Hunger Games (Book 1)

analysis
#81

Hi, everyone.

This has been an entertaining analysis, and I’m actually glad to hear that the movie and the book line up fairly well. (That doesn’t surprise me, considering the movie is over two hours long.) I actually watched before this topic came about, just because I wanted to, then I watched the rest of the series…

I agree with the Upper Left arrangement for the first story. (This story has the exact same weighty feel as Arrival, which is also Upper Left. In fact, I watched Arrival that same night because I was just in the mood for those kinds of stories. :smile:)

I also agree with the orientation of OS in Universe and MC in Physics.

Our introduction to the story involves the way the world is, and taken as a whole, even in the first story, the Author is clearly indicating there is a problem in the Universe, even if the characters themselves either don’t see it or don’t agree. That problem is that the Hunger Games are a standing and standard yearly event that induces fear and maintains control over the citizens. This thing just is…

That Physics is the source of personal issues created for Katniss is less clear at the start, except that, if I recall, we see her steal something. The volunteering to take place for her sister. The showboating that she doesn’t really want to perform at the intro to the games. The rather rash actions and inactions taken during preparation. All of these serve to get her into deeper trouble – cause her more problems.

And, Psychology for IC has been monumentally achieved with that video above, and its explanations.

As for the relationship, that moment when Peeta throws the bread to Katniss is shown so many times in the movie. (In fact, it was shown enough that I literally yelled at my screen: Enough already, I get it. I don’t need to see this again. And, yet I still saw it again.) It’s a memory that defines both the relationship and how their attitude toward one another affects the growth of that relationship.

That said, there have been two posts that suggest the OS should be in Physics and MC in Universe. If we regard the part in the arena, and project it out, I would not be surprised if there were a sub-story of notable strength with that arrangement found there. Especially, if we consider the length of both the book and movie.

P.S. - I’m still reading through the Issues and Problems discussion. Right now, I’m leaning toward OS Issue of Interdiction with MC Issue of Interpretation. But, I’m going to read the rest of the thread first, especially since I could also see an MC Issue of Instinct.

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#82

Okay, it looks like I’m actually in agreement with the arrangement of Issues and Problems that have been related thus far. Though, I’m still hesitant on the RS Problem. (See below.)

I fully support Interdiction as OS Issue and Instinct as MC Issue, with both having a Problem of Ability, for exactly the reasons stated by @Lakis and @mlucas.

I’m still undecided as to the RS Problem. However, here’s something interesting:

  • If the Outcome is Success, then the Equity/Projection/Speculation/Inequity quad is forced.
  • If the Outcome is Failure, then the Ability/Aware/Self-Aware/Desire quad is forced.

That leads me to wonder: What is the Story Goal here?

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#83

Hey @Hunter thanks for joining us! Glad we’re on the same page so far.

Our current formulation for the Goal is something like “ruining a barbaric ritual” or “breaking the Capitol’s tradition”. From this perspective, it’s Success – nothing is the same after their trick with the berries.

Earlier on though, I had suggested a possible alternative in which the Capitol (or Snow and the Gamemakers) were the Protagonists and the Goal was something like “keeping the tradition of the Hunger Games” – which would make it a Failure.

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#84

Honestly, this is the way I’m leaning. I see the rebel archer as a heroic Antagonist, who is motivated to prevent or avoid anything disagreeable, constantly butting heads with anyone. Then, we have the corrupt capital as an immoral Protagonist, working to pursue and maintain a situation that has existed for over 70 years.

I could see the capital as preventing or avoiding something, but I’m having trouble marking the archer as pursuing anything. In fact, the archer has very little agency at the start of the story and doesn’t go after anyone intentionally during the games. This suggests to me that the alignment has to be the first:

  • The archer is the Antagonist (avoid), per Dramatica definitions.
  • The capital is the Protagonist (pursue), per Dramatica defintions.

Also, that would make Katniss like Hiccup (from How to Train Your Dragon) in that they’d both be an Antagonist, which actually seems to match up with the way they each act in a logical sense.

