it lines up so well with her ambition- become the finest warrior any of the clans have to offer. As the berserker rage aspect becomes more prevelent, she becomes more and more disturbed by the fact that she isn't disturbed by what she can do, and that she doesn't want the escalation of her power to stop.

- Tigerstar still does his thing, but Brambleclaw knows about it. He recognises the signs from when his father used to visit him, and tries to train Lionblaze in his own way. She ends up caught between wanting to be a good warrior, and testing the limits of her power.

SIX

- Jayfeather can stay basically the same because he's my perfect little angy boy and nothing needs to change. His arcs can be strengthened by having a more robust relationship with Yellowfang where they try to out-bitch each other, and coming to terms with his internalised ablism. Maybe he has a chat with Mothwing about faith a couple of times. Him furiously lashing out at being offered help transitions into an acceptence and understanding of his abilities more naturally. He never stops being A Grumpy Old Man.

- All fucking past-lives unexplained time travel goes in the BIN. Doesn't fucking happen. You can have that lore dump sprinkled across the books, or come from going deep into the tunnels and having a surreal meeting. Make it properly eldritch-level scary, shake Jayfeather's confidence in the idea of them being just a bunch of ghosts.

SEVEN

- Have the way Brambleclaw and Squirrelflight present very clearly as parents to the Three be explicitly, textually unusual. One of the things I liked so much about the first series was an almost total lack of emphasis on who was mated with who, and who was related or not. It felt very real to how feral cat colonies form, where raising kittens is a communal job. This gets completely dropped the moment series 2 starts and now the cats have monogamy.

- This emphasis on the family unit and fostering close relationships between parents and kittens is deliberate on the part of both Leafpool and Squirrelflight. Their aim is to cover for Leafpool so she doesn't lose her role as medicine cat- something she already gave up Crowfeather for before she was pregnant.

- In that little bit of backstory, have a robust reason for both Leafpool and Squirrelflight to leave the camp while Leafpool is pregnant and giving birth, possibly one that ties into the present day story in some minor way. I don't know how, it would just make that element of the story a lot more ground than "we left, the kits were born, then we came back and everyone was cool with it"

- When it comes to the "I am Not your mother" reveal, Jayfeather and Lionblaze are confused and hurt that they were lied to, but come to the reasonable conclusion that well, since they were raised mostly by Squirrelflight, saw Leafpool often, and are loved by both, they don't hate her. Lionblaze has something of a crisis over being half-clan, possibly initiating an attempted reunion with Heathertail. Jayfeather is more concerned with how other cats will think it makes him lesser, something he's still sensitive too.

- Hollyleaf, meanwhile, completely fucking snaps at the way her mother Violated Part Of The Code. It's a completely irrational reaction, but expected because she's been growing more and more reliant on The Code for the whole series, and less and less stable in her attempts to aid her clan and train to be its new leader.

- Squirrelflight is the one to murder Ashfur. This is easy to work out while reading- she's literally the only one of the four with a motive who isn't a perspective character. The mystery is less around finding out who did it, and more about why she did it (it's very ambiguous as to whether it was an accident or not). The main tension comes from who finds out when.

- Lionblaze is shocked, awed by how far she'd go to protect the three of them, and reassures her she did the right thing (as a way to salve her own uncertainty over her own longing for violence). Jayfeather makes it all about himself because he's Jayfeather- upset that he didn't know immediately, instead of, you know, figuring it out in a few hours because he can basically read minds. They try their best to hide it from Hollyleaf, who is already rattling around the final volume as a full-on antagonist, but are unsuccessful. This almost costs them something incredibly important- possibly Squirrelflight's life.

EIGHT

- the whole plot with the Tribe Of Rushing Water is a MASSIVE can of worms that could be removed from the series without issue. As it is:

- Characterize the Tribe as uncertain of how to fight other cats, because yes, they haven't had to do this before. DON'T characterise them as pathetic, doing whatever their leader says without thinking, and with ancestors who have Given Up

- Have some of the Tribe be really good at the violence. Worryingly good. Have others be sickened by what they're being asked to do.

- Have some of the clan cats reflect on what they've done. Hollyleaf would be all for introducing this society to jesus The Code, but even she might be horrified at being thanked by a tribe cat who can't wait to get out there and win themselves glory, only to be killed a few hours later

- The Tribe begin a new tradition of marking the walls in the mud they use as camoflage in order to commemorate their battles, and memorialise the fallen. One of the characters reflects on the fact that in a generation or two, the Tribe will feel like it's always been this way. How many of their own traditions- those that feel almost like natural law- started out the same way?

- Have Sol as the leader of the invaders, or maybe having insinuated himself into the tribe as a "mediator" and doing his charismatic cult leader thing.

NINE

- Cinderheart isn't a reincarnation of Cinderpelt. She's just named after her bc Cinderpelt saved her mother from a badger. this is because I think the reincanation thing is stupid and I can't think of a way to make it good.

TEN

- No more using tails as hand gestures like covering people's mouths. Never. None of it. It's expunged from existence.

Disclaimer: I haven't read Omen of the Stars yet, so I can't account for anything that might happen in that series that's grounded in Po3. I'm like... two thirds of the way through the first volume. I'm Not Impressed.

[wuxian-vs-wangji]

I was just wondering how you chose the couples for your edit! I'm curious about the reasoning behind where you put Guangyao/Xichen especially! And Xue Yang and Xingchen! And Jiang Cheng and Wen Qing! And all of them hahahahaha

lol, ok, I’ll go line by line!

But for mercy sake, I will put it below a “keep reading”, if you are on mobile it’s a 50/50 chance you don’t get the option and just have to scroll.

