I'm not quite as crazy for these books as every. single. person. I know seems to be. I wasn't even planning on buying them (since I didn't think I'd read them again) until I saw Mockingjay for 50 cents at a garage sale yesterday and I couldn't resist. But I do like them a lot.

What's your favorite book? The Hunger Games, without a doubt. For some reason I was much more into it than the others, for which my attention waxed and waned. Mockingjay was my least favourite.

What's your opinion on the ending of Mockingjay? The ending itself was fine, but I think the whole book was not written as well as the other two. It was too jumpy. It drove me crazy how Collins dragged out

Spoiler

they're running around in the Capitol, but even then, at the pivotal moment (Prim's death), OH NOES! Three days later in the hospital.

Peeta or Gale? Peeta - not so much because I love him, but because I don't like Gale. He's so moody and he seems really territorial and I don't care for that kind of guy at all.

Who is your favorite character in the trilogy? CINNA. He's just so lovely and smart and brave in his own way. Second favourite is Finnick, because I just about always like the cocky characters.

Spoiler

They both died! Whyyyy?

Who is your perfect casting for the film? I try not to think about that too much, because the chance of my picks being the ones that end up in the movie are like one in 3 billion, so I try not to get too attached to people in a role that I know they won't have. BUT, that said, I would love Amy Adams to play Effie Trinket. And I do kind of like Robert Downey Jr as Haymitch, but I think he's too pretty for him, if you know what I mean. I have to say I'm not keen on Jennifer Lawrence though.

Wow! It's nice to see a thread on this series. I've been obsessed with them ever since I first read The Hunger Games when it first came out (plus there was pretty much no information back then, I can't believe how much it has exploded in popularity, especially because I've been going on about this books for a long time)

Anyway,

What's your favorite book? Since The Hunger Games is what made me become obsessed with the series I would say it would have to be that one. But Catching Fire and Mockingjay are close behind.

What's your opinion on the ending of Mockingjay? I did like the ending. It was a gut wrenching book and I had to put it down for a few minutes (especially towards the end) because so much was happening. I remember that I couldn't stop thinking about the series when I finished.

Peeta or Gale? Peeta! He was always my first choice. I always thought Gale would end up being a little crazy.

Who is your favorite character in the trilogy? Katniss because even though she's so emotionally stunted I completely admire her love for her sister. She's so brave and even though she can't always show 'love' I think by her actions you can see she is capable of it. Peeta of course. For being so steadfast and strong. And Finnick. I grew to love him. I thought he was awesome and

Who is your perfect casting for the film?
I'm a huge fan of Jennifer Lawrence. And I think she will be exceptional. I read that Suzanne Collins preferred an older actress to someone too young. Plus she was there for each audition and was able to see who could capture Katniss best. As for Peeta I don't mind Hunter Parrish, mainly because he looks like Peeta in my head. Everyone else not sure.

just thought I'd bring the new casting news over here, how does everyone feel about Josh as Peeta and Liam as Gale?

I'm not too happy about that, to be honest. Josh just not how I picture Peeta in any way. And I don't think he'd look that good with blond hair. Also, I'm worried that he'll look too young next to Jennifer. But I'll wait till I see his acting to make final judgments.
I'm certainty still seeing the movie, but I just might wait until bargain theaters.
Liam I have almost no opinions on. Don't know much about his acting ability, but with his hair dark he'll have the look right.
But, I'm not as concerned with Gale's casting as I am with Peeta's. Gale isn't in the first book much anyway.

I recently read this series for the first time, and I'm still not sure what my thoughts on it were. It was kind of a mixed bag, in my opinion; there were a few things that I did not agree with (some of the aspects of Katniss and Peeta's relationship, for example), but overall I found that the books were pretty good, considering the subject matter. I didn't dislike the series... I just didn't really like it.

What's your favorite book? The Hunger Games. My favorite part in the whole series is when Katniss

Spoiler

shoots an arrow at the judges during the scoring. That was pretty epic.

What's your opinion on the ending of Mockingjay? Ehh, so-so. Like most of you, there were some things that I wish hadn't happened, but it was pretty much impossible to have a 'happily ever after' ending with all that had happened before.
I didn't care for the book as a whole because I thought there were waaaay too many people struggling with their sanity throughout it. Honestly.

Peeta or Gale? Finnick. In all seriousness, though, neither. I don't get all the hype about Peeta, and on the flip side I don't see why so many people dislike Gale. In my opinion, neither one of them was all that amazing, or all that bad. I probably have more objections about Peeta than Gale, though.

