I Am Always and Forever Team Katniss (Or: A Hunger Games Entry)

[rsadelle]

I saw The Hunger Games last weekend with two fangirls, a fangirl's wife, and my mother, which was a lovely group of women to spend the morning and lunch with. I've been slacking on making a post about the movie because I really only had three things to say. Now, however, I'm on a Hunger Games email thread that has brought up a fourth thing about the series that I want to talk about. This entry does include political discussion on race and gender lines, so if that isn't your thing, you can read to the first two points below and then leave this post.

The movie as an adaptation.
The Hunger Games is possibly the best movie adaptation of a book I've ever seen. The book is entirely first person, and there are a number of things we only learn because Katniss figures them out. The movie did an absolutely fantastic job of putting those things on screen for us to say without ever resorting to cheap tricks like narrative voiceovers. One of our fangirls hadn't read the books, and she also quite enjoyed the movie. The only thing I think they didn't quite get across well enough, although our control fangirl said she got the gist of it, was how a person's name might end up in the lottery more than once.

Pairing I didn't expect to see.
Katniss/Cinna. I never saw this pairing in the book, but something about seeing them on a screen made me see it as more than just a friendship.

Race.
There's a fair amount of violence in the movie (obviously), but the only rageful, out of control violence is committed by black men. On the one hand, the text makes it clear that they are one hundred percent justified in their rage, and it's not the only portrayal of black men in the movie. On the other hand, the violent black man imagery, particularly in a movie that is made up of almost entirely white people, made me cringe.

Gender and Romance
As I mentioned, I'm now on a Hunger Games email thread. The most surprising thing to me about this thread is that so much of the reaction to Hunger Games is, "PEETA!!!!!!" There are two reasons I don't understand this.

First of all, it reminds me of the tweet that is part of why I stopped reading all things related to Penny Arcade: "Possible hunger games spoilers: Just finished the first book. If you are a boy who identifies with Peeta that is a really crappy book." I was so bothered by that because if you identify with Peeta, you're missing the point. Everything about the books tells you that you're supposed to identify with Katniss. She is our main character. She is the one we're supposed to care about. I'm troubled that even amongst feminist fangirls, there's so much focus on a boy.

Secondly, I don't quite get the love for Peeta. I think Peeta's an interesting character, and I'm glad he and Katniss get a more or less happy ending. But Katniss/Peeta is not my Hunger Games OTP. My non-fannish mother, while reading the second book, called me and said, "It's a fantasy world. Why can't she be with both of them?" but I'm not a threesome girl either. In reality, I am Team Katniss all the way, but in a relationship context, she and Gale belonged together. In a world where she hadn't been gone to the Hunger Games, they would have gotten married (or found some other way to be together), not had children, and continued to protect and provide for everyone they loved. My heart broke for them at every place where the two of them being together became impossible. Gale is the person I see as an equal match for Katniss right from the beginning. I get that Peeta grows into a strong survivor, but I don't get why everyone loves him quite so much. Is it only because of how strongly he loves Katniss? Am I missing some facet of his character that makes him so appealing? Or is this just one of those things I don't understand because I'm a lesbian?

Comments

[eleanor-lavish.livejournal.com]

I feel like I want to retype my "I identify with Peeta not because he's a boy, but because he's the person whose life experiences and reactions to the Games, the capital, etc I have the most in common with" email here! But I am too lazy to go get it, and I know you read it already, so I hope that helps?

I also don't think Team Peeta folks are not also Team Katniss in many cases - it's just a holdover from all the love triangles ever. (I was going to use Twilight as an example, but ugh. Buffy is better - Team Angel or Team Spike, most of us were first and foremost Team Buffy, because it was about who was best for HER, in the end.)

[rsadelle]

I still don't get it. :-(

I'm still standing by my choice of Gale. I'm getting the uncomfortable feeling that part of what people like about Peeta is the way he loves Katniss. That is not what I think relationships should be; people should love each other for who they are, and not feel obligated to return love. Gale, to me, is the person who is most clearly her equal partner from the very beginning.

