Everdeen, everlasting

Why the odds will ever be in ‘The Hunger Games’ favour

My first and only vacation abroad with my parents was special, and I was determined to round off the memorable trip by getting matching souvenirs for my friends back home. Little Me knew it had to be something related to the books the five of us had read, given that this was a time when Young Adult (YA) fiction was all anyone talked about.

Only problem was, I wasn’t big on Harry Potter like the rest of them. That’s how I ended up purchasing four Deathly Hallows necklaces and a single Mockingjay one. Because, hey, we’ve all got to live up to the main-character dream at some point in our lives (no offence to the school buddies reading this; the gifts were still just as heartfelt). The Mockingjay pendant proved to be a worthwhile investment because next year, over a decade later, it accompanies me to the theatre for The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping.

Expectations for the Haymitch Abernathy prequel have risen to an all-time high, and one can credit the cast announcements for that. It’s not everyday that you see the cast for a film adaptation meet the fans’ standards. But between book-accurate features and striking resemblances, Sunrise on the Reaping continues to impress. It’s as if we can watch the film unfold while it’s still in production. I mean, Kieran Culkin taking over Stanley Tucci’s legacy? Name a better pick.

Of course, there are always exceptions, but this isn’t the first time The Hunger Games franchise has hit the mark with its cast. The previous batch belonged to the President Snow prequel, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, which stunned audiences by bringing Tom Blyth onboard as Donald Sutherland’s young counterpart among other top-tier casting choices.

And while the crews for each feature deserve every bit of the praise they rack up, it’s hard to imagine a world where The Hunger Games films would be able generate this much fanfare without the enduring glory of the books.

Dystopian yardstick

The original Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins became a worldwide sensation during the 2010s, leading the way for YA dystopian novels that tailed the genre’s success.

The most prominent example that comes to mind is Divergent and its subsequent novels, which set up a world divided into five factions – like the 12 districts from The Hunger Games. In similar fashion as the latter, Divergent, too, has a young female protagonist, Tris, who finds herself in the centre of a budding revolution.

The amount of similarities might have you squinting to find the differences between the universes, and that’s true not just for Divergent but for the many novel series published after The Hunger Games.

This is not an attempt to incite plagiarism debates, but to understand Collins’ cultural impact and the formula it inspired. A teenage huntress entangled in an uprising much larger than her unsophisticated existence (and possibly, simultaneously a love triangle) because she is the chosen one destined to lead the people. How many stories come to mind?

Except, the thing about Katniss Everdeen is that she’s neither the ideal pick for the ‘chosen one’ archetype, nor is she qualified to lead anyone. Katniss is not a warrior but an underprivileged girl who is forced to match pace with her circumstances. She earns no medals because nobody wins in a war. Because even if you make it out of the arena alive, the Games never truly leave you.

What Katniss represents

Katniss is not, as the kids say, a girlboss. That’s what drew Little Me and like-minded readers to her more than traditional heroes. She never sets out to be one. She doesn’t aspire for greatness. She just wants to be left alone, safe and sound. But grief propels her actions, leading her to spark a blood-soaked revolution. She is a symbol by condition, not by choice.

In a meta extension, the Girl on Fire also unintentionally shaped what readers now seek in female protagonists, just as in the books she’s reluctantly coaxed into becoming the Mockingjay despite being just a kid reacting to life-or-death stakes.

Even after all these years, as critics pick apart other franchises for relying on ambience over coherent plots, Katniss’s flame still burns.