Tropedia

  • Before making a single edit, Tropedia EXPECTS our site policy and manual of style to be followed. Failure to do so may result in deletion of contributions and blocks of users who refuse to learn to do so. Our policies can be reviewed here.
  • All images MUST now have proper attribution, those who neglect to assign at least the "fair use" licensing to an image may have it deleted. All new pages should use the preloadable templates feature on the edit page to add the appropriate basic page markup. Pages that don't do this will be subject to deletion, with or without explanation.
  • All new trope pages will be made with the "Trope Workshop" found on the "Troper Tools" menu and worked on until they have at least three examples. The Trope workshop specific templates can then be removed and it will be regarded as a regular trope page after being moved to the Main namespace. THIS SHOULD BE WORKING NOW, REPORT ANY ISSUES TO Janna2000, SelfCloak or RRabbit42. DON'T MAKE PAGES MANUALLY UNLESS A TEMPLATE IS BROKEN, AND REPORT IT THAT IS THE CASE. PAGES WILL BE DELETED OTHERWISE IF THEY ARE MISSING BASIC MARKUP.

READ MORE

Tropedia
Register
Advertisement
Farm-Fresh balanceYMMVTransmit blueRadarWikEd fancyquotesQuotes • (Emoticon happyFunnyHeartHeartwarmingSilk award star gold 3Awesome) • RefridgeratorFridgeGroupCharactersScript editFanfic RecsSkull0Nightmare FuelRsz 1rsz 2rsz 1shout-out iconShout OutMagnifierPlotGota iconoTear JerkerBug-silkHeadscratchersHelpTriviaWMGFilmRoll-smallRecapRainbowHo YayPhoto linkImage LinksNyan-Cat-OriginalMemesHaiku-wide-iconHaikuLaconicLibrary science symbol SourceSetting
The Hunger Games Book Cover

It's just a bird, nothing more.


Cquote1

 Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor!

Cquote2


The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins, is a trilogy of young adult novels that take place After the End in Panem, a nation in what used to be North America that is divided into numbered districts and a large capital city.

In the first book, heroine Katniss Everdeen takes her sister Primrose's place when Prim is chosen to be a contestant ("tribute") in the Hunger Games: an annual televised Deadly Game wherein 24 teenage contestants are locked in an arena to fight to the death until only one remains. Her struggle for survival ends up igniting a firestorm that quickly goes beyond her control, until she finds herself embroiled in an all-out war that almost makes the arena look like Disneyland.

The three books are:

  • The Hunger Games (2008)
  • Catching Fire (2009)
  • Mockingjay (2010)

A feature film adaption was released in March 2012, staring Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss, Josh Hutcherson as Peeta, Liam Hemsworth as Gale, Woody Harrelson as Haymitch, and Donald Sutherland as President Snow. The film has its own page here.

Now with a Character Sheet!


Provides examples of:[]