However, I’m not entirely sure I see that as a Failure. I don’t have time to explain right now, but I’ll come back to this.

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#85

Alright, here’s my reasoning for a Success-ful outcome, even if the capital is the Protagonist and the Story Goal be “Maintain the Tradition of the Hunger Games”.

If the Story Goal is “Maintain the Tradition of the Hunger Games” (and perhaps even keeping a single winner), then it is true that the way Katniss and Peeta “won” upsets that.

However, the capital spins that into government favor.

In effect, the capital claims that neither Peeta nor Katniss won, but it was their relationship that won out. The old rules haven’t been nixed. At best, they are re-interpreted. There’s also no clear evidence in the first story that the Hunger Games were brought down. In fact, I’d say it’s fairly clear in the first story that the Games can and will happen again. Thus, unfortunate for the districts and for Katniss, they may have won the battle with the berries, but it doesn’t really change anything. The spark was stifled, and for now, the tradition lives on. (Also, this entire star-crossed lovers bit can be seen as the capital working to ensure their success through the use of Desire [love], which is the OS Solution.)

Finally, given this goal, then the consequence would be something like “Remembering How it Truly Was Before the Capital”, which the capital definitely doesn’t want. (And which doesn’t happen here.)

I’ll add to this that if the Story Goal is “Break Tradition” with Katniss as Protagonist and the capital as Antagonist, then the Consequence would be something like “Keep True Memories Suppressed”. So, either way, I take it to be a Success, but the interpretation of that Success seems rather free, strangely.

I also like Projection for the RS Problem and Speculation for the RS Solution.

RS Problem of Projection: The neighbors-to-possible-lovers relationship can’t really grow, and in fact, becomes more suspicious and turbulent, whenever it dwells on that memory of the bread and how unlikely it is that they could develop into anything more than that.

RS Solution of Speculation: But, when the relationship is more tolerant, and thinks about what might be possible, it strengthens and grows, though I don’t think this is ever fully utilized, leaving the RS unresolved by the end.

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#86

The sense I got from the book, at least, is that the Capitol (and Snow) are in serious triage mode after the games – that it’s a major defeat for them, and this is why Katniss is in such mortal danger. Her only hope is to make everyone believe they are actually in love. In her last interview, Caesar Flickerman tries to reassure Katniss:

“Nothing you say will be wrong,” he says.
And I think, Oh, Casear, if only that were true. But actually, President Snow may be arranging some sort of “accident” for me as we speak.

I admit I’m influenced of course by events from the next book. I know we’re supposed to bracket that out, but is it at least a hint at the author’s intent? In Book 2 Katniss’s victory sparks a rebellion in 11; causes Snow to visit and threaten her personally; causes the death of the gamemaker, etc. And the games in Book 2 are completely different. Book 2 is Catching Fire – implication being that Katniss’s defiance of the Capitol in Book 1 was the spark.

I find this compelling – like I said before, Katniss feels more like Avoid/Prevent than Pursue to me. But if that’s the case, I think the Outcome has to be Failure. That screws up all of our illustrations of Projection for the RS. (It would be Desire/Ability, which one could argue for).

Or we could go back to the OS Issue and make it Destiny, and MC Issue of Conditioning. I could probably argue most of that storyform too. I actually like Falsehood better than Suspicion for the RS Issue. :thinking:

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#87

Unfortunately, I’ve only seen the movie. I’ll admit that I had forgotten about Snow telling Katniss that she needs to make him believe that she and Peeta are truly in love. However, I attribute that to the capital still working the Solution of Desire into their Success.

As far as the references to second story go, the only one I can think of that exists in the first is a spark of rebellion in the district. However, at least as far as the movie goes, that rebellion is demonstrated as quelled in the first story. We aren’t told otherwise until the second story, and there’s no indication in the first story that the games will be different, either. We only know they’ll continue, even though we learn they’re different in the second story.

All that said, I wouldn’t actually be surprised if the book illustrates it as Failure and the movie as an almost Success. You and others have mentioned the book feels tragic. However, I argue the movie doesn’t quite feel tragic, but only severe, instead. This would be a way for the movie to lighten that Tragedy for Hollywood purposes, and it would also explain the sparseness of the RS, since the RS Problem and Solution could take either quad.

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#88

Assuming you’re correct – the Goal is something like maintaining the tradition of the Games, Snow is the Protagonist, and the Outcome is Success – what would Failure look like?

#89

If Snow fails to maintain the tradition, then the districts might start to remember the true history and carnage that happened in District 13, and suppressed memories would return to the citizens. I think portrayal of this in the movie is through the idea that the capital is pursuing a false history.

This is illustrated pretty clearly with the way the capital uses District 13 as propaganda to rationalize the the point of the Games. The districts are fed a Past that the capital wants to keep, whereas, they would lose control of that narrative if any true memory of District 13 is brought up. In fact, isn’t it a point among the citizens not to discuss District 13?

P.S. I would also argue that memorializing Rue is an example of the Consequences, that martyrs will end up being remembered for their sacrifices in the war. Perhaps even a Forewarning of Failure.

#90

I’m not sure about this Snow & Capitol as Protagonist idea. In that kind of backwards setup, we as audience should be rooting for the protagonists in some way, like Jim says in Captain America: Civil War the audience is rooting for Cap & Ironman to come to blows. Or in Empire Strikes Back when you root for Luke to leave Dagobah and face Vader even though it’s playing into Vader’s hands. With Hunger Games I don’t think we’re rooting for Snow or the Capitol…

Stepping away from the rather subjective “audience rooting for”, there is another tool that Jim’s investigation into this concept gave us. Remember the Protagonist side is one of initiative while the Antagonist side is one of reticence. The Protagonists want to do something to fix things, while the Antagonists want to leave things as-is (status quo).

I really think Snow & Capitol are trying to keep things as-is, defending the status quo by preventing whatever the Goal is. While Katniss is definitely on the side of initiative toward that Goal – changing things, breaking tradition by volunteering (first ever District 12 volunteer!).

@RailwayAdventurer collected a lot of good links in this post:

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#91

Okay, so I just read/skimmed the last couple of chapters again and made some notes in my kindle so I can cut and paste here.

I am now back to believing that Katniss is the Protagonist and the Outcome/Judgement is Success/Bad. First, @mlucas you make a really good argument:

This is very clear at the end of the book. @Hunter you brought up the Consequence of Memory which I hadn’t even thought about yet, but she actually harps on for several pages at the climax of the story. At this point, all the other tributes are dead and Katniss and Peeta think they’re about to rescued. Instead, they get another rule change – that there can be only one victor. [Forewarnings of Obtaining]

In response, Peeta throws away his knife and tells Katniss to kill him. They go back and forth:

“Then you shoot me,” I say furiously, shoving the weapons back at him. “You shoot me and go home and live with it!” And as I say it, I know death right here, right now, would be the easier of the two … “You’re not leaving me here alone,” I say. Because if he dies, I’ll never go home, not really. I’ll spend the rest of my life in this arena trying to think my way out … And he goes on about how he loves me, what life would be without me…"

In other words, if only one of them gets out, that would be a Failure with Consequences of having to remember it for the rest of their lives. When both of them get out, that is Success.

On the next page, Katniss figures out that the gamemakers have to have a victor:

Yes, they have to have a victor. Without a victor, the whole thing would blow up in the Gamemakers’ faces. They’d have failed the Capitol. Might possibly even be executed, slowly and painfully while the cameras broadcast it to every screen in the country.

However, having two victors is also not a victory for them, as Hamich makes very clear in the next chapter:

“Listen up. You’re in trouble. Word is the Capitol’s furious about you showing them up in the arena. The one thing they can’t stand is being laughed at and they’re the joke of Panem,” says Haymitch.

We find out that the gamemaker was actually executed in the next book (I think his execution was actually shown in the first movie). So I don’t think there’s any way that Katniss and Peeta coming out as joint winners could be seen as a victory for the Capitol.

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#92

Great points @Lakis. Love the Forewarnings and Consequence illustrations.

Yes, this is done in a pretty cool way: they lock him in a room with a bowl of the same berries. So he knows he’s expected to eat them.

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#93

I was thinking about this some more @Hunter, and realized something important that I think helps put Katniss’s whole throughline into perspective.

A very common illustration for Physics in other stories is something like “raising a family” or “parenting”. I think that fits Katniss perfectly. After her father died she was forced to become the breadwinner for her family, the main parent.

And this not only works for Act 1 but carries through the whole film – she volunteers and does her best to survive all for Prim, the way a mother would. Until the very end when she Changes and adopts Peeta’s perspective that it’s better to accept death, even it means not coming home to Prim, than to give up who you truly are (to let them change you).

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#94

This is a nice reminder. And, I don’t have a problem with Katniss as Protagonist from that perspective, but I don’t like the term “fix”…

I guess, at this point, a good determination would be to look at the Drivers, especially if we can pinpoint the first. I saw some discussion on the Drivers prior to this, but it was brief. Doing so might establish where the initiative and reticence lie more strongly.

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#95

Yeah I just threw “fix things” in there as a sort of shortcut phrase, you’re right it’s not perfectly accurate. The idea is simply that the Goal is some sort of change to the status quo meant to address the inequity that the First Driver puts into place.

You could look at the First Driver both ways:

  • Young, frightened, innocent Prim’s name is drawn in the Reaping. This is so blatantly wrong that it upsets the “balanced inequity” that existed before, bringing to light the inequity of the Capitol’s child-stealing traditions. This sets up the goal of breaking that tradition in some way.
  • For the first time ever, someone in the beaten, subjugated District 12 volunteers for the Games. This upsets the “balanced inequity” that existed before, there is now a danger of the poor districts gaining a voice / leader / agency, which could lead to uprising. This sets up the goal of … I’m not sure … keeping Hunger Games traditions in order to beat them back down?

Just looking at those on their own, either could work. But in this story I think the first makes more sense in terms of which is initiative and which reticence – the Capitol clearly works to defend the status quo.

Also, I think it’s clear from the setup that Katniss’s volunteering is a decision driven by the Action driver (although I suppose you could zoom out and see the whole thing as one Action).

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#96

This definitely sounds a lot more like the story.

As far as Action vs Decision, I would say that it isn’t clearly Action from this initial Driver alone, due to the huge focus on the selection of tributes.

That said, it really is the act of volunteering itself that drives the story. Things could have gone right along as they always had if Katniss hadn’t volunteered to take Prim’s place. And, objectively, logically, she didn’t have to volunteer. She only did it because of a subjective need to protect Prim. (Cold, when written like that, I know. But, since we’re dealing with the Objective Story, that’s to be expected.)

And, of course, looking at the climactic scene with the berries, their entire debate about who or even whether to kill, or to eat the berries was forced upon them by the rule change. And, as mentioned, that rule change comes, effectively, out of nowhere, so it is also an Action driving the climactic decision.

Then, there’s the Act of shooting the apple, which forces the judges to really consider her ranking.

I can’t really think of others right now, but those three are so greatly memorable that I’d say Action is definitely the right choice, and considering that 2 out of 3 listed actions are directly produced by Katniss, I’m inclined to agree with her as Protagonist, now.

I’m also really liking the idea of breaking tradition based on the first driver. Come to think of it, didn’t the woman that was performing the selections even say something along those lines? However, I think I’d rather word it as “Stick It to Tradition” because she’s not really out to break tradition, she just ends up disrupting it, sometimes severely. (Ooh… That works a lot better in my mind.)