—There are those who seek me a lifetime but never we meet,

Jiang Cheng & Wen Qing

I decided to put them here because I thought the line about always seeking love fits JC really well. Wen Qing was his Almost, and he lives as a sort of widow after her death. He has kind of given up on his entire life in pursuit of hatred and wrath.  

This line feels very tragic, and it works for them. I won’t get into the context of the riddle within the story because it’d make my answer too long, but there is an element of the context and the fact that this is the opening line of the riddle kind of feeling like a dark parallel.

—and those I kiss but who  trample me beneath ungrateful feet.

Lan Xichen and Jin Guangyao

How different would things have gone if Meng Yao- at any point, even after helping Xue Yang escape The Unclean Realm- just… stopped. Stopped with the power grabbing and swallowed his ambition? Xichen loved him- that finger stroke in Cloud Recess was enough to prove that to me. And I do think that, unlike Xue Yang, Meng Yao was capable of love once upon a time.

I knew, looking at the rest of the riddle and what I planned for each thing, I needed a full ship in this blank, but really it’s wholly directed at Meng Yao. His are the ‘ungrateful feet’. He was given a gift and chose a dark fate instead.

— At times I seem to favor the clever and the fair,

Mian-Mian and her family

If at any point I didn’t use the ship I used in any of these lines, the only other ones I could think of would be Meng Yao and Qin Su, Guangshan and his wife, or Wen Chao and his ho. None of those are anyone I particularly want to hold up in a positive light.

Mian-Mian was fair to Wuxian at every step, and she was fairly clever in how she managed Zixuan and kept his ego in check for him (without ever getting territorial over him, she was a bro to Yanli and I love her for it). Mian-Mian was a good bean, and didn’t really fit anywhere else.

— but I bless all those who are brave enough to dare.

Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli

This is one of only 2 that I went into this knowing exactly what line they belonged to. Zixuan was always kind of afraid of Yanli. She was consistent in her dealings with him, but for him to actually man-up and realize he loved her took some bravery.

Plus he did it when Wuxian was- as far as the other Cultivators are concerned- in Feral Kitten Mode. So to court/marry/father a child on Wuxian’s sister took a hell of a lot of daring.

— By large my ministrations are soft-handed and sweet,

Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji

OK, so originally I was going to do this whole thing as a WangXian edit, then I realized the above line had to be Yanli and Zixuan and the below had to be Xue Yang and Xingchen, THEN I realized I’d have to add other couples so there is not a random Yanli and Zixuan/Xue Yang and Xingchen in the middle of a WangXian edit, and bit by bit they were whittled down to just one section.

In the original plan this would be Wuxian playing his non-Chenqing flute on the back of the donkey while Wangji led it, but I wanted a more powerful and peaceful scene. To me that is them watching the snowfall, which I also took as a sign of time passing.

IDK if there is anywhere in canon that really gets into it, but mentally I figured the “Present” arc covers about a year, including a winter spent in Cloud Recess. Just a soft and sweet break from the world on fire.

— but scorned, I become a difficult beast to defeat.

Xue Yang and Xingchen

This was the other one I knew had to be exactly where it ended up, which changed directions on the others.

Xue Yang and Xingchen are absolutely fascinating to me. Just– I could probably write an essay but I am containing it. What they had was in no way love from Xingchen’s perspective. Not just because he didn’t know it was Xue Yang- even if their history were erased, Xingchen always treated him as a friend.

Xue Yang the Rabid Cat though~~~ sociopaths cannot feel love, but they can get this sort of entitled possessiveness over something that looks like a sick, toxic, twisted kind of “love”. That “beast” just fits the line too well. Also the context of who is giving the riddle in the source text. Think Xue Yang but an all-powerful immortal queen who has enslaved a continent out of SPITE.

— For though each of my strokes lands a powerful blow

Jiang Fengmian and Madam Yu

My initial thought for this one was Guangyao and Xichen but I loathe GIFsets that are too literal (except my “I love you, I said and then I stabbed him” one with these two, I made the GIF for that one because it takes the quote less seriously and I giggled).

Honestly these are the winners of “I really don’t want Guangyao/Qin Su, Guangshan/Whats-her-face, or Wen Chao/Ho”. I had no one else coming to mind couple-wise and of the few passages I hadn’t chosen people for yet, this one… was left.

Originally in the idea of doing the entire riddle as WangXian, this was going to be the Umbrella Scene. Specifically Wangji stepping aside and Wuxian racing past.

— When I kill, I do it slow.

The Yunmeng Trio

The context of the original riddle really was focused on romantic love as something this villain was fixated on. The original plan (and indeed it is still in my notes so it literally changed halfway through me making that GIF) was to do Wuxian and Wangji here. A cross-cut of them young and happy and the cliff scene.

I really didn’t want 2 WangXian if the rest were mixed though. There were no more romantic couplings, so I tried to think of the same idea of a cross-cut between early days and late times. I was giving up and had a fade half-made that was Wuxian laughing (taking off the mask he tried to scare Wangji with when they were young) and Wuxian’s cry-laugh on the roof of the Nightless City. I accidentally clicked too far over in the episode timeline and saw him screaming because of Yanli and was like “Hum….”

There was a decent enough wide shot of the Yunmeng trio, in Episode 2 there is the fun jostling shot, and I figured if you had to summarize what led from Caiyi Town to the Nightless City in terms of their dynamics, no matter what way you look the answer is “love” (which was my mentality for the two Wuxian’s faded together- what love turned him into).

 Yanli’s love of her family, Wuxian losing everything in his life he loved, and Jiang Cheng raw and raging because of the loss of the woman he loved and the impending loss of the sister he loves.

And then I got some DM’s after the riddle was posted asking about the answer, so I chose to make the WangXian GIF and attach it as the answer :)