In the new country of Panem that takes over North America, one thing reigns supreme: The
Hunger Games.
Over the course of 4 movies we get to learn the hardships and struggles that go along
with not knowing if you’re going to be picked for the brutal games that have you kill other
kids.
We learn about the luxury of living in the capital, not having to worry about being sent
into the arena or not having enough food.
Today we’re going to take a look at the morality of these characters and see if in
this dystopian society, it’s even possible to be a good person.
To our contestants, may the odds be ever in their favor.
I’m Kyle with WickedBinge, and this is The Hunger Games: Good to Evil.
As usual, we’ll be starting with the most pure and working our way down.
These characters are The Good.
Our gold medal of good goes to Primrose Everdeen.
Prim is Katniss’s little sister and the person who accidentally sets this all into
motion when she’s called for the games.
Even though Katniss takes her spot, she does everything she can to help her sister, being
the emotional support that gets Katniss through a lot of the drama, she takes in an abandoned
cat to save it’s life, She helps around the house since their mother doesn’t do
much from her depression and even though she was quite young, Prim helps the rebellion
as a medic even if it does kill her.
She’s just a sweetheart and nobody deserves this spot more than her.
We decided that Rue deserved The Silver Medal of Good.
Rue is only 12 years old when she goes into the games, and she takes the route of hiding.
She helps Katniss take out some of the careers, and gives Katniss advice, despite knowing
that both of them can’t win.
She taught Katniss the popular whistle and her presence is felt in the rest of the series
even if she isn’t there to see the rebellion go down.
The bronze medal of good goes to Peeta Mellark.
Peeta works in the bakery with his parents and had no problem sharing bread with Katniss
and her family.
Peeta and Katniss work together to stay alive in the hunger games and he’s even willing
to die instead of kill Katniss.
Peeta is ok with having Katniss get taken out of the area while he’s taken to the
capital, and even while in the capital he gives clues to Katniss about what to do.
We don’t give him the Gold or Silver medal of good, however, because of the brainwashing
that the capital does to him.
While not entirely his fault, he does try to attack Katniss a few times.
Peeta also teams up with the careers in their first hunger games.
While that might be a good strategy to survive, we do have to knock him down a few points
for teaming up with some of the villains in the first movie for a while.
Our main hero, Katniss Everdeen is next.
Katniss takes her sister’s spot as a tribute in the 74th hunger games…
Demonstrating her loyalty and willingness to sacrifice.
She’s the first character we see to stick it to the gamemakers by shooting an arrow
through an apple when they don’t pay attention to her, she tries her best to take care of
Rue, and saves Peeta from Cato.
Before the 75th hunger games during the private session she paints a dummy of the last game
maker and hangs it showing her disapproval of this game.
Katniss takes her role as the symbol of rebellion and helps to kill both president Snow and
Coin.
She’s against having a hunger games with the children of the capital as she thinks
that it’s too much and too cruel to do to them even after 75 years of hunger games for
the districts.
She retires with Peeta and has two children after everything is over.
From these acts it seems like Katniss should be higher, but…
Katniss is, well, kind of rude and arrogant at times.
She snaps at Peeta and Effie a few times, she leads Peeta and Gale on and while she
might really like both of them she doesn’t give them closure until she marries Peeta
after the civil war.
But most of her problems are just that she’s short tempered and sometimes rude, that doesn’t
mean that she doesn’t deserve the praise for being the hero that she is.
Next on the good list is Effie.
We do really believe that Effie is a good person, even if she’s ignorant at the start
of the series.
Effie reads off the reaping that chooses who goes into the hunger games.
She works hard to make sure that Katniss and Peeta have the support that they need, and
when she has to draw for the third quarter quell knowing that Katniss will be the woman
sent back into the games, we can see that she’s visibly upset to do some.
She offers support to Katniss after the capital and district 13 abandon her in the mockingjay
movies.
She’s been trained since birth to think that the hunger games are ok and her arc of
realizing the evil of the games is one of the most compelling in the series.
If you’re on team Gale you’ll be happy about this next spot.
Gale is Katniss’s best friend in district 12 and is her other love interest.
Gale puts his name in the drawing for the hunger games more than usual so he can get
more food for his family, and slips out of the district boundaries so he can hunt for
some real food for them too.
Gale offers his support to Katniss throughout the first 2 movies and when it comes time
for district 12 to be bombed, he helps to get everyone that he can out before getting
himself to safety.