Who is your favorite character in the trilogy? ...Finnick, maybe? Or maybe Rue... Prim is good, too. I really don't know. I started out wanting to dislike Finnick, but it got to where I just couldn't help liking him. He's pretty awesome during the games in CF, and then he's pretty good in Mockingjay once he stops struggling with his sanity. He and Annie were my favorite pairing in the whole series.
Katniss is impressive at times, but there's just something about her that won't let me like her as much as I feel I should like the main character. I like her at the beginning of the series, and through most of THG because she's just trying to stay alive, and the killing still bothers her. During the rest of the series though, it just seemed like she stopped caring about it. I understand that she's been through some horrible stuff, and I don't have a clue how I would react in her place, but it felt like she became... I don't know how to describe it, but I found it revealing that it gets to the point where she can't even think of one reason why someone shouldn't kill her. (And then she ends up in the hospital again. Woop-woop. )

Who is your perfect casting for the film? Not planning on seeing the film, so no opinion.

...if anyone is interested in discussing these books a little deeper than "OMW I LOVE KATNISS PEETA IS SO PERFECT I LOVE HIM TEAM GALE ALL THE WAY", I'm all game.

I'm with you on this.
And I second your opinion of Katniss' name; totally teen heroine-ish and dumb.

...but I had him pegged for psycho pretty much from the start.

...Gale is a psycho? So... what does that make Peeta during Mockingjay?

hyaline, I agree 100% with your assessment of Katniss in Mockingjay!! My reaction: "Oh look, Katniss is in the hospital again." It got really old, really fast.

--- flambeau

Peeta was

Peeta was

Spoiler

tortured into mental instability

. Gale

Spoiler

decided to help make WMDs designed to kill people trying to help wounded victims without any pressure on his sanity.

That's pretty psycho.

Ditto. Comparing Gale and Peeta is like comparing apples to oranges. Both were in two completely different circumstances and yeah...doesn't even compare.

Please don't feel like I'm bashing your opinions or anything. I really am interested in hearing other people's perspective on the books, especially when the differ so vastly from mine.

I can see how Katniss' mental instability in Mockingjay might be viewed as a cop-out and not at all what one might have expected from her given the first two books. But I thought that, given the issues that Collins was trying to write about as far as war and it's effect on people, it was pretty appropriate to deal with the less glamorous, yet still very realistic side of war. It's not romantic, pretty, enjoyable or easy. But I thought it was a bit of a brave choice of Collin's to take characters that she's molded into such heros and show them breaking into itty bitty pieces, and then slowly puts them back together. It's not traditional or what's to be expected, but I have a feeling it's probably a far more realistic and accurate portrayal of what would really happen to people who were put in those situations.

Tomorrow I'll finally begin Catching Fire. I'll post my thoughts on it as soon as I read it completely.

The accuracy of what the characters go through over the course of the trilogy is one of the things that I like the best about the series. So many books portray war in this glitzy, glammed up light where the characters are able to kill dozens or hundreds of people with absolutely no damage to their mental stability whatsoever. The battle in Eldest comes to mind in which Eragon slaughters soldiers by ripping their life forces out and feels nothing over it. That's just not how life works. In real life we call the people who are able to kill with no compunction sociopaths. The fact that so many of our heroic characters essentially have the hallmark characteristics of sociopathy is something that really disturbs me.

A Hunger Games thread! I just finished the whole series a couple weeks ago, and loved it. I read the whole thing in 3 days like Gymfan. I really think I need to reread it, because I was reading so fast I had barely any time to really process what was happening and dwell on it.

What's your favorite book? The Hunger Games, I think. This is pretty bad, but I read them all so fast I kind of forget where one book ends and the other one begins. But I'm just going to say the first one, I think it kept me engaged the most. It was really fast paced, where I think the other two move a little bit slower.

What's your opinion on the ending of Mockingjay? I was satisfied with it.

Peeta or Gale? In book 1, I was for Gale. But by book 3 I was kind of hating Gale and was for Peeta. I don't really have a very strong preference for either, I like both for different reasons. But, I was very happy with how things turned out, and really wouldn't have it any other way. That being said, I thought that was a very well done love triangle. I don't usually like love triangles, but this one I actually liked.

Who is your favorite character in the trilogy? Hmm. I really liked Prim. Cinna and Finnick are definitely up there, too.

Who is your perfect casting for the film? I'm really not familiar enough with actors and actresses to choose. Robert Downey Jr. is like, exactly how I picture Haymitch, though.

Interesting interview I found with Suzanne Collins that talks about how she came up with the idea for the Hunger Games series, and talks about some of her thoughts behind various aspects of it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/10/magaz ... ted=1&_r=2

I found this quote particularly interesting:

Back in 2009, the literary agent Rosemary Stimola sat down to read “Mockingjay,” the third, highly anticipated book in a wildly popular trilogy of young adult novels by Suzanne Collins. Stimola, who represents Collins, read eagerly until she came to one of the last chapters, in which a firebombing kills thousands of civilians caught in a revolutionary war, including one heartbreakingly innocent and beloved young character. The book was then a computer file, not yet the blockbuster it would become upon its release last August. Changes could still be made. Stimola picked up the phone and called Collins.

