Ep 696 - Sunrise on the Reaping (The Hunger Games #0.5), by Suzanne Collins

Summary

Overdue Podcast Summary: Episode 696 - Sunrise on the Reaping (The Hunger Games #0.5) by Suzanne Collins

Introduction

In the 696th installment of the Overdue podcast hosted by Headgum, Andrew and Craig delve into Suzanne Collins' prequel to The Hunger Games series, titled Sunrise on the Reaping. Released on March 31, 2025, this episode provides an in-depth analysis of the book, exploring its themes, characters, and plot intricacies. As seasoned enthusiasts of the series, Andrew and Craig offer their nuanced perspectives, enriched with notable quotes and insightful commentary.

Book Overview

Sunrise on the Reaping, originally known as Songbirds and Snakes, serves as the second prequel to The Hunger Games trilogy. Set 50 years before the original series, the novel reimagines the foundational elements of Panem's dystopian society, focusing on the early days of the Hunger Games and the rise of key figures like Coriolanus Snow and Haymitch Abernathy.

Themes and Analysis

The podcast hosts extensively discuss the central themes of authoritarianism and media manipulation that Suzanne Collins weaves throughout the narrative. Andrew highlights Collins' philosophical influences, noting, "Suzanne Collins read a lot of David Hume as a kid," emphasizing the depth of her thematic explorations (04:10).

Craig adds, “Collins is really hammering home the lessons about oppression and authoritarianism,” reflecting on how the book mirrors contemporary societal issues. They both agree that Collins intentionally revisits and deepens the series' core messages, making them more relevant to the current political and social climate.

Character Discussion

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to character analysis. The duo examines the development of Haymitch Abernathy, portraying him as a more complex and flawed figure compared to his portrayal in the original trilogy. Andrew remarks, “Haymitch is not a hero,” highlighting his struggles and the circumstances that shape his character (32:09).

Coriolanus Snow is scrutinized as well, with both hosts expressing frustration over his ruthless nature. Craig humorously notes, “Coriolanus Snow is like, oh, great dictator who just can't let go,” while Andrew sarcastically comments on Snow’s questionable management skills, “Just a bad management move,” illustrating their disdain for Snow’s tyrannical methods (62:30).

Plot Points and Reactions

Andrew and Craig dissect key plot developments, such as Haymitch's defiance during the Reaping, his strategic alliances with other tributes, and the Capitol's manipulative tactics to control the narrative of the Hunger Games. Andrew muses, “These mutants were always gonna eat this kid to nothing left, no matter what Haymitch did,” underscoring the inevitability of tragedy within the Games (72:46).

Craig discusses the book's portrayal of rebellion, stating, “They are trying to get people not to come together in terms of a common goal,” which ties back to the overarching theme of division enforced by authoritarian regimes (89:22). The hosts also critique the book’s handling of romantic subplots, finding them forced and less organic compared to earlier installments.

Insights and Conclusions

Throughout the episode, Andrew and Craig reflect on Collins' narrative choices and their implications. They ponder why Collins resurfaces similar themes without expanding them into a trilogy, suggesting that she focuses on concise, impactful storytelling rather than prolonged sequels. Andrew questions, “Why revisit these themes again? Is she just rehashing what we've already seen?” highlighting a possible stagnation in thematic evolution (86:11).

Craig concurs, noting Collins' intent to directly address and reinforce her messages about societal control and resistance, “Every Hunger Book gets blunter about the messages fans keep missing,” indicating a deliberate strategy to ensure her critiques resonate more profoundly (86:22).

Notable Quotes

• Craig [00:05]: "These are books you should have read by now."
• Andrew [03:25]: "Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins."
• Andrew [13:05]: "Haymitch’s personal dramatic arc."
• Craig [20:32]: "Now that's a great question, Andrew."
• Andrew [32:09]: "Haymitch is not a hero."
• Craig [62:30]: "Coriolanus Snow is like, oh, he's a terrible leader."
• Andrew [89:22]: "They are trying to get people not to come together in terms of a common goal."

Conclusion

Episode 696 of Overdue offers a comprehensive examination of Sunrise on the Reaping, presenting both praise and critique of Suzanne Collins' latest contribution to the Hunger Games universe. Andrew and Craig adeptly navigate the complexities of the book, providing listeners with a clear understanding of its place within the broader narrative and its reflection of contemporary issues. This episode serves as a valuable resource for both long-time fans and newcomers seeking to grasp the intricate dynamics of Panem’s dystopian society.

Transcript

[Andrew]

This is a headgum podcast.

[Craig]

While Andrew and Craig believe the joy of discovery is crucial to enjoying any well told tale, they will not shy away from spoiling specific story beats when necessary. Plus, these are books you should have read by now. Hey everybody. Welcome to the 50th annual episode of Overdue, a podcast about the books you've been meaning to read. My name is Craig.

[Andrew]

My name is Andrew. And for this quarter quell we reach. Read two books instead of one.

[Craig]

I can't. Welcome back to our Hunger Games series.

[Andrew]

We didn't actually do that. I'm just. That's just a joke. I did. I mean, I did reread part of the first one and I re listened to all of our old Hunger Games episodes. So like I'm researched.

[Craig]

Did you listen to Songbirds and Snakes?

[Andrew]

I did.

[Craig]

Oh, I, I.

[Andrew]

We did not like it.

[Craig]

No, we did not like it. I only listened to hung Songbirds and Snakes. If we had done this as a long reads, we would have called it Hungry Games, I think. Or Hungry Hungry Hippos, probably. Well, we probably couldn't have called it Hungry Hungry Hippos. That's a trademark.

[Andrew]

No, that's trademarked. Anyway, I think maybe we could have invented a fictional character named Hunger James.

[Craig]

Hunger James would be really into the Hungry James.

[Andrew]

Hungry James who loves the Hunger Games.

[Craig]

I just. When you did the quarter quell voice. Everything in these books is that voice.

[Andrew]

Heavens Blue Arc Heavens.

[Craig]

Call your latest.

[Andrew]

We got another. This one. Really. The fun thing about. We're gonna talk a lot about this book. The fun thing about it being mostly kind of a reimagining of the first one in a lot of ways.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Is that when they do sneak in little tiny pointed references to songbirds and snakes for the, for the songbirds and snakeheads out there, it did make me really upset. The one instance of snow lands on top that we got in this book made me really upset.

[Craig]

Snowland's on top. Andrew.

[Andrew]

That the, the authoritarian dictator of this universe has like a fun little catchphrase for his family.

[Craig]

So if you don't.

[Andrew]

I did end up. I did. Especially after I read other people's reactions to it. I did end up liking this. I don't want to be negative about it.

[Craig]

No, no.

[Andrew]

I did not like songbirds and snakes very much.

[Craig]

We haven't said the title of the book. It's Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins, A Hunger Games novel. It is the second prequel to the Hunger Games trilogy, which was Originally published from 2008, 2010. Song the The Much maligned on this podcast, Songbirds and Snakes, the Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.

[Andrew]

Maligned by us. My Kindle edition does say sunrise on the Reaping parentheses. A Hunger Games novel. Close parentheses, parentheses. The Hunger Games. Close parentheses.

[Craig]

And this book arrived on bookshelves. Bookshelves. What?

[Andrew]

Try again. Do it again.

[Craig]

Book shelves.

[Andrew]

Bookshelves.

[Craig]

Bookshelf. Heavens be a mere two weeks ago. A mere two weeks ago. Last. When we. When we covered Songbirds and stuff Snakes, it was like five months after it had come out. And this time we're like, why not just do it right as it comes?

[Andrew]

We're getting. We're getting faster. You know, we're getting better.

[Craig]

Next time we'll read it before the next Hunger Games book comes out.

[Andrew]

Actually, someone in the overdue Discord was saying they did not send out ARCs for this, like, at all. Yeah, which would not surprise me. I don't like. They don't need.

[Craig]

They don't need.

[Andrew]

Though people did have reviews that went up on the day of. So I don't know, maybe it was just like.

[Craig]

Maybe there weren't fun arcs.

[Andrew]

People didn't get arcs. But I.

[Craig]

What I couldn't find, though. I imagine she just started working on this book as soon as Songbirds and Snakes came out. I couldn't find if the. The film at all had, like, factored into this book. I think the film was.

[Andrew]

Was the film 2023, the film of songbirds and snakes?

[Craig]

Yes, it was 2023.

[Andrew]

My impression, reading through especially like Polygon's coverage of this, is that there is a kind of a finely tuned machine that kicks into gear when Suzanne Collins has a new idea for a Hunger Games book. And it's all the same people who are editing it and like, producing, like, they edit the novel and then they produce the movie. And it's kind of a glide path that has existed, like, existed for the original four movies and then also for the prequel movie.

[Craig]

There were some, like, fairly. There was a mix of mixed reviews for the film of Songbirds and Snakes, though it was a financial success.

[Andrew]

I'm sure it was. I think probably a lot of that, as with our reaction to it, is caught up in like a sort of post Joker, like, do we still need to be. Do we were handing it to these villains.

[Craig]

We were very hard on the. The POV character choice for that book, which I think we will revisit in some ways as we talk about this book. But just, you know, plenty of people thought it was well done as a film. So I would be interested maybe to go back and watch it. As I, as I think about, like, why did this, where did this book come from? And one of the first things I found was Suzanne Collins read a lot of David Hume as a kid. I'm like, okay, well, we can't market books on the 18th century philosopher David Hume, but we can market it on kids being killed in bloodsport.

[Andrew]

So what, what really breaks my. Like, I haven't seen Songbirds and sn, but I have seen like the, the promo pictures for like production stills and you know, like full color photographs for the movie.

[Craig]

They heavily feature Rachel Ziegler who is playing Coriolanus Snow. I have no idea.

[Andrew]

It does, it does really break my brain that they're doing like sort of, I don't know, like Great Gatsby style, like period piece.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Panam.

[Craig]

Yes.

[Andrew]

Supposedly the future of our own United States. I mean, I guess fashion is cyclical and all, but.

[Craig]

True, true.

[Andrew]

It's a little funny to have them doing like, like Bioshock, Hunger Games or whatever it is, whatever aesthetic it is that they're trying to go for with that.

[Craig]

Okay, before we get into this book, any other table setting we want to do on the Hunger Games? I do think it's important to note, Andrew, what episode number is this that we're doing right now? You know?

[Andrew]

696.

[Craig]

690. The 696th annual overdue podcast. In a few weeks we will be celebrating episode 700, the Big 7 Hundo. And we figured we would do it the only way we know how to celebrate milestones, which is to head to Forks, Washington. I love to go to Forks and hang out with the gang from Twilight, so.

[Andrew]

Well, is it the gang from Twilight though, Craig? Or is a slightly reimagined version of our gang?