  • Accidental Murder: Peeta accidentally kills Foxface with poison berries. Also, in Mockingjay he accidentally launches a member of his squad into a trap that killed him.
  • Acquired Poison Immunity: Snow, as part of his gambit when he made his rise to power. Subverted in that it wasn't perfect, and he carried long-term damage from it.
  • Action Girl: Katniss and most of the other female contestants.
  • Adult Fear:
    • The point of the Hunger Games was for the Capitol to show it has so much control over its citizens, that they can kill their children publicly and there is nothing they could do about it.
    • Also the fact that Katniss has sworn off the idea of marriage or children because she knows that any children she had would have to face the Reapings just as she had. She only breaks this promise to herself fifteen years after Panem has changed.
    • Prim's death. A girl who's barely a teenager is mercilessly blown up by an explosive parachute.
  • Aerith and Bob:
    • On one hand, you've got normal names like Annie and Johanna, but then on the other you've got more unusual names like Katniss, Peeta, Twill, Plutarch, and Beetee.
    • During the 74th Games, Katniss comments on the odd naming conventions of District 1 (which result in names like Cashmere, Gloss and Marvel) once she learns Glimmer's name.
  • Airstrip One: The Districts are numbered and segregated by industry.
  • After the End: Some combination of wars and natural disasters destroyed the entire population of the world except for Panem. There are implications that Panem consists of less than 100,000 people and represents the entire human species. District 12, the smallest district (possibly excluding 13), has a population of between 8,000 and 10,000 before it is bombed (it's stated that the 800 to 900 survivors are just less than 10 percent of the population). That would mean the bare minimum population of the districts 1-12 would have to be about 96,000, and most likely more, since districts 2 and 11 appear to be several times the size of 12.
  • The Alcoholic: Former District 12 champion Haymitch Abernathy. In fact, it seems that a lot of Games champions end up with some kind of drug or alcohol addiction, due to a combination of too much money and time on their hands, having no real way to cope with the horrors they faced in the arena, and having to mentor new tributes year after year who seldom if ever come back alive.
  • Amazing Technicolor Population: The people in the Capitol have some strange fashion ideas, among them body dyes. At least one person mentioned has dyed her whole body pea green.
  • Ambiguously Brown:
    • Rue and Thresh are both stated to be dark-skinned, but it's never mentioned how dark. Word of God says that they are black.
    • Katniss, Gale and Haymitch sport the "Seam look", meaning olive skin, dark hair and grey eyes.
  • Animal Motifs: Metaphorically, Snow as a snake. Visually, Katniss as a mockingjay. Tigris as a cat-person as both.
    • Also Foxface from the first book. The reader never even learns her real name.
  • Annoying Arrows: This happens unless Katniss hits a vital area.
  • Anyone Can Die: The Hunger Games is actually an interesting example. Many of the characters are guaranteed to die, due to the format of the Games, however, as with most other works, main characters are very rarely if ever killed (depending on who you'd be willing to count as a main character), and only in major events. Katniss, as the first person narrator, inevitably survives the entire series.
  • Apocalypse How: In the backstory. It's continental societal disruption at the least, leading to the creation of Panem.
  • The Archer: Katniss. Also Gale.
  • Artistic License Animal Care:
    • In Mockingjay Katniss stuffs Buttercup into a bag and carries him over her shoulder, even elbowing him to get him to be quiet. She also bounces him against the floor. In the book, this only causes yowling, but in real life this probably would've caused him a great deal of injury.
    • Katniss also picks Buttercup up by the scruff of his neck without supporting his rump. He's a grown tom cat. Any pet owner will tell you that is a humongous no-no.
    • After Buttercup is forced into a bag, he allows Prim to tie a ribbon around his neck and hold him in her arms. After being bagged? Both of these actions would probably cause a cat a great deal of distress (possibly causing the animal to retaliate in violence) in real life.
  • Artistic License Biology:
    • In Mockingjay, Katniss sees Peeta planting evening primrose and the only part she registers at first is rose. Fortunately the thorny roses Snow leaves and primrose are not even mildly similar to look at, so she realizes her mistake pretty quickly. Mistaking one for the other would be more or less impossible.
  • Artistic License Pharmacology:
    • Snow uses assassination by poison to get into power. Apparently the Capitol can neither run basic autopsies nor test surfaces for presence of toxins.
    • In Mockingjay, Katniss describes morphling as making her feel numb and empty. For opiate addicts (who've begun to grow 'immune' to the effects) this may be the case, but morphine makes non-addicts feel relaxed, warm and happy, even through emotional depression.
    • Hijacking specifically tracker jacker venom, as further explained in Hollywood Psychology below.
  • Artistic License Physics:
    • Beetee's electric trap in Catching Fire would not be capable of killing all the sealife and the Careers on the beach like he claims. (Ever wonder why lightning doesn't kill fish in lakes?) Fortunately, the plan wasn't meant to actually work; it was a distraction for his real plan.
    • Planes are supposedly not be able to fly very high because of some sort of vague, inadequately explained "destruction of atmosphere." This is either implying that there are issues of human ability to survive in aircrafts because of low pressure, or that destruction of atmosphere causes the atmosphere to lessen in physical size rather than density. With regard to the first, planes alread fly in much lower pressures than what humans can survive on their own (think cabin pressurization and those emergency oxygen masks)--the height of planes' flight ability in-universe is given at 100 yards and accounting for current ability to fly in low pressure, if planes are limited to 100 yards, sea level would not be within comfortable, easy to survive human pressure. This would make the tall buildings in the Capitol extraordinarily implausible (unless all of these buildings are pressurized, which is in and of itself implausible). With regard to the latter, destruction of atmosphere would cause atmosphere to expand to fill the same space, not a lessening of physical size in the atmosphere surrounding the earth. In other words, "destruction of atmosphere" is not a reason that high-flying planes would not exist.
  • Artistic License Psychology: After months in completely solitary confinement, most would be psychotic, and almost no one would be able to function around human beings. Sort-of justified in that it often helps to find something to occupy your mind with.
  • Asian and Nerdy: Everyone from District 3 (which produces electronics). "Nuts" Wiress and "Volts" Beetee, the two engineers in Catching Fire, "are small in stature with ashen skin and black hair." The explosives expert in The Hunger Games is described by Katniss as "scrawny, ashen-skinned" and by Rue as "not very big." The narrator of the Scholastic audio books puts on a distinct stereotypical Asian accent that is especially noticeable in Catching Fire.
  • Ax Crazy: Some of the Careers. Clove would've given Katniss a Glasgow Smile if Thresh hadn't stepped in. And Cato explodes so violently when Katniss takes out his supplies that he snaps a nearby boy's neck. Enobaria rips someone else's throat out.
  • An Axe to Grind: Johanna Mason in the Quarter Quell; after all, she's from the lumber district.
  • Babies Ever After: Katniss and Peeta have two kids.
  • Babies Make Everything Better:
    • Peeta deliberately invokes this trope by claiming Katniss is pregnant after the two are forced back into the arena for the Quarter Quell. Apparently not even the bloodthirsty denizens of the Capitol seem to want to watch a pregnant woman be killed.
    • Subverted in the series epilogue: while Peeta and Katniss have two children, and this is a sign of hope, the world is still far from a good place, and Peeta and Katniss both retain enduring psychological issues as a result of the events of the books.
  • Bad Dreams: Katniss and the rest of the victors seem plagued by them.
  • Bad Guys Do the Dirty Work: This occurs with regard to Rue.
  • Band of Brothers: The victors in the second book.
  • Battle Couple: Katniss and Peeta in the first book, but subverted in the second when Finnick is Katniss' lancer.
  • Battle Royale With Cheese: Subverted in that defeated characters don't come back to help fight the Big Bad, they come back in another more sinister form to rip the remaining tributes limb from limb.
  • Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Brutally subverted. By the end of the first book, Katniss has several wounds, at the end of the second she has a nasty scar on her arm, and by the end of the third she's covered in burn scars.
  • Because You Were Nice To My Friend: Thresh spares Katniss because she helped Rue out before the latter died.
  • Becoming the Mask: Katniss pretends to be in love with Peeta just to keep them both alive in the arena. At the end of the first book, she's prepared to kill him to save herself. Contrast the end of the second, where she's totally prepared to die so he can continue living.
  • Bee-Bee Gun: Katniss uses a hive of lethal, genetically-altered wasps to kill some of her opponents. And almost kills herself in the process.
  • Being Tortured Makes You Evil: Peeta, though he got better.
  • Betty and Veronica: Peeta is the Betty and Gale (despite being Katniss' best friend from early childhood) is the Veronica to Katniss's Archie: Peeta is nice and fairly sweet, while Gale has a revolutionary mindset and a ruthless streak. This picture sums it up nicely.
  • Big Bad: President Coriolanus Snow.
  • Big Brother Is Watching: Cameras are waiting to catch every minute of Katniss and Peeta's lives once they become contestants in the Hunger Games. Life in the districts is also very closely monitored, leaving people afraid to say anything that might come off as negative about the Capitol. President Snow even knows Gale and Katniss kissed in the woods outside District 12.
  • Birds of a Feather: Katniss and Gale, though ultimately inverted when Katniss decides that she needs Peeta to balance her own personality out.
  • Bittersweet Ending: The freedom at the end of the third book is paid for in a lot of blood, and the characters are burdened with deep emotional scars. However, Panem is rebuilding and there's some Babies Ever After for the two lead characters.
  • Black and Gray Morality
  • Black Market Produce: Katniss makes her living poaching game and selling it on the black market. In addition, most food that isn't made from grain rations is expensive and rather rare in the Districts. The decadent Capitol, on the other hand, has tons of food of all kinds.
  • Blood From the Mouth:
    • Subverted by President Snow, since it's neither overt nor a sign of his impending death. Played straight later.
    • The first tribute Katniss sees die suddenly sprays blood onto her face while fighting with her over supplies, due to a sudden and terminal case of throwing-knife-in-back. Katniss herself narrowly avoids succumbing to the malady a few seconds later.
  • Blood Knight: "Careers" are kids who train all their young lives to win glory in the Games, volunteering for them if they're not selected by lottery.
  • Blood-Splattered Innocents: About thirty seconds into the 74th Hunger Games, the boy from District 9 coughs blood into Katniss' face after getting knifed by Clove.
  • Blood-Splattered Wedding Dress: Invoked with Katniss's wedding dress: instead of being spattered with blood, it lights itself on fire then turns into a mockingjay dress.
  • Blue Eyes: Prim, Mrs. Everdeen, and Peeta. Implied to be a trait of the merchant class.
  • Boomerang Comeback: This is how Haymitch won his game. He made it to the edge of the arena, where he discovered there was a force field that reflected back everything that was thrown at it. The other remaining competitor caught up with him, threw an axe, Haymitch ducked, the axe bounced back, and killed the thrower.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy: Peeta. He gets better.
  • Bread and Circuses: Panem et Circenses. Discussed Trope in Mockingjay.
  • Break the Cutie: Peeta's Trauma Conga Line is significantly longer than that of most of the other characters, though for the most part he takes it all in stride.
  • Breakfast Club: People who have won the Hunger Games tend to become close friends and stick together, because only other tributes can understand what they have gone through.
  • Brief Accent Imitation: Gale at the beginning of the first novel, inciting one of about five times where Katniss actually laughs.
  • Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu:
    • In the first book, Katniss is blown back by the explosion she sets off destroying the Careers' supplies and is rendered completely deaf in her left ear. Unable to escape, she only survives by hiding right under their noses.
    • In the Quarter Quell, Katniss nearly kills herself breaking the force field over the arena.
  • Brother-Sister Team: Gloss and Cashmere.
  • The Brute: Cato, in the first book, and the aptly named Brutus in the second.
  • Bureaucratically Arranged Marriage: The Capitol plans to do this to Peeta and Katniss. This is later subverted in the end of the third book, where they voluntarily decide to marry.
