Hunger Games fans, this is our year.
A full-length trailer for the newest installment in The Hunger Games cinematic universe officially dropped on April 13, and if you’re anything like me, you’re already on your fifth rewatch of the two-minute video.
Sunrise on the Reaping takes place during the 50th annual Hunger Games – the Second Quarter Quell – and follows a young Haymitch Abernathy, long before he becomes the mentor to Katniss and Peeta in the original trilogy. The book, written by Suzanne Collins, came out in March 2025, and for a movie of this scale to arrive only a year and a half later is seriously impressive.
I was genuinely floored by this trailer. The vibrant visuals, the accuracy to the book, and the casting all feel incredibly intentional. Let’s break it all down – the details, the Easter eggs, and what I’m most excited for.
Warning: spoilers ahead if you haven’t read the book.
The trailer opens with a vivid shot of the beginning of the Games: all 50 tributes – double the usual number – standing on their pedestals around the Cornucopia. The arena looks exactly how it’s described in the novel: “breathtaking” yet “sickeningly beautiful.” It features rolling green hills, thousands of colorful flowers, and most notably, a Cornucopia designed to resemble an eye from above (just like in the book!). It’s a haunting detail that reinforces the idea that the Capitol is always watching.
That theme carries throughout the trailer. Propaganda posters flash during the District 12 reaping, and there is even a poster of President Snow wearing his peacekeeper uniform, as an ode to The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. All the visuals seem to be going for a 1984 vibe, emphasizing surveillance, control, and spectacle (how I love dystopian stories!)
What really sets this film apart from the others in the series, though, are the ‘70s visual influences. While The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes had a more muted, post-war, almost industrial aesthetic, and the original four films leaned into darker, desaturated tones, Sunrise on the Reaping embraces a brighter, retro-futuristic palette. Purple and yellow accents, pulled directly from the book’s cover, show up everywhere: in plumes of smoke during the chariot parade, in the arena’s flowers, and even from planes above the Capitol crowd. The visuals are truly stunning.
And then there’s the cast.
I didn’t think I could appreciate the casting any more than I already did, but this trailer proved me wrong. Joseph Zada delivers his lines in the same dry tones as Woody Harrelson’s older version of Haymitch. His line after Caesar Flickerman asks him what he thinks of there being twice the number of tributes as usual – “From what I’ve seen, they’re 100% as stupid as usual” – lands exactly as it should. I also appreciate that they’re sticking with his established movie canon look.
Mckenna Grace as Maysilee Donner was such a perfect choice – she absolutely nails Maysilee’s signature sass, shooting daggers with her eyes at the Capitol employees throughout the trailer. In fact, I even chose her as my top Maysilee pick over a year ago when everyone was coming up with their dream casts. Ben Wang as Wyatt Callow and Molly McCann as Louella McCoy – the other District 12 tributes – also seem like great choices, even from the brief glimpses we get of them. And if these actors’ friendships on social media so far are anything to go by, they’re going to have great chemistry in the film.
We also see more of a younger Effie Trinket, played by Elle Fanning, than I expected, which hints that the film may expand her role in interesting ways.
The set design is just as detailed. From the Panem logo engraved on the ceiling of the train station to the books lining Plutarch Heavensbee’s mansion, everything feels so intentional. Important details from the novel, like Haymitch wearing Lenore Dove’s pin throughout the games, continue to prove that this movie was made for the book lovers.
With that, as someone who almost always prefers the book to a movie adaptation, I was surprised by how many scenes looked exactly how I imagined them while reading: the tense reaping in District 12, the chaos of the chariot parade crash, and Haymitch’s strategy discussions with Beetee, Wiress, and Mags about destroying the arena.
There are a couple scenes with creative liberty, though, like a shot of the tributes all rising into the arena from the same room. I think this bold choice is going to make for some incredible tension leading into the beginning of the games.
The ending of the trailer just reminds me why Ralph Fiennes is so good at playing the villain. Fiennes, as a middle-aged President Snow, delivers the line, “And may the odds be…” before trailing into a laugh. The odds will never be in the tributes’ favor, and his acknowledgment of this is chilling.
If you couldn’t tell, I’m counting down the days until November 20. If this trailer is any indication, we’re in for a visually stunning and emotionally devastating return to Panem.