[Craig]

Interesting. So we are going to read for episode 700, Life and Death, Twilight Reimagined, the gender swapped Twilight novel written by Stephanie meyer.

[Andrew]

You know, 20 in 2015. We did already read the 2020. I think it was Midnight sun was the one from. That was the first book from Edward's perspective.

[Craig]

Yes.

[Andrew]

But this book is like, what if Edward was never born and it was a girl Edward instead?

[Craig]

Yes. And we, we are already like. I have a curious going on in there.

[Andrew]

One question about this book and I'm not going to say it on air because I do not want people to tell me before I read the book.

[Craig]

Please don't spoil this book for us. But you can join us live on the Internet as we discuss it. It will release on April 28th on the podcast feed. But if you want to join us for a live recording, you can do so on Friday, April 25th at 8:30pm Eastern. You could just go to bit ly overdue 700 at the appointed time and that'll be. That's the appointed place. And we will talk about Twilight again.

[Andrew]

Love it. So for the last time, until she comes out with new books, which she has said that she's working on, and unless she goes like full turf for some reason, we'll just keep revisiting this.

[Craig]

I think so. So that's Bit ly slash overdue. 700, Friday, April 25, 8:30pm Eastern. Andrew, what else do we need to do? Hunger Games setup wise, if somebody's never read a Hunger Games, they need to know that there's been five books. This is the fifth one.

[Andrew]

This is the fifth of five books.

[Craig]

The original trilogy was a YA sensation post Harry Potter. It's an American version of Battle Royale from Japan. And it's inspired a lot by, you know, Vietnam and Iraq and reality tv.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Suzanne Collins has said, and it is worth keeping in mind as we read into this is she was, she was taken by the juxtaposition of like the, the, the opulence of reality and frivolity of reality television juxtaposed with like war on terror, Iraq war.

[Craig]

Also, I don't, I don't know that I mentioned on any of the other podcasts. We did the only non Hunger Games book on her bibliography that I could find, or at least a surface level bibliography since the first Hunger Games book is like a 2013 children's picture book that's autobiographical about like her experience with her dad going off to Vietnam. It's called Year of the Jungle. I think like her relation, she cites her relationship with her dad and the Scholastic interview where she's talking about David Hume. Like the, I think her experience as a child of someone who went off to this war that we all, you know. No. Did not go. It was not a just war. It did not. It produced only.

[Andrew]

Let's not get into what a just war is. No.

[Craig]

Yes. Not even nominally a just, you know what I mean? But just a, a big mess and a mess.

[Andrew]

Quagmire.

[Craig]

Yes, Quagmire is the right word. So that all seems to be the, the soup from which the Hunger Games emerges. The original trilogy. Our hero, Katniss Everdeen, wins two sets of games, sort of the second one sort of, and then leads a revolution sort of begrudgingly, very extremely Begrudging.

[Andrew]

Yeah, but yeah, it's a, it is a. There's a, there's a capital called Panem. This is a play on like the bread and circuses thing from ancient Rome where the aristocracy has a life of idleness and ease while the people who supply all of the, you know, the people who have the, the means of production in their hands are all sort of subservient to them all, all subjugated in some like, long ago conflict. Katniss almost entirely accidentally becomes an icon that. That leads to a revolution that leads to the overthrow of this society. We get very few glimpses of what that overflow looks like. One thing that did come up in the press tour for this book for Sunrise on the Reaping was Collins. And like editors and producers who are familiar with what she is thinking about, they don't think she's gonna do like a sequel sequel ever. Like, I don't, I don't. It was just too bad because I like. Something else that came up is they all say, you know, Suzanne Collins writes when she has something to say. This is her, the movie, the movie producer Nina Jacobson, who's been associated with the films, Suzanne, the originator and North Star of everything that we try to do with these books. She doesn't write just to make money. She writes when she has something to say. And so I do, I do find myself wanting this woman who did this hugely successful sort of fall of society, rise of authoritarianism, like media literacy, YA series, to put her brain to like, what it looks like to come out of that and what comes after that. And she does not. She's not, she's not interested in doing that. At least not hasn't been to date.

[Craig]

I'm struggling to think of like major media franchises where they successfully make that.

[Andrew]

That's the thing though is like, I think it requires more work and more imagination.

[Craig]

Yep, yep, yep, yep.

[Andrew]

And it's not to say that Suzanne Collins doesn't have any. It's just like if we're, if we're thinking about sort of aspirational fiction and what we, you know, reading about the world that we want to live in, I, I find myself these days wondering more about something that's a little more positive and constructive and a little less kind of rolling around in the, in the bad feelings the way that this book does.

[Craig]

Off the top of my head, I think people would point us to Le Guin and like Butler for that.

[Andrew]

Sure, sure.

[Craig]

Maybe go dig around in their bibliographies again to see what's available to us. I think that some of that came up when you read the Dispossessed years ago. But, yeah, it's. It's also interesting to me that this is not part of a, like, formal prequel trilogy of any kind. Like, it doesn't. She wrote three books, and then it's like, surprise, here's another one.

[Andrew]

Yeah, right?

[Craig]

Then, oh, here's another one. It doesn't. This does not feel like it is continuing a specific thread from Songbirds and Snakes other than it's in the Hunger Games world.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Like, you get. You get a few. So Songbirds and Snakes from. Okay. District 12 is the district. The district that most of these books can center on, because that's where Katniss is from. That's where Heymitch Abernathy, who is the hero of this and kind of a, like, a begrudging mentor figure. Every. You can describe everything in these books. Everybody's begrudging like, nobody wants to be, but. Yeah. And then the one other Victor from. Who's ever won a Hunger games, and it's 75 years from 12, from district 12 is Lucy Gray, who is the, like, the love interest of Coriolanus Snow in Songbirds and Snakes. So you get, like, the first book does say, you know, there have been two Victors ever. Hamish is the one who's alive. You don't really spend a lot of time dwelling on whoever that the. The second person was. This one makes more, like, winking references to her because it is assuming that the audience at least knows more about her and what her deal and, you know, how her, like, how her story kind of echoes forward into. Into this one. Yeah, that's the only thing.

[Craig]

That's it.

[Andrew]

No, that's, like, the big thing. Yeah.

[Craig]

Yes. It is part of a larger tapestry. It is not like, you know, some of the authors we read, they're like, okay, and now here's my sequel trilogy or my prequel trilogy. You know, like, that kind of thing. So what if George Lucas just made, like, a Darth Vader movie and Obi Wan movie?

[Andrew]

Well, what if George Lucas woke up in a cold sweat every, like, four years and was like, oh, David Hume. I always say Jack Porkins when I'm trying to think of an obscure Star wars character. But what if George Lucas wakes up and is like, I gotta do the Admiral Ackbar movie. Listen, listen. And would I watch that? Yes, absolutely, I would. Would I? Probably not be satisfied by it. Like, probably also. That would be true.

[Craig]

Sunrise on the trapping.

[Andrew]

But. Yeah, but yes, she. She claims to just, you know, when she has. When she has a thing to say and a character she wants to say it about, then she. She wants.

[Craig]

She.

[Andrew]

She does these things the edit. Her longtime book editor David Leviathan says of her, suzanne always starts with the philosophical point she wants to explore. And I think Haymitch and the 50th Hunger Games are the perfect grounds on which you can make readers think about the nature of authority and questions of when we obey and when we rebel. One of the genius things about the prequel is that suddenly readers understand that history is made as much game as it is by the immediate battles. Yeah, it does. It does hit at a time when I think people are kind of trying to think, okay, what is a longer? Was a longer. Yeah, fight for. For what we want.

[Craig]

Look like, I think his name is David Levithan, not Leviathan, who is a sea monster.

[Andrew]

I do have Leviathan twice, both in the copied and pasted quotes.

[Craig]

Okay, that's cool. I have it from her website because there's also. He's. He kicks off an interview with her where he just starts being like, just spit some David Hume at me, Suzanne. Let's go.

[Andrew]

Well, that is a. That is an error on. If it is, in fact Levithan, then that is. That is my error, and I own it. But it's also an error on the. On the part of polygon.com good.

[Craig]

Okay.

[Andrew]

It does say Leviathan two different times.

[Craig]

Yes.

[Andrew]

In this piece about how there will never be a Hunger Games, he is.

[Craig]

Asking her about the Hume stuff and why she wants to write about Implicit submission. Because that's like one of the big. Like one of the epigraphs in this. In this novel. And she says within. This is like her big thing within the story. I'm attempting to have implicit submission play out on three levels. Individual Hunger Games and National. I love the second level being Hunger Games. First, there's Haymitch's personal dramatic arc. Will he defy his own implicit submission to the Capitol and stop that reaping? The second level plays out during the actual Hunger Games. By refusing to demonstrate implicit submission, will Ampert's alliance against the Careers upend the usual results in the arena, allowing a newcomer to win? We'll talk about all that. And finally, there's the nation of Panem, in which not just the districts, but the entire country has ceded power to a dictator and his cronies. And so she is like. And that's a lot of the thing that Andrew said, like, feels kind of very relevant to 2025 is the, like, on what levels are you just, you know, obeying without any question? Like, what are you. When are you just rolling over? When are you just saying, meh, it stinks, but it's a living, you know, so that's, that's kind of where she's coming from. I've got other quotes from her that can. That pertain to more specific stuff we can talk about.

[Andrew]

But yeah, like what's, what's interesting and what I sort of had a little bit of trouble with before I started reading, you know, like her statements and like her statements of her editors and whatever is. I do think a lot of like, she. So she's thinking about the nature of authoritarianism and what like, resistance to that looks like. And she's thinking about how media is used to present a narrative. And like, great. And unfortunately, that stuff is super relevant in this current moment, hasn't gone away. But it is also like literally all the same themes that she was working with in the first Hunger Games book. And so one, one thing to think about, I guess, as we, as we talk is like, what, what is she emphasizing more? Like, what, what is it? If, if we accept as true that Suzanne Collins does not write for the money that she writes when she has something to say, then how is this new echo of a bunch of themes she's played with before? Like what, what, what, what does she think that she is like, emphasizing or restating?

[Craig]

Sure.

[Andrew]

In a way that makes it more relevant?

[Craig]

Now that's a great question, Andrew. I'm not going to answer it because we do need to take a quick break, but I think we'll answer it by the end of this episode.

[Andrew]

We'll see. May the odds be ever in our favor.

[Craig]

Andrew. This book is brought to us by one. This book, this episode, Suzanne Collins.

[Andrew]

Suzanne Collins did the book.

[Craig]

She did.

[Andrew]

It's brought to us by Suzanne Collins and the folks at Scholastic. Thank you.