  • Butt Monkey: Poor Boggs. His life is a string of tribulations, from Katniss puking all over him to Gale breaking his nose to getting his legs blown off and dying horribly. The closest he comes to complaining is a sigh when Katniss pukes on him.
  • Call a Rabbit a Smeerp: The addictive painkiller in use around Panem is called "morphling" (morphine) and the people addicted to it are called "morphlings."
  • Captain Obvious: Played for Laughs by Peeta in Catching Fire. After running head-first into the force field at the edge of the arena, he goes into cardiac arrest and gets saved by Finnick. Peeta's response? He mentions there's a force field ahead of them.
  • Cats Are Mean: Buttercup is to everyone who isn't Prim. Until Katniss and he finally bond after Prim's death.
  • Chekhov's Gun: Nightlock berries and Foxface's death
  • Chekhov's Hobby: Frosting cakes turns out to come in really handy.
  • The Chessmaster: President Coin.
  • Children Forced to Kill
  • Closed Circle
  • Close Knit Community: District 12
    • District 11 gets less limelight, but are this as well. They pool their money to buy Katniss a thank you gift in the arena for treating Rue well and giving her a proper funeral.
  • Conditioned to Accept Horror: The whole point of life in the Districts, and the Games. Katniss takes a lot of horror in stride in the first book, but over the course of the trilogy the conditioning wears off.
  • Consummate Liar: Haymitch, Snow, Coin, Johanna, and Peeta.
  • Contrived Coincidence:
    • In-universe. Family members of past tributes are disproportionately likely to be selected as tributes themselves. Katniss figures the drawings must be rigged that way to create extra drama.
    • The odds of Prim getting reaped in her first year, without any additional buy-ins is staggeringly small.
    • In the first book, Katniss finally collapses from dehydration mere feet away from water.
    • If Katniss ever thinks that she doesn't want to kill a person during the games, she won't have to. Either someone/thing else kills them (Rue, Wiress, Thresh, Mags) or they survive (Peeta, Finnick, Beetee).
    • When Katniss is thinking about betraying Boggs he very conveniently steps onto a mine and then gives command to her so that she doesn't have to technically betray anyone.
  • Convenient Miscarriage: Invoked: A fake miscarriage for Katniss and Peeta's fake baby.
  • Costume Porn: Each tribute gets a personal stylist. Looking flashy outside of the arena serves a practical purpose, though: tributes who catch the audience's eye are more likely to receive sponsors who can help them survive the arena.
  • Covered in Mud: Peeta uses a large amount of mud with plants on top to disguise himself as part of a riverbank when he is too injured to move. This probably helps his infection along.
  • CPR: Clean, Pretty, Reliable: In Catching Fire Finnick performs CPR on Peeta (whose heart has stopped) for several minutes before he coughs and sputters to life. After being thrown backward by an electrified forcefield.
  • Crap Saccharine World: The arena of the second Quarter Quell (Haymitch's) is this. At first glance it's the "most breathtaking place imaginable." There're blue skies, puffy white clouds, songbirds flying by, crystalline streams, luscious fruit, gorgeous flowers, butterflies, etc. Then everyone realizes everything is deadly poisonous. And the fluffy, golden squirrels are carnivorous.
  • Crapsack World: Most of the districts are horrible places to live. The people are poor, starving, and oppressed while those in the Capitol live outrageously decadent lives but are also extremely closely watched and more likely to be punished or even executed for speaking out. And that's even without mentioning the eponymous Deadly Game.
  • Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass:
    • Haymitch Abernathy seems like a useless drunk, but he did actually win a Hunger Game after all. In Catching Fire, we learn that Haymitch survived his Games using extreme cunning. We also learn that he's a member of the underground resistance.
    • Johanna Mason famously exploited this trope to win the games, appearing to be helpless when she is actually a ruthless killer.
  • Cruel and Unusual Death: Anyone who's died in the Games, really. And the last book.
  • Crystal Spires and Togas: The Capitol is described as being full of colored glass, and the people are obsessed with fashion. Technology also seems to have advanced to the point that it can be completely hidden from view. Although no one wears a toga, Capitol residents almost all have Roman names, establishing them as a decadent and technologically advanced society.
  • The Cuckoolander Was Right: Wiress knows what she's talking about. The trick is figuring out just what that is.
  • Dark Action Girl: Pretty much any female Career tribute by definition, but Clove fits the trope to a T. Annie is the exception.
  • Darker and Edgier: The whole series is pretty dark to begin with, but the series finale, Mockingjay, is much more hopeless than even the first two.
  • Dead Little Sister: Katniss' father dies five years before the first book, forcing her to toughen up and learn to hunt to support herself and her family. Later, Rue dies in the Games, awakening her killer instinct. The threat of this trope becoming literal drives the whole trilogy. And then in Mockingjay, it does become literal, driving Katniss towards deep depression and increasingly close to insanity.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Haymitch and Johanna.
  • Death Course: The Hunger Games, especially when the tributes settle down into a comfortable recovery period / stalemate. The Capitol defenses use much of the same design aesthetic.
  • Defector From Decadence: Plutarch Heavensbee, his assistant, and some of the other people in District 13 have fled the Capitol. This was also the goal of Lavinia, the redheaded Avox, and the boy she was with when Katniss first saw her, but they didn't make it.
  • Deprogramming: Has to be done to Peeta in book 3.
  • Despair Event Horizon: Katniss passes over it in a matter of paragraphs at the end of Catching Fire. And the rest of the series from there consists of it getting worse.
  • Defictionalization: You can actually buy mockingjay pins. Interesting, because the citizens of the Capitol displayed this exact behavior in Catching Fire.
  • Did Mom Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?: At the beginning of Catching Fire, the president drops by for a terrifying "chat" with Katniss, during which he threatens to kill her whole family if she doesn't conduct herself properly on the Victory Tour. (Katniss's mother isn't present for this part of the conversation, but she does drop in to serve them tea. Katniss then has to conceal the conversation from her mother, telling her the president was just wishing her luck.)
  • Disappeared Dad: Katniss and Prim's father died in the mines a few years before the book begins. Gale's father also died in the same accident. It's concealed in somewhat of a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, but Haymitch's father might have been this as well. Haymitch has told Katniss that President Snow had his mother, baby brother, and girlfriend killed as punishment for making the Capitol look bad in the arena, but a father is never mentioned.
  • Disposable Woman: Rue in the first book. In the others, Prim. For someone driving the plot of the first book, she gets almost no screentime and dies to instigate the ending.
  • Do Not Do This Cool Thing: The Hunger Games are hateful, deplorable, they ruin their victors psychologically, and the series as a whole is viciously anti-war... but a major part of the story's appeal is the actual excitement of the Hunger Games sequences... For both the Capitol and the readers!
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?:
    • In District 11, the dark-skinned population is forced to farm and are treated with particular brutality. This sounds a lot like slavery in the American South.
    • Panem and District 13 are nuclear powers locked in a stalemate. Panem is decadent, wealthy, and corrupt. Its citizens enjoy outrageous luxury while they exploit the surrounding communities to feed their enormous appetites. District 13, on the other hand, is a dull and drab place, ruled by an a totalitarian regime that regiments every aspect of its citizens' lives. That's pretty much how the US and the USSR portrayed each other during the Cold War.
  • Doomed Hometown: District 12 is firebombed to the ground at the end of Catching Fire.
  • Dogged Nice Guy: Peeta.
  • Drowning My Sorrows: Haymitch becomes a drunk due to the horrors he has witnessed.
  • Driven to Suicide: Katniss understandably attempts various suicidal things after the end of the war in the final book. None are fulfilled naturally
  • Drunken Master: Haymitch is a hopeless alcoholic, but his knowledge of people and tactics is astounding.
  • Due to the Dead: Katniss covers Rue's body with flowers and sings a funeral lament.
  • Dying Alone
  • Dying as Yourself: Peeta's wish before going into the arena.
  • Dysfunction Junction: Go figure.
  • Dystopia: Panem is not a great place to live.
  • Early-Bird Cameo:
    • Johanna Mason gets a brief mention in the first book, then appears in the flesh (literally!) a book later.
    • Delly Cartwright is mentioned in the first part of the first book in passing, but doesn't appear until the middle of the third.
  • Earn Your Happy Ending: More like earn your bittersweet ending.
  • Eat the Dog: "No one in the Seam would turn up their nose at a good leg of wild dog."
  • Elaborate Underground Base: District 13.
  • Embarrassing First Name: While the people themselves don't seem to be, at least Katniss notes that a lot of District 1 should be embarrassed by their names, the likes of which include Glimmer, Marvel, Cashmere, and Gloss.
  • Enemy Mine: Temporary alliances are all part of the Hunger Games. In Catching Fire, the doomed tributes hold hands in a show of solidarity against the Capitol.
  • Enforced Method Acting: Often used in-universe with Katniss.
    • She's never warned about Peeta's interview strategy so that her reaction will be more genuine.
    • She's dropped into the warzone to film her candid reactions for propaganda, since she can't act at all.
  • Establishing Character Moment: The first two things we learn about Katniss are that she loves her sister and that she has no problem drowning kittens.
  • Mr. Fanservice:
    • Gale maintains a surprising harem in the fandom for someone who was a tertiary character for the first book.
    • Also, Finnick, both in-universe, and out.
  • Everything's Better with Monkeys: Inverted. A group of deadly monkey muttations show up in the arena in Catching Fire.
  • Everything's Worse with Bees: Tracker jacker wasps.
  • Even Evil Has Standards:
    • The gamemakers frown on certain behaviors in the Hunger Games, but moreso because it will draw a poor reaction from the audience rather than out of moral disdain. They will not tolerate cannibalism, nor will they allow a psychopath to become a victor (unless they can be charming about it, as the Career Tributes tend to be somewhat... Ax Crazy).
    • The Capitol citizens will gleefully watch children fight to the death, but send a young woman who's alledgedly pregnant into the arena and they'll call it barbaric.
    • In the third book, Snow never exercises his Nuclear Option, which would damn humanity to extinction, even when he realizes that he's doomed. He states that he would never kill someone if it gave him no advantage.
  • Evil Gloating: When Clove catches Katniss, she decides to give her something to think about. Followed- as usual- by a Thwarted Coup De Grace.
  • Evil Smells Bad:
    • President Snow smells of blood and cloying roses. It seems symbolic at first, but a reason for it is given in Mockingjay: Snow killed many rivals with poison. He uses the roses to cover up the smell of poison, and his bloody breath is from the mouth sores left by poisoned drinks he shared with his victims after taking less-than-perfect antidotes.
    • Snow uses the overpowering smell of roses to intimidate his enemies, especially Katniss. The lizard mutts in Mockingjay were specifically given this trait to screw with her head.
  • Eye Scream: When Katniss is hunting squirrels, she shoots them in the eye (to spare the meat).
  • Face Heel Turn: Katniss thinks Johanna has done this when she "attacks" her. She assumes Finnick must be in on it too.
  • Fantastic Drug: "Morphling," a heroin-like addictive drug that is obviously a reference to morphine.
  • Fantasy Counterpart Culture: Panem is basically a futuristic, sci-fi version of Rome. The country's name is an adoption of Rome's "Bread and Circuses" motto. The Capitol is an incredibly authoritarian superpower that brutally reigns over conquered territories to feed the decadent desires of its own citizens. The gladiatorial parallels with the Hunger Games are obvious, of course. The parties feature guests who induce vomiting so that they can consume more food, which is popularly thought to have been common at Roman banquets.
  • Fail O'Suckyname: Plutarch Heavensbee, Effie Trinket, and just about everyone in the Capitol. Except Seneca Crane.
  • False-Flag Operation: Toward the end of Mockingjay.
  • Feed the Mole
  • A Fete Worse Than Death: The Capitol requires the Districts to treat the Games as a festival.
  • Fighting From the Inside: Peeta during a fair bit of Mockingjay.
  • Filk Song: Even if one ignores the many versions of Rue's Lullaby, there are a considerable number of these floating around including:
  • Film of the Book
  • Fire-Forged Friends: Katniss and Johanna.
  • First Kiss: Katniss has hers with Peeta. All she feels is that his lips are very warm, because he has a fever.
  • Five-Bad Band: The Career tributes from the 74th Games.
  • Five-Man Band: One of these forms during the Quarter Quell:
  • First Boy Wins: Subverted. Peeta is the first boy chronologically speaking, which should cast him as Unlucky Childhood Admirer, but he is introduced within the story after Gale.
