Lionsgate dropped its first trailer for The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes and it’s grim. It’s The Hunger Games after all and they send children into an arena to die. But this time around there feels this sense of urgency and danger during a time in history where the games themselves turn into the televised horror that we got to know in the OG movies with Katniss Everdeen. It starts here with Rachel Zegler‘s Lucy Gray Baird and Tom Blyth as Coriolanus Snow.
Lucy is the female tribute from District 12 and Snow (I’m not using that man’s first name) is her mentor for the upcoming 10th Hunger Games. He’s there to train her to be the best so he can elevate his position in the Capitol. Surprise surprise, they end up “falling for each other.” I use quotation marks for the romantic aspect of it all because I’ve never trusted Snow. I never trusted him in the OG movies. Never trusted him in the book for The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes and it’s not happening here. Why? Because he is what makes this whole trailer grim.
There is something about Blyth’s eyes that portrays a disconnect with what he’s doing with Lucy. There is no love. There is him playing the part. And sure, maybe a part of him cares for her. But he will betray her. That’s the only way he’ll end up on the road to being President Snow. So that leads to a grim trailer where you’re sold this love story that will only end up with the innocent paying for “snow to land on top.” There’s also the grim reminder that there will be some “excusing” Snow’s actions because “sad boy pain.”
Fuck him and congratulations to Blyth for your stellar acting in making me hate this character even more.
If you’re going to give us The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, I hope it proves over and over what a villain Snow has always been. I want to see a monster with pretty eyes and nice hair. I want to see him coming close to getting that “happy ending” dystopian YA stories love and then proving how much of a little shit he really is. But most of all, I want Lucy to survive, thrive, and have an even stronger connection to the OG movies. Because you can’t build up a champion like that and wave her away because Snow has to win. Fuck that. And fuck Snow.
Watch the official trailer for The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes below: