OT - The Hunger Games

[simonmark6]

I've read the series and it's OK. Not fantastic or ground breaking but a decent page-turner. I don't know about the film, but the ubiquitous love triangle is already there in book one.

The new take on the "Bread and Circuses" idea is OK as is the repressive actions of the government.

It could be used in the sense of institutionalised violence being used as a tool of control. What if the powers that be in Krakow decided to institute a Games to allow robotniki a fast track into the city. Win three fights and get citizenship. It could be a pressure release against the rioting and if you add sentences of fighting in the game, you might get an interesting scenario.

Add a freedom fighter who uses the games to spread the message of revolt, and you won't be far off the premise of the books.

Katniss is also emotionally compromised, suspicious and reliant on violence to solve her problems: she's pretty much a PC...

[Jason Weiser]

Simon,
I do believe you're on to something here. I also read the trilogy on my nook. It was decent. Liked the first two but the third was blah. Bows and arrows shooting down aircraft....um, no. But I did like the ideas for Krakow. That would work....

[Fusilier]

Originally Posted by simonmark6

What if the powers that be in Krakow decided to institute a Games to allow robotniki a fast track into the city. Win three fights and get citizenship.

Add in the occasional lunatic who volunteers to play because he enjoys the sport. I stole that from BR but in T2000 there would probably be plenty of unhinged people like that.

[simonmark6]

Yup, third book moved away from relationships and face to face combat into war stories and she sucked at that. Still, lots of my kids are reading it and I've been able to interest them in Twilight 2000 of the back of it rather than them expecting anything with Twilight in the title to be about sparkly-bastard vampires and poncy werewolves.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

Originally Posted by simonmark6

Yup, third book moved away from relationships and face to face combat into war stories and she sucked at that. Still, lots of my kids are reading it and I've been able to interest them in Twilight 2000 of the back of it rather than them expecting anything with Twilight in the title to be about sparkly-bastard vampires and poncy werewolves.

That's no vampire. It's a sparkle-fairy!

[Targan]

I went and watched The Hunger Games with my wife last night. She liked it. I liked it until the combat started, then I just wanted to see the main female protagonist get killed.

*Possible Spoilers* (avert your eyes for the rest of the post if you don't want surprises ruined).

The only characters I really had any respect for were the Tributes from Districts 1 and 2. They had been put through combat and survival academies from an early age and had volunteered for the Hunger Games. The big, scary male Tribute from District 1 (who was supposed to be the main bad guy among the Tributes) really had his shit together. He must have killed 5 or 6 other tributes single handedly, half of them within the first 2 minutes of the games commencing.

The main protagonist, Katniss, rocked with a bow but if she was a male would have suffered from severe erectile dysfunction. The idea behind the Hunger Games is to make best use of whatever weapons and equipment are provided. She acted smart at the start of the games but then progressively acted like she had a head injury. When another Tribute she was allied with died in front of her she had a little cry (ok, fine, she's a chick and her little friend had died) but then she didn't loot the body (even though she had given the kid a whole box of survival matches like a half hour before). Then she spends 10 or 15 minutes (with other Tributes almost certainly hunting her at the time) picking flowers to arrange around her friend's corpse, and throws away a really nice all-metal spear that her friend had been killed with. At that point I just wanted her to be killed, and failing that I could have settled for seeing her maimed. What a retard.

I'll definitely watch the sequel(s) but only so I can enjoy the moments when Katniss gets injured. I'll be cheering at those moments. Given her status in the films I've already given up on seeing her die. I'll just have to get by imagining that at some time later in her life she gets some horrible disease and dies in pain.

[Tegyrius]

Targan, I think it's safe to say you are not the target audience.

- C.

[pmulcahy11b]

The Hunger Games trilogy -- just some of the literally hundreds of books I own but have yet to read. I have got to save up the money for a tablet...

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by Tegyrius

Targan, I think it's safe to say you are not the target audience.

- C.

I had a friend in high school who read the Lord of the Rings trilogy hoping that Mordor would come out on top...