Suzanne: “writes explicitly political fiction”
Lynn: WHY ARE THERE POLITICS IN MY CHILD SPORT MURDER BOOK 😂😂😂😂

Can we all also agree Mags being one of Haymich's mentors and comforting gives "She's actually a really nice lady" in Catching Fire such a deeper meaning.

Sometimes you lose and lose and lose before you win. That's what this book is showing. They tried for YEARS to bring down the capitol and Katniss was just the right amount of lucky that she had the right combination of personality, skill, bullheadedness that works in the rebellion's favor.

I don’t think I’ve ever disagreed with you more😅

I think it makes complete sense to have an attempted rebellion in this book. The fact that it fails just highlights that revolutions and achieving real change takes time- even multiple generations.

And you know what's perfect? A generation is ~25 years. In Panem, every 25 years, there's a quarter quell, and in two of those, there have been attempted rebellions. It just goes to show that there is no real chosen one, it could have been Haymitch or someone else. It just wasn't the right time or haymitch wasn't "lucky" enough. Successful revolutions don't happen in a day, and i think Suzanne Collins has always been brilliant at showing that.

Lyn, the whole point is that revolutions takes time and district 12 is soooo smalll, everyone knows each other

Lyn, respectfully, I think you missed the mark on this one completely. This book is entirely meant to recontextualize Catching Fire -- it is not meant to stand alone.

Suzanne wrote this book with even more of a point than any other -- that point being "you weren't listening the first time I told you" -- which is why it seems so heavy-handed in places. Every criticism you gave emphasizes this point further. The entire point is that Katniss wasn't one-of-a-kind, some fantasy Chosen One who's destiny was to overthrow the Capitol. She was one piece in a large machine-- a revolution lying in wait. The characters we know showing up as they do isn't fan service, it's emphasizing that they are all vital cogs to the revolution-- and that all this has been brewing for a very long time. She is showing us how they managed to pull off the events in Catching Fire in just a few short weeks -- because these people already know each other and are deeply aligned and waiting for an opportunity. It shows there was a failure -- probably many failures -- that came close, and was completely covered up by the oppressive regime.

Think about it with the context on just one character at a time: Plutarch. He spent the entire time between this book and Catching Fire creating a career as a game maker and building Snow's trust in him, so that one day he could be the gamemaker for the Last Hunger Games and end them forever. Beaty spent his years designing ways to bring down the arena if the opportunity arose. Decades of work were required to make that happen.

Because we didn't listen the first time and girl-bossed Katniss to death in memes, she beats us over the head with it this time -- Katniss isn't special, she isn't unique. She hammers the similarities to Haymitch, one after another. She didn't cause the revolution, she was its face, a piece of propaganda -- an unwilling one, majority of the time. Neither Haymitch nor Katniss can even conceive of a revolution in their minds at the start of their books, and Haymitch has lost hope for it after his games and rejects Plutarchs offer. They aren't revolutionaries, the people around them are.

The entire point of this book is that a revolution doesn't take one mythic hero -- it requires the dedication of many people coming together and working hard for a long time, despite failures, and being ready to take an opportunity that presents itself.

No mention of Ampert 😭

the whole point of this is to explore propaganda, why we submit, and to also show you that revolutions don’t happen overnight, it takes generations trying and failing to pull it off.

i think it’s a fantastic prequel because it completely recontextualizes the original trilogy. katniss was never the chosen one, it wasn’t her specifically that made the revolution happen and she was never special in that specific way. she just happened to be the symbol when they were finally able to pull off one. so many book readers over the years have wondered why there was never a rebellion until katniss and the reality is that there were multiple attempts but you never knew about them. that’s very true to real life history.

we saw so many characters from the original trilogy because they were all involved in the first attempt and that’s why they were being punished in catching fire. all the previous characters that were brought back were brought back for very specific plot purposes.

i just don’t see how someone can say this book was just for fan service. i can understand in certain aspects how someone would feel that way but to write off the book as majority fan service is a bad faith interpretation or misunderstanding of the story in my opinion. i think this was a great addition to the series that added a lot and really makes you think about the trilogy in a different light. in my opinion, that’s what a prequel should do if you’re doing a prequel on characters we know instead of new ones.

edit: i rewatched your video and there’s more things i don’t understand you saying. in the beginning you’re complaining about how it’s repetitive yet you also complain about how you want it to be basically just the first book but with haymitch. why would you not want new elements/motivations added to the story? that’s what makes a story not repetitive when you’re reading a story with a very similar premise. also i don’t understand why you have such a problem with the past being so directly connected to the present. why is it so unrealistic that people have been making attempts at rebelling for years? why is it unrealistic for a group of people to attempt one, fail, and then try again when they see another opportunity years later? i just don’t understand why you see such a big issue with us finding out that it isn’t a butterfly effect story, it’s a years of slowly trying and building up to story.