Gale joins the rebellion as a soldier and does what he can to save the districts from
the capital’s rule.
One of the best fashion designers in the capital before he’s killed, Cinna should be next.
Cinna cares a lot for Katniss and tries to make her feel as comfortable as possible.
It seems a lot like her also isn’t comfortable with the hunger games and gives Katniss the
Mockingjay dress that ends up getting him killed.
He works his hardest to make Katniss and Peeta stand out so they can get more support for
the crowd and hopefully some more sponsors.
We’re going to throw in Cressida here next.
She’s a resident of The Capital and a director who joined the rebellion along with her camera
crew.
She impresses Katniss with her bravery in as she and her crew got footage of the Mockingjay
despite the danger.
Her fearlessness in combat is fueled by her desire to capture the detail of the war around
her on camera.
So that she can help unify the districts against the Capitol.
Probably the smartest person in the series is Beetee.
He agrees to help get Katniss to the arena and uses the metal tree and a wire to strike
the tree with lightning.
In Mockingjay he makes some new weapons for Katniss, Gale and Finnick and hacks the capital
to put out rebellion propaganda.
What knocks him down a bit is his willingness to create a capital specific hunger games,
and he agrees with Gale to blow up the inside of the nut in district 2 knowing that it will
kill district 2 peacemakers and innocent civilians.
Next up is Finnick.
Finnick comes off as very arrogant and not a very good person.
He later describes to Katniss that when he won the hunger games, he was prostituted out
in the capital and that’s what gave him his wealth and kept his family and girlfriend
Annie alive.
He helps keep Katniss and Peeta alive and fights to get Annie out of the capital and
to free the districts from them.
He takes great care of Annie as after she won her hunger games she suffered severe ptsd
and needed constant care.
It’s unfortunate that he died, but he died a hero and we can’t forget him.
Moving on, we give a quick mention to Thresh, He is strong and resourceful and posed a serious
threat during his time in The Hunger Games.
Most importantly, he demonstrates empathy for Rue and integrity when he decides to spare
Katniss for her actions…
Tha said, he’s also shown to be quite brutal, but you can’t hold this against him much
given the fact it’s a life-or-death situation.
Overall, we don’t know too much about Thresh, but he demonstrates honor, which lands him
in The Good Category.
We think that Mags should be on the good list even though she doesn’t do much.
Mags takes Annie’s spot in the 75th hunger games and it’s clear that she has a strong
relationship with both Annie and Finnick.
She realizes that she’s slowing the group down and eventually just walks into the poison
gas to die so the rest of them can live.
While we don’t see a lot of her we love what we do get to see.
She’s a sweet old lady and there’s nothing more we can ask of her.
Next is Wiress.
Wiress is the female tribute from district 3 in the 75th hunger games.
She’s incredibly smart and is part of the plan to get Katniss and Peeta out of the arena.
Unfortunately for her she goes mad in the first part of the game and is killed by gloss
pretty quickly.
She doesn’t do much but she is the first person to figure out about the arena being
a clock and she does agree to help bring down the capital while she’s still sane.
Last on our good list is Johanna.
Just like Finnick she was prostituted out to the capital to save her family.
She’s quite mouthy just like Katniss and let’s her feelings known during the live
interview portion of the 75th hunger games.
She fights to end the hunger games and while she can’t do much in Mockingjay because
of her injuries.
Her attitude knocks her down a few pegs and she is also one of the people who votes to
have an only capital hunger games.
With the Good characters out of the way, we now move into more neutral territory…
This is The Grey Area.
First on the grey area is Haymitch.
Haymitch is the mentor to Peeta and Katniss but it’s clear when they start that he doesn’t
want to.
We learn that Haymitch hasn’t really been training the tributes sent to him because
he doesn’t think that they have a shot.
He’s an alcoholic who’s attitude rivals Katniss, which is probably why they end up
getting along so well.
He sends Peeta and Katniss supplies throughout the first hunger games and becomes an important
part of the rebellion, the plan to get Katniss and Peeta out of the arena even started with
him.
His alcoholism and unwillingness to train other tributes does put him down a few pegs
though.
Next is the head game maker for the 75th hunger games, Plutarch.
Plutarch helps to get Katniss and Peeta out of the arena and even gives Katniss a tip
about what the theme of the arena is with his watch.