  • Flashback Nightmare: Used rarely.
  • Flat Character: Prim. Many of the minor characters. Arguably, many characters (including Katniss) qualify for this; their motivations are not generally complex. (Survive, hunt, run, and survive.)
  • Flaw Exploitation: Katniss exploits the Capitol's need for a victor.
  • Florence Nightingale Effect: The second one, with Peeta and Katniss, respectively.
  • Flower Motifs: Several characters are named after flowers or plants, the President reeks of roses, and of course there's Rue's death scene.
  • Flowery Insults: Zig-zagged by Peeta when he paints the picture of dead Rue covered in flowers for his private session but he never says a word to the Gamemakers.
  • Fog of Doom: A nasty example is encountered by Katniss and her alliance in the Quarter Quell. It's poisonous to the touch, burning skin and clothes and causing seizures and temporary paralysis.
  • Food Porn: Early on, Katniss describes just about everything she eats in detail, which sort of makes sense considering she spent a good portion of her life nearly starving to death.
  • Foreshadowing: In the first book, Katniss mentions she first met the avox in the train while in the forest with Gale. She ponders where the avox could have been headed since there’s nothing beyond the forest of district 12...
  • Fragile Speedster: Rue, who can move deftly in the treetops, but can't face anyone in a confrontation.
  • Freudian Slip:
    • After Rue is fatally injured by the District 1 Career, in a panic, Katniss refers to her as 'Prim' in her narration, though it's not really a secret that Rue has been a surrogate Prim in Katniss' eyes before that.
    • And reversed in a later book Katniss sees Prim after Rue's death and calls Prim 'Rue' in the narration.
  • Fridge Horror: As Katniss sings a song by her father called "The Hanging Tree", she notices, many years after first hearing it, that the point-of-view character is the guy who was hanged there.
  • Friend to All Living Things: Prim seems to befriend any animal she meets, and can't bear to go hunting with Katniss.
  • Full-Circle Revolution: Nearly.
  • Gallows Humor: Katniss and some of the other Hunger Game tributes/victors learn to have a very droll outlook on their Crapsack World. Finnick takes it somewhat literally in Catching Fire by tying a noose and pretending to hang himself as a joke.
  • Gender Flip: Katniss is the Action Girl and is proficient at hunting with a bow and arrow. Peeta bakes and paints, and is more emotional of the two. They're an inversion of Manly Men Can Hunt and Feminine Women Can Cook, respectively.
  • Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: More literally than usual. Genetically engineered beasties are the Capitol's favored weapon of war, or at least are coequal with troops and air power. Proper nukes are still around, though.
  • Generation Xerox: Katniss looks like Mr. Everdeen, has inherited his hunting abilities, singing voice and, like him, will marry someone from the town. Prim looks like Mrs. Everdeen and has inherited her passion for healing. Also Mrs. Everdeen was close friends with Katniss' friend, Madge's mother, as a teenager and the father of Katniss' love interest Peeta had a crush on Mrs. Everdeen.
  • Genghis Gambit: In order to rally the people in the Capitol on her side and end things early, Coin blows up a bunch of children and makes it look like Snow is responsible. It works.
  • Genre Savvy: After spending a life watching the Hunger Games, Peeta knows what storylines will excite the audience, and uses it to his advantage. He also admits he suspected all along that the Gamemakers would never let two people survive the arena. Katniss, by contrast, has Genre Blindness.
  • Genre Shift: Mockingjay abandons the Games entirely, breaking the base as it does so.
  • Giant Space Flea From Nowhere: Just one fight left. Environment is herding the survivors towards the lake for a final brawl. SUDDENLY WEREWOLVES!
  • Gilded Cage:
    • The wealthier districts have better living conditions but more brutal and fanatical Peacekeepers. On the other hand, District 12 is one of the poorest districts, but the authorities are far more willing to turn a blind eye to things like poaching and black market trading, or at least until book 2.
    • The Capitol itself could also be seen as this - for somewhere that is supposedly very privileged, we see several people willing to risk their lives to escape. The fact that Seneca Crane was executed for simply failing at his job implies at least a very restrictive society, where you're watched constantly and not toeing the line has terrible consequences. In 'Catching Fire', Effie actually says 'That sort of thinking...it's forbidden, Peeta. Absolutely.' when Peeta tries to hold the Gamemakers accountable for killing children by painting a picture of Rue's death which implies the Capitol citizens may not quite have the freedom Katniss assumes.
  • Gladiator Revolt: The series, especially the third book, could be seen as a post-apocalyptic version of this, with Katniss and other Hunger Games winners becoming major figures in the rebellion.
  • Good Is Not Dumb: Peeta is kind and patient and totally kills people in the arena, including finishing off one girl in cold blood while he's in the Career pack, besides being three steps ahead when it comes to manipulating the on-camera narrative.
  • Good Scars, Evil Scars: Invoked in Mockingjay, when Katniss has her uglier scars surgically cleaned up, but is left with some more attractive scars, because she's got to have some scars to show how bravely she's been fighting. Averted in the end, however, when she gets ugly skin grafts, and there's no attempt to blend them because District 13 has no more need of her.
  • The Good, the Bad, and The Evil / Black and Gray Morality: District 13 is just as full of assholes as the Capitol. The conflict really boils down to some truly horrible people who happen to be in power and all the innocents who get caught in-between. Crapsack World indeed.
  • Gorn: How the Capitol citizens view the Hunger Games. In-universe only, hopefully.
  • Gotta Kill Them All: Throughout the Hunger Games, Katniss quite literally counts the number of remaining contestants on her fingers and toes. Although she only personally kills two or three in the end.
  • The Government
  • G-Rated Sex: The act is alluded to at the end of Mockingjay, then skipped over to a brief conversation between the characters afterward.
  • Gray Eyes: Apparently fairly common in the Seam, including Katniss and Gale.
  • Great Offscreen War:
    • One or two of them--the civilizational collapse that led to the founding of Panem (we're never sure just what it was or if a war was involved), and the more-recent uprising (~75 years before the books take place) when the Districts rose up against the Capital.
    • Most of the fighting in the revolution is also off-screen, up until Katniss gets directly involved in District 2.
    • Even then, the majority of the rebellion is off-screen, with the individual Districts' revolts (sans Two and Eight) and even the final capture of Snow being done away from Katniss and therefore the reader. It helps to emphasize the fact that Katniss is only a tool in the war, not a soldier and certainly not a major player.
  • Green-Eyed Monster: Gale tries damned hard not to like Peeta.
  • Guys Smash Girls Shoot: In the first book:
  • Hair of Gold: Peeta, Prim, Delly Cartwright
  • Hands-On Approach: Finnick uses this to show Katniss how to tie a difficult knot.
  • Hannibal Lecture: Katniss' last conversation with President Snow. She decides Hannibal Has a Point.
  • Harmful to Minors: Only minors are selected for the standard Hunger Games. The 75th Hunger Game changes the rules.
  • Hate Sink: Katniss and Peeta can't exactly attack the directors of the Games, the Capitol doesn't send its children to die in the Games, and most of the other Tributes are from Districts as oppressed as 12. However, "Career Tributes" from Districts 1, 2 and 4 are volunteers, Child Soldiers have who trained to kill other children since they were able to walk. In addition to their loathsome mindset and superior skills, they always team up to eliminate the weaker Tributes, then gleefully kill each other once everyone else is dead.
  • He Who Fights Monsters: Gale, especially after setting off what is essentially a giant mine explosion in District 2 to win a battle.
  • Her Heart Will Go On: Peeta tries to invoke this in a More Hero Than Thou dispute. Katniss' internal monologue reveals she'll have none of it.
  • Heroes Prefer Swords: Averted. The only character who really seems to use a sword as their main weapon is Cato.
  • Heroic BSOD:
    • Katniss at the end of the second book, and all over the third.
    • Minor one (compared to the later BSOD's) in the first one occurs for Katniss after Rue dies
  • Heroic Sacrifice:
    • Katniss taking her sister's place.
    • Mags in the second book--twice.
    • And all over the place in Mockingjay.
  • Hero Secret Service
  • Hidden Depths: Just about all the sympathetic characters reveal themselves to be more than they at first appeared.
  • Holding Hands: Most notably during the interviews for the Quarter Quell.
  • Hollywood Healing: Due to the advanced medicine available in the Capitol, most injuries sustained by the characters are healed completely. Aversions include Chaff's hand and Peeta's leg, though he gets a prosthetic leg that is rarely referred to again. In the end, Katniss and Peeta are both covered in skin grafts and burns that the medics didn't bother replacing.
  • Hollywood Tactics:
    • When the rebels attack the Capitol, direct siege would have included trying to seize or disable the Capitol's nuclear missiles, or else bombarding the Capitol into submission. The narrator mentions that they can't do aerial bombing because of anti-air defenses — but what about plain old artillery? Or maybe the rebels could have first attacked the anti-air emplacements, and then bombed the Capitol flat. Or they could have just declared victory and negotiated the Capitol's surrender. All of these options would probably have been easier than block-by-block urban warfare through a maze of boobie traps.
    • During that same attack, Katniss takes point immediately after being promoted to leader of her squad. In real life, a squad leader never takes point, since the point man is the one most likely to die in an ambush, and the squad leader is someone you don't want to lose.
    • There seems to be a lack of any standard infantry weapons besides assault rifles and pistols. No grenades, shotguns, flamethrowers, grenade launchers, mounted machine guns, battle rifles, submachine guns, etc.
    • No one has armored ground vehicles.
    • At one point a character mentions the use of an EMP bomb by the Capitol. Why didn't the rebels just EMP bomb the Capitol to disable the pods?
    • Katniss's combat bow, given to her by 13, is supposedly accurate to 100 yards. This sounds pretty incredible, until you realize that the assault rifles wielded by the Peacekeepers are accurate to around 500 yards, shoot on a much flatter trajectory, don't need constant reloading... and can penetrate body armor.
    • Capitol attack aircraft drop their bombs from the dizzying altitude of 100-ish yards. As though to lampshade this idiocy, Gale and Katniss then shoot down the planes with Trick Arrows. An arrow taking down a bomber. Wrap your head around that one.
    • The third book has Finnick take a trident to war. A trident that he can throw. Tridents are weapons made for spearing and catching things; they are not ideal for killing in a quick-fire situation (though it is certainly possible to kill with one) because things killed with tridents are meant primarily to stick on the prongs. In old warfare, tridents were generally used for disarming (their length and shape allowed them to accurately knock swords out of combatants' hands without having to get too close), but not as a primary weapon except in gladiatorial combat. As for throwing, tridents simply aren't balanced for that at all. Even if a throwing trident were possible, it's extraordinarily unlikely that it would ever be useful in a war fought mainly with guns.
    • There is some very odd squad formation. For some reason, the army of District 13 puts two sisters in the same squad, and allows people whom it knows to be psychologically and emotionally unstable (Finnick, Katniss) to go into actual war for the sole purpose of creating propaganda. Boggs, Coin's second in command, is frequently put on the front line.
    • District 13 is still shooting propaganda spots long past the point that they would be useful. A huge tactical problem once you realize that people's lives, including the life of Coin's second in command, are put in danger for this purpose.
  • Hollywood Psych:
    • Though Haymitch is an alcoholic, in the first book he very conveniently decides to stay sober only when he needs to be on the condition that Peeta and Katniss not interfere with his drinking when he feels like it. Real alcoholism isn't quite that convenient. Bit better in later books when we see him at least having difficulty sobering up.
    • Catching Fire describes Annie as hysterical when she's reaped for the 75th games, without going into any sort of detail. This is enough to have Katniss think she's completely insane. Later in Mockingjay, we meet Annie and Katniss seems to think she's just a little quirky, though she occasionally covers her ears with her hands for no apparent reason. In real life, a person covering their ears that way would imply that they are hearing things that aren't there. Being that this isn't a one off (she does it "occasionally") it's a pretty big alarm bell for a psychotic disorder not otherwise specified. This is not to mention that she's also implied to see things that aren't there. So yeah.
