#the mockingjay pin

[tributes-vamps-and-ginnyweasley]

Okay but a piece of Maysilee Donner's jewelry becomes a symbol of the rebellion.

Even if she ignored it and thought it was ugly, I think she'd still love that

[triassictriserratops]

How Grievers Love: What We Leave Behind

i was thinking about Maysilee (as I do at least once a day since SOTR). Specifically about how she didn't care for the mockingjay pin. About how it was something that became cherished because the people who loved her needed something to hold onto. how hilarious she would have found it to learn that this pin became a symbol for a revolution. (ESPECIALLY knowing how much it fucking HAUNTED Snow. Anyways, on a totally personal note, this reminded me of a story about my late fiance. When they died, the funeral services were in their home state of Indiana.

I'd been in a state of catatonic shock for days at this point that nothing could break me out of.

as i'm sitting in the front row watching the services, i hear music start up from the volunteer orchestra. (all friends of my late partner)

Now, my late partner was a musician. And a wonderful one at that, even dabbling in composing. They played the piano, the mandolin, the freaking MELODICA, and the cello (the cello being their favorite instrument) I immediately recognize the music that the orchestra has chosen to play as Pachelbel's Canon (Canon in D)

and, for the first time in 8 of the most horrific, gray, blurry days of my entire life - i managed to smile. see, the thing is....as a cellist, my partner fucking HATED that song. hated it with every part of their being. "look, it's nice. like it sounds really nice. it's a NICE sounding song... BUT IT'S THE SAME 8 FUCKING NOTES OVER AND OVER AGAIN. it's so fucking BORING to play"

so, hearing it playing at their funeral. how much it meant to the family, how lovely the service was - and how much they would have hated THAT exact song being played... i'd never wanted to laugh so badly in my entire life.

side side note... at the celebration of life that i had for them in Washington State, with all of their college friends and Seattle friends - i chose to start the service by playing this video. i feel it set the tone and i think (hope) that they would have really appreciated the joke.

[mollywog]

Just a girl gifting the most precious thing she has on her to show her friend how much she’s loved.

[morningdawnbreaks]

The mockingjay pin

It feels so underwhelming to me that Maysilee just treated the mockingjay pin like a piece of junk that she thought was ugly, when in the original series it becomes such a big symbol.

The fact that Madge is so insistent for Katniss to wear it made it seem like it would be more important in Maysilee’s story than it ended up being.

Maysilee was rebellious, but she didn’t need a pin to signify it.

[triassictriserratops]

AND AND AND

when someone we love to the bottom of our soul passes away - all we have left to pass them along are our stories and the things they touched.

so we pass them on.

we'll pass on a paperweight they didnt care too much about. A book they bought but never got around to reading. A sweater they wore frequently, but it wasn't their favorite or anything. It was just the one they grabbed most of the time.

we hold on to the items they treasure and the items WE treasure because it reminds us of them.

when my partner passed, I kept a lot of little trinkets and I like thinking that most of them weren't even prized possessions. Just...thing they happened to own. But in my heart they'll always be connected to this person I loved with my whole heart.

Merrilee passed on this bit of her sister she gets to hold and keep. And Madge gave it to Katniss because she associates this pin with love, and this person she loves is going off to the Capitol.

Meanwhile Maysilee is watching this all like "dafuq?"

Funny thing, I didn’t expect Maysilee to say she hated the mockingjay pin. Especially with how much the pin ends up meaning for the revolution, I thought it’d be more on the lines of “oh yeah I love it and left it home to keep it safe” or “oh yeah it’s my sister’s now.” But she didn’t care.

And that brings me to my point. The mockingjay was not THE symbol. It was just what happened to be around at that point in time. It wasn’t something that had universal meaning behind it until the revolution gave it meaning. At the end of the day, the symbol wasn’t even that important, especially on its own. Yes, it had the jabberjays and singing lore attached to it but I’m sure so many items meant similar things. It became important because of the meaning associated to it by the people.

[tending-the-hearth]

going back through mockingjay and what do you MEAN clerk carmine is most likely the fiddler at annie and finnick's wedding, what do you MEAN clerk who was the one to bring lucy gray the katniss just before things fell apart and the one to raise the girl who became haymitch's reason for living what do you MEAN clerk got to see his sister and his niece's dreams come true as the hunger games are destroyed by a girl with lucy gray's fire and lenore dove's heart what do you MEAN clerk saw the arrows his friend made be part of the downfall of the capital what do you MEAN clerk lost his family but saw them live on in haymitch and katniss and peeta

[danyllura]

Maysilee asking for utensils to maintain a semblance of dignity and not allowing the capitol to view her as an animal. Katniss purposefully dropping her utensils and using her hands to eat when Effie refers to the starving tributes from the year prior as savages for doing so.

