Sunrise On The Reaping Spoilers - Blog Posts

my fav thing about sunrise on the reaping was when haymitch was like yeah caeser i'm a lone wolf 😏 i'm with the newcomers but i'm not WITH the newcomers, yknow? they call me a rascal. a rebel against the gamemasters. I scored a ONE and that is a THREAT. you do not want to mess with me 🙅

cut to him with like 20 kids following him around like ducklings, him hiding in his t-shirt, him letting a bunny guide him to safety because it reminded him of his girlfriend, and him making nightlights out of potatoes.

katniss everdeen didnt even tell us the names of her own PARENTS. of course she didn't bring up beetee's wife and child, let alone effie's family in the original trilogy. SHE BARELY TOLD US ANYTHING ABOUT PEETA!!! she basically went through life with survival blinders on, give the girl a break😭😭😭

SUNRISE ON THE REAPING SPOILERS

“I first saw the girl at the Hob when she was just a baby. Burdock was so proud of her, he toted her around everywhere. After he died in that mine explosion, she started coming alone, trading the odd squirrel or rabbit. Tough and smart, her hair in two braids then, reminding me for all the world of Louella McCoy, my sweetheart of old. And after she volunteered for the Games, that nickname couldn’t help but slip out. I didn’t want to let them in, her and Peeta, but the walls of a person’s heart are not impregnable, not if they have ever known love. That’s what Lenore Dove says, anyway.”

When we first meet Haymitch, we can instantly tell that he has made a habit of distancing himself from tributes. That he has nobody left he loves, so he pushes away anybody else that tries to come into his life. But now we know how full of love Haymitch was. How deeply he loved Lenore Dove, how deeply he loved his mother and Sid, his friends, even Hattie. Everything Haymitch did was out of love. He was reaped because he tried to protect the girl he loved. As he was reaped, he did his best to protect his sweetheart, 13-year-old Louella McCoy he grew up with. He tried to distance himself from the other tributes, but eventually he couldn’t help but love them too.

He couldn’t help but call Ampert “Buddy.” He couldn’t help but call all of the district 6 tributes his doves, and mourn all of their deaths, no matter how little he actually knew them. How Louella was replaced, and how he wanted to hate her replacement, but gave her the name Lou Lou and protected her like their own. Haymitch was the one who initiated the hug of all four tributes from 12. He was distrustful of Wyatt, and grew to mourn him like a brother. He carried Lou Lou like his life depended on holding onto her. How he hated Maysilee Donner, and thought of her as the most stuck-up girl in 12. He called her Sis. He grew to love her like the sister he never had. She died as his sister.

All of the love that Haymitch didn’t need to give, and yet he loved so endlessly and so whole-heartedly. And with every person he loved, he lost them, and lost a part of himself. No wonder he didn’t want to let Katniss and Peeta into his heart. He had already tried so hard to push away Burdock, who relentlessly tried to care for him in his despair.

Then, in comes Katniss Everdeen. She carried with her a piece of every person Haymitch tried to push away. She was Asterid, Burdock, the Seam children he grew up with, all in one person. He didn’t want to let her in. He couldn’t have.

And yet, Haymitch couldn’t help but call her sweetheart.

Because Katniss was a woven tapestry of every person he had ever loved. She was his best friend’s daughter. She carried Lenore Dove’s songs. Louella’s skin and hair. Wyatt’s protectiveness. Maysilee’s fight, Maysilee’s resistance, Maysilee’s pride, Maysilee’s pin. And in the arena, she painted the best poster Haymitch and Maysilee could’ve ever hoped for- Rue, surrounded by flowers, her passing in dignity and not as another number in the games. And refusing the Capitol their winner by eating the berries with Peeta.

It’s no surprise that Katniss and Peeta broke down Haymitch’s walls. Haymitch had the flint striker, the spark. And Katniss was the fire that caught 25 years later.

The fact that there are several undertones that we don't understand until later in life when we're older, reading The Hunger Games is astounding.

Haymitch was never forced into anything (I'm talking prostitution) because his love and family were dead. If he hadn't pushed his friends away they would be the new collateral that Snow would hold over Haymitch's head.

Haymitch was never going to have a happy ending either way and that's all the more depressing to think about. Had Lenore survived, she would've been something to hold over him. His life was bound for depression the minute he won the games. He didn't die in the games, his chance of happiness died the minute he boarded the train.

(And perhaps that theory that Burdock's death in the mines was targeted may hold some merit, although in my opinion that was a very late accident that I'm not sure it would been connected. However, the chance that it was more of an act to squash rebellion definitely sticks, and it no doubt it still probably haunts Haymitch.)

Suzanne really making us look at the victors in the eyes and realizing that they are all victims.

Please I can't.

suzanne collins did a lot of great things in sunrise on the reaping but one of my favorites has to be her decimating all AI usage in one sentence.

SOTR Spoilers Ahead:

I've seen a couple of posts now about people's suspicion over The Capitol being able to find a girl that could replace Louella as fast as they did, especially after finding out Lou Lou's from District 11

But I'm gonna be honest, when I found out she was from District 11, it actually put a lot of the pieces together for me. My mind immediately went to Seeder, the D11 female victor in Catching Fire

If its been a second since you've read CF here's her description:

She looks like she could be from the seam. I wouldn't be surprised if Seeder's description is the reason SC chose D11 for Lou Lou tbh.

Also for making their faces match, I've always just kinda assumed fast fashion cosmetic surgery is common place for The Capitol so there's probably plenty of surgeons able to do the job quickly and well enough to pass her off as Louella to anyone who didn't know her.

And it’s not like they did a particularly clean job at it either. Their “solution” was so incredibly slapped together and messy (And that’s HORRIFIC because we’re talking about a CHILD). She’s hooked up to drugs 24/7, which could easily be ripped out, manipulated, etc. and also make her barely able to function and causes more problems for the Capitol than not. One thing that’s brought up over and over in sotr is the Capitol’s gross incompetence, but because of they’re good at propaganda, you wouldn’t realize it. Lou Lou’s another example of that

(Also....Seeder's in her 60s in CF...meaning she would have been a victor and, I dunno, old enough to have a 13 year old by the 50th Hunger Games...I'M NOT SAYING SHE'S LOU LOU'S MOM I'm just saying the timeline lines up weirdly well)

Without fail every single THG book has had at least one moment (usually multiple) with a district 11 tribute/citizen that had me ugly crying and GOD LOU LOU’S GOTTEN ME LIKE 4 TIMES

LENORE DOVE IS NOT A REDHEAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

CONFIRMED HAYMITCH ABERNATHY IS AN ALLY

everyone should talk about how derange Lenore Dove is

girl is 16 and she already been arrested twice. and when she got questioned she wrote a SEVEN PAGE DOCUMENT about if would die give all of her things to her geese for her alibi.

She literally talked about breaking into the Donners home to get back pin her uncle made for Masyilee. Haymitch and Burdock had to stop her for actually doing it!!

My girl is so chaotic and i love her for it

ok so pls stp🙏🙏

so you’re telling me that after what happened to louella/lou lou haymitch had to watch peeta come back from the capitol as a “mutt version of himself” and question whether the shell of a human with peeta’s face was even peeta at all

and he had to do all that SOBER???

oh fuckkkkk youuuu

the way the gun is kissing my head is insane

haymitch says himself katniss is like him, but luckier.

katniss realized the berries were nightlock before peeta ate them.

haymitch being repeatedly told not to step off the plate once he's in the arena until 60 seconds are up, haymitch reminding himself of this fact, only to immedietly get distracted by a bunny he wants to pet.

I know for a fact the entire team started screeching at the tv when he reached for it