    • Hijacking. The way Tracker Jacker venom works in the first book is somewhat questionable, but in Mockingjay it really doesn't make sense as a conditioning tool. For one, the brain really doesn't work that way. Conditioning is an unconscious mechanism that can't be manipulated into a deliberate response the way the book describes. This is why the CIA stopped trying to do this in the first place. For another, the part of the brain that controls fear is so separate from your memory that it's unlikely that a drug designed to affect the fear part of your brain would have any affect on memory whatsoever.
  • Hot Wings: Cinna's outfits.
  • Hufflepuff House: Most of the Districts of Panem are pretty extraneous and we learn little about them.
  • Human Sacrifice: Tributes are sacrificed by the Capitol to remember the betrayal of District 13.
  • Human Shield: Snow surrounding himself with children.
  • Humans Are Bastards: At the end of Mockingjay, Katniss hits this trope hard.
  • Hungry Jungle
  • Hypocrite: Various characters have their moments, but a few from Katniss stand out. One being that she judges Madge for having an expensive pin that could feed starving families, yet isn't bothered when she herself is later clad in incredibly expensive outfits. There's also her judgement of fellow tributes because of their killing, when she doesn't make any attempt to restrain her own killing - on a few occasions, she even mentions how her fingers are itching for her knife/arrows just because Johanna snapped at her. She also complains a great deal about the wasting of food, when she, in fact, does it herself (when she threw out the gift of cookies from Peeta's father, for example).
  • I Gave My Word: Subverted. Haymitch promises Katniss that he'll keep Peeta alive and also tells Peeta that he'll keep Katniss alive.
  • I Need a Freaking Drink:
    • Katniss upon finding out she'll be going back into the Hunger Games for the Quarter Quell.
    • Haymitch, pretty much all the time.
  • I Was Quite a Looker: Katniss is surprised at how handsome Haymitch used to be.
  • I Will Only Slow You Down: Mags.
  • I Will Punish Your Friend for Your Failure:
    • Snow's favorite tactic.
    • The entire premise of the Games itself was a way to punish the rebels by making their children kill each other, and to remind them that the Capitol can and will do things like this if they rebel again.
    • Snow directly threatens Gale and indirectly threatens the rest of Katniss' loved ones if she doesn't convince all of Panem (including Snow himself) that she's madly in love with Peeta.
    • Snow also uses the threat against loved ones to force Victors into prostitution.
  • Icon of Rebellion: The mockingjay.
  • Idiot Ball:
    • Katniss and Peeta pass this back and forth in the first book: Katniss for not picking up on Peeta's crush, and Peeta for assuming her reciprocation was real.
    • Katniss seems to be very bad at reading people, and Peeta announced his crush on national television. Even if this led to improved sponsor chances, the other contestants would undoubtedly pick up on this and use it to their advantage.
    • Cinna, Haymitch and Effie all tell Katniss that her high score after firing an arrow at the Gamemasters is a good thing, no one seems to notice the big ol' bullseye that this stunt grants her. It had also just been mentioned that high scores have often put big ol' bullseyes on the tributes who received them.
    • Katniss seems to be clutching this ball rather firmly for someone who's quite familiar with nature. The fact that she isn't the least bit perturbed by the monkeys' initial behavior is silly. Even if she wasn't familiar with monkeys, she knows how animals behave, and she knows that the gamemakers stick 'mutts' into the games. Not hard to work out there's something sinister about them.
    • In Catching Fire, when Plutarch goes out of his way to show her his fancy pocket watch, and makes some rather pointed statements regarding it and time in general. It doesn't occur to her until much later that he was trying to drop her a hint about something. And it apparently never occurs to her that the Mockingjay hologram inside the watch is an indication that he's a member of La Résistance.
  • I'm a Humanitarian: A District 6 tribute from a past Games named Titus is said to have gone insane and ate the bodies of the tributes he killed.
  • Important Haircut: Or rather, important lack of haircut. In Mockingjay, all the rebel soldiers have their hair cut short, except for Katniss because she needs to stay recognizable.
    • And, oddly enough, Katniss having her body hair waxed throughout the series. District Twelve has no fashion to speak of, and the citizens have a lot more important things to concern themselves with, so at home, Katniss lets her body hair grow out without thinking anything of it. Her stylists stripping her bare is just another example of the Capitol changing who she is — to the point where by Catching Fire, she considers her fuzzy legs a sign of her freedom, and she's a more than a bit sore to lose them.
  • Improbable Aiming Skills: Katniss is repeatedly shown hitting small game directly in the eye, seemingly with ease. The fact that her arrows have large enough arrowheads to take down humans and deer and therefore have tips bigger than the eyes of some of the small game she's shooting is never accounted for.
  • Incendiary Exponent: Two of Katniss, The Girl On Fire's first ceremonial outfits in the Capitol fit this theme, though only one of them actually uses fire.
  • Informed Ability: Peeta is mentioned as being good with a knife and Katniss makes a point of giving him one during the Quarter Quell, yet he's more proficient at being The Load.
    • The Career tributes are hyped-up as being trained practically from birth to be efficient, ruthless, cunning, killing machines. They don't know how to treat tracker jacker stings, and seem to think that the best way to flush Katniss out of a tree is to wait at the base of said tree, which is convenient for when someone wants to drop a hive of tracker jackers on you.
  • Inelegant Blubbering: During Katniss' breakdown after the announcement of the Quarter Quell, most notably.
  • Insanity Defense: Used to get Katniss off for assassinating President Coin.
  • Interrupted Suicide: Katniss tries to kill herself at the end of Mockingjay, but Peeta stops her.
  • It Has Been an Honor: One of Katniss's prep team.
  • It Got Worse: Pretty much the majority of the series.
  • It Meant Something to Me: Peeta to Katniss at the end of the first book.
  • It Was a Gift: Katniss' Mockingjay pin.
  • It's All About Me: For whom is the Quarter Quell a real ordeal?
  • It's Personal: Between Katniss and Snow.
  • Just Friends: Katniss and Gale.
  • Karmic Death: Marvel got an arrow in his neck from Katniss as revenge for killing Rue.
  • Kill'Em All: The Games are to end with one person left standing. Both the 74th and 75th end a little differently.
  • Killed Off for Real: You never know who will stay alive in the arena until the very end.
  • Kissing Cousins: Gale pretends to be Katniss's cousin to explain his close relationship with her when Peeta is supposed to be her lover.
  • Kiss of Life: When Finnick revives Peeta in Catching Fire, Katniss describes it initially as "kissing" since she's never seen CPR performed.
  • Knife Nut: Clove.
  • La Résistance: Revealed at the end of the second book.
  • Lap Pillow: Reversed between Katniss and Peeta, and once each between Katniss/Finnick and Katniss/Gale.
  • Last Kiss: A couple of times between Katniss and Peeta, never for real.
  • Last Request: Rue asks Katniss to sing for her. Despite not singing for years, Katniss comes through.
  • Leave Him to Me: Katniss insists on being the one to kill Snow.
  • Leitmotif: Rue's song.
  • Lockdown: During the bombing of District 13 in book 3.
  • Losing the Team Spirit:
    • Katniss at the end of the second book.
    • She completely loses it in the third one as well.
  • Lottery of Doom: The reaping, which selects tributes for the Hunger Games.
  • Love At First Sight / Love At First Note: If we take Peeta's word for it, that is.
  • Love Hurts: Often literally.
  • Love Makes You Crazy: Katniss tries to convince the citizens of Panem she was so crazy with love for Peeta that she can't be held responsible for her actions. To say nothing of Peeta's actions to begin with.
  • Love Triangle: Unsurprisingly resolved at the end of Mockingjay.
  • Madness Mantra: Wiress repeatedly says, "Tick, tock" during the Quarter Quell. No one initially understands what she's referring to.
  • Magical Negro: Rue.
  • Maniac Monkeys: One of the many delights of the Quarter Quell.
  • Man On Fire / Wreathed in Flames:
    • Katniss gets lit on fire five times: thrice in the name of fashion and twice in combat situations. There is a reason they call her The Girl Who Was On Fire.
    • Peeta also gets singed at the very end, when he was presumably following Katniss.
  • Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: Peeta is the male version of Feminine Women Can Cook and Katniss is the female version of Manly Men Can Hunt.
  • Meaningful Name:
    • Katniss is a real plant. Its common name? "Arrowhead". And its scientific name is Sagittaria, which is a transparent reference to the Zodiac sign Sagittarius, a fire sign whose symbol is an archer.
    • Peeta the baker sounds like "pita," a type of bread.
    • Effie Trinket seems to be trivial and shallow.
    • Cinna was the name of both a doomed opponent of Sulla the dictator and a conspirator against Augustus Caesar.
    • One of the meanings of "Rue" is "regret." Her death haunts Katniss, who failed to protect her.
    • Avox means, in an awkward and incorrect mixture of Greek and Latin, 'without a voice.'
    • "Coriolanus," as in "Coriolanus Snow" refers to a hated Roman who betrayed both sides and died loathed and friendless.
    • Tigris had plastic surgery to look like a human-tiger hybrid. Katniss wonders which came first, the name or the look.
    • A mag is a type of nut. Mags knows a lot about plants and nuts.
    • Pollux and Castor, the twin cameramen from Mockingjay are named for the Gemini of Roman mythology. Like the myth, Castor dies and Pollux is allowed to live - only with some horrible mutilation.
    • Titus and Lavinia are names from Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus. Like their counterparts in the Shakespeare play, Titus was known for cannibalism, and Lavinia had her tongue cut out. Given Peeta's comments about 'fingers and toes' an unfortunate implication, given what other things happened to Lavinia in the play.
    • In Mockingjay, the expression "the opposite side of the same Coin" comes to mind.
    • Panem sounds like a mutilation of "Pan America", but is meant as a reference to the Latin phrase "panem et circenses", meaning "bread and circuses", or idiomatically, sustenance and entertainment - the two things you need to give a population to keep them happy.
    • In addition to any other possible meaning, a lot of the tributes' names related to their district's industry or their personal profession:
      • District 1, luxury goods, gives us Marvel, Glimmer, Gloss, and Cashmere.
      • District 3, electronics, has Wiress. And Beetee, which invokes "bit" and sounds like TV, CD, PC, etc. (Or BD, as in Blu-ray disc). For British readers, it invokes BT - British Telecom.
      • District 4, fishing, Finnick Odair and Annie Cresta.
      • District 7, lumber, gives us the optimistically-named Blight.
      • District 8, textiles, has Twill, Paylor (play on 'taylor) and Woof (another word for "weft").
      • District 11, agriculture, has Rue, Thresh, Chaff, and Seeder. Chaff is a double example. Not only does it mean "the husks of grains and grasses that are separated during threshing," but it also means, "worthless matter." Chaff never becomes important to the plot.
      • District 12 has no set theme for names; they're mostly things that are important to the parents. There's Peeta, after the type of bread (his parents are bakers), and Katniss and Prim were named after flowers their father was fond of. And of course Katniss' nickname, "The Girl On Fire", may refer to District 12's main industry: coal mining.
      • The Capitol uses Roman names, in reference to their technological superiority as well as their decadent culture.
      • District 2 is noted for having the closest relationship to the Capitol, and their tributes also have Roman names: Cato, Brutus, and Clove (derived from Clovis).
    • In Katniss' case it's a nickname but the drama largely boils down to "The girl who was on fire" against President Snow.
  • The Medic: Katniss's mother and Prim.
  • Memento MacGuffin: The pearl in Mockingjay.
  • Memetic Sex God: Finnick is an in-universe example.
  • Mercy Kill:
    • After Katniss puts Cato out of his misery at the end of the 74th Hunger Games.
    • In Catching Fire, Katniss considers doing this for Peeta and possibly Beetee as well.
    • Gale and Katniss have an understanding in 'Mockingjay' that they would kill each other before letting the other get captured, to avoid torture. Both fail to do it in the end.
  • Mind Control Eyes: Peeta
  • Morality Pet: Katniss has Prim and Rue, and Gale has his own younger siblings.
  • More Hero Than Thou: In Catching Fire, Katniss and Peeta are each determined the other will be the survivor.
  • The Mourning After:
    • Katniss's mother goes into a near-catatonic depression after the death of Katniss's father, leaving Katniss to support the family. Even when the mother becomes functional again, she never really gets over his death.
    • In Mockingjay Katniss goes into this after Prim's death
  • Mushroom Samba: A (mostly) extremely unfunny version thanks to tracker jacker venom.
  • My Own Private I Do: In Catching Fire, Peeta claims he and Katniss did this, so that he can then claim Katniss is pregnant to garner extra sympathy.
  • Mystery Meat
Cquote1

