#Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

[ghostsandyoumightdie]

"Suzanne Collins gave Coriolanus Snow a tragic backstory and made him sympathetic!" So close. Actually, she put the reader in the POV of an extremely privileged character whose thoughts and views and morals still ultimately aligned with fascism, who constantly fell back on those philosophies no matter how many brief moments of humanity he felt for the Districts. She wrote a realistic human being who aligned himself with the status quo and benefited from it. She demonstrated a character who did not become kinder or more empathetic through his suffering, but instead became angrier at the indignity of it, and punished the ones he saw as "deserving" it sevenfold. She showed you, the reader, that those in power know exactly how much the oppressed suffer, and do it anyway, even if they briefly suffer the same.

[moonsmiracles]

Rereading sunrise on the reaping and accepting the fact that I will actually never be okay ever again 😀

[siminiecricketart]

I adore my district 12 girlies

[timelesslords]

thinking about how the hunger games were designed to prove that without society, order, government, someone to rule, we devolve into little more than animals, and how the games themselves prove over and over again that this is not true. We see it in every single game we witness.

Katniss placing flowers around Rue's body in the arena. Thresh sparing Katniss because she was kind to Rue, even though he was making it that much harder for himself to win.

Haymitch going back for Maysilee after hearing her scream even though their alliance had been broken. Haymitch holding her as she dies the same way Katniss did Rue.

Coral's "I can't have killed them all for nothing" when she realizes she's not going home. Lamina cutting down Marcus at great personal risk. And, my favorite moment in tbosas, Reaper collecting the bodies of his fellow tributes, his peers, even the ones who tried to kill him, into a pile. Taking the weapons from their hands. Closing their eyes and crossing their arms in the best approximation of a proper burial he can manage, covering them with the Capitol flag as a makeshift shroud.

The Games bring out the worst in people, yes. But despite the extreme circumstances, despite the exterior pressure of the Capitol, despite the fact that it could mean pain and heartbreak and death, it also shows that people have an enormous capacity for goodness. That even in a situation purposefully designed to make empathy impossible, people can't help but have it anyway.

Snow looks at the Games and all he can see is what's inside himself-- this pure animalistic drive to conquer and defeat. He kills and it feels good and he thinks that everyone else must feel that way too. He doesn't realize (maybe can't realize) that he is the exception, not the rule. He cannot see outside himself, outside his own warped perspective, to realize that the fact that people do show humanity in the games proves his entire worldview wrong.

[you-askedforthis]

In Catching Fire Katniss mentions that Victors are meant to have a “special talent” and that hers was fashion design.

She says she refuses to sing for the Capitol, implying it is her choice.

Which just seems improbable to me, the Capitol is not above forcing Victors to perform.

In reality Snow was probably the one to refuse to let her sing. He was not going to let a Covey girl from District 12 sing in the Capitol ever again.

[diamondsunbursts-and-marblehalls]

Reaper is everything.

The respect he had for the other tributes. The grave he made for the fallen tributes. He was completely exposed and could have been killed by anyone, but recognizing those kids and respecting them the way they deserve was more important to him. The way he tore down the symbol of the government that was supposed to protect them, and used it to cover the bodies of the kids it failed so badly. His calm demeanor. The love he had for his sick and fragile district partner. The love he had for Wovey. The way he protected those gentle souls the best he could. He didn't even try to fight. He knew he wasn't going to kill any of these kids. He's the original revolution. He wasn't going to play the capitol's games. He didn't let them turn him into something he's not. He is everything good.

