Aiming for the Heart: Another Hunger Games Post

Last week, I talked about the Hunger Games' recently popularity. Today, I want to talk about a revelation I had at the end of Mockingjay, the series' 3rd and final book.
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First thing I have to cover is the history of my affair with these books. I read The Hunger Games 3 years ago and began Catching Fire, but quit early on due to boredom. I wasn't invested in the characters.

Now comes the movie. The teens falling head over heels, the Internet swarms, the whole phenomenon. So I decide to borrow back books one and two from my friend.

Josh Hutcherson

I read them in a day. I see the movie. I fall totally in love with Josh Hutcherson (Peeta), though he's short, and I'll never forgive Suzanne Collins for his name.*"Son of a breadmaker...", scans audience for appropriate facepalms*

(ALSO: Birdy's song "Just a Game", featured on the movie's soundtrack, makes me cry. Though I have to mention that her music usually does.)

- Point being that I fall in love with the books the way I didn't 3 years ago, but the way every reader seems to be doing now. I feel appreciation for Katniss. Gale is complicated. Then, as I've said, I've totally fallen for Peeta. (Or Josh Hutcherson, the line is blurry here.)

What I do have to say: It was Mockingjay, the end of the series, that made me impressed. That tought me something about my own writing. The first and second books definitely provide a lesson for plotting and raising the stakes, but they didn't hit me the way Mockingjay did.

It was the death of a character and Katniss' subsequent meltdown that did it. Sure, I was effected by *possible spoiler* Rue's death (and the flowers!), but it didn't make me cry the way I did at the series' end.

Here's my point: Think of your reader as a target. If you shoot him in the foot, it'll hurt (and probably irritate him.) If you hit his upper arm, it will hurt more. But hitting him in the heart will completely rock him. (You could also try hitting his head, but then you might miss him completely. Or knock him over.)

The end of Mockingjay hit me in the heart, and led to some serious blood loss.

How I feel about the series now:

I'm glad it's popular, because it's the kind of thing teens should be reading. It's not just some silly love story, it's about the desensitization of violence in entertainment/the media, and war and survival. It poses morality questions and features a fantastic female protagonist (which is, in YA, pathetically rare.)

How I feel about the movie:

- I'm not a fan of Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss - I'd prefer someone younger, who acts more like... well, a terrified girl struggling to maintain her compusure and figure out this boy thing while surviving. Katniss definitely isn't a damsel in distress, but is only 16 in the first book.

(FUTURE UPDATE: I still think JLaw might be a little old for the part, but I don’t care, because she is amazing. She’s a fantastic actress and a super role model.)

- I don't get all of the fan outrage I've been seeing. (To me it's a little silly after surviving through 8 Harry Potter adaptions.) I actually enjoyed some of the changes, such as the choice of character who gives Katniss her symbolic mockingjay pin. In the books, it's Madge, the mayor's daughter, who's cut out of the movie completely. Instead, it's an old woman from the Hob (the black market), who gives the pin away for free. Though Madge is more likely to own the gold pin, and has enough resources to give it away, it's not her kind of person - the mayor's family - who gives Katniss power. *possible spoilers* Katniss' defiance of the Capitol is symbolized by the mockingjay and leads to riots and revolution. Revolution by the poor, weak, and oppressed - epitomized well by the old Seam woman. Even if Madge got the pin from her mother's sister, who died in the Games (if I remember correctly.)

- I wish the movie was creepier, even if it was necessary to tone down some bits. The scariest part, and the only part I remembered from 3 years ago, was taken out! *spoilers* (that is, the eyes and hair of the dead tributes in the muttations)

- Josh Hutcherson is mine. Hands off!

Have you read the books? Seen the movie? What did you think? And what stories hit you in the heart?