“Strange things did happen here”: songbirds mixing with snakes

“The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes” released to theaters
The Mockingjay pin paying tribute to the symbol of the rebellion from the original Hunger Game films
The Mockingjay pin paying tribute to the symbol of the rebellion from the original Hunger Game films
Rebekah Bushmire

Today, Nov. 17 the new “The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes” movie will be fully released to theaters and available to rent for $20 on the streaming service Vudu. This prequel is set 64 years before the original “Hunger Games” movie and revolves around the 10th Annual Hunger Games, showing how the young Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth) becomes the cruel and dictatorial leader of Panem. A question that a lot of fans have for the new movie is if it will show up to the expectations set by the previous movies. 

It has a few laughs and some stylish outfits, but is unfortunately a shallow prequel.”

— critic Hanna Flint

The movie has young Snow being trained as a mentor for the female District 12 tribute Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler) when he unexpectedly falls in love with her while preparing her for the games. She changes his perspective on everything that he was raised to believe, because he has never met anyone quite like her in his life.

“The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes” is based on the novel “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” published in 2020 by Susan Collins, and this prequel is the fifth film to be created based on the novels surrounding Panem and its famous Hunger Game events. 

In the novel, Baird (Zegler) becomes the winner of the 10th Annual Hunger Games. However, she received little publicity after winning the games, opposed to the publicity surrounding the future District 12 winners Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson) and Katnis Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) from the previous four films.

It looks like no Katniss is no problem for Songbirds And Snakes.”

— critic Lou Thomas

“In the central role, it’s [Blyth’s] task to make sense of Coriolanus Snow’s journey, and he does,” said critic Mick Lasalle on the rottentomatoes site.

The current reviews by movie critics are very mixed, with half saying that it was bland and the other half saying that it was amazing and that they loved the tension between the two main characters, Snow (Blyth) and Baird (Zegler). 

“It has a few laughs and some stylish outfits, but is unfortunately a shallow prequel, which fails to breathe new life into the Hunger Games franchise,” said critic Hanna Flint on the rottentomatoes site.

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About the Contributors
Brody Shipley, Staff
Brody Shipley is a freshman at McIntosh High School and a new member of the McIntosh Trail, for the past two summers has worked as a camp counselor. Shipley excels in photography and design, because he took classes for them a few years back. Shipley is good at Mathematics and English, he enjoys traveling, music, and art. He talks and spends time with his family and friends in his free-time because he loves being around people that know him and love him.
Rebekah Bushmire, Editor-in-Chief
Rebekah Bushmire has been on The Trail staff for four years and will be serving as the editor-in-chief for the 2023-2024 school year, as well as the managing editor for the Legend Yearbook, a program she has been a part of for four years. Bushmire worked at City Hall as an intern in the Public Communications Department over the summer. She has been serving as a Student Press Law Center New Voices Georgia Student Leader for two years. She is in Quill and Scroll, the International Honor Society for high school journalists and the NSPA Honor Roll. Bushmire will have served two years as GSPA Student Ambassador come graduation. She has been awarded an All-Georgia Feature Photograph, Superior Social Media Breaking News, Superior Social Media Promotion, Superior Feature/Entertainment Photograph, Superior Portrait Photograph and Superior House Editorials from the GSPA award program. Bushmire is also the co-president for the International Thespian Society, an honor program for high school theatre students along with having been nominated for the Governor's Honors Program in the Theatre category. She has either worked as a tech crew or performed in eight McIntosh shows. In her free time, Bushmire enjoys hanging out with her friends, sleeping or watching a good show. She loves cows and everything cow print. A fun fact is Bushmire hates scary movies and refuses to watch them. Post-graduation, Bushmire plans on staying local for college and working while in school.
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