okay so today we're going to be talking about a bird of song and ballads..
whatever. And more specifically about what everybody was talking about two
weeks ago. So if you don't know, this book is the prequel book to the Hunger Games
that was recently announced, and it is going to take place before Katniss and
all them were even born, and that's all we really knew up to this point. And then
the news broke about what the book is really going to be featuring and who
it's gonna be focusing on. And then the internet predictably blew up for a day
or two, and then moved on to other things. So now that everybody's done talking
about it, here I come, two weeks later to talk
about it .I've actually been thinking about this book so much over the last
two weeks because i pre-ordered this book thinking that it was gonna be about
Haymitch or mags and their Hunger Games. But the day after I finally put the
pre-order in, it was announced that it was about President Snow. So I'm going to
start this video by reading off some tweets and some things that people have
been saying or were saying when the news first broke, and then we're gonna move on
to some of my thoughts, and then we're gonna move on to a poll and discussion
about your thoughts. So let's first read the original tweet -
the original story. What does Suzanne Collins herself / pop
culture Twitter - what's the article say about it. President Snow is the
protagonist in The Hunger Games prequel book The Ballad of songbirds and snakes -
that's what it's called! A teen born to privilege, but searching for something
more. A far cry from the man we know he will become. Here he's friendly, he's
charming, for now he's a hero. Things other people have said: Characters from
The Hunger Games I'd rather read a prequel about: President Snow, Haymitch,
Finnick Sinha, Johanna, Beatty, Annie, Effie, Katniss's dad, Caesar Flickerman,
president coin, tribute boy from district 6, Buttercup, a turkey Gail shot, yeah me
too. The Hunger Games prequel should end with
the rebellion of district 13, the dark days, and the announcement of the Hunger
Games as the reminder. Snow shouldn't be a factor
and neither should the secondary characters of the Hunger Games. I
actually really like that idea, that would have been a really cool sequel.
Hunger Games fans: hey, we want a prequel about Haymich or Finnick. Suzanne Collins:
okay okay I hear you, but how about a Hunger Games version of the Joker
instead. Really waited so long for the new Hunger Games prequel, thinking
hammock was going to be the center of it all, but we're gonna get a President Snow
origin story. You mean to tell me I've waited years and pre-ordered the Hunger
Games sequel, thinking it was about mags, for it to be a President Snow origin
story about a rich white boy becoming an authoritarian and Thorat adium tarry hum
who loves checks notes genocide. I feel like the stuttering just added to that,
so I'm not gonna retake it. Okay those are some of the negative reactions, let's
also read some people that are defending the book. Are people really already
judging this Hunger Games prequel? A'all are mad for what we already had two
books on The Hunger Games. I'm glad we're getting some new content
that will expand on the universe, it'll be like getting a book into the villains
head his origin story I'm intrigued. If you're whining about the new Hunger
Games prequel being about President Snow, you need to re-examine your life. That
kind of stuff is interesting to me, do you know what I'd give for a prequel
about Voldemort? Quit judging till you read the book. So now I just want a
prequel about Voldemort, but here's the thing, and I'm interrupting my formatting
and now, I'm gonna state a little bit of an opinion. But we actually did get a
little bit of his origin story in book six, I just read it, when we go back into
Dumbledore's memory and we see him in the orphanage and we see that even as a
kid he's using these magic abilities that he doesn't even understand, he's
using them to hurt people. Even back as a kid, he was a twisted messed-up character,
and that made him really interesting. President snow, I feel really confident
that's not what we're getting out of him, because the little announcement we got
said that he was charming he was likable and he was the hero.Which granted, Tom
Riddle was also charming, but that's not the impression I'm getting. I'm thinking
we're getting a, "he was good, something dramatic happened,
and now he's bad" format, which I'm not a fan of. But let's move forward. I'm
waiting until this Hunger Games prequel comes out to pass judgment on the
premise. Suzanne Collins was very intentional with the Hunger Games, the
criticisms and parallels in those books are very pointed, and for now at least, I
trust that she knows what she's doing with this one. People are losing their
minds over this and I'm here wondering if they remember what the Hunger Games
is even about. Like do y'all seriously believe that after a trilogy showcasing
how bad capitalism, dictatorship, and war is, Collins would write a villain
sympathetic story? Get a grip. And now I'm gonna mention the many many tweets that
talked about how terrible this book would be because we don't need to have a
book that's going to make us sympathize with a fascist dictator who forces
genocide - forces genocide on this world, somehow make him sympathetic, relatable,
and make us like him. There were a lot of tweets about that, and to that I'm just
going to say that I think that that's definitely not what's happening here. An
origin story doesn't mean we now love the villain, it just adds the background
to the villain. So i 100% think that that's not what we're doing here, just
because it says for now he's the hero I don't think that that means that we're
supposed to believe that he's actually a hero, I think it just means we're seeing
where he's coming from and what made him descend into villainy,
but we're not supposed to suddenly like him. Alright, I'm gonna end it on: To the
Hunger Games fans who are angry that President Snow will be the focus of the
new book. Writers write about what interests them what moves them, what
compels them to put down words that's how you got the stories you love from
them to begin with. And I agree with that, writers are allowed to write whatever
they want. But you know, we're also allowed to have opinions on that. And
here are my opinions. So I've already mentioned it but when the fir - when the
Hunger Games prequel first was announced, my initial reaction was Haymitch or maggs
or both, we're going to get some of the original Hunger Games. Now some people
have pointed out that that's a ridiculous idea, why did anybody think
that? Because if we had the original Hunger Games or some of the early Hunger
Games it would just end on a really sad note. The Hunger Games continues,
the world is still in despair, people are still dying. Which is a fair,
point but since we already have the ending, I don't feel like we need the
prequel to end on a super hopeful note. And really this the story's already
complete we have no need for a prequel, the story's done. So if we're going to
add to the story I really just want layers on the characters I already love
as opposed to trying to add to the story in some other way. But that's a
preference thing, I know a lot of people wouldn't agree with that. So when the
book was initially announced I was so confident that it was gonna be Haymitch
or mags that I actually told my friend that that was what it was going to be
about - or that we were all speculating that that was what it was going to be
about. And I'm pretty sure she pre-ordered it too, and when the president snow thing
was first announced that he's our protagonist, my initial reaction was to
be really frustrated. And the reason is because I've read several
villain origin stories and they're almost never good. Almost every villain
origin story I've read has been, "this person was nice and sweet and good and
great, and then something happened, someone manipulated them, someone didn't
listen to them when they were trying to say what they wanted with their life,
someone jilted them, and then because of that one event, boom. They're evil now.
They're killing everybody around, they have no compassion, they're the big bad.
And that sort of completely unlayered, totally bland, uninteresting villain
origin story is such a letdown to me. If you're gonna create a really complex
layered detailed interesting slow descent, or something like Tom Riddle
where they start off already really twisted but they have a face that they
can present to people to convince people to join them or convince people that
they're actually good, that's an interesting villain story. But a "I'm nice
until the end and then I snap and then I'm bad" it's not interesting. And I'm not
saying Suzanne Collins is gonna do that by any means, I don't necessarily think
Suzanne Collins is doomed to repeat the bad origin stories I've read, it's just
when I hear origin story I don't have high hopes because it seems to be a
tough one to execute because I haven't seen it executed well very many times at
all. But eventually I finally warmed up to the idea, I thought about it more as,
okay, it potentially could be done well. President snow could maybe be
interesting, like he's always been bad but a really good manipulator, or we
could potentially have enough nuance to it, that is an interesting layered story
instead of what I've read so many times before. And then I thought, wait a second,
isn't President Snow the one that created the The Hunger Games? Is this
going to be a story about how the Hunger Games was created? That would be
interesting. And then we got an excerpt for a prequel. The excerpt dropped it's
just a short little sort of half scene that takes place at the beginning of
song of ballads and snakes whatever it's called. And my friends. And my friends, it
follows snow when he's a mentor for a girl in district 12. He is in the
position of Haymitch. He's not the creator of The Hunger Games ,he's not
participating in The Hunger Games, he's gonna be a mentor and he's gonna try to
keep a girl alive. So here's my thought, I'm afraid that this prequel is going to
be snow, a good guy, a hero, charming. Someone everybody loves. And
he's going to work hard to try to keep this girl alive. She's gonna die, and he's
gonna snap and turn evil and then suddenly run The Hunger Games. I hope I'm
wrong. I have so little information to base this assumption off of so I'm not
judging the book at this point, I'm not condemning the book at this point, I'm
just talking about what I'm thinking. And what I'm thinking is, I really hope I'm
wrong about what this book is gonna do. Suzanne Collins could wow me, and man I
hope she does. I've pre-ordered the book, I'm not going to change that. I plan on
reading it as soon as it's released, regardless of all the fear I have of how
this book is going to turn out. I will be reading it right away and doing a very
extensive review on it. I I am so scared of how this book is gonna turn out but
I'm gonna read it and I just really really hope - I really hope it's not gonna
be that. I hope it'll be more complex and less predictable and boring and one
noted - one note - it'll be less One Note. Now we're to the portion of the
video where you're going to talk. There are so many conflicting opinions
out there, there are a lot of people that are really excited about a villain
origin story, and think it's gonna be really interesting. And there are a lot
of people that are absolutely furious because they think that this is going to
be a book that makes us sympathize with snow, and then there's everybody in
between. And I'm just really curious what people are thinking. So here's the poll,
it's gonna be right here in the corner. There's gonna be a little eye that's
gonna pop up in a circle, click that I let it drop down, if you're on a phone
then tap your screen as if you're about to pause this video and then the eye
will show up, let it fall down and there's a poll. Are you excited about
this book? Do you have a lot of hope? Are you terrified? Do you just really not
care and why are you even watching this video, you don't even like the Hunger
Games? And then after you're done voting in the poll, jump down to the comments
and please talk to me more about this. Do you have hope for this book? Are you
totally turned off? What do you - what are your predictions? Do you think that it's
going to be something totally different from anything I've even discussed here?
Let's talk. I'm really excited to have this discussion even though it's two
weeks too late. Let's hang out and talk about it. I post videos every
Sunday Tuesday Thursday and Saturday, see you guys soon. Bye