[Craig]

The episode everyone is listening to right now is brought to you in part by one of our Patreon supporters, ck. But more specifically, her mom's book, Unicorn and Friends, a coloring activity book for kids. There are a ton of unicorn books, but only one by CK's mom. To find it, you must search Amazon for Moon Rabbit Arts Unicorn Coloring book or go to moonrabbitarts.com it makes a great gift for Easter. Or really anytime, as long as you like unicorns. 100% of the images are hand drawn. There's no clip art. There's no AI filler. Yes, it's Just cram jammed with bespoke unicorn images.

[Andrew]

Is this the ad copy or did you put cram jams?

[Craig]

I said cram jam, but I mostly. Yeah, I'm speaking to the truth here. 55 pages of puzzles, coloring pages and activities like finding your unicorn, name matching games, mazes and word searches. I looked at some of the word searches. They seem pretty good.

[Andrew]

Did the sumpia.

[Craig]

No, because I could know because I found the answer key, but.

[Andrew]

Oh. Oh, well, all right. That's cheating.

[Craig]

That is cheating.

[Andrew]

But it's good to know that it comes with its own answer key. Like, you don't need to buy the teacher edition of the. Of the. Of the book.

[Craig]

You can find the answer key out there. She also has a jumbo Christmas book for all the super organized types who want to get a jump on their Christmas shopping. You can consider it alone for her X Games Gingerbread man who has been CK's favorite for years and years. Again, you search Amazon for Moon Rabbit Arts unicorn coloring book or go to Moon Rabbit Arts. Welcome, Andrew, to the second quarter Quell. It's time to talk about Haymitch Abernathy and his journey to the Hunger Games.

[Andrew]

What were they? What would they have done for a hundred? It's just a shame we never got 100.

[Craig]

Wow. Quadruple quell.

[Andrew]

I. Well, I mean, I think you would call it the centique. Well, or something like with a hundred in it. But that is my question, I think sort of backs up my. What remains my predominant feeling about these books, which is the thing that Suzanne Collins, like, gets up in the morning thinking about is like, how do I design another round of the Kid Killing Games, baby?

[Craig]

Yeah, I have two.

[Andrew]

She is really. She's really interested in designing the Hunger Games.

[Craig]

Two notes from our Patreon discord over patreon.com overdue pod to join in. AA said, excited for this episode. Suzanne Collins was good at creating the arenas and taking us through how the games played out in the first two books. I hope she does that well in this one too. Even though we know the ending. And Carrie said, why am I so into this series when the central action of each book is a bunch of kids killing each other? The conclusion I've come to is she's just so good at writing compelling characters that evoke strong emotion. We will be the judges of that for ourselves, not for you. That's how you feel.

[Andrew]

I think she, like. I think she mostly succeeds.

[Craig]

I do. I agree. Yes. I agree.

[Andrew]

It's just like. Like what. What struck me and what will Stick with me about this book is way more so than in Songbirds and Snakes. Where you do it is like centered around a Hunger Games, but it's this like early primordial version of the Hunger Games that had not taken on all of its like modern trappings yet. Is. This is like all the beats of this are just the first book. Again, it is much, it feels much more like a Hunger Games book. If you are mainly thinking of the first two.

[Craig]

Yes.

[Andrew]

As, as being Hunger Games.

[Craig]

I was on the lookout for. Oh, we haven't come up with that yet. Or here's a proto version of the game, like an earlier patch of the Games, which. Yeah, we talked about that with Songbirds and Snakes. And one of the things in that novel that was at least interesting, even though I think I didn't find it as satisfying to read, is that you weren't in the head of or near the head of a character who is participating in the Games directly. So you were getting this like sort of third hand experience through Coriolanus. But we're back in the arena in this one and yeah, it doesn't feel like I'm getting, you know, if the original Hunger Games took place in the 2000s, I'm not getting like the late 70s or early 80s Hunger Games here. It just feels like the Hunger Games.

[Andrew]

Yeah, it's. It's like if you're thinking about it in terms of film, you know, if you're thinking about the 10th Hunger Games that we saw in Songbirds and Snakes as like a silent movie era or like a very early like talkie kind of thing, and the modern Hunger Games as like a, you know, a, a current big blockbuster film from a, from a major movie studio. Like this is that. But in like the 80s or 90s, like so clearly recognizable.

[Craig]

Yeah, it's a 90s movie.

[Andrew]

There are a lot, there are a lot of things that have, have changed. There are a lot of tweaks that have been made. But like these, these pads are pretty well worn already and people know what they're like. The form is established. And so I was talking to Susanna about it and that's what, what made me reread the first ch of the first Hunger Games book as she is like, yeah, this is still like an earlier version of the Hunger Games. Like they're treating the, the, the tributes. Worse still, like that whole scene where they're being like treated for, for ticks or where they have like all that, that stuff dumped on them and they're still handcuffed and Very roughly handled like it. I think we're still. And throughout the rest of the book. And this is just to my memory because I didn't make it all the way through the first Hunger Games book again. But, like, I think you are. There is more, like, unfettered communication between the different tributes from different districts in this book than I remember being possible in the first one. And the first Hunger Games, I think it is definitely way more, like, focused on, like, cultivating, like, individual celebrities. Like, I think you see moments of that in. In Haymitch's arc in this.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

But there's, like, the. Just the production values by the time you get to the 74th Hunger Games are, like, amped up. And, like, the costume design is amped up, and the way you're trying to develop each. Each person's individual storyline is. Is amped up.

[Craig]

That is interesting to me because of, like, the weird timey wimey ness of reading this politically relevant YA series that is taking place, you know, 15 years after the original. It's written 15 to 20 years after the originals were, but it's taking place 24 years prior.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

So you have this. What you're laying out is kind of interesting because it's like, you think about, why might the 74th Hunger Games from the original book be even more individualistic? And my first guess there is, like, that's a bit of a reflection of where reality TV is at the time. And why does it feel like this book, the story is meant to be way more, like, collectivist or, like, you know, what. What, how does a revolution start kind of thing. And that doesn't feel reflective of the 2008 moment. It feels more reflective of now. And I think in universe, there's this, like, snapback, like, when we get finished talking about the book, you can surmise that the reaction to the events of this book creates 20 to 25 years of the Capitol really tamping down on the ability of the districts, like, maybe getting a little scared by what happened in the 50th.

[Andrew]

Yeah. And I think, like, you can see in the way they talk about these games being edited, I think really trying to play up the US versus them, like, among the districts, especially, like, even. Even down to, like, the individual level.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

To prevent a big group of Tributes from the more, like, downtrodden districts from. From, like, getting together and then inspiring, you know, inspiring the other districts to unionize, basically.

[Craig]

Yeah. There. Yes, there is a My District tributes are unionizing plot here. And there's no knowledge of that in. Or at least from Katniss perspective. And that's. Hoo, boy. That's a whole thing with this series, right? Is that she is. She is dedicated to the single character perspective in each novel. And as she fleshes out her world, it just kind of. Again, I find myself going, man, just give me a chapter from one other person ever. Yeah, I buy it here more than I did in Songbirds and Snakes.

[Andrew]

In Songbirds and Snakes, it was. It was like, here. It's mostly rough because Haymitch spends this whole time, like, pining for this woman who you get to see for, like, two pages at the beginning of the book and then never see or hear from her again.

[Craig]

Yeah, well, because she's not interested in Snow's perspective is she's not interested in real flashbacks. She could have put in scenes of him and Lenore Dove doing stuff, having a relationship, and, like, chart an arc with them throughout the book. And she's way more interested in, hey, I'm gonna front load this. Like, they have this relationship. And then he's gonna be reciting the Raven for the rest of the novel as he thinks about her, because that's where the. The word. What did she say? What. Why did he. Why did she go with the Raven? Love of his life, her early death, his relentless grief equals Edgar Aleppo. So I'm with the Romantic poets again, she said, and she couldn't resist the Raven as the source poem for this character that we barely spend any time with.

[Andrew]

Okay, okay. Do you want to hit. Hit us with, like, a dramatis personae.

[Craig]

Oh, boy.

[Andrew]

Yeah, just, like, hit us with the nuts and bolts.

[Craig]

Okay.

[Andrew]

Because otherwise we're just gonna be talking about, like, the nuts and the bolts.

[Craig]

So it's. It's nuts and bolts. Haymitch's birthday. Oh, I do. We will go through the list of tributes because. Names. My God, the names.

[Andrew]

Well, and she does just drop a. An Excel table in the middle of her book just to tell us who everybody's named. Which Susanna also pointed out did not happen in the first.

[Craig]

No, but the. The main characters we have, we have our Haymitch Abernathy. He's our POV character. As Andrew said, he was the adviser and mentor to Katniss. This is him.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

As a young boy.

[Andrew]

As a young man who's like, I don't drink alcohol. Thank you.

[Craig]

I do make moonshine.

[Andrew]

I do make moonshine.

[Craig]

Do not drink it.

[Andrew]

But I do not get high on my own supply. Eagle Eyed readers will remember that Haymitch is a Borderline embarrassing. Drunk. Yep, yep. By the time of the first Hunger Games. And he's only snapped two by the pluckiness of Katniss and the bread boy, Peeta Melarch.

[Craig]

We do get in the opening. We get like brief snippets of Katniss's family, but they're not Katniss's family yet. And Haymitch has a girlfriend, Lenore Dove, who's one of the Covey. One of the like musical roving band people that live in District 12.

[Andrew]

If we do another these. Suzanne. This is just this side channel. Me and Suzanne Collins. Hey, Suzanne, if you do another one of these, you gotta pick a love interest who has one first name. I don't know if I can do another. Two first names lady.

[Craig]

Well, the Covey, you always got to use their full name, I guess.

[Andrew]

Always got to use the Covey because their names are like warm little coveys.

[Craig]

Lucy Gray was also. So he's got this girlfriend. He's got a younger brother. He's got a mom. His dad is dead. Was he killed in the mines? Was he killed for being a dissident? We'll never know. Probably both. And it's his birthday every year on July 4th, reaping day. I didn't remember that July 4th was the reaping Day.

[Andrew]

I don't remember that either.

[Craig]

But it is.

[Andrew]

It's not mentioned, like it's very specifically mentioned in the first. In the, in the first one, it's not mentioned that July 4th is reaping. Like Reaping Day is a thing that happens every year. But Katniss is. Katniss is never like, oh, July 4th again.

[Craig]

And so he's gonna get reaped. Well, he doesn't know if he's gonna get reaped, but his girlfriend gives him a cool Flint Striker necklace that he wears throughout the rest of the book. That's important.

[Andrew]

He's gonna start sick. Etsy Buy.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

From Lenore Dove.

