To me (and this is MY OPINION aha) Lucy Gray is dead because the way her voice seems to haunt Snow after he’s shot her … it’s very ghost like and supernatural the way it just seems to surround him.
*TBOSAS SPOILER*i’m so obsessed with tbosas ending where the badass music is playing (the same music from mj1 ending) and the closeup of snow’s face looking at the rainbow on the skirt of the statue (lucy gray haunting him) and the black screen and future president snow saying it’s the things we love most that destroy us and then the majestic music and the tbosas logo IT’S JUST SUCH A MASTERPIECE.
I'm this close to dropping everything related to my phd and writing a fanfic of lucy gray staying in the capitol with snow. imo snow would definitely end up the same deranged power hungry person (because collins left so many hints at that in the first part of the book even before he was banished and became a peacekeepr. he just needed a push) but i want to explore how he would descend into that when he at first gets all he wanted from the games, all the money and fame and ofc a secure future. also we got to see snow in 12 aka lucy gray's world, i would love to see how lucy gray would've reacted to the capitol, not just the games part of it, but snow's world, all the scheming and politics and backstabbing. how she'd change, if she changes, how she would feel about not being able to preform, the level of fame she got. it would be such a great au to write tbh.
thinking about how the hunger games were designed to prove that without society, order, government, someone to rule, we devolve into little more than animals, and how the games themselves prove over and over again that this is not true. We see it in every single game we witness.
Katniss placing flowers around Rue's body in the arena. Thresh sparing Katniss because she was kind to Rue, even though he was making it that much harder for himself to win.
Haymitch going back for Maysilee after hearing her scream even though their alliance had been broken. Haymitch holding her as she dies the same way Katniss did Rue.
Coral's "I can't have killed them all for nothing" when she realizes she's not going home. Lamina cutting down Marcus at great personal risk. And, my favorite moment in tbosas, Reaper collecting the bodies of his fellow tributes, his peers, even the ones who tried to kill him, into a pile. Taking the weapons from their hands. Closing their eyes and crossing their arms in the best approximation of a proper burial he can manage, covering them with the Capitol flag as a makeshift shroud.
The Games bring out the worst in people, yes. But despite the extreme circumstances, despite the exterior pressure of the Capitol, despite the fact that it could mean pain and heartbreak and death, it also shows that people have an enormous capacity for goodness. That even in a situation purposefully designed to make empathy impossible, people can't help but have it anyway.
Snow looks at the Games and all he can see is what's inside himself-- this pure animalistic drive to conquer and defeat. He kills and it feels good and he thinks that everyone else must feel that way too. He doesn't realize (maybe can't realize) that he is the exception, not the rule. He cannot see outside himself, outside his own warped perspective, to realize that the fact that people do show humanity in the games proves his entire worldview wrong.
thinking about the fact that they made a point to tell us that there are no cameras in the vents. like- lucy gray is a performer, she is always performing, it is her calling and her survival mechanism and when we meet her she literally cannot stop performing because she is always on camera or being perceived- by coriolanus, by the capital, by her fellow tributes and the folks back at 12. but for that one, awful moment, in the vents, watching dill drink the poisoned water she laid as a trap- for that one moment in the whole entire movie, lucy gray isn’t being observed. that is the only moment in the entire movie she isn’t performing for someone else, and she uses it to grieve
coriolanus saying "is this real" to lucy gray about their feelings for each other because he needs to know that he's doing this for something and won't be wasting his time aka doing it for selfish reasons to make sure he's benefitting vs. peeta saying "real or not real" to katniss about their feelings because they're both equally traumatized and need the reassurance but their love isn't transactional and he's not asking for himself he's asking for both of them, so that they're both grounded in each other
Ok ok I’ll preface this by saying i am a literature freak (English degree + a writer) and adaptions really do kill me because details matter so much to me in books
BUT if I had to rate TBOSAS movie I’d say it’s a solid 3.5 stars out of 5
There may be spoilers below
AND NOT BECAUSE OF THE ACTING OR THE BEAUTIFUL SETS OR COSTUMING. Absolutely great job by everyone with what they were given. The acting was a VERY good part of this movie
I hated the pacing. Often I felt it drew on too long or wrapped up too fast. It just ! I know the time constraint of a movie + a book of this length (the “main” action of the hunger games compared to everything set in 12 are so vastly different and would make this movie imo a nightmare to make no matter who did it)
And I also entertained the idea (by myself) of this actually having been split into two movies (which I normally hate so me even CONSIDERING it is wild) but then again!!!! The second half of the book even draws on stupidly long. I’ve read it at least 4 times and I get so damn bored at the end 😂
Besides the pacing, I am not a massive fan of some of the changes. Characters being left out (what tf happened to Clemensia? Where is Ma???? Did the twins even die in the movie?!) and the .. almost idiotic “telling not showing” the characters did? I hated that
I felt like the dialogue was … not amazing at parts of the movie. Which was disappointing.
Im beyond tired, so im sorry if none of this made any sense. Also, I have more opinions I just can’t think of any due to my brain being tired (it’s 11 pm)
And this is NOT me shitting on this movie at all. I think it was entertaining enough. There were just some directions I did not love. Still 3.5 is I think a fair rating (again I am picky lol!) I’d venture maybe for 4 if I could get past some of the things that bothered me.
Let me know if you have any opinions etc about some of the stuff I said. Again apologies for the messiness my brain and I wish to sleep LOL
the part where they cut off the games to broadcast the president's son died with "an important life was taken today" SECONDS AFTER watching a pile of dead district children was chilling