“No!” Stimola wailed. “Don’t do it.”

She was reacting as a reader, not a career adviser, but perhaps in the back of her mind she was imagining the emotions the plot twist might provoke in the book’s youthful fans: depression rather than inspiration, desolation rather than triumph. The capacity of young-adult literature for dark messaging has been expanding since the early ’70s, but this poignant loss seemed almost unbearable.

“Oh, but it has to be,” Collins told her. Stimola, paraphrasing, recalled the explanation Collins offered her over the phone: “This is not a fairy tale; it’s a war, and in war, there are tragic losses that must be mourned.”

I think that explains a lot of how different people perceive the books. When you're attached to the characters emotionally, all you want is for them to have a satisfying ending. But Collins said it perfectly....this wasn't a fairy tale, it's about a war, and there are always tragedy in war.

Thoughts?

I certainly agree with that, and like Bookwyrm, the greater realism of Collins' works, compared to so many others, is one thing i've always appreciated about her books.

(Not going to bother with spoiler tags, but major spoilers through-out)

Some people seem to feel that Prim's death means Katniss went through all that for nothing. I can kind of understand where they're coming from, but i don't really agree.

She volunteered for Prim's sake, of course, but as the story goes on it becomes about more than just surviving and keeping her sister alive. She covers Rue's body with flowers as a message, uses the berries to force the Capitol to play by her rules instead - if only once, and during Catching Fire wonders exactly how hard she should be trying to stop the rebellion.

And even if Prim's death did mean it was all for nothing ... sometimes, that's how life goes. It doesn't always make sense, and what we do doesn't always accomplish what we want. And i know we often read fiction to escape from real life, but if someone was reading The Hunger Games series because they thought it would be light-hearted escapist literature, i'd like to see the edition they were reading; it'd be an interesting read, i'm sure.

It's taken me so long to post in here I think because it's been so long since I read the books! Reading over all your posts, there's so much I don't remember at all!

I definitely want to talk about the books' realism though. I'm with Booky one hundred percent. I think the books are incredibly relevant and that they treat the themes that they wrestle with with a lot of respect. I just watched one of the Invisible Children documentaries last night. Children in the world do not have the luxury and safety they have where I live in the US. I'm also in a Food Systems Class this quarter that has caused me to think more about some of the issues of the Capital in the book. The Capital has plenty to eat and it's citizens live in the lap of luxury to the point of ridiculousness while the rest of the districts starve. That is not so different for the reality we see in our own world when we look at wealth and food distribution.

What's your favorite book? The Hunger Games. The first book in every series benefits from a singleness of mind and a tighter plot. That's what THG had, though the rest of the books were good sequels.

What's your opinion on the ending of Mockingjay? It was disappointing and I think that's the point. It's going to take a long time for the nation to rebuild, and not even to rebuild. They didn't even have much to go on before the war.

Peeta or Gale? I was always a Gale fan. I like the "best friend" romance relationship. It just makes sense that you would love the person you spend the most time with and the person you care about the most. And Peeta is just so perfect I thought it was a bit unfair. With the ending, I can hardly say that I wish she'd ended up with Gale, but I guess I wish Gale had made better choices.

Who is your favorite character in the trilogy? I guess Katniss. I don't know. I don't think the characters are bad, but they aren't the strongest part of the books.

Who is your perfect casting for the film? I'm ok with Lawrence and Hutcherson, but I have doubts about Gale. That's just not how I pictured him at all. I saw him as sort of like a tan Skandar Keynes. Thinner than Liam Hemsworth, with less macho movie star good looks. Maybe Luke or Harry Treadaway, but they're kind of old.

This seems to have fallen to the third page. I'm bumping it up so casting announcements can be made in here instead of in the Future Movies thread so people can comment on them more specifically.

Along that point, I think that the girl who has been chosen for Rue looks perfect. and Foxface looks pretty good too. Prim looks sweet, but a little off with the unibrow, but she looks pretty good other than that. Glimmer looks perfect as well.

P.S."Brooklyn!"

So I finished reading THG but by the time the next two books come in at the library (my hold for catching fire at the library comes thursday ) the SF just might be closed.... and spoilers don't really scare me, i'll just not click the little black boxes so here I go

What's your favorite book? .... ummm i've only read the first one so far
What's your opinion on the ending of Mockingjay? I haven't got there yet although thanks to the internet and oh-so-wonderful friends, I know three things that happens at the end of the series

As for the recent tribute castings, I think they did a good job for the boy from district 3... foxface isn't quite how i pictured, but i think they can make it work

EDIT: there have been a lot of casting for other random tributes who get killed off quickly and Seneca Crane (the head gamemaker)... the two that i'm most looking foward to though are Haymitch and Cato.... although I always get this scene stuck in my head whenever i saw his name (the part i'm refering to comes in around 0:30)