However, he uses Katniss for propaganda a lot in Mockingjay and was assumed by Snow
to be a part of the bombing that killed capital children and rebel casualty aides including
Prim.
He’s more willing to let innocent people die if it furthers his cause which docks him
a few points.
The next spot on our list actually goes to a group of people, most of the smaller hunger
games players.
This spot includes Foxface, Woof, Cecelia, Chaff, Seeder, and Blight.
We don’t know enough about these characters to rank them on their own in the good spot
and we don’t know enough to call them evil.
These are just kids who are trying to stay alive and we can’t fault them for that.
Our last spot for the grey area is Mrs.Everdeen.
She’s not a bad person and is just someone who’s suffering from depression after her
husband was killed.
Suffering from a mental illness isn’t something that should knock people down in morality
but what does knock someone down is their inability to take care of your children.
She pawns the responsibility of taking care of Prim to Katniss, for years considering
their dad died when Katniss was only 11.
Having to be not even a teenager and be already acting like a mom can take a huge mental toll
on a child.
Now we move into the Dark Side.
These characters have little to no redeeming qualities and are just downright cruel…
These are The Bad and the Evil.
First on our list of evil is Mrs.Mellark.
We don’t see a lot from her so there isn’t much to say but from what we do see of her
is that she’s physically and verbally abusive to her son Peeta.
We don’t see anything of Peeta’s father but if he’s anything like his wife it’s
a miracle that Peeta ended up being the kind and caring person that he is after everything
that he went through in his life growing up.
Next is another group of characters, the careers from districts 1 and 2, Marvel, Glimmer, Clove,
Cato, Gloss, Cashmere, Brutus, Enobria.
These characters act as some of the main antagonists in the first two films.
The careers from districts 1 and 2 get excited for the hunger games and spend their lives
training to kill and win.
They get an evil spot because unlike the other people put into the games, they aren’t just
trying to survive, they want to kill.
They enjoy the sport and think that it’s a great honor to play in the hunger games.
The previous head game maker, Seneca deserves the next spot.
Seneca works on the games to make them as entertaining to watch as possible which basically
means that he comes up with cruel ways to kill the tributes.
He’s this low on the list because as stated his job is to kill people and to make it look
entertaining, all while receiving a nice paycheck on the side.
He eventually caves to the demands of Katniss and Peeta to make it so two people can win
the game from the same district.
Unfortunately for him this gets him killed, but it sways the events of the series to lead
to revolution.
Our bronze medal of evil goes to Romulus Thread, the new head peacekeeper of district 12 in
Catching Fire.
He’s very loyal to the capital and is unflinching in how strict he is at how he enforces the
law.
We first see him beating Gale for trying to stop him from attacking an elderly woman.
He beats Katniss for trying to save Gale.
He’s airlifted out of district 12 before the bombing in Mockingjay to save himself
and leave all of the citizens and some of his own employees to die.
The silver medal of evil goes to President Coin from district 13.
On the surface she seems like an honorable leader, someone who just wants to take down
the capital, but deep down she’s just as dirty as Snow is.
She tries to execute Katniss’s prep team and Effie, she wants Peeta and Annie killed
instead of saved, she drops bombs on innocent civilians and her own citizens to frame the
capital and she starts the idea of bringing the hunger games back for the capital to make
them pay.
Her rule could have been just as vicious as Snow, and she shows no remorse for the crimes
that she commits until her death at the hand of Katniss.
Finally our gold medal of evil goes to none other than president Snow.
Snow killed any political adversary he had and even poisoned himself so it wasn’t suspicious,
he keeps the hunger games going to paint a message to the districts, he kills Haymitch’s
family because of the way that Haymitch won his games, he threatens Johanna and Finnick’s
families if they don’t do what he asks, he kills his employees if they don’t follow
his exact rules like Seneca, Snow had Cinna killed for the mockingjay dress, refused to
call off the games after even the capital citizens cried for it and intentionally had
the third quarter quell stacked so Katniss would have to go in for a second time giving
her almost no shot at winning if it wasn’t for the plan to get her out.
There was no rule about the same district members being able to survive so either Katniss
loses by dying or loses by killing Peeta.
He truly is an evil, heartless mastermind and his time as a politician and ruler over
the hunger games shows it.
But what do you think?
Who do you think are the most good and evil characters in The Hunger Games?
Let us know in the comment section below.
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