The theme is propaganda. That people HAVE tried but the control of the capitol is so strong. But it takes time. Its honestly a deep take. I think if this came first it would kill us but we couldnt have the epilogue.


Also when i realized that you forgot that the Og books explain haymitch had his love and his mom and bro offed as punishment i felt for you.

They weren't trying to break the arena to live, they were breaking it because they knew they were going to die anyway so they were trying to make a point.

Oh Lyn, I've tried to write this comment like 4 times throughout the video- but I'll just say this: Freedom is a Constant Struggle. The resistance didn't begin with Katniss or Haymitch or Beetee or even Sejanus. It took 75 years for it to work- it didn't happen over night and it didn't start with Katniss- it ended with her. Haymitch was a pawn just like Katniss was- they were both part of a much bigger picture and a much longer fight against the Capitol. There's so much more I can say about this- the fan service accusations, the missed themes of the book, the Newcomers alliance that you never even mentioned- but I think the other comments got it lol. 10/10 rage bait.

Everybody is entitled to their own opinions, but I think you've missed the mark on this one. It's a prequel, of course we are going to read about characters we already know, and it is perfectly clear that the rebellion was in the works for a long time, it possibly even started the minute after Snow rose to power. About Haymitch, he seems like such a gentle and kind hearted boy, miles from the broken man we got to know in the original Hunger Games, I liked seen that part of him, before the system broke him. For my part, I really loved this book and it gave me a more comprehensive knowledge of the rebellion and how it came to be.

This is a very cynical view on the book that if you can’t break out of that pov, the real point of the book isn’t going to hit you. SC doesn’t just write the books for character deep dives, her overarching themes on rebellion and fascism has been #1. Reading the book it seemed to me that the rebellion has been happening for a long time, even in TBOSAS when the arena was blown up. There could be fights from the rebellion featuring tributes happening in every hunger games but the main theme of this book, “propaganda”, is why we don’t know this, the districts don’t know this, and Katniss doesnt know this. Her hunger games is when they finally have a catalyst that sparks the fire. Who knows how many trials and errors they had over the years

I haven't read it yet, but I'm actually happy to know that there is struggles for rebellion 20 years before the original series. The problem i had that i ranted about with the first is how haven't people tried to end this earlier! And I'm im glad there were people trying to end  it. People were trying to end it in song bird and snakes too.

Yeah, i'm surprised you missed the point. the thing is that it's a prequel, it has to be on the nose by concept. i agree that it seemed like fan service that so many characters from the 75th games came back and that he ended up being a part of the rebellion from the beginning., but actually it makes sense! he was just like katniss, only less lucky and without her perfect timing. both times a rebellion was building but this time it wasn't perfectly crafted yet, and he suffered the consequences, which is why he is so heartbroken to see her go through the same stress he experienced before. then all the people involved in the attempt suffered the consequences: mags being in a wheelchair, wiress going crazy, beetee losing ampert. it makes sense that once the third quarter quell is used to eliminate victors who are rebels they would be chosen at the reaping. haymitch is chosen instead of peeta, and i bet that annie knew something about the rebelion so she was chosen (they probably thought mags was too weak to do something either way).
the other thing is that we, having read catching fire, thought we knew how his games ended, but we were also victims of propaganda, as we thought he won by being selfish and detached from the rest, while actually everything he said and did was for a greater good. he was trying to "paint his poster" but the capitol had the control in the end.
one more thing; he is actually forced to be an addict by the capitol. he had this thing hooked on his chest that numbed him, and once he got it removed he experienced withdrawal, but had the taste of how numbness felt, so he knew where to look for it once he lost everything.

Collins has said this book came about because too many fans were sympathetic to Snow after reading A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

She wanted to show that Snow always chose the evil bastard route, and no one should think he was a woobie because he lost Lucy Grey ( Gray?) Baird.

snow’s conversation with haymitch is actually extremely realistic because throughout this entire series we know no matter how hard snow tries to make everyone forget lucy gray the only person who can’t is himself, he’s bitter and obsessed so he pays very close attention to district 12. He finds out one the tributes from 12, who was sacrificed which he has to know about since he knows everything that happens in 12, is dating a covey girl. It’s his perfect storm to meddle with because he’s childish.

Lyn, 48 tributes in haymiches games. His 48th tribute he had to train was Katniss. The promise he made that the sun wouldnt rise in his birthday again, he was the last name picked. He was the start of the end.

we also can’t call the first trilogy as a “normal hunger games” without the plan of taking down the capital, because it was from Katniss’ pov. plutarch could have been working with another tribute and we will never know. the reason we see it in Haymitch’s games is because it’s in his pov. it is critical to the series as a whole to see this plan unfold