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So... has anybody seen the movie? Read the books? What do you think? Is it over-hyped teen drama or deeply meaningful political commentary?

I like Katniss. She kicks ass.

Haven't yet, but plan to give the books a try. Students have been recommending them to me for awhile.

No and nope! In fact, until rather recently this phenomenon had totally escaped me. Is this supposed to be the new Twilight or Harry Potter? This is what is called Young Adult fiction, right? Anyway, the actress looks good from the photos I've seen.

Careful. The character's 16, I think.

Some are seeing this series as a political commentary on the haves and the have-nots. I've seen arguments that it's pro-liberal (down with the rich... more power to the poor) and arguments that it's pro-conservative (down with big government... every hunter for him/herself). Still others claim that it's just more teen angst a la Twilight (Team Peeta vs Team Gale) and that there's no deep thought involved in it at all. Me, I'm on Team Katniss.

Distracted wrote:Careful. The character's 16, I think.

Eeeek!

*runs to check*

Whew! The actress, Jennifer Lawrence, is apparently born in 1990. Dodged that one... But Katniss? What a silly name for a character!

I liked this movie when it was Battle Royale.

Kevin Thomas Riley wrote:

Distracted wrote:Careful. The character's 16, I think.

Eeeek!

*runs to check*

Whew! The actress, Jennifer Lawrence, is apparently born in 1990. Dodged that one... But Katniss? What a silly name for a character!

The names are weird. That's true.

Distracted wrote:So... has anybody seen the movie? Read the books? What do you think? Is it over-hyped teen drama or deeply meaningful political commentary?

I like Katniss. She kicks ass.

I kinda got sucked in when I got curious about the books. Went and saw the movie Friday night and was immediately reminded of why I almost always wait until things come out on video. $11 for a ticket to a throbbing headache due to trying to look at a screen that is too wide for my field of vision while listening to a volume turned up so high as to be painful...?

...but I digress. I liked the book, I liked the movie, and I don't classify it as teen angst although I do classify it as having teens for an audience. But I don't find it as meaningful as it could be either. It suffers from being watered-down, though the watering down was necessary to keep it to a "teen" book and a PG-13 rating. Unfortunately, there's only so far you can water down certain types of commentary before making them ineffective, and that's what happened here.

I do not like Katniss. She's self-centered and immature, and far too naive for me to believe she grew up in the circumstances she did. I also am admittedly not a fan of the way the love triangle turned out. (Trying to keep it vague to be non-spoilery.) But the storytelling, particularly in the book but also in the movie, is extremely tight and well-structured, and when the plot elements start to annoy me I can step back on focus on the structure for a few minutes to calm down.

Get a load of this:

The Boy With The Bread + The Girl on Fire= Team Toast

S'not my fault! My 13 year old and her friends came up with that!

^ I now I get that joke!

*****

Finally saw The Hunger Games movie. It was OK, but not as awesome as all the hype has led you to believe. Weird premise where the rulers all looked like they were from a Lady Gaga video. I've been told the books are better, but I wouldn't know since I haven't read them.

But Jennifer Lawrence sure was yummy! Now I know who'll be the next babe for my calendar. But there wasn't a lot of chemistry between her and that bread guy (but maybe that was intentional?)

Ooooh! Better not let my teenaged daughter hear you say that!

I agree, though. It could be just a limitation of the actors, since Jennifer is a couple of years older than Josh and in RL apparently thinks of him more as a little brother than as a potential love interest, but in the books Katniss is still conflicted at this point about whether she likes Peeta in "that way" or not, so it also might be deliberate. We'll see in the next couple of films, I guess.

Oh my, another shipper war brewing!

But that other guy was hardly in the movie, so I can't really compare them. I like Team Katniss/Kevin!

I was actually disappointed that she didn't have to kill the bread guy in the end. It felt like such a cop-out by the writer.

Ah, but killing him would have placed the novels out of the young adult section, I think. Too tragic for 14 year old girls to deal with. And besides, if she had killed him we wouldn't have the pleasure of later becoming aquainted with (spoiler warning!) EvilBrainwashedPeeta!(tm).

I'm still personally getting over the idea that the next book needs two movies to tell its tale.

...really? Where I come from, editing is considered a good thing, and goodness knows Collins edited the holy crap out of the books before submitting them for publication.