[Craig]

And we're gonna meet some other kids through the Reaping. We're Gonna meet Luella McCoy, a little 13 year old who's friendly with Haymitch. We're gonna meet Maisily Donner, a twin prissy pants sort of on the rich end of the district. Her dad isn't running to be the next mayor. So like there's the. Are they collaborators? Are they highfalutin sort of thing with her?

[Andrew]

Yeah. Haymitch perceives her as snobby and kind of above. Above it all.

[Craig]

Yeah. We've got Wyatt Callow who is of the Callow family. We learn later that they're a bunch of like odd makers and booker boys. Yeah, he's basically like a Nate Silver fanduel computer for. For betting odds on the Hunger Games. He's got computer brain and he specifically to crunch odds on all of the competitors and all of the Hunger Games. He doesn't. He doesn't handle the bets. His hands are clean, but he makes the odds.

[Andrew]

Yeah, I just. Now I do feel like DraftKings would definitely be a sponsor, like a real sponsor of the real Hunger Games.

[Craig]

This bloody trident brought to you by DraftKings.

[Andrew]

And I don't think DraftKings has ever tried to advertise on the show. And I hope that they don't because.

[Craig]

Please don't come here.

[Andrew]

They're scumbags and a cancer sponsored on society. But I do think that they would sponsor a Hunger Games movie. Like, I think if we go see Sunrise on the Reaping in theaters, I want to see. Yeah, well, that's.

[Craig]

That's the other thing we didn't talk about at all. If we talked about other episodes, the like, specifically the original trilogy of films. There was all of the fancy tie in merch and stuff that was all about just like people being rich. And I don't know if Suzanne Collins ever published an essay that was like, did you guys read the books? But she should have.

[Andrew]

I feel like every. Everybody who writes or creates anything is like, you do know what an antagonist is and who the antagonist is, right? Like, this is the thing when Susanna and I got the boys pilled, man. Does. Does nobody in the Boys fandom know who the bad guys are in that movie? Man. There are people watching the fourth season being like, man is home. Homelander seems kind of bad, actually. Is he the bad guy? Is this guy who killed a plane full of people with his laser eyes in the first season a bad guy?

[Craig]

The fourth, reaped boy or the second reaped boy. Again, there are only two genders in the Hunger Games, right?

[Andrew]

Yes.

[Craig]

At least that we've seen.

[Andrew]

Can you imagine, like probably by the hundredth the capitol be like, gender is a spectrum. And so we're introducing, we're bringing in like 12 kids from each spectrum.

[Craig]

They would use that. Yes, they would use that. They are so brutal and awful that they would use that as justification to reap even more children.

[Andrew]

Yep, yep, yep, yep.

[Craig]

Woodbine Chance, a kid we don't know much about because he tries to run and dies, is killed summarily in front of a Whole bunch of people causes a riot. Lenore is trying to help his grieving mom. And Haymon.

[Andrew]

Sorry, Lenore Dove.

[Craig]

Excuse me? Lenore Dove tries to help his mom. Haymitch tries to prevent her from getting hit by a Peacekeeper cop, and he gets hit. And then he gets reaped instead. And then Plutarch Heavensbee shows up. There was a Heavensbee in Songbirds and Snakes, one of his ancestors. And Plutarch in the original trilogy becomes head game master, ultimately revealed to be a revolutionary.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Rebel rouser, played by Philip Seymour Hoffman in the films RIP but you can.

[Andrew]

Really, I think, sense the glee. Like, in the. In Songbirds and Snakes, she was like, here's the last name that, you know from my first books. Isn't that cool? But you can really sense the glee with which Suzanne Collins sends, like, Effie Trinket into the story for no reason.

[Craig]

Oh, when she shows up.

[Andrew]

Yeah, we just got. We just got characters, you know. Now isn't that fun?

[Craig]

Well, because we've got this woman named Drusilla who is, like, a proto Effie who's not good at it, and all these kids.

[Andrew]

Anyway, I think my favorite character in the. In the whole book is the. The snake pervert.

[Craig]

Okay. The snake pervert. Mango stiffed.

[Andrew]

Yeah, mangoes.

[Craig]

Or is it Magno Stiff?

[Andrew]

I think it's Magno. I don't think it's mango.

[Craig]

Yeah. We could talk about Magnus Stiff last.

[Andrew]

Magno. Last Magno in Paris. I think he's. He just likes to lick toads. And he sucks.

[Craig]

Yes. He got. He's get. He keeps getting in trouble for making the kids, like, wear live reptiles and then also giving them the same dirty clothes every year. Yeah, but he's just high on toads all the time. His name is Magno Stiffed. Oh, boy. But Plutarch shows up, and. Yeah, even the folks in our Discord, who, like, were pretty high on the novel would admit in casual conversation on the Discord that Plutarch being here and Plutarch's kind of arc as a secret revolutionary, like, you know, rich family worming his way into the games to maybe cause some. Some sort of positive outcome. Feels a little shoehorny. Like he's a little elegant of. Of any of the things that she. She. I mean, Effie is pretty just like, whatever. Effie's here.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

But we don't spend a lot of time with her. It's fine.

[Andrew]

I don't like. I don't actually like, whatever. Effie's here for this because it does try to make her a lot more sympathetic where, like, having any sympathy for every trinket at all is, like, a late book one, sort of. Like, it's a thing that does not. Or even. Even book two. Like, she's mostly portrayed as a capital stooge. Yeah, fair. Fair in that initial trilogy. And, like, she's got some sympathies and some empathy for the plight of the people in the districts, but she's not in any way a revolutionary in this book. She's almost revolutionary adjacent, in a way. So I didn't really like that that much.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Plutarch heavily in this is like, what if Mr. Beast wanted to overthrow the government?

[Craig]

Well, because he is a real. No, no. Cause he is like, a reality TV maven.

[Andrew]

So, like, we put 100 kids into 100 cages, and the one that survived got $700,000.

[Craig]

Plutarch, heaven's beast.

[Andrew]

And got to come live in the company town that I run as Mr. Beast.

[Craig]

I hate it. Heaven's Beast bulls or whatever they're called. But no. But, yes, because Mr.

[Andrew]

Beast. See, you got me with the Nate Silver thing. I had not thought about the Nate Silver thing until you brought it up. And so I'm glad I can get you with Blue Dark. Heaven's Beast.

[Craig]

He actually saves, well, his life because he is like, wait, don't kill her. Let me reality TV her saying goodbye to this new kid. It'll be better footage than this riot that we don't want to show anyone.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

And he coordinates this whole goodbye, but there's this, like, thing where when Hay is on the train, Lenor is waving from a hill, and he's like, well, at least they didn't, you know, control the narrative of our final goodbye. And, like, it's. I was mildly touched by it. It mostly struck me as a reminder for. That. This book is really concerned. Even more so than maybe not even more so. I haven't reread them, but she is really hammering home the. They can change. I'm gonna tell you a version of this story, and no one else experienced it this way because it was, you know, what is it? Card stacked or edited or whatever by the Capitol.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Like, so as a prequel. The other thing this book is dealing with is the whole prequel. Itis. Of it all.

[Craig]

You. Yep.

[Andrew]

Is. Is you. This. This is a. This is a story that. Where we basically know the outcome. Like, we know. We know Haymitch isn't going to die, and we know that he is not living a life surrounded by his loved ones in the Time of the Hunger Games. So it's a pretty safe assumption that none, none of the other District 12 people he makes friends with are going to make it, nor Dove is not going to make it. Like, these are all things that you can pretty much assume from the outset.

[Craig]

And we know the outcome of his. His games, at least nominally, because there's like, a scene where they're watching footage of his games and you see the fact that he wins by, like, dodging an axe, it bouncing off a force field and hitting his opponent.

[Andrew]

Yeah, kind of. Kind of Hayish. Like, Haymitch knows how to glitch outside the walls of the Hunger Games and to use the. And to use the arena against his. His competitors. But. Yeah, so that's actually the interesting part of how it works as a prequel is like, the boring part is like, okay, we know Haymitch is going to live, and basically all these other fools who we don't already know from older Hunger Games books, they're all going to die. Whatever the specifics of Haymitch's Hunger Games and the alliance between all these people that springs up and the relationships that he forges, like, all of this is new to us because Suzanne Collins has created a world where, yeah, we know about these Hunger Games, but we know, like, the capital sanitized version, so we don't know what actually happened. And that gives her the freedom to. To do more of whatever she wants without having to be hemmed in by the, like, the events of a book that she wrote, you know, a decade and a half ago.

[Craig]

Yep. And. And it's on theme for the series, too, even more so than other prequels that are, like, here's the. Where it is about narrative control, it is about propaganda. So you do, like, it's. It's endemic to the storytelling that you have this.

[Andrew]

Yeah, but like, just as Haymitch, like, I don't know, like 40%, 45% of the way through the book is like, you know, rising up on the portal into the arena to do the Hunger Games part of the book. I realize, like, I don't actually remember how much the old books talked about the specifics of Haymitch's Hunger Games. I was surprised, like, how little we knew. Like, we knew how he won, basically, but nothing else about it.

[Craig]

Yep, that's it.

[Andrew]

And so that, that, like, lack of back story flashback combined with the, like, the, the media manipulation point that she's trying to make actually works in her favor here, I think. Yeah. So, I mean, I'm, I'm, I Appreciated that. Like, I think that's well played.

[Craig]

We spend time on the train with everybody. This is where we get to see what Maisa Lee is her name. There's just a lot of letters in that name. She, like, shows off that she will take no gruff from anybody. She will be snob.

[Andrew]

Do you mean guff?

[Craig]

Yeah, she'll be gruff to anyone is.

[Andrew]

What she'll be gruff to anyone who gives her guff.

[Craig]

Yeah. She will slam on anybody's clothes no matter whether or not they're in charge of the hunger. That's like, her primary mode is, like, tearing you down for wearing Kevin's B is Mr.

[Andrew]

Beast. Then she's like a tick tock teen.

[Craig]

She really is. And she's always doing, like, quotes of your videos and just, like, ripping your whole house to shreds.

[Andrew]

Yeah, right.

[Craig]

And she gets herself beat up by Drusilla on the train for doing this. Which does. It elicits some, you know, sympathy and fond feeling from the reader, even as Haymitch is trying to figure out who in this group of kids he actually likes. He doesn't really like her or Wyatt. He does like Luella.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

And so even within the four from 12, there's, like, a. What. What alliances do we have here or not?

[Andrew]

Sort of.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

But. But we go through a pretty familiar set of beats where they're on the train to the capital. You know, you get a little extra, like, rough handling of them by the Capitol people.

[Craig]

Thank you for bringing that up, because I certainly didn't. I. As I thought about it, going through my notes, I was like, wow. I guess that wasn't part of the. The whole part where they were, like, chained going to the makeup tables, you know, they were.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

And it's lighter with them.

