The Hunger Games Retrospective: Mockingjay – Part Two

The Hunger Games concludes with the second part of Mockingjay and shows the final clash between The Capitol and the Rebels.

Peeta has been rescued from The Capitol, but he has been brainwashed, leading to him harbouring a bloodlust against Katniss. The war has swung in the Rebels’ favour and the Capitol is about to be assaulted. Katniss is set to the frontline to film more propaganda pieces, but after the commander of her platoon is killed, Katniss attempts to lead a mission to assassinate President Snow and end the war once and for all.

During the early 2010s, there was a trend to split the final books in a series into two films. This happened to Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows and Breaking Dawn, the final book in the Twilight Saga. Mockingjay followed the example of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows since the first films were slow build-ups and the follow-up films were about the big battle. Mockingjay – Part Two had a similar structure to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two since both films start with a smaller mission before entering the main battle. However, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two was a better-structured film since it started as a heist before the main trio went to Hogwarts. Mockingjay – Part Two’s story was more fractious.

Mockingjay – Part Two starts with Katniss seeing Peeta getting treatment and attending Finnick and Annie’s wedding. She goes to District 2 to fight against the last Capitol stronghold and Katniss gets shot by a loyalist for her trouble. Most of the film was focused on Katniss’ attempt to infiltrate the Capitol, but after that, there were multiple endings. It made me sympathise with people who thought Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King had too many endings.

There was a logic to all these endings. Just because the war was over it didn’t mean the story was over. The film showed that Coin wasn’t any better than Snow since she was power-hungry, willing to commit atrocities, and wanted to reinstall the Hunger Games as a form of punishment for the Capitol. The film wanted to conclude the clash between Katniss and Snow when they met in Snow’s greenhouse. Snow reveals the truth about the final massacre. Finally, the film aimed to show that the scars of the Hunger Games and the war would never heal for Katniss and Peeta and they need to escape from the world even if it was getting better for the rest of Panem.

Mockingjay – Part Two best feature was the action. The bulk of the film was Katniss’ special forces mission into The Capitol. Before it happened Finnick described it as the 76^th Hunger Games since the Gamemakers set up numerous traps to stop the Rebels. This section was like Catching Fire since the characters were surviving the traps. The platoon had to face a tsunami of tar, mutants hiding the sewer, and rows of heat rays in the ceiling that turned people into ash. This was when the film was at its most thrilling. The fighting in the sewer had a horror feel to it like Francis Lawrence’s adaptation of I Am Legend. The mutants looked a lot alike zombie vampires in I Am Legend. The special effects were a lot better in Mockingjay – Part Two.

From a story point-of-view, it can be seen as ridiculous that a group of gladiators and soldiers were able to infiltrate The Capitol. The book shows Katniss and other Hunger Games competitors had to train to be soldiers and some of them fail, like Johanna did. These scenes were cut for pacing reasons, but it makes a load of untrained people sent into a warzone. Being able to kill in a gladiatorial contest and fighting in a warzone are different set of skills.

There were several character dynamics throughout the film and storylines that needed to be resolved. There was the love triangle between Katniss, Peeta, and Gale. Katniss saw more of Gale’s dark side and showed he had a black-and-white view of the war: there was no nuance. Katniss had grown closer to Peeta during the films, but due to the brainwashing, Peeta couldn’t be around Katniss. The film saw the end of Katniss and Gale’s potential relationship. There was also political drama since Boggs (Mahershala Ali) warned Katniss that Coin wanted to estimate Katniss as a threat, so she was willing to send Katniss into a warzone with Peeta joining her platoon. The film was able to offer a double conclusion since it showed Katniss killing Coin and Snow getting killed by the citizens, eliminating two dictators.

Katniss’ motivation in the first film was to protect her sister. Throughout the films, Prim grew up to be a confident teenager. This was shown when Prim met Peeta when he was in the hospital despite his murderous rage. In the novel, Peeta meets a different character, but it was changed to Prim, partly for practical reasons, but it shows Prim being braver and adding to the personal stakes for Katniss and Peeta. Prim worked as a medic for the Rebellion and was sent to the frontline and despite all of Katniss’ efforts to protect Prim, it all ended in tragedy. It was a gut punch when reading the novel.

Mockingjay – Part Two was a film that was all over the place due to its story, but fans of the series would be satisfied with it as a conclusion. It did deliver as a spectacle.