A PORTRAIT OF THE GARBAGE AS A TRASHCAN

In Which I Continue To Have Issues With The Hunger Games

Catching Fire had done little so far other than enrage me. After several encounters of the vaguely racist kind in District 11, Suzanne Collins clearly decides she is not up for the task of describing the other districts. So the entire tour (which was basically the entire premise of this book so far) blurs by in a few paragraphs, in what literally reads like an outline for a book. I’m surprised she mustered the energy for complete sentences! (“And then this happened, and then this happened, and then this happend.”-How Suzanne Collins writes)

There is even (no spoilers but) a fairly significant thing that happens in terms of Katniss/Peeta’s fake relationship which is just mentioned in passing, with literally no detail whatsoever. And this was already a series that suffered from lack of detail! We have gone from “almost no detail most of the time” to “literally no detail about anything ever.”

And the first paragraph of that bullshit summary is some of the most badly written present-tense crap yet, but I will talk about that later when I have the book in front of me.

AND THEN, at the party in the Capitol, Katniss—who remains confused about whether or not she likes Peeta and whether or not she likes Rebellion (even though she’s presumably had WEEKS to think about both)—talks to Peeta, who suggests that Rebellion might not be such a bad thing. For the second time in this series, our supposedly fiercely independent feminist hero takes her political cues from her boyfriend!

And then like three pages are spent describing this stuff that you drink that makes you throw up at parties so you can eat more. It’s an over-explained metaphor for the evils of excess, but it’s also a thing that is real anyway! Search Ipecac on YouTube some time, it’s hilarious.

Everyone says The Hunger Games is great because it is 1. feminist 2. exciting 3. inventive 4. not as badly-written as Twilight. It is none of these things.