[kvanderquack]

rereading thg and Rue’s token is a braided chain of grass with a sunflower pendant…

[ultimate-potato-god]

Haymitch being sent STRAWBERRY ice cream in honor of Maysilee Donner. And then Katniss bringing Madge, her niece, strawberries 😭😭

I’m not ok again.

[witchygirlaud21]

“Maysilee thought the pin was ugly; she would hate how it’s the symbol.” WRONG Maysilee ORIGINALLY didn’t like the symbol because of what she thought it represented, the Capitol! Haymitch told her a different way it could be viewed in the arena, not as a bird from the Capitol but as a sign of resistance. Maysilee even agreed; she said if she ever made it out, she’d give the pin another chance, but she never made it out. Maybe she would’ve thought the pin was ugly, but she would’ve loved the symbol and the resistance; she hated the Capitol. Why would she hate the symbol that brought down the Capitol?

[mollywog]

Boggs, who came to 2 when I did, told me that even with all the plotting, it was a little too easy to rescue Peeta. He believes if 13 hadn’t made the effort, Peeta would’ve been delivered to me anyway. Dropped off in an actively warring district or perhaps 13 itself. Tied up with ribbons and tagged with my name. Programmed to murder me.

Something about gifts within The Hunger Games series being double edged swords…

[witchygirlaud21]

SOTR SUNRISE ON THE REAPING SPOILERS!!!

A lot of people are imagining flamingos as the birds who kill Maysilee because they’re pink, but I imagine them being hummingbirds. (Specifically the sword-billed hummingbird.) They have long beaks as described in Catching Fire, and hummingbirds are already known to be brightly colored, but these hummingbirds being bright candy-colored pink sent to target the girl who was never supposed to leave the candy counter. The icing on the cake is Merilees’ hummingbird pin that she lost. THE PIN THAT MATCHED THE MOCKINGJAY PIN!!!!

[mollywog]

In Chapter 3 of The Hunger Games - Madge gives Katniss the infamous Mockingjay pin…

What do you think her motive was?

[kitty-everdeen]

FINALLY got around to decorating my sketchbook cover - and of course it had to be the hunger games because I'm completely unhinged.

[linkislefthanded]

SOTR spoiler !!!

I get she was going for the nothing is as it seems angle but I hated that she changed the scene where haymitch and Maysilee “break” the alliance. It felt a lot more powerful and meaningful and inspiring to me that he’d come running after her no matter what. No matter the expectations or rules they try and put on him, his humanity wins. That’s the sort of stuff that inspires resistance. To me anyway.

[witchygirlaud21]

MILD SOTR SPOILERS!!!!

Them taking Madge out of the movies will always pmo because she was actually an important character.

1) She was Katniss’s friend, and they were close enough that when Katniss volunteered, Madge gave her the mockingjay pin that belonged to her dead aunt, who died during the Quarter Quell (Rip Mayslee Donner 😔). It adds so much more significance to the pin, especially when we learn that it was part of a set made by the Coveys.

2) Madge also shows how wealth gaps in the districts are another way of keeping the districts fighting internally so they can’t focus their hate on the Capitol. Gale saw Madge and said she wasn’t going to be reaped because she was wealthy (in District 12 standards), but we know that’s not true no amount of money can stop the Capitol’s cruelty to the districts. In Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, people from the Capitol didn’t respect Sejanus’s family because they came from District Two. It didn’t matter that they had enough money to make it to the Capitol; they still saw them as less than. We see it when Maysilee Donner is reaped, and her father is tossing money into the air trying to prevent the inevitable, but the money was worthless to the Capitol. It adds more to Gale’s character and shows why the districts couldn’t just unionize and overthrow the Capitol.

3) The reason why Katniss knew about the uprisings was because she was friends with Madge, and she would go to Madge’s house sometimes because Madge’s dad was the mayor. She saw on the TV how the districts were starting to rebel.

4) In the movies, Katniss seems more like a “pick me” because it doesn’t emphasize any of her female relationships. Madge was one of them, along with Johanna (two Mockingjay movies, and they didn’t include their roommate era 😔😔😔).

I read somewhere she was in the og script I don’t know if that’s true but idk maybe in another universe they didn’t cut her from the movies