[Andrew]

Yeah. The impression. The impression that you get, I think. And even. Even if you're just thinking about, like, snow and the way that he decides to, like, kill the entire family of anybody who looks at him cross eyed.

[Craig]

Yeah, man.

[Andrew]

In this, you. You get the idea that the. The. One of the big things that's been kind of learned between this Hunger games and the 74th Hunger Games is, like, sometimes a lighter touch is. Is a little better.

[Craig]

Mm. Mm.

[Andrew]

But, yeah, so. So you get. You get. You know, they're on the train, they're eating the. The fancy food. You get the bits about, you know, the. This food is so much better than what we have at home, where we're always starving and it's always terrible.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

These capital people live lives of impossible opulence this seems wrong to me. I'm going to get to know the other people from my district a little bit and challenge my own assumptions about them.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And then I also am going to learn a little bit about people from other districts. And we are also going to be handled by people who are going to create like a public facing Persona for us. And we're going to have to trot that out in front of the camera. Like, this is all. This is all pretty standard Hunger Games stuff.

[Craig]

Yeah. The couple I was. I couldn't remember how the order of operations worked in previous books, but it's like an interesting sequence of events. They go to the Tribute House. They're thrown to the makeup desk after they get their weird bads. Their weird terrible bads. And their makeup is done by like university students trying to pass a class.

[Andrew]

Feels.

[Craig]

Feels like a reference like that to songbirds and snakes. Like the kind of like weaponization of. Of academia. We meet. Well, we hear about Magno Stiff and maybe meet him. And then there's the chariot parade, which they're supposed to go be on their chariots in front of Snow.

[Andrew]

It's basically this chariot parade. Broke your brain a little bit. As I recall from. From us. We try usually not to burn POD by talking about the books in between episodes. But we did spend a weekend together while we were both mid book and we accidentally shared some thoughts with each other.

[Craig]

Significant. Like the big events of this book between Coriolanus Snow and Haymitch Abernathy revolve all like, they're very big bad things happen. Snow is a monster.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

He ruins Haymitch's life.

[Andrew]

He throws up all the time and he's puking everywhere. He's puking black stuff. But like, that's a bad guy thing.

[Craig]

It's all because. Because in this world where he runs a yearly murder contest, these kids are on horses on a chariot. None of them know what to do with these horses. And then like a Philly sports celebration. One drunk idiot sets off a firework.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Some moron whips a battery at a horse. Then it just goes off the rail.

[Craig]

All the horses go bonkers. And a bunch of them like, crash. Luella dies in the crash. And Haymitch is like, well, I'm not gonna let them just disappear her body. I'm just gonna take it. And he starts running. He gets on a chariot. He rides the chariot all the way to Snow. He puts the dead body on the ground and he starts clapping. And then they take him away. Right. The rest of the book. Snow has made it his mission to destroy this boy who clapped at him, even though he is a ruthless dictator. And as I say it out loud, I know that ruthless dictators often have the thinnest skin around, so maybe that makes it all make sense. But as I was working through the book, I kept being like, did I miss something that made Snow this mad? But I guess this was it.

[Andrew]

This was it. It's like. It's like a moment of defiance that nobody. Most people are not going to. In the districts are not going to see because they only get the edited feed of the video.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

People in the capital are just going to forget because their memory of the Hunger Games will conform to whatever they're shown later after the fact.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

Yeah. He just decides to go nuclear on Haymitch, even though at any given point, like, Haymitch is not a hero, even. Even less than Katniss was.

[Craig]

Correct.

[Andrew]

Is not a hero.

[Craig]

Yes.

[Andrew]

And he frequently is given the chance to do, like, do big rebellion and doesn't take. And he does. He does absolutely do rebellious acts in this. And. And we'll get into that more when we talk about the actual Hunger Games part. But, like, you do get the sense that if Snow had just, like, let his girlfriend live, but let the threat of him killing his girlfriend hang over Haymitch for the whole rest of his life, he would have had, like, a pretty, like, kind of a loyal foot soldier forever.

[Craig]

Yes. Yes. Yes, yes. Yeah, I don't know.

[Andrew]

Some of that's probably intentional on Suzanne Collins's part. Like, these dictators lay the traps that they then fall into themselves.

[Craig]

It was just one. I just share that again. It broke my brain because I, in the moment, could not believe that that was all that had happened. And in retrospect, yes, you are not supposed to be able to believe that that's all that happened. You know, a terrible tragedy befell this little girl, and now this man wants to kill this man and everyone he's ever known and. Or this boy and everyone he's ever known and. Okay, then we meet all the Tributes. Andrew. District one. Panache. Silke. Loop. Carrot. Alphaus. Camilla. Janice. Nona. Ampert. Who's important. Dio. Lessie. Lect. Coyle. Urchin. If you're from District 4 and you get named Urchin. Shut up.

[Andrew]

Your parents get, like, everything that we've seen says that your parents still get to pick your name. So, like, your parents did that to you?

[Craig]

Yeah. They also named a boy Angler in the fishing district. Come on.

[Andrew]

I Mean, that's. That's just a historical, like, family name, I guess.

[Craig]

Mareet Hechel, Anyon Fiser, Patina, Miles, Welly, Atride, Velo Bircher, Autumn Hartwood, Rin Gina, Wefton, Notion, Ripman, Alana Ryan. Ryan.

[Andrew]

Ryan. Regular Ryan.

[Craig]

I wanted to read all this just because Ryan's.

[Andrew]

Ryan is in there. Like, after Ripman, who is my least favorite Mega man boss?

[Craig]

Like, you get Ryan Current of Clayton, Midge, Buck, Lanny, Stamp, Peeler, Hull, Chicory, Tile, Blossom, and then District 12, Wyatt, Maisoly, Haymitch, and Luella Ryan, Rin. Rin Gina.

[Andrew]

It's short for Orangina.

[Craig]

Yeah, you're fair. No, Notion is pretty good, though.

[Andrew]

Ryan is just. Ryan is strange.

[Craig]

So the kid we need to know out of that list of 48 kids other than Haymitch is Amper, a little boy from District 3, the son of BT a con, a now controlled, revolutionary technologist of some kind.

[Andrew]

Yeah, a sort of like a Donatello, who I just barely remember from the first trilogy.

[Craig]

Yes. Yep. Yep. But they've got a plan.

[Andrew]

And by. And when I say a Donatello, I do, of course, mean the Ninja Turtle who does machines. Beedi does machines also.

[Craig]

That's true.

[Andrew]

Including potato batteries.

[Craig]

Yeah, They've. They've got some sort of plan. And over several chapters, it is revealed that they're going to enlist Haymitch to help them flood the arena. To break the arena somehow. That is. That is the act of rebellion that they can perhaps muster in this Hunger Games.

[Andrew]

Yeah, and there's a. There's a big, like, you know, the meme where you do the thing and then a bunch of domino marks and then profit. Not even the domino thing. I think the question marks.

[Craig]

Profit.

[Andrew]

Yes, it's the question marks where it's like, yeah, we're going to. We're going to ruin the arena of the Hunger Games. And then question, question, question mark. And then rebellion. Yeah.

[Craig]

I. To. To Collins, his credit, there are moments where Haymitch is like, so I've signed up for this plan, and I've been given no details, and I'm not quite sure what's supposed to happen after. And the reason he's okay with it is that he thinks he's going to die anyway. So, like, why not?

[Andrew]

So his life is basically forfeit. And he's like, yeah, I'm like, 40% sure. I don't trust any of these people, but, like, what else am I going to do?

[Craig]

Yep. Yep. And Amber, it's like a little guy who is also Starting a. Like, so we talked in previous episodes, there are the Careers who are the big beefy competitors who have been training their whole lives to be in the Hunger Games.

[Andrew]

Yeah. And then as in the first books, they are all scabs. They will not. They will not unite with the other people in the other districts to rise up against the capital because they are relatively well resourced and well fed. And they see, they have. They feel they have more in common with the people in the Capitol than the people in the other districts. And so they stay more loyal.

[Craig]

And so Ampert's deal, in addition to this bomb plot where he and Haymitch will break the arena somehow, is also to start a like an alliance of every non career competitor.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Which. The numbers. It's like 2 to 1, like. And it does come to pass through a lot of, you know, kind of small scenes here and there throughout the training portion of the book.

[Andrew]

A lot of it is Maisily making cool crafts.

[Craig]

A lot of crafts.

[Andrew]

All the other districts. Yeah.

[Craig]

Some kids liking Wyatt's stats, some kids thinking that Haymitch is cool. And they call themselves the Newcomers.

[Andrew]

The Newcomers. And all the other. All the other Tributes are like. Like, hey, Wyatt, I. I love, like. I love how you acknowledge that all outcomes are statistically possible. And that's what makes you always right every time.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

100% of the time.

[Craig]

Yep. H H. The signal in the noise.

[Andrew]

Eh, Riverians.

[Craig]

No. Which district is that?

[Andrew]

No, just go. Just go back.

[Craig]

The mentors. So that. That's the plot of all the Tributes is that there's going to be this kind of like alliance. The book doesn't really. I don't remember if the book is like Amper is causing this alliance almost as a distraction from the bomb plot or if it's just like, why not do both? I think it's. Why not do both. Yeah.

[Andrew]

I don't think. I don't think Amber is explicitly looking to. To like. I think he's encouraging. Hey Mitch. To. To help them all like buddy up.

[Craig]

But he's the one who starts it though.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Right. I think he can't quite close the deal. Yeah, you're right that I don't remember the specifics of why, but I think it just is. I think once. Once Haymitch learns from bd, who has like a cool. This whole. The whole sequence where all the Tributes are going around and like, they get to like learn stuff from different people. Training room has such big like science fair energy. Science fair. Or just like pick what kind of gym class you're gonna take sort of thing like, you just go to the booth where the guy teaches you how to make a potato bat.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

But once Haymitch learns from Beedi that Ampert. Man these names. Is in the Hunger Games because he's Beatty's son and because Snow wants to punish Beedi, like, that's what gets Haymitch on Ampert side. And basically everything else flows from that. Like, it doesn't really matter what Ampert's correct motivations are so much, because Haymitch, like, Haymitch's big thing is like, man, this Snow guy seems bad. And I just. I just want to do the opposite of whatever it is that he wants in everything.

[Craig]

Yeah, there's this.

[Andrew]

Including drinking his milkshake drink in that scene when we meet.

[Craig]

When we meet their mentors, Wyrus and Mags. Wyrus won the most recent games by standing still in a big mirror arena. Did not kill anyone. A kid hit his head trying to attack her and drowned. And then Mags, a previous Victor, who is kind of nice, are my notes.

