The Hunger Games film adaptation is coming out in theaters today. Fans of Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark* will finally get to see the story play out on the big screen. Advance tickets are selling out across the world. Millions will crowd into movie theaters and buy popcorn and candy to munch on while watching starving teenagers fight to the death. People will no doubt show up in costume, wearing the colors of their favorite districts. I, for one, plan on shaving my beard to match that of Seneca Crane**.
I resisted reading the books for a long time. Normally I seem to resist fads until everyone has finished talking about them, and then I engage and am depressed that no one wants to talk about them anymore (wasn’t Omar from The Wire like the best character ever?). All the same, I am half way through the third book, and really enjoying it as a story! My main criticism is that I wish that this were written for adults instead of teens and that the characters were having sex instead of just kissing ALL THE TIME, but I said the same thing about The Lion King***.
What about you, Great Whatsit? What are your thoughts? I am not a teenage girl, but I feel like Katniss is a pretty good role model for a teenage girl! At least better than the girl from Twilight, whose greatest strength is fainting into the arms of a dude with no shirt on and having babies, as far as I can tell. And the movie itself, do you think it will be good? Lenny Kravitz is in it, so does that make you feel any feelings? Does Elizabeth Banks dressed up like the Easter Bunny in drag make you excited? Does your mom like this book? Because my mom LOVES this book. So much. You know what else she loves? Stanley Tucci acting effeminately. She’s seriously as pleased as punch if that is a thing that people are as pleased as.
Anyway, yes, I’m a little late to the discussion, it’s true, but are you guys excited? Because Harry Potter is over you guys. It’s gone. I need this. America needs this. My mom needs this.
*Totally appropriate names for human beings.
**I am not referring to the beard on my face.
***And then I realized that it was, and that it was called Hamlet.
I like the idea of the Eastern Bunny, for some reason, though I suspect him of being a typo.
Um, I haven’t read ’em. I thought about it, really. Harry Potter I took a very deliberate pass on, but then I enjoyed His Dark Materials so maybe The Hunger Games would be lots of fun? Is it going to result, though, in lots of people dressing stupidly in line for tickets? If so, I’m out. And is there going to be a metrick fuckton of fanfic featuring even worse writing than the originals? Out, out, out.
Also what’s this about Stanley Tucci? Did you know he once, in a revival of Terrence McNally’s Frankie and Johnny in the Claire de Lune, stopped and broke character to chew out an audience member whose phone kept ringing? For that alone, he will always be loved.
Indeed, it was a typo. Thanks for letting me know.
It’s worth a read. Very engaging. And if it was good enough for the Tucc, it’s good enough for me.
I totally wasn’t pointing out the typo to be a little bitch. I like the Eastern Bunny. I picture him as an uptight Jewish rabbit with horn-rimmed glasses and a subscription to the New York Review of Bunnies.
Can’t you write it “the Tooch”?
Your mom loved the book? Wow – my mom walked out of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom because it was too violent. Your mom probably bullied my mom in elementary school. Although, my mom is sneaky so she might have put something in your mom’s sandwich in retaliation.
Anyway. I haven’t read the Hunger Games and don’t usually go in for post-apocalyptic / dystopian / violent-teenager-y stuff. But I’m kind of looking forward to the movie, albeit warily. Lenny Kravitz is cool, but not the biggest draw. The Ptucc (I spell it with a silent “p”) is more so.
Who you callin’ effeminate? I’ll have you know that my hairstyle is based on a 7th-century Japanese samurai warrior style. And that tux is made of snakeskin.
Also, Lenny Kravitz is a punk.
Tell your mom I love her.
As a person who frequently goes for post-apocalyptic / dystopian / violent-teenager-y stuff, I loved it. As a mom who frequently gets in trouble from the offspring for not being typical, I think Lenny was cooler than all the boy kids (the girls were in a class by themselves) AND Mr. Tucci. Just saying.