  "Once it's in the soup, I call it beef."

Cquote2
  • Named After Somebody Famous: People from the Capitol are often named after Ancient Roman historical figures: Cinna, Caesar (Flickerman), Seneca (Crane), Coriolanus (Snow), Claudius (Templesmith), etc.
  • Neck Snap: Cato to the boy from District 3.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
    • Katniss' main goal through the second book is to find a way to trick Snow into believing she's in love with Peeta. Unfortunately, she does convince him (and just about everyone else), and therefore manages to give him the leverage to break her during Mockingjay.
    • One can say that the entire series is this. Prim dies anyway, which was what the instigation of the plot of the first book was trying to prevent.
  • Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: President Snow and the Gamemakers.
  • Nightmare Sequence: Katniss's dreams are usually a horrifying mishmash of bad memories and fear-gripped imagination, like everyone getting their tongues cut out or all her loved ones screaming in agony.
  • Nobody Poops: Bears may shit in woods but tributes, apparently, do not. It wouldn't be so noticeable, except that Collins takes pains to make everything about the Hunger Games and the horrors of the arena seem dirty and uncomfortable and horrible, so in the first book at least it's a glaring omission. They do, however, urinate. Possible justification: if you're exercising a lot (say, fighting in an arena) and not getting much to eat (say, fighting in an arena), your body makes use of more of the food you eat. But you'd think Katniss would've noticed the lack of... Well, whatever.
  • No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Given the nature of the beast, it's an inevitability. Even outside the arena, Cinna receives a nasty one as Katniss watches helplessly. And they never saw him again.
  • No Name Given: Katniss never learns the names of most of the tributes. She doesn't find out until well after the games are over that the boy from District 1 was named Marvel, even though she was the one who killed him.
  • Not So Different: Presidents Coin and Snow.
  • Non-Action Guy: Peeta, whose sole moment of badassery is so early on in the games that it's easily outshined by his persistent habit of being The Load.
  • Non-Action Big Bad: President Snow.
  • No Periods, Period: Either the books take places very strategically to avoid this problem or Collins simply overlooked it. Even when Katniss becomes well fed and goes to war in a squad with multiple women it's never an issue. and See also: Nobody Poops.
  • Not in This For Your Revolution: It takes Katniss a long time to decide to actively help the revolutionaries instead of just looking out for her own survival.
  • Not Me This Time: When confronted with the bombing of the children in front of the mansion, Snow reveals that he had absolutely nothing to do with it, and in fact it was President Coin.
  • Nothing Is the Same Anymore: Slowly occurs over the course of the second book, finally setting in for good at the very last line. Taken Up to Eleven in the third book when Katniss' last routine from home, hunting with Gale, stops when their relationship deteriorates and they go their separate ways.
  • Nuclear Option: Discussed. Both District 13 and the Capitol have nukes trained on each other, but mutually assured destruction of all humanity keeps them both at bay.
  • Obfuscating Stupidity:
    • Katniss remarks this was Johanna Mason's strategy in her Games: everyone thought she was a sniveling, useless weakling and overlooked her... until she turned out to be a vicious killer who ended up the victor.
    • Oddly enough, Haymitch counts — not only is he quite the strategist in the first Games, but he turns out to be a major figure in the underground resistance by the end of book 2. Not bad for someone most people just think of as the town drunk.
  • Official Couple: Katniss and Peeta (at least, as advertised by the Capitol), and Finnick and Annie. In Mockingjay, Katniss and Peeta end up together for real.
  • Offscreen Moment of Awesome:
    • The implied epic two-day battle between Cato and Thresh. In the rain.
    • Peeta killing Brutus in the Quarter Quell could count. Not bad for the guy who's usually seen as The Load.
  • The Ophelia: Katniss near the end of the third book, after killing Coin. Annie is also presented as unstable at the best of times.
  • Opposites Attract
  • Ornamental Weapon: Subverted with Katniss' bow. After all, just because it's pretty doesn't mean it can't be deadly.
  • Orphanage of Fear: It isn't actually seen, but the District 12 community home is said to be like this.
  • Outrun the Fireball: One of the Gamemakers' traps.
  • Planet of Hats: Each of the districts has a different primary industry, which serves as its theme. This is an Invoked Trope in the Hunger Games, since the tributes are each trope are traditionally dressed in ways that reference their theme.
  • Perfect Poison: Nightlock berries. Most of the plants in the Second Quarter Quell.
  • Phobia: Johanna develops a fear of water after being tortured with drowning / electrocution.
  • Please Put Some Clothes On: Katniss is flustered by people's nudity on several occasions.
Cquote1