[Andrew]

She's a little old lady.

[Craig]

Yeah. They are one.

[Andrew]

When the Hunger Games was not that difficult.

[Craig]

Yes. And Haymitch remarks that, like, they are getting cast off Victors from other districts.

[Andrew]

Because 12 has no victors. Usually, it's your district's victors that are. That are training you, but 12 has none of them because the only one we have is Lucy. Lucy Gray.

[Craig]

Yes.

[Andrew]

She got, I guess, like, shot in the woods by Coriolita Snow.

[Craig]

Yeah, he didn't want to go camping anymore. And Mags does the thing where she asks the kids, like, actually what they want, which they is like. They're like, that's kind of weird because we're all gonna die. And Haymitch is like, I want to remind people I'm here because the Capitol won the war and thinks that 50 years later, this is a fair way to punish the district Matrix. But I'd like them to consider that 50 years is enough. And everyone's like, good point, Haymitch.

[Andrew]

I would like them to consider that they should not be doing this bad stuff to us anymore.

[Craig]

And Wyrus shares her song of wisdom. First, avoid the slaughter. Get weapons. Look for water. Find food and where to sleep fire and friends can keep. Andrew, how much did you like all the songs in the book?

[Andrew]

Everybody has a little dumpster, little song for everything. This. This information is so much more clearly and succinctly and memorably transmitted in a sentence, and it's Haymitch even has trouble remembering the dumb little song when he's in the arena. Like, he has a think. He doesn't think about it. Not everything needs to be a dumb little song. Nobody's reading the Lord of the Rings and being like, oh, boy, more songs.

[Craig]

No, explicitly. I remember my reaction to Lord of the Rings was, oh, no, more songs.

[Andrew]

Nobody's reading the Red Wall books, and it's like, hey, good, another song. Let's do more songs. Not everything needs to be a song.

[Craig]

I don't need to print, you know.

[Andrew]

I know it's in the public domain, and we love the public domain here on Overdue Podcast. You do not need to reprint the entirety of the Raven in your last chapter to drive home the things that you're doing.

[Craig]

She does do that. That earlier in the book, Lenore Dove has. We got a couple of her songs that she sings that Hamish remembers.

[Andrew]

Uhhuh.

[Craig]

And they all just reminded me of when that guy sang that song on Tik Tok. And then everybody had to talk about it at the presidential debates. The law demands that we atone and we take things we do not own, but leave the lords and ladies. Fine. Who take things that are yours and mine. The rich man or the rich man.

[Andrew]

Yeah, I was gonna say Richmond, north of Panem.

[Craig]

Vibes like, listen, these are fine political points to make. It was just like, kind of just. Just struck me funny, you know, and kind of bizarre that this is what we make people talk about on a presidential debate stage that is ultimately relevant. Anyway, so they get their mentors. Oh, there's a private, private meeting that Plutarch brings Haymitch to with Coriolanus Snow. And this is where he reveals that he ate some bad oysters when he killed the parade manager.

[Andrew]

Yeah, he ate some. Like, he ate a small amount of poisoned oysters, basically, while he was poisoning.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

The parade manager. And this does. Like, at some point, Corey, you just got. Cory, you gotta delegate, man. Like, you can't just be, like, personally poisoning.

[Craig]

Everybody's doing all of this himself.

[Andrew]

Yeah, like you. That. That's. It just seems if you. If you're the dictator, it seems so unpleasant to have to barf all of your blood into a big bowl while you're waiting for somebody to get you milk. Yeah, you could. You could do this better. This is bad management is what this is.

[Craig]

So he tells Haymitch that he's gonna ruin Haymitch's life, and everyone who knows him lives if he. I guess I don't even know that Haymitch has to do anything else. It's just gonna happen.

[Andrew]

Haymitch's fate is. It's sealed at this point. Snow's already decided. Hey, I don't like you because you clapped at me. I'm gonna clap back at you by killing everybody who you've ever known in life.

[Craig]

He does say, like, hey, I could kill you worse in the Games if. If I wanted to.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Yeah. And I could make everybody you love watch.

[Craig]

Yeah. Because apparently the. The. The wrinkle in this game is that they have mutations. Mutations that can specifically attack individual Tributes and will not be, like, distracted by another Tribute, like, you know, waving something at them.

[Andrew]

Also, everything be poison.

[Craig]

Everything be poison. That's the thing.

[Andrew]

It'd be very beautiful, but poison. They.

[Craig]

They kidnapped a girl from District 11 and gave her emergency plastic surgery to make her look like Luella. So now there's a zombie Luella.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Who's a kidnapped kid. They're all kidnapped kids, but from, like.

[Andrew]

District 11, I think. But then she just, like, she just dies.

[Craig]

Yeah. It's really. Yeah, it's sad.

[Andrew]

It's more like, look how bad this. Look how bad the capital is, and look how much they want to sanitize the. The version of events. It's like they're gonna pretend this. They want so badly to pretend this kid didn't die.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

That they have brought in a replacement. Like, a replacement kid. But. And I think the way that she acts and the way that she's controlled sort of echoes some of the things that, like, happened to PETA. I think in the second and third, that's a good. Especially the third book. It's like just a. An. A reminder of what the Capitol can do to individual people when it decides to. To. To do that. And what.

[Craig]

And if you think about it as a different form of control from the, like, media propaganda forcing you to all participate in this system to, like, we will just control your body directly if we want.

[Andrew]

Yeah, we will. Yeah, we will. Just like Clockwork Orange, you and not even think about it.

[Craig]

Yeah. So we go through the scoring where Hay gets a one. We go through the interview.

[Andrew]

One is bad, one is the worst.

[Craig]

One is very bad. Where Effie arrives to help them prepare. There's a whole sequence where they're doing their preparatory interviews with Drusilla, and then they go to meet Cesar Flickman. The Tucci is here. We do get Paul.

[Andrew]

Paul Giamatti is not here.

[Craig]

He's not here.

[Andrew]

A little Tucci and Paul Giamatti are different people.

[Craig]

Different people, Andrew. There's a little bit of footage of the 10 funker games just to wet Andrew's whistle. And then there's footage of the 25th, the first quarter quell, where apparently one of the Flickmans came up with, may the odds be ever in your favor. Fun little lore drop there.

[Andrew]

Love to know when the catchphrase was invented. Flowers. Flowers for Algernon.

[Craig]

This is a whole. This is a whole section that later in the book is revealed that is like, way heavily edited from what Haymitch's experience is. The Careers come off looking poorly. All of the newcomers kind of make some fun cases, and in particular, District 12 comes off well. Haymitch has found a cat like a character as a moonshine and Rascal. Rascal is the word they use.

[Andrew]

Yeah, he's going for a sort of a. A roguish edit.

[Craig]

I like when he's doing like Rodney Dangerfield esque crowd work with a guy who wears bees on his head. Like a cube of bees on his head.

[Andrew]

Oh, they gave me a one. No. What are they so scared of? I don't. I don't know.

[Craig]

I may image my wife gave me a one.

[Andrew]

That's not my attempt to do a Rodney Dangerfield. That's just me doing a weird voice. But yeah, my wife gave me a one. That's funny. That's good.

[Craig]

Then Plutarch invites people over and we get the like, oh, actually, he's trying to help them. He sets up a phone call with Lenore Dove. Excuse me. And he gives Haymitch three bits of info about the dome, about the arena. The sun is linked with the outside sun, which is important because BT said go north. The. The flower berms will open. That's where the mutts will come from. And he says, hey, take control of the narrative. That's my. That's not really a helpful tip, but okay, yeah, sure. And then he. And then he does this, like, weird media interview with them where he's like, hey, we need to like, cut some wrestling promos. Can you come up with a way to make fun of the Careers? And Haymitch calls them near beer careers.

[Andrew]

Near beer. That sucks.

[Craig]

I hated it. And then he's. And then there's like a paragraph where Plutarch bemoans the loss of, like, deep fake AI videos. Did you catch this, Andrew?

[Andrew]

He's like.

[Craig]

He's like, no, man. I'm gonna have to edit all of this footage together. I love we. We cut so many good promos, but I'm gonna have to do all the editing. Plutarch seems genuinely happy. Says he's gonna be able to edit the clips together into some fine proposals. He sighs when he mentions the tools that were abolished and incapacitated in the past, ones deemed fated to destroy humanity because of their ability to replicate any scenario using any person.

[Andrew]

Yeah, I guess it was the right thing to do. Yeah.

[Craig]

We almost wiped ourselves out even without them. So you can imagine. But. Oh, the possibilities.

[Andrew]

You keep going. I need to go look at the front of this book and see if it has a little like. You can't train AI with this.

[Craig]

Oh, boy. Okay. The games. The games begin. Everything is beautiful, but dangerous. Andrew already said everything is poison. It's a beautiful landscape. The water's poison. All the food will kill you. And Haymitch runs into the woods. He gets a backpack with actual food, which actually helps him figure out that maybe he shouldn't eat any of the other food. Food. He does get poisoned because he drank some of the dirty water, but then.

[Andrew]

Nasty water, for them, he's charcoal.

[Craig]

Then, like, a bunny drinks more of it and dies, and he's like, oh, no.

[Andrew]

Oh, no. The bunny.

[Craig]

He eats charcoal and then, like, spends a day recovering from poison while 18 kids die. Wyatt dies early, and Lulu zombie Luella finds him. She, of course, then dies smelling poison flowers, and he. Well, he has to kill her because they won't. The capital won't let her die quickly enough to his liking.

[Andrew]

Okay. All right. All rights reserved under international and pan American copyright conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, used to train any artificial intelligence technologies, are stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented without the express written permission of the publisher. Go, Suzanne Scholastic. Also, Suzanne Collins does have another book. It's called Gregor the Overlander, and it's book one in the Underland Chronicles.

[Craig]

Oh, when is that?

[Andrew]

There's a promo for it back here. I don't know anything else about it. I just know it's being. Promote. Promoted in the back of this Hunger Games book.

[Craig]

Interesting. Interesting, yeah, but what else did I have to say about the games? I don't know.

[Andrew]

We just went off on another AI Lulu dies.

[Craig]

He refuses to give up the body right away. He does that thing again, but the lightning butterflies chase him away.

[Andrew]

And he had lightning butterflies?

[Craig]

Yeah. And he does burn them with a burning stick and finds one of the.

[Andrew]

If they were a bug type, they would be Weak to fire damage.

[Craig]

He knows his stuff, you know, I.

[Andrew]

Was just trying to think if there's a. There's definitely a electric type spider. Pokemon. I don't know if there's an electric butterfly.

[Craig]

Okay. Okay. So he. Now he knows how he's gonna get inside the arena to blow something up.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Because there's, like, a big. Their whole plan is, like, there's a big pool under there.