[norwich36.livejournal.com]

Well, not having read the books, I am mystified by Team Peeta folks. (Is he more interesting in the books?) From the film I am all about whoever Katniss wants to be with, and in the film that really seemed to be Gale.

[rsadelle]

Apparently he's more understandable to privileged/middle class white girls? Or something? I still don't understand.

[rsadelle]

Oh, I think Collins absolutely sells that because of the things that happen, Katniss and Peeta work. I'm mostly just surprised at how many people's first choice of character to care about is Peeta.

[rsadelle]

Frankly, I dont get identifying with either boy--the book is about Katniss and her life, her choices and sacrifices. For me that supercedes it all.

Yes, yes, yes! This is it exactly, and why I'm having trouble understanding other perspectives on the series.

[archivecats.livejournal.com]

This is a theory that I am making up off the top of my head only because I like to think of reasons for things: Maybe you see lots of readers talking about Peeta rather than Katniss because they *do* identify with Katniss, and because they identify with her completely enough that they just accept her thoughts/actions, whereas Peeta is still a little more of a mystery worth discussing (but not as much of a mystery as Gale, who, as noted above, we don't see for most of book one).

As far as the "picking Peeta over Gale" (versus the "spending all your time talking about Peeta") - as other commenters have noted, we readers get to spend a lot more time with him than we do with Gale, and we go right along with Katniss in getting to like him more and more as that happens. Katniss herself believes Gale is far more her equal than Peeta is, but she also has growing romantic feelings for Peeta - it's not like the readers are seeing things that aren't there.

As to *why* she should like him when he's not her intellectual/educational equal (except that those aren't exactly the right words, because it's only the woods training that he never got, because he *never had a chance* to get it) - because you are right that she needs a good reason in addition to physical attraction - she's no Marianne Dashwood, and in her world it's all about putting food on the table ... maybe it is because he is a kinder person than she or Gale. Not "more loving towards Katniss". More kind toward humanity. (Which, granted, we mostly see through his interactions with Katniss.)

Now that I think about it, isn't Katniss's first encounter with Gale an adversarial one, where he threatens her because he thinks she's stealing from his traps? Compare that to her first encounter with Peeta. If Katniss had made it to the end of the Hunger Games with Gale, I'm not sure he would have thrown away his weapon the way Peeta did...and I'm positive Peeta would never have done what Gale did at the end of Mockingjay. Gale's instinct is to be ruthless. That's Katniss's instinct, too. It's another way in which they're equals - and it looks by the end like she doesn't want to be his equal in that way anymore. (Was Gale always a little more ruthless than Katniss? He was the one who wanted to run away and leave both their families to fend for themselves. Would Gale have made an alliance with Rue? Would he have volunteered in a younger sibling's place?)

You could definitely argue that Gale *never had a chance* to learn kindness the way the baker's son did. But if you're going to excuse the miner's son from learning kindness due to family circumstances, then you have to excuse the baker's son for not learning woodsmanship.

Rawr! You made me miss my bedtime with your discussions of fictional characters! :) I hope I managed to get words that fit close enough to my thoughts. Short version - I agree with you that Peeta comes across as incompetent compared to Gale, but he also comes across as a nicer person.

P.S. you said that in a world where Katniss didn't go to the Hunger Games, she and Gale would have ended up together. Most likely; she sure wouldn't have been with Peeta. But after Mockingjay that original world doesn't exist anymore, for better and worse. Losing train of thought because it's late ... umm ... we probably are meant to feel bad about all the lost possibilities. But those are really depressing to think about and talk about online, so everybody focuses on the characters who didn't disappoint them and whose fates didn't depress them. No talking about Prim.

[rsadelle]

Oh, no, people specifically said they identified with Peeta because they could understand his motivations when they couldn't understand Katniss's because hers were too different from their lives.

"More kind toward humanity." What a great way to describe him! And I do really think Collins makes that relationship work; I just don't understand the overwhelming focus on Peeta.

[archivecats.livejournal.com]

"...they couldn't understand Katniss's because hers were too different from their lives."

Huh. Fortunate souls.

[rsadelle]

Ha! Definitely a first world problem. (Although I maintain that one of the functions of fiction is to let you understand someone who isn't anything like you.)