Culture

So, Are We All Rewatching ‘Hunger Games’ Right Now?

I'm craving the next 'Hunger Games' more and more.

by Lia Kim  29 March 2023

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Memes about Peeta’s MUA skills are all over TikTok. Lenny Kravtiz is getting recognised on the street for his role as Cinna. The new poster for The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is to die for. Hunger Games is back, baby.

Yup, The Hunger Games is once again having a moment. More than a decade since the first Hunger Games movie came out in cinemas, it’s as teen dystopian fiction’s crowning glory. 

Respectfully, those who have tried to imitate its legacy have failed. Sadly, but it’s going to take a lot more than a watered down dupe slapped with a terrible ending to recreate the Hunger Games legacy. (I’m looking at you, Divergent). 

That being said, there are specific reasons I reckon this franchise has stood the test of time and pretty much invented the genre that is Young Adult (YA) Dystopian Fiction, while others have faded into oblivion.

Allow me to explain…

The Hunger Games Respected The Genre

Okay fine, The Hunger Games didn’t invent the genre. It wasn’t even the first to pit a bunch of unlucky teenagers against each other to fight to the death, with Battle Royale doing exactly that years earlier. But YA fiction and dystopia just vibe with one another, do they not? How else did you expect us to work through all that anti-establishment teenage angst while dealing with our first proper crushes?

The Hunger Games had all the goods: a plucky teenage protagonist, believable stakes, and a love triangle to boot. It also didn’t try to subvert the genre for no good reason, allowing the main characters to feel like teenagers while navigating its dystopian universe. The first instalment set up the universe, the second one did it even better, and the third tied up all the loose ends. 

In fact, The Hunger Games respected the genre to such a high level that it low-key ruined it. It set such a standard that the franchises that followed ended up trying too hard to be exactly the same.

Completing the entire Divergent series is time I will never get back — the film studio didn’t even bother finishing the adaptations. And I truly can’t even remember what the dystopian conspiracy in Maze Runner was.

Sadly, in trying check all the right boxes, the movies were weak attempts to jump on a trend that ended up taking the entire genre down with them.

The Cast Is Utter Perfection

Need I remind anyone where Jennifer Lawrence kicked off her illustrious career? Technically, I did first see her in X-Men: First Class as a young Mystique in 2011, but The Hunger Games made her the highest grossing action heroine of all time.

It was also the first glimpse I had of Natalie Dormer, who went on to play the best character on Game of Thrones (GOT), and it gave us Lawrence and Dormer’s iconic accidental kiss on the red carpet.

Fellow GOT actor Gwendoline Christie made an appearance as Commander Lyme. Amandla Stenberg also had her breakout role as Rue in the first film. Sam Claflin was born to play Finnick Odair and is back in the spotlight now as Billy in Daisy Jones & The Six. A decade later, all of these actors are still killing it. Why? Because they were perfect. 

It’s Perfect For Memes 

The Hunger Games is going through a real renaissance on social media. And the reason for that is because it’s unintentionally perfect for memes. Too often, movies and TV seem to be gunning for that perfect viral sound bite.

The Hunger Games came out before meme culture had a chokehold on the industry, which somehow made it perfect meme fodder. 

Oh, and the fact that it predicted the rise of TikTok itself? Truly ahead of its time.