[vesteneris]

drawing Tigris as a stylist once again before SOTR comes out in about 2 weeks okay bye

[six-miscellaneous-nebulae]

alright so this took me twenty six hours. yay! please click for quality there are way too many details that i’m super proud of

you know what? labeled version under the cut

1. The flowers/vines wrapped around the frame are primroses. they’re also present to the right of Prim herself

2. The Capitol insignia is present in the four corners of the frame

3. The mockingjay (obv)

4. Dandelions in between Katniss and Peeta

5. A lark for Peeta (I had all the other birds, needed one for him!)

6. The katniss plant is by Katniss herself and Boggs, with a flower right in front of Katniss’s chest

7. A burdock plant, between Katniss and Prim

8. A Honeysuckle flower (Katniss runs into these after her tracker-jacker debacle in book one and remembers them from home)

9. Rue flowers, with other wildflowers (specifically white, purple, and yellow, which are the colors of the flowers Katniss used after Rue died)

10. Buttercup flowers (did you know these are poisonous? I didn’t)

11. Nightshade plant, of which the night lock is based on

12. Dahlias, because if I remember right there was one on Finnick and Annie’s wedding cake

13. Pine tree branches/pinecones, to represent Johanna’s home district, district seven

14. Potato plant/flowers next to Betee and Ampert. They’re also present to the right of Haymitch

15. Mockingjay graffiti

16. Yellow roses in between Haymitch and Maysilee, for friendship

17. Haymitch’s four little doves

18. Cattail, for Mags

19. Graffiti reading “The odds are never in our favor”

20. Blueberries—Maysilee uses blueberries in Sunrise on The Reaping to replenish her poison for her darts

21. Bee Balm

22. Sunflowers, for Lou Lou and the district nine and eleven tributes in Sunrise on The Reaping

23. Red Roses

24. Another mockingjay for Sejanus (this one is a little bluer/more saturated than Katniss’s, due to less generations of breeding with mocking birds)

25. Wheat for Reaper

26. A songbird for Lucy Gray

27. A snake, particularly the one Lucy Gray uses in the beginning of Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

28. A raven, for Lenore Dove

29. Marigolds, symbolic of the cycle of and connection between life and death

30. White Roses

31. A snake from the 10th Hunger Games

[mallydraws]

My soul will always seek yours

[spicybag3l]

What i love about the hunger games is that even though most of the covey died out and hell they bombed district 12 to the ground. And yet the covey traditions are still alive. That’s truly the last word to snow no matter how hard he tried to erase the covey their songs and their culture is still alive.

[incognitokoala]

something something arachne teasing brandy and ending up dead for it something something

something something the capitol dangling the chance for katniss and peeta to both live and then taking it away and getting the rebellion statted in return something something

[balladofmyramblings]

not targeted or anything but it’s crazy work to literally be on the verge of death coughing blood and still interfering in teenager’s love lives because one of them is related to a girl you had a two month fling with 40 years ago. like maybe move on? it was NOT that deep

[janisred13]

me when I come out of a depressive episode

Just give him a minute ✋

[sadieillustrates]

the reused trackers in sunrise on the reaping

in sotr it is revealed the capitol reuses the tributes' trackers.

“What happens if we win? Do they take it out?” asks Wyatt.

“We collect all of them from the tributes, dead or alive,” says the woman. “They’re reusable. Of course, this year we needed twenty-four extra.”

i have seen some people speculate this is a cruelty on the capitol's part. it could be fatal to reuse trackers inserted under the skin and removed from dead bodies.

i actually think the reused trackers show a weakness on the capitol's part. there is this myth the capitol has infinite resources and funds, that they are calculating in every way. but what we see throughout sotr is this is not fully the case. the capitol is cruel yes, but they aren't as put together as they want everyone to believe.

the capitol hoards the resources produced by the districts. they live beyond their means, lavishly. this however doesn't mean there is infinite resources. what brought together panem was a series of events, one being resource scarcity!

instead the leaders of the capitol keep up the illusion to the citizens of the capitol that they have plenty of resources, never ending. to create a sense of security. the people in the capitol feel comfortable and safe. they never worry about anything. they don't have to. everything they could even need simply appears with out the signs of labor with out even lifting their finger!

with the trackers, and other things, we see that they really do not have enough. there are places they must cut corners. yes, they spend and waste so many resources on the games, but they save where they can. why make more trackers when you can just reuse the same 24 every year?

[you-askedforthis]

Just thinking about how in Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes Lucy Gray says, “the show’s not over until the mockingjay sings”

And how at the end of Mockingjay Katniss is mute until she talks to Snow and votes yes for another hunger games.

But it’s only after she kills Coin and is imprisoned in her old room in the training center that she starts to sing…