The Hunger Games Trilogy Was A Missed Political Warning
My younger sister is about the same age I was when the first Hunger Games movie blew the minds of middle schoolers around the world. So, without much else to do under lockdown in the suburbs, I suggested that we watch all four movies.
To me, and probably half of the world’s Gen Z and Millenial cohort, the Hunger Games trilogy was integral to my formative years. I was obsessed. I was always a fast and ambitious reader growing up (a.k.a., a nerd), but I read each installation of Suzanne Collins’ iconic series at least three times in my middle school years.
As big of a splash as the books made, the movies were a whole other beast. I remember it clear as day. The YouTube video tutorials teaching us how to braid our hair like Katniss and Primrose Everdeen; girls arguing over who they thought was cuter, Gale or Peeta. This was the golden age of dystopian young adult fiction — which, by the way, is a genre that deserves some academic attention (why were YA writers so into this concept in the early 2010s?) — but, the Hunger Games was always my favorite.
I haven’t seen a series of book-to-film adaptations succeed so explosively since the last film in the series came out over five years ago. And I don’t just mean in the box office. To me, that was the least important part. It was its cultural impact that always stayed with me. A few months ago I happened to be in a small club in a small European country and at around two in the morning, the DJ inexplicably thought it was the appropriate time to queue ‘The Hanging Tree’, a moving a capella song that became the rallying cry for Panem’s revolution against an oppressive regime, inspiring thousands to sacrifice their lives for the greater good. But, the EDM version!
This is all besides the point — but, at the same time, it is the point. The Hunger Games was so culturally impactful in every way besides the most important. Although I had seen each installation of the film series multiple times, they felt different this time around. It isn’t that the politics of the Hunger Games universe is subtle –– well, because it just isn’t. It’s impossible to describe the plot without discussing authoritarian regimes and political revolutions.
But, rewatching the films now as a young adult who — like many others my age — is becoming more disillusioned with the entirety of the American political system with each passing news headline, led me to inevitably draw some comparisons. Before anyone argues that drawing comparisons between the American political system and the Hunger Games is ridiculous, yes, I know that we do not have a reality television show where children kill each other for entertainment. I also know that the American government’s power does not flow from one individual, that it does not have two opposing political parties willing to abandon morality for power, and that its police force doesn’t kill dissenters — well. Wait a second.
The last thirty minutes of Mockingjay Pt. 2 called into question all sorts of philosophical tenets and how they manifest in our lived reality. Especially resonant was Katniss’ realization that the leader of the revolution, President Coin, is as equally morally reprehensible as the fallen dictator, President Snow. She realizes that although Coin’s initial intentions may have been pure, her desire for power and revenge corrupted her, replacing one oppressive regime with another.
This is a relatively clear reflection of the cyclical nature of politics in many countries, even when just looking at the 20th century. The first nation that comes to mind is Russia, which replaced its oppressive monarchical system through revolution only to install a new, yet similarly corrupt and oppressive regime in the form of the Soviet Union. But if you loosen the constraints of the analogy, it applies to American politics today.
A presidential election is coming up and boy, is it a depressing one. The political disillusionment of my peers is summed up in the ‘Settle for Biden’ campaign, which is essentially more in support of voting Donald Trump out of office rather than voting the candidate himself in. This outlook does not indicate any enthusiasm for either party; it is a choice between the lesser of two evils. Like Katniss, many young leftists are caught between two political forces with starkly different narratives, but a chillingly similar flexible moral compass in the pursuit and maintenance of political power.
I do not exaggerate when I say that it’s been days since we finished our marathon and I’m still thinking about how the Hunger Games challenge my values and politics. If Fight Club could inspire teens across the world to start beating each other for sport in the early 2000s, why didn’t the Hunger Games inspire more young people politically? Was it too mainstream? Was it somehow too nuanced? Maybe it was just before its time.
Sure, the commentary on political revolution and ideology in the Hunger Games is not groundbreaking in the literary world. And maybe some of the political messaging is lost on young teens who are more focused on the Peeta-Katniss-Gale love triangle (which I understand — it’s riveting). But, what was different about it was that it was a story of political revolution marketed toward teens and young children. The cliche that ‘children are our future’ sounds like a cheesy line that a politician would pull out at a campaign rally — but, it’s the truth.
I rewatched the Hunger Games movies with my thirteen-year-old sister. Afterward, we spent half an hour talking about political ideologies. I used the characters in the Hunger Games to draw comparisons and give examples, explaining extremism in the best way that I could to a child. This is the power of the Hunger Games trilogy that was lost in all the box office BS and celebrity hype.
In 2020, rewatching the Hunger Games was different than any other time I’d watched it because it felt like a warning. I know we’re nowhere near the ‘watching children kill each other for entertainment’ stage of autocracy, but the exhaustive laundry list of things our current president has been able to get away with is an indicator of change in that direction. I hope that I make it clear that rewatching the Hunger Games in 2020 did not make me suddenly aware of political corruption and class inequality in America. These things are an abundantly clear reality in America today. But, for the first time, I saw these movies as a tool to educate rather than horrifying but can’t look away entertainment. The Hunger Games have the potential to be the next generation’s Fahrenheit 451, and it’s time we revisit the series from a new perspective.
