The Hunger Games has been a beloved franchise long before the last book had even been published. After gaining enormous traction in the early 2010s during the dystopian rise in literature, The Hunger Games didn’t fizzle out afterwards like most dystopian media from that time.
In 2020, Suzanne Collins, the author of The Hunger Games, announced that she would be releasing a prequel to the original series called The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, and fans were eager to get their hands on it. Following the success of the prequel, Collins has continued releasing more books within the world of The Hunger Games, with the most recent being Sunrise on the Reaping, which follows Haymitch Abernathy and his games in the Quarter Quell. It’s been explained in a few interviews with both Collins and her editor, David Levithan, that she often writes when she has a “philosophical point she wants to explore,” which is why she has chosen to return to the iconic series.
In Sunrise on the Reaping, Collins explores the ongoing theme of rebellion that she has in all of her works. She brings in the backstory of one of the fans’ beloved characters, Haymitch Abernathy, to show the beginnings of the revolution. Fans also see how Katniss was able to succeed in the original series after a lot of hard work that came from years of planning and preparation. Like Collins’ first prequel, we are getting a movie adaptation of this book, but unlike The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, we’re getting this movie much sooner. The trailer for Sunrise on the Reaping has already been released, along with a release date for the movie itself, Nov. 20.
The release of the trailer caused excitement among fans, especially since it seemed well-made and practically ready for release. The trailer showcased the reaping for the Quarter Quell and several moments from the games, all of which looked fantastic and just like how it was described in the book. Fans have begun counting down the days to the movie’s release, and there was even speculation that the official trailer would be shown during the Super Bowl; however, that did not happen.
Since the movie is based on the book, most are already aware of how sad the movie will be. The Sunrise on the Reaping was full of heart-wrenching moments that fans are excited to see played out on the big screen, and the series continued success is largely due to its political messaging. Each book serves a purpose; we see that the events of the first three books did not come from nothing, but from a very long period of planning. When Collins writes, she does so when she has something to explore, and many of the ideas and themes she looks at are easily applicable to our current world.
That is the beauty of the series: you don’t need to be living in a desolate dystopia to be able to apply the lessons and concepts to your own life.