[Andrew]

Yeah. There's a big water tank, and they're gonna. They're gonna blow up the water tank, and then it's gonna get water, it's gonna get the computer wet, and it's gonna ruin the Hunger Games. Gotta make the computer wet.

[Craig]

He does. He does find Ambert.

[Andrew]

This is me in, like, OpenAI's data center, just being like, I gotta make the computers wet. I gotta, like. I make all these.

[Craig]

Gotta pour all my bottled water on this computer. Cool it down. He does find Ambert, who gets gotten by the rodent mutts and is turned into bones. It's very sad.

[Andrew]

He has turned into a literal Skellington, which is kind of funny.

[Craig]

Is it funny? I thought it was sad.

[Andrew]

It's all. No, it's. I mean, it's sad, but it's, like, funny that he's like, all that's left is a skellington.

[Craig]

It is described as, like, a small, white skellington. Doesn't say Skellington.

[Andrew]

Well, it doesn't say skellington, but it is like dying in a video game where your body just falls into a pile of bones.

[Craig]

And the point of all, I think, if you want to draw some thematic resonance from these, like, Mutt attacks, where he can never, like, stop anyone from being killed by these Mutts because they've been programmed to kill these kids specifically. So, like, they will. These, like, these rodents were always gonna eat this kid to nothing left, no matter what Haymitch did, you know? And similarly, I think, like, the Capitol will destroy people no matter what. He does that sort of thing. He does blow up the pool. He. Here's a big generator. Come on.

[Andrew]

It kind of, like, breaks part of.

[Craig]

The Hunger Games, but then a volcano.

[Andrew]

Blows up, but they just, like, edit around it. Like, that's. It's not like Haymitch thought. He pretty much thought he was gonna die in the explosion that he was gonna make. So he hadn't really thought about what the next step was. But it's clear that no one had thought about what the next step was when it sort of partially breaks the Hunger Games. And then they just Go on. Anyway, would have gone, yep, yeah.

[Craig]

And so then he's kind of in a. And then we move into part three, which is titled the Poster. And I. I could not. I know that this running dialogue is about, like, don't let them paint posters with your blood. Like, you know, paint your own poster. Like that's the phrase. But I just kept thinking about posting. I couldn't. Anytime they said the poster my Hunger Games don't know about Hunger Games don't know about social media.

[Andrew]

They don't know about social.

[Craig]

Weird thing.

[Andrew]

But they do know about AI but.

[Craig]

They do know about it. It's a weird thing to think about in a, like, living in the current media landscape where all of this feels very relevant. And yet the Hunger Games does not have a form of recognizable social media for very understandable reasons within the world.

[Andrew]

But I mean, if they had social media, though, you know that Coriolanus Snow is a. Is a like a. Is a bad post. Like, he's posting, oh, he's terrible 30 times a day, wondering why people don't love him more at the same time as he, like, kills their families.

[Craig]

Ketamine Snow or whatever you want to call him. Yeah.

[Andrew]

So then Tesla Heavensbee is a sort of plausible hunger Names name. My name is Ariana SpaceX. Welcome to the Hunger Games.

[Craig]

It's all so terrible. So then Haymitch doesn't know what to do. He's like, what if I just got out there, you know, mess things up for some people. And then he's like, oh, what if I could get out of the arena? Maybe I could blow up the generator. But he runs into Maisalie. They don't really share their secrets, but they do work together. She kind of resents the fact that he's not telling her his secrets. They kill some game makers.

[Andrew]

They kill some game makers. This is the part of the book where the Lenore Dove thing sort of rankled me the most. I feel like it's more organic for Haymitch and for Maisily to do an enemies to lovers sort of romantic thing. And then to have her die in the Hunger Games and like to have them both realize, oh, I like you a lot. Oh, you're gonna die in the Hunger Games. Or one of us has to die in the Hunger Games.

[Craig]

Yeah, I know.

[Andrew]

And I know that they. They try to do that a little bit by like doing the like the brother sister thing.

[Craig]

Yep. But she's just so committed to not replicating a Hunger Games based romance.

[Andrew]

She does. She doesn't want to do Katniss PETA. But I think, like, Suzanne Collins is always just, like, just to the. Just, like, just to the side of a romantic subplot that I'm invested in. Like, the PETA Gale thing, I never cared about.

[Craig]

No, she's not. And I don't know that she is either. So it's just it. But I'm with you. You get into a groove as a reader where you're like, well, this is going this way, clearly.

[Andrew]

Well, that, like, the Hunger Games had to, like, that was post Twilight. And so it's like, oh, two boys, like, this one girl. Well, I guess we have to, like, play up this, this aspect of the whole thing, whether it work, whether it works or not.

[Craig]

And so she. She does get killed by some evil birds. And it's pretty Evil flamingos, right?

[Andrew]

Like, they're pretty awful. Yeah. She's not a skellington.

[Craig]

No, the bird, like, puts its beak through her throat, like. Yeah, I, I, I have a note in my edition that's just, like, this book, man. Like, the. In the Business of Kid Killing this book. So they're down to three. One career Haymitch and another newcomer. He's wondering if he could blow up the Cornucopia. The other newcomer dies. He and this career named Silke basically kill each other. But, of course, then the axe force field boomerang happens.

[Andrew]

Yeah, Like, Haymitch is bleeding. They're basically having a race to see who can bleed out first. And then Silka throws an ax at Haymitch. And Haymitch, having tried to blow, like, tried to damage the generator before, knows that it has a bouncy castle force field. And so it, so he knows to just, like, stay on the ground bleeding out while this ax flies back at this person's head. And that. That's how we get to the version of the, the of Haymitch's victory that we know about.

[Craig]

Yep. And then the rest of the book.

[Andrew]

I mean, you know, wouldn't you believe. Would you. Would you believe that the rest of this book is an unrelenting, miserable slog where everything that anyone has ever known or loved just, like, dies in a fire? Like, literally.

[Craig]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Andrew]

A book that has not been uplifting so far is like, all right. Scorched earth, baby Poison gumdrops. We're doing the whole thing.

[Craig]

I don't, I didn't, I didn't pull it out of the, Like, I didn't copy the text out or anything. But somebody in our discord was talking about how, like. Because they knew how, like, the terrible state Haymitch was in coming into the book. It did actually kind of make the slog a little easier to bear because it's not. You're, you know, it's going to work out.

[Andrew]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Craig]

But no, he comes out and he has no idea how his efforts have been edited. It's probably all for naught. He attends an after the final rose ceremony where he has to watch all the heavily, heavily edited footage where he sees that some of his events have been. Some of his things have been happening, like, out of order, which to me, like, I guess I. I think I assumed it was like the Truman show, like, it was just always on, you know.

[Andrew]

Mm.

[Craig]

But I guess they're edit. And they're editing more of it as it's happening or it's on more of a delay as it's being broadcast or something.

[Andrew]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, even, even the, like the reaping part is on a five minute delay. They say explicitly in the beginning. But yeah, I bet the actual games are more. Yeah. Like, probably hours rather than. Rather than minutes.

[Craig]

Well, and he.

[Andrew]

Because the people in the districts don't, like, know any different.

[Craig]

That's true. And. And he.

[Andrew]

And it's also. It's like the Olympics on NBC. Like, this is. This stuff happened on the other. This, this stuff happened on the other side of the globe. It could happen whenever. It's not a big great metaphor.

[Craig]

Wow. Yeah. Okay.

[Andrew]

This is why we can't have social media in this universe because everybody would have gotten the Hunger Games spoiled for them on the Olympics.

[Craig]

Really doesn't like it when you post clips on social media. Yeah, that's. Yeah, that's.

[Andrew]

Coriolanus Snow is like, oh, you posted. You posted that Break dancing lady. I'm gonna. I'm gonna have goons come to your house and kill your Grandma.

[Craig]

I sold McDonald's ads against that breakdancing. They're the official sold.

[Andrew]

I sold DraftKings ass.

[Craig]

And after. So he's like, oh, no, all my revolutionary stuff has been edited out. Oh, no one will ever know that. We were even attempting to like, you know, organize any of the tributes.

[Andrew]

Like, that's even the. Even. Even the Caesar Flickman stuff where the Newco and the near Beard careers are all being put into separate groups. Like, that all gets toned way down.

[Craig]

Yes. Because that is like the defining element of the games for Haymitch. And that's all gone. Then he has to, like, be in a cage at a bunch of parties where people take selfies with him. Interesting. And then he goes back home and the first thing he sees when he gets off the train is his family dying in a house fire.

[Andrew]

Yeah, his mom and his little brother. Sister.

[Craig]

Yeah, his little brother. Sibling, Sid.

[Andrew]

Yes.

[Craig]

Okay. And then he's sad about that, and he goes to visit Lenor Dove after, like, some. Like, why should I be with anybody? They're all just going to die anyway. He goes and sees her and she's like, great.

[Andrew]

Surely. Yes, sure. Surely this one person who they. The capital is already holding in prison this whole time. Surely when I go to be reunited with her, it'll Shortly after my family perished in a. And I think he's wary.

[Craig]

I don't think he thinks this.

[Andrew]

I don't think he's nearly wary. And enough. Because he's like, oh, these gumdrops you had on the ground, let me just feed you one of them. Without checking what color they are or whether they're the gumdrops. I think they are.

[Craig]

They are not the gumdrops he thought they were. They're from Coriolanus Snow. Snow falls on top and they do kill her. They're poison. And he doesn't have any charcoal tablets because he's not in the arena. I thought that was a weird thing for him to be like, who has charcoal tablets? That was a little weird. I'm very sorry for Haymitch. I know this was very. A very effective moment for a lot of readers, but it was, to me, odd that he was like charcoal tablets.

[Andrew]

Now you just, like, you just think of the. You know, you were in a situation.

[Craig]

Yes.

[Andrew]

This is why Coriolanus Snow engineered. This is because Haymitch was in a very similar situation recently.

[Craig]

You're right.

[Andrew]

He's gonna know exactly how it feels when Lenord of is choking on her poison gum drops.

[Craig]

And so, of course, of course, of.

[Andrew]

Course his brain would go to charcoal tablets.

[Craig]

And now. And it feels even worse because he doesn't have the tablets. Thank you, Snow.

[Andrew]

And it's an all the more ironic for being in the coal district. Somebody just scoop a big handful of dust and, like, push it together. That's charcoal, right? That's just. I played Minecraft. I know how you make charcoal.

[Craig]

Just bang on a tree and charcoal comes out.

[Andrew]

Well, you got to put the. The wood in a kiln.

[Craig]

Oh, sorry. I haven't seen the movie. I don't know how it works. Jack Black will teach me.