  Finnick: "Why? Do you find this... distracting?"

Cquote2
  • Police State: Panem is one. District 13 is less openly cruel but even more restrictive.
  • Portmanteau:
    • "Muttation" is a generic in-universe term for a genetically engineered creature, probably derived from "mutt" and "mutation". Lots of things count, like those wolves at the end of the first book, or Jabberjays and Tracker Jackers. Many more exotic variants are introduced in the third book when they're storming the Capitol.
    • Poisonous berries called "nightlock" (nightshade, hemlock).
    • The third book features political ads called "Propo", as in "propaganda points", and a "Communicuff", which is exactly what it sounds like.
  • Present Tense Narrative
  • President Evil: President Snow, especially as time goes on. President Coin of District 13? Not much better.
  • Primal Fear: Suzanne Collins seems to be a fan of these... both The Hunger Games and the Underland Chronicles are full of people dying in horrible ways thanks to fire, drowning, bugs (sometimes GIANT bugs) and/or savage animals.
  • Promotion to Parent:
    • The death of Katniss' father and her mother's subsequent depression make her the breadwinner of the family.
    • Gale is also the primary provider for his family after his father's death; his mother helps as best she can, but she's only able to bring in a pittance doing laundry.
  • Prongs of Poseidon: Since he's from the fishing district, Finnick is dangerously adept with a trident.
  • Protagonist-Centered Morality: Pretty thoroughly.
    • With regard to clothing, it starts with Katniss looking down at the shallow, appearance-centered Panemites but then squealing in delight when Cinna makes her look pretty, and continues from there. Earlier she complains in her inner monologue that Madge's pin could feed a starving family for months, but later when she's given a dress covered in jewels, she makes no similar protest, the narrative instead expressing her awe at how amazing she looks in it.
    • Early in Catching Fire, Katniss complains about the Capitol needlessly wasting food. She seems to have forgotten the scene in the previous book where she throws out the cookies Peeta's father gave her.
    • Later in Catching Fire, Katniss is upset that nothing is different in the arena, saying that she'd hoped the tributes would show restraint. This completely ignores the fact that Katniss was the first tribute in the 75th games to try and attack anyone (Finnick).
    • District 8 is so lacking in medical personnel and supplies, people are left with unchanged bandages and untreated infections; their hospital is basically a morgue. Peeta alone, on the other hand, gets a whole team of doctors because he's Katniss's love interest. This is never brought up as morally questionable.
  • Protected by a Child: Near the end of Mockingjay, this is what Snow does to protect himself.
  • Proud Warrior Race Guy: Tributes from Districts 1 and 2 tend to come off this way due to those Districts' practice of training children specifically in order to volunteer for the Hunger Games. As a result, these "Career" Tributes are also far more likely to win than Tributes from other Districts, although Haymitch describes their arrogance as a flaw that can lead to their defeat.
  • Pyrrhic Victory: The ending of Mockingjay.
  • Race Lift: Katniss's race is never stated. She has "olive" skin, but her mother and sister are both blonde, so it's unclear if this trope is in effect with the casting of Jennifer Lawrence in The Movie.
  • Rain of Blood: Literally.
  • Reality Ensues: Pretty much what Mockingjay runs on.
    • Katniss's improvised plan to go behind enemy lines to assassinate President Snow fails spectacularly and destroys her entire squad.
    • Some fans found Finnick's death to be unnecessary and lacking in heroism. But that makes sense in a war.
  • Reality Show: The eponymous games.
  • Regional Speciality: Each district's bread is very distinct.
  • Replacement Goldfish: Katniss forms an alliance with Rue, stays with her while she dies, and vows to win for her, who reminds her of her own little sister Prim back home.
  • Recruit Teenagers with Attitude: Peeta and especially Katniss.
  • The Revolution Will Not Be Civilized: The third book is FULL of this.
  • Romantic False Lead: Gale.
  • Romantic Plot Tumor: In The Hunger Games, this is invoked: Katniss and Peeta fake a romance in order to woo the audience of the Games (or rather, Katniss is the only one faking). In the beginning of Catching Fire, President Snow decides to force her and Peeta into a marriage in order to convince the Districts that her behavior at the end of the 74th Games wasn't rebellious in nature. The rest of Catching Fire revolves around several of the victors in the 75th Games trying to protect Peeta because they think Katniss won't help District 13 in the rebellion if he dies. Quite a bit of Mockingjay is dedicated to gaining Peeta back after he's kidnapped and brainwashed.
  • Rousing Speech:
    • Katniss tries to give one in the middle of a firefight in District 2. It succeeds in turning the workers against the pro-Capital soldiers, but doesn't keep her from getting shot by one first.
    • In Catching Fire Katniss makes a beautiful speech in District 11, about her ally Rue.
    • Her "If we burn, you burn with us" speech in Mockingjay is implied to be received well.
  • Rule of Drama: Ties with Rule of Empathy, below. The Capitol loves best those victors who put on a great show.
  • Rule of Empathy: Tributes must be able to invoke sympathy from the Capitol and District audiences. Sympathy will equal sponsors and money for necessities in the arena, and could therefore make the difference in the Games. Peeta, it turns out, is a natural at invoking the Rule of Empathy at the drop of a hat. Katniss is not.
  • Rule of Three: Suzanne Collins loves her powers of three. There are three books. Each book is divided into three parts. Each part contains nine (3x3) chapters.
  • Sacrificial Lion:
    • It's debatable whether Rue in book 1 was this or Sacrificial Lamb.
    • Prim and Finnick in the third book.
  • Say My Name: Especially Katniss' incident in the tree during the first games.
  • Scary Black Man: Thresh.
  • Schizo-Tech: Justified in that the Capitol deliberately suppresses technology in the Districts, especially weapons tech.
  • Screw The Rules We Make Them: The Gamemakers.
  • Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Peeta (sensitive) vs. Gale (manly).
  • Sex Slave: In book 3, according to Finnick, this happens to a lot of victors, himself included.
  • Shaggy Dog Story: The story begins in the first book with Katniss sacrificing herself to save Prim's life. Prim dies at the end of the third book.
  • Shallow Love Interest: The fandom seems to be split on who this applies to. Gale is either truly the other half of the Official Couple, or he's a Paolo. Similarly, Peeta is either a cunning yet rather hopeless romantic, or a total idiot. Of course, there are also those who think this applies to both characters.
  • Shell-Shocked Veteran: All of the Victors have some form of PTSD.
  • Ship Sinking: In the third book, Katniss and Gale's relationship is increasingly strained, especially after the battle in District 2. They may have been able to work past that, but it's when they realize that Gale made the bombs that killed Prim (not to mention horribly scarring Peeta and Katniss) that puts the final nail in the coffin of their relationship. Possibly for both of them, since Gale didn't seem to upset about losing her.
  • Shoot the Hostage: President Coin orders a bombing attack on children being used as human shields by President Snow - and makes it appear that the attack was initiated by Snow, in order to destroy any remaining public support for Snow's regime.
  • Shout-Out:
    • Word of God has stated that Katniss's family name is a reference to the Thomas Hardy character Bathsheba Everdene.
    • Katniss (the "Girl on Fire") is in Squad Four Five One, a reference to Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, which is another dystopian novel with a fire motif.
  • Shout-Out/To Shakespeare: Lavinia, who has no tongue, is a reference to Titus Andronicus. Titus is also name-dropped, a Tribute who goes cannibal in the games.
  • "Shut Up" Kiss: Katniss does this to Peeta in the cave when he attempts to give her an If I Do Not Return speech. He shuts up.
  • Sibling Yin-Yang: Katniss and Prim
  • Simulated Urban Combat Area
  • Single-Target Sexuality: Peeta towards Katniss. He fell in love with her when he was 5 and never fell out of love. Except of course for the brief time while he was hijacked, and even then it seems that a part of him still loved her.
  • Slave to PR: A dominating theme. A likable persona for a tribute wins sponsors: for example, Finnick. It culminates in Mockingjay when it is strongly implied that the rebels bomb a town square full of children, in a Capitol hovercraft, solely to convince everyone in the nation that the Capitol is evil. P.R. is possibly the most powerful weapon in The Hunger Games.
  • Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: The cynicism side. Far, far, far on the cynicism side.
  • Slow Clap: Not exactly an applause, but the whole community of District 12 uses a cultural gesture to show their support of Katniss when she takes her sister's place. District 11 tries this as well and pays the price.
  • Social Services Does Not Exist: Avoided. They exist, they're just the worse alternative.
  • Some Kind of Force Field: Prominent in Catching Fire, causing death or serious injury multiple times.
  • Someone to Remember Him By: Annie gives birth to their baby sometime after Finnick is killed.
  • Speak Ill of the Dead: Clove talks about Rue, while holding down Katniss near the Cornucopia. Of course, karma sweeps in to save the day, via Thresh.
  • The Speechless: Avoxes, traitors who've had their tongues mutilated as punishment.
  • Spoiled Sweet:
    • Katniss's prep team, who are simply too naive to be genuinely mean.
    • Though we aren't one hundred percent sure of his financial situation, probably Cinna, who treats Katniss with respect and the games with disgust despite being from the Capitol.
    • Madge who is the Mayor's daughter, very kind and is one of Katniss' few friends.
  • Spot the Thread: The official, "live-action" shots of District 13 are revealed to be Stock Footage by a mockingjay which flies past the screen.
  • Strange Salute: When Katniss volunteers to take her sister's place, the entire crowd touches the three middle fingers of their left hands to their lips, and then holds it out to her. Katniss explains that it's an old District 12 gesture that means thanks, admiration, and goodbye to someone you love. It becomes a little more meaningful later on.
  • Stunned Silence: The first response to Katniss' exchange.
  • Star-Crossed Lovers: Peeta and Katniss pretend to be this to garner sympathy. They eventually do become real lovers, but get out of everything alive, so their stars were not crossed.
  • Super Doc: Outside the poorer districts, medicine is far in advance of our own time.
  • Super Happy Fun Trope of Doom: The role of the Peacekeepers isn't as sweet as it sounds. (Bit like in Real Life, then?) Pretty much everything surrounding the Games is treated as fun and entertaining; being a "tribute" is an honor.
  • Super-Persistent Predator: The tracker jacker wasps do not give up an attack once pissed off. Running away doesn't help.
  • Sure, Let's Go with That: When Caesar Flickerman asks Katniss exactly when she first fell for Peeta, she's evasive at first (since at this point she hasn't actually fallen for him yet) and then immediately goes along with his first guess.
  • Survival Mantra:
    • Although nonverbal, Finnick's compulsive knotting in Mockingjay.
    • Katniss shares Finnick's knotting habit for a bit in the third book, but has one of her own.
Cquote1