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#97

Actually that’s a great point. If Katniss hadn’t stepped up in that moment, the world would have remained in it’s (horrible) status quo.

Something like “Disrupting an evil tradition” works for me (especially if you imagine that as part of a premise statement).

I agree.

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#98

OK, to summarize the current Storyform:

While severe, you can break tradition (The Past) by giving up […] (Ability).

MC Resolve: Change
MC Growth: Stop
MC Approach: Do-er
MC Mindset: Linear

Story Driver: Action
Story Limit: Spacelock
Story Outcome: Success
Story Judgement: Bad

OS Domain: Universe
OS Concern: The Past
OS Issue: Interdiction
OS Problem: Ability

And, now, time to de-rail the whole conversation: I don’t agree with that premise!

So, I tried a couple of strange Storyforms, including one in the Upper Right that auto-filled the Narrative First premise with the following:

When you engage in determining a verdict for something, everyone suffers the consequences of being rash… (And, this just sounds so much closer, even feels closer. It could be tweaked, but darn if that’s not what’s being said.)

#99

What’s the storyform for that? (What is “determining a verdict”?)

If we were starting from the beginning, I wouldn’t 100% rule out upper right for this if only because I can think of a few OS Universe/Progress stories that feel pretty heavy to me (unlike upper right stories with other OS Domains). However, given all we’ve laid out, I have a very hard time seeing it for this story.

At some point I need to ask Jim to clarify how/why/when he uses the “give up [Problem]” for all Success stories now. I think it would be easier to make our premise work with something that suggests adopting the solution.

That said, with our current storyform, using only existing gists, I came up with this:

While tragic to the individual, you can reject the family traditions by giving up being unable to fight back

Replace “the family” with “evil” or “abhorent” or “dehumanizing” or something and it sounds pretty close to me.

(I guess I’m still on the old version? Change “while tragic…” to “while severe” – it still works).

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#100

MC Resolve: Changed
MC Growth: Stop
MC Approach: Do-er
MC Mindset: Linear

Story Driver: Action
Story Limit: Spacelock
Story Outcome: Failure
Story Judgement: Bad

OS Domain: Universe
OS Concern: Progress
OS Issue: Threat
OS Problem: Expectation
OS Solution: Determination

OS Concern of Progress: The initial volunteering is a major change in status quo that brings the problems of “how do we handle this?” because it’s different from other types volunteering they’ve seen before. Then, there’s the fashion designer who wants to “change things up” in regard to the usual tribute entrances, which seeds more trouble for the designer. The game makers keep changing the rules, which causes all sorts of issues for everyone, as well.

MC Concern of Doing: Katniss causes a lot of trouble for herself in her actions, or sometimes lack thereof, but it’s actually going down a level to Experience where this makes more sense. She is uncomfortable throughout the story due to her lack of experience with the city, and the hullabaloo surrounding the games. Within the arena, her experience in the wild is both useful and problematic – the wall of fire punishment for doing what once should do in the wild.

IC Concern of Being: Even though the love may be real, Peeta is playing it up as an act. And, his main concern that makes Katniss think every step of the way is that he Be himself. There is always a shred of doubt about whether Peeta is truthful or not, but in any case, at the end, when Katniss adopts the Be-er attitude – she’s playing up the role of star-crossed lovers, all in order to survive.

RS Concern of Preconscious: The relationship is cemented in a nervousness that causes discomfort and separation through and through. It’s difficult for these neighbors to really get to know one another due to jumpiness within the relationship. Worry (the Issue) also stagnates the relationship, as if either one is concerned for their future, the relationship is tormented by those concerns, unable to reel itself back together.

I’m not entirely against this premise, especially if written: “While severe, you can disrupt an abhorrent tradition by giving up your inability to fight back.”

Though, I’m inclined to believe it to be a sub-story, and the intro into the larger trilogy, rather than the actual story of the first book.

By the way, the phrase"give up [Problem]" is most often used for Stop stories, while a premise that includes adopting the Solution is most often used in Start stories.

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