I love a good villain origin story; but finding yourself rooting for a man that later terrorizes characters you love is a strange feeling.
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes takes place 64 years before the Hunger Games trilogy. The movie features Coriolanus Snow before his tyrannical reign as president of Panem. He’s barely scraping by when he becomes mentor to the eye catching district 12 candidate, Lucy Grey.
Performer and singer Lucy is the antithesis of Hunger Games’ protagonist and natural hunter, Katniss Everdeen.
The games change that.
Lucy becomes a hunter and Katniss a performer. Driven but kind Snow turns cruel and murderous. And the games show what happens to humanity without society; the prey become the predators.
When I hear the word dystopian, I think The Hunger Games. It’s been five years since I read and watched Hunger Games and this series still has me in a chokehold. Which is why I was skeptical when hearing of the prequel. I thought it pointless to add onto an already symbolic series.
I was wrong.
It didn’t piggyback off of the Hunger Games; it added to the compelling story with new captivating characters and storylines. Actors Rachel Zegler and Tom Blyth perfectly captured the essence of Lucy and Snow.
It’s also filled with parallels. The most notable was when Lucy talks about the plant Katniss, alluding to Snow’s later enemy and downfall. Another was Lucy’s bow after the reaping, mirroring Katniss’s defiant bow against the game makers scoring her. Or Lucy singing the Hanging Tree, later Katniss’ rebellion anthem. It’s these tiny details that remind you this prequel lays the foundation of the inevitable wars in the trilogy.
They also served as a wakeup call to stop rooting for Snow. As he stops at nothing to help Lucy win I forgot the person he later becomes. However, in the last third of the movie it was apparent he was losing sight of himself.
When Lucy states that she believes everyone is born good and it’s up to them to not cross the moral line into evil, Snow laughs it off. Then he crosses that line.
The best part, though, was the ending audio clip from Snow in the Mocking Jay Part One saying, “It’s the things that we love the most that destroy us.” Snow chooses power over love and this leads to his bitter character. And it’ll take 64 years until Katniss disproves his mantra that “snow lands on top.”