[Andrew]

You haven't seen a movie? A Minecraft movie?

[Craig]

A. Oh, sorry. Is that what it's Called Yes. Oh, my goodness, Save us, Jack Black. We. In this sequence, we do get some sneak peeks of Katniss's parents. Again, I don't know that Katniss is born before the events prior to the epilogue, but there are kind of references to Burdock and his.

[Andrew]

Her mom.

[Craig]

I don't remember her mom's name.

[Andrew]

Yeah, so the. Yeah, the epilogue is the one bit of post Hunger Games trilogy.

[Craig]

Yeah, that was kind of neat.

[Andrew]

Which is kind of neat is like, you know, Katniss and Peeta, it's still together, still kind of trying to make it work. And this is this answer actually a question I had really early on when I was reading about hey, Mitch, like, telling us his girlfriend's full government name and like, explaining again what the Hob was. And all this stuff is like, who is. Who's recording this? Who is it for? Like, what is. What is happening? Like, why am I reading these thoughts in, like, in. What is the in universe explanation for why I'm getting these thoughts from the sky with all this extra expository information for people who don't remember what happened in the first Hunger Games book?

[Craig]

Sure.

[Andrew]

And it is because Haymitch, like, it all spilled out of him as they were writing sort of an account of the. Of the war as they're writing the history books, basically.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

And Hamid starts, like, picking at the. At these events, and then it just all comes out.

[Craig]

Specifically, he mentions that, you know, they're making a. There's a page in the memorial book for Katniss's dad. And Katniss's dad is the one who shows Hay where they buried Lenore.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Lenor. Excuse me. Sorry.

[Andrew]

Lenor is the lady.

[Craig]

Not the only chamber door. Excuse me, Andrew. It's telling me he has to use the full name. My. My.

[Andrew]

My door above Lenor. Lenor Dove.

[Craig]

Lenor Dove. And he's like, oh. And then I just had to tell him about Ma. And then I had to tell them about Sid, and then I had to tell them everything. What is interesting about that paragraph? I do like that being in there. The book is not written as if it's old Haymitch, though. Like.

[Andrew]

No, it's written as if it's a Hunger Games book. And Suzanne Collins is like, yeah, I don't know if you read this book like a year ago or 15 years ago, but I just need to refresh your memory on some stuff occasionally.

[Craig]

And in that interview with David Leviathan, she did say that she did make a specific choice to make it Young Heish as the POV character, like, almost implying that she had considered a different mode for it. But she says, quote, found that the younger Haymitch speaks directly to the YA audience the best. So that was her intention. She. She wanted it to be a teen protagonist and not like, I think, as she said, like, Atticus Finch, like, retelling his youth or something like that. Like, that's not what she wanted. So, yeah, that's the, that's the plot of the book. I think we've covered most of the points.

[Andrew]

We've covered pretty much every thought that I. As we.

[Craig]

What was your question that you asked us an hour and a half ago?

[Andrew]

My question I asked an hour and a half ago. What are you talking about?

[Craig]

You asked us, like, what. What is she doing here?

[Andrew]

Yes.

[Craig]

Okay, so why cash grab a clock? Like, what is she doing?

[Andrew]

Why revisit these themes again? Yeah, is my question. I think you had linked like an article that was kind of about this.

[Craig]

Oh, the Polygon article. Yeah, it was just whatever.

[Andrew]

Whatever it was that you found that was like, Suzanne Collins doesn't think that you got it, and so she's really trying hard to make sure that you get it this time.

[Craig]

That's basically right. Every Hunger Book gets blunter about the messages fans keeps missing by Petrana Radulovic for Polygon. Yeah, this. The article is doing a little bit of recap for folks. So. But she's basically like, listen, we've been the Hollywood in particular and plenty of readers have ignored her intentions and messages about oppression and authoritarianism. It's not just a primer on media manipulation. Some of our Discord folks were like, hey, this could be read as baby's first media literacy. But book. And they don't mean that necessarily as a pejorative.

[Andrew]

No, just like, like literally somebody needs to be thinking about and teaching this. And I don't know what like, schools are going to be left to. To teach it.

[Craig]

So the article says it's Collins confronting a certain type of Hunger Games fan head on, asking them exactly why they're editing out her story's most uncomfortable themes and what they hope to achieve by softening the overall message to cater to their own pallets. I. I buy a version of that. It doesn't have to be. Doesn't even have to be her responding to fans specifically as much as her coming to a media landscape and being like, this is all overproduced and we are learning nothing.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

And when you asked that question, the first thing I thought of was the Newcomer alliance stuff. And how, how it is just utterly erased. And that is the thing that then the capital snaps back. And then over the next 24 years, there's, I would imagine there's none of or less of it each year until you get to Katniss. And then it has to be like that particular version of revolution visible. And yet you could also argue that it's like Plutarch. Folks like Plutarch are playing the long game. Right. They're like, we're not going to win this year. BT's plan is to blow up a pool. It's not snow.

[Andrew]

Folks like Plutarch can also afford to play the long game.

[Craig]

That's also part of it.

[Andrew]

They're operating from like a comfortable position. But yeah, I mean, like, literally everything about these books is like, the capital is creating artificial distinctions that distract you from what the real us versus them ought to be. The real, like, have versus have not ought to be. They've created the illusions of other haves so that the have nots can get mad at them instead of the actual halves.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

And they are, they just operate in like a state of constant terror that people will one day realize that there are like, more of us than there are of them. And they're trying to just like, head that off at any and all cost.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And like, that's the lesson. And every and everything else is in service of that. It's like it is in service of getting people not to come together in terms of a common goal.

[Craig]

Yep. Yep. I could see that would diffuse, like.

[Andrew]

That would diffuse all of it.

[Craig]

I could see her leafing through her well worn David Hume volumes. And coming upon this quote, it is therefore an on opinion only that government is founded. And this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military government, as well as to the most free and most popular. And just going, yeah, that seems relevant to what I've been looking at over the last eight to 10 years. Gonna make sure that people got it.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Which is interesting. Like, if you think of. And this is, this is, this is a topic that I have a pretty surface level awareness of. So I'm not, I'm gonna try not to get too in the weeds. But if you imagine like a North Korea Riyadh situation, okay. Like, everybody, like, what if everybody, a majority of like regular people in North Korea are like, we aren't. We're not doing this anymore.

[Craig]

What would happen? Yeah.

[Andrew]

Yeah. What would happen? And I think and, and the things that you see that regime do, including like controlling the media and having all this like highly orchestrated stuff telling lies about what the outside world was like blocking off outside influences. Like everything is in service of making the people not do that. Even though it's a dictatorship and not like a democracy.

[Craig]

Yep. Yep.

[Andrew]

So yeah, just. Just interesting to think about, I guess. Yeah.

[Craig]

And interesting again that she decided to do this with a book that is not a like. And now I will tell a. A three part tale over multiple books. I just needed to go visit Haymitch for a while.

[Andrew]

Yeah, I just needed to start with trying to engender some sympathy for the. For the dictator first. And then I'm gonna get to this. Then I'm gonna get to this others.

[Craig]

And maybe that didn't work as well. So I got to go to Haymitch. I did. Did you catch in that episode? And this will be the last thing I say that I did. I said as I was frustrated by the 10th annual Hunger Games. Maybe I want a book about Hunger Games 20. And you said, careful what you wish for.

[Andrew]

Be careful what you wish for, my dude.

[Craig]

It's true. Thanks everybody for listening to our snaptake reaction to what's this book called? Sunrise on the Reaping.

[Andrew]

They do explain it on the Reaping.

[Craig]

What if the sun came up every day? What if the sun didn't come up?

[Andrew]

Well, because Lenore. Lenore Dove is doing like bioshock environmental storytelling by painting, like can't let the sunrise be. You can't let the sun rise on another reaping. Hey, Mitch.

[Craig]

Hey, Mitch.

[Andrew]

She paints this in her own blood on like the side of a bathtub or something. And that's what keeps Haymitch going for the rest. Rest.

[Craig]

You're not wrong. Thanks everybody for listening. You can send us your Hunger Games takes to overdue podmail.com or find us on social media at Overdue Pod. Thanks to Nick Lauren, just who composed our theme music, Andrew. If folks want to know more about the show, where do they go?

[Andrew]

Overdue podcast.com is of course, as always, our information super Highway Superstation. All the things that you could hope to know about the show are there, including links to ways you can subscribe, links to the books that we have read and the ones we're going to read. The schedule for April should be up there imminently. Craig, what are we doing in April?

[Craig]

I forget The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner, the Ministry of Time by Kaylee Ann Bradley, Stories of your life and others by Ted Chang and Woof. Twilight Again. Again. Life and death. Life and Death. Twilight Again. Reimagined Return to Fork.

[Andrew]

At this point, she could just release a book that was called Twilight Again that was just like, what if Twilight, but from Bella's perspective and people would go nuts. That would sell. That would sell 2 million copies.

[Craig]

Oh, my God. If she just sat down, was like, what if I just tried to write the book from memory?

[Andrew]

What if I. What if I retold Twilight for Bella's perspective?

[Craig]

What if I retold Midnight sun from Bella's perspective?

[Andrew]

Well, I mean, you gotta do the gender swap Edward book too.

[Craig]

Yes, you do.

[Andrew]

Like, what, what is this book like from Edith. Edith Collins perspective?

[Craig]

Are there, is there enough Paramore and Muse to put on these soundtracks to keep pumping up these.

[Andrew]

I mean, they keep coming out with albums, I think, I think all groups, all these acts are still together. Anyway, Return to Twilight. Everybody. Have fun with that. Patreon.com overdue pod is a place where you can give us money, which is good for us.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

Just like, just like, you do the math, but also you also, you get some stuff. You get to be in our discord. You get bonus episodes early. You get to sit in on like, bonus recordings. The bonus episodes I'm talking about, of course, are our long read shows like Sit Me Baby One More Time.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Drawing close to the end of our selected read through of the Babysitters Club series by Anne M. Martin, which is going to conclude pretty soon with a viewing of the 90s movie.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

With overdue podcast favorite Larissa Olanik and others.

[Craig]

And others. I'm sure other people are in it.

[Andrew]

I'm sure other people are in it. Patreon.com Greg, do we got anything else? Are we done?

[Craig]

No, I'm just stuck here in the games. I'm running from a. A really big porcupine and I got to get out. I got. I got to get out. I got to bang on the wall.

[Andrew]

Like, I am going to throw this book away and then I'm going to duck and the book is going to come back and it's going to hit you in the face.

[Craig]

And then you win.

[Andrew]

And then I win. All right, everybody, thank you for listening to another Hunger Games podcast. And until we talk to you for another Twilight podcast, please try to be happy.