The Hunger Games

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It was around 2006 when I watched this Japanese movie titled Battle Royale, the one with all that post-war near apocalyptic world, where the government will be crazy and desperate enough to throw a full game of setting teenager out in secluded island and kill each other until only one remain and declare as winner. Fast forward to the beginning of 2012, with all the commotion about the upcoming movie, The Hunger Games, I force myself to read the novel with a pang of underestimate feeling caused of its similarity to Battle Royale.

Set in the alternate future of what today is North America, is the country of Panem. With its 12 districts that enslaved by the all and mighty Capitol. Each of Panem's districts is said to has specific characteristic that distinct one to another, which is also the characteristic that been assumed by most of the population of the district itself, from the fact that every character's ability  in the books is being defined by which district they comes from. On the other hand, all that districts share the same characteristic : poor, enslaved and dictated by the capitol, and has a life quality that maybe seems similar to what it's been told about the life in North Korea today.

The story is told on the first person point of view of a girl named Katniss Everdeen. Admit it, as much as I adore the 'K' name (not related to the particular K-clan) I still find the name a little bit odd, but maybe everything is odd in Panem, odd enough that the government of the Capitol set out a game of survival that mandatory for all districts in the sake of Capitol's citizen amusement called The Hunger Games. See? very Battle Royale. The Hunger Games held annually, which every year each district send 2 tributes to participate in the games, a girl and a boy range between 12-18 year old. Katniss is a girl tribute from district 12, what it said to be the poorest district of the 12, the one that produce coal to the Capitol. She volunteered herself to be a tribute when the reaping called out her little sister name, desperately prevent her sister to go on a widely televised slaughter games. She then joined by the boy tribute Peeta Mellark.

Things go out from the day they're selected as tributes down to the preparing time at the Capitol and the actual Games itself. I won't bother to spoil the detail, go read it yourself if you want to, or check in on Wikipedia. I finished read it last night, and feeling just little impression on the book. Not that it is a low-rate type of fantasy fiction, it just well... just another american teenager novel written with a little twilight-like approach. Don't get me wrong, it's not that similar to the cheesy-ness Twilight, but yet the two share some similarity. For the first half of the book, I really drowned by the story. The adventure vibe in Katniss' naration, give the actual feeling of being a heroine. The type that you don't want to happened to yourself but for all the odds, you did all the things with just fine. The way Suzanne Collins narrate the story, gave me the feeling that it do really exist, that all the tradition, event and protocol described in the books are exist. I like how she drive Katniss character to be a pure survival fighter. How her daily basis life at district 12 gave her advantage in the games, how she pull the show to the Capitol audience in desperate try to make it back home safely, and how her love for her sister gave her the real realization of her ideal. I love Katniss in the first half of the books, she is a real hunter, with great instinct of survival and the brain that good enough for her to outsmart the other tributes.

What made me feel a little disappointed is how the story goes after that to the end of the book, -like I said, it's Twilight all the way. With all those conflicted feeling of 'I definitely like boy number 1 but actually feeling a little confused with boy number 2'. The number 1 boy is Katniss' long-time friend Gale Hawthorne and the boy number 2 is the fellow tribute Peeta Mellark. Gale is not directly involve in the story, but he gave quite a hint of his feeling for Katniss at the beginning of the book. And Peeta, with all the reality show type of the games confess his feeling to Katniss on the games and act as the all sacrificing boy of the unrequited love. And then there is Katniss, with those clever brain of her, to my disdain, do exactly what Bella Swan do, hung them on! Well, maybe Katniss can be a little bit forgiven because she does all those things unconsciously with the thought to survive the games and gain Capitol audience favor with spoil some romance with Peeta (it is a reality show after all). But still it didn't prevent me to loath the writer the moment I reach the last word. Oh God, is it always have to end as a cheesy triangle romance??? Be creative!

So, in conclusion, JK Rowling still remains the best female fantasy writer for me, because she can avoid adding more of her estrogen-driven plot to her novel. I still recommend The Hunger Games though, for light read before sleep and especially for those who plan to watch the movie at March. Because from all the experience of movie adapted from best seller novel, none has ever outperformed the real plot in the books. So at least we can get a real picture of what the writer really intend on in the novel before watching the movie, and then we can mark it to ourselves which one we like best.

That's all from me. Happy Hunger Games!