The Hunger Games trilogy is a beloved house hold name, whether you read it and
hyper-fixated so hard you learned to throw knives and shoot bow and arrows, yes, I am talking
about myself, or you watched a few of the movies and enjoyed it for what is is, a feel-good love
story about child murder. And then there’s the prequel. Sorry, I have to hold for all the readers
who just found out there’s a prequel.
Now that you’ve read the book, or more likely quickly made a google search, I can
continue. “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” was a folky backstory of the books widely
agreed upon as the most popular character, President Snow. It follows the story of 19 year old
student Corionalanus Snow, or Corio, as he mentors a performer in the traveling band the covey,
Lucy Gray, in the 10th annual hunger games. The underestimated songbird now has to fight for
her life, and unless I’ve missed out on the revelation music has been deemed lethal, it’s going to
take help from Corio and luck.
Suzanne Collins, the author of the Hunger Games series, as well as a team of directors
and perfectly casted actors, teamed up with lionsgate to release the book as a movie and the
publication was nearly as good as the book. I’m joking of course, not much can obtain that title,
but TBOSAS was impressively under hyped right up until the release of the movie. Luckily,
though, this time the title of “The Hunger Games” was enough to popularize the movie.
The reception around the recent movie has a widely agreed upon idea: that the movie is
good, but not as good. It lacks the self awareness with its morals at times and although I think it’s
a good movie to enjoy and theorize about, it’s not easy to understand the deeper themes without
reading the book. Where the original movies show more fully the depth in the story, I, and the
wider THG fanbase, agree that TBOSAS could use some more awareness and empathy.
In the end, though, The Ballad of Song-Birds and snakes is a worthwhile watch. Whether
you’d prefer deep-diving into the meanings and plots of the movie or just enjoying it at face
value, enjoying it for fun and love, it’s still worth it.