  My name is Katniss Everdeen. I am seventeen years old. My home is District 12. I was in the Hunger Games...

Cquote2
  • Take a Third Option: The climax of Book 1.
  • Take Me Instead!: In the first book, Katniss volunteers to take Prim's place as tribute for District 12.
  • Take That: In universe, the mockingjay becomes an increasingly unsubtle one of these towards the Capitol.
  • Taking the Bullet: During the Quarter Quell, one of the morphlings is killed by an attack from a vicious monkey that was meant for Peeta.
  • Tall, Dark and Handsome: Gale.
  • Taking You with Me: Book 1: Cato threatens to take Peeta with him into the jaws of the Muttations if Katniss shoots him with her arrows.
  • A Taste of the Lash: Gale in Catching Fire
  • Tears of Remorse: After Katniss's meeting with the Gamemakers.
  • Teenage Wasteland: Subverted. The kids are all right, adult authority in the form of The Capitol is forcing them to kill or be killed.
  • Tempting Fate:
    • In the first book, Katniss reassures her sister Prim that her name won't be drawn for the Hunger Games... Seconds later, that's exactly what happens.
    • If you're referred to as "the girl who was on fire" enough times, eventually you do get actually lit on fire.
  • Theme Naming: The Capitol and District 2 use Roman names to highlight their decadent nature and fondness for gladitorial combat. The nation itself is called Panem, the Latin word for bread. The districts often use names referencing their primary industry.
  • There Are No Therapists:
    • The districts are implied to have therapists, as Katniss's mother was able to somehow gain access to one in order to get hold of drugs to treat her depression. Largely, people do not seem to seek psychological help, though. This could be attributed to a lack of money, however Katniss's family struggles to eat, so...
    • Subverted in District 13: all refugees are given psychological help and local specialists do everything they can to get Peeta back to his old self after a Mind Rape. Before the final attack on the Capitol, soldiers are checked for possible psychological problems (Johanna gets sent to a mental facility). Katniss also goes through therapy after her sister’s death, though one might wonder why she didn't get this sort of help earlier.
  • There Can Be Only One: Played straight for seventy-three years. Zig-zagged in the first book.
  • There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Here, there and everywhere given the nature of the Games. Big mention to Cato, who, having lost all his limbs and skin from being gnawed on by at least twenty wolf-like creatures for hours on end, dies from an arrow to the face.
  • Thirteen Is Unlucky: District 13 is the odd district out.
  • Title Drop: Of sorts. In the third book, "Fire is catching" becomes a slogan for the rebels.
  • To Absent Friends: The book that Katniss, Peeta and Haymitch create at the end of Mockingjay.
  • Tomboy and Girly Girl: Katniss and Prim, Katniss and Madge
  • Too Clever by Half: Foxface. Up until the point where she fails to distinguish poisonous berries from normal ones. Granted, she was starving by then, but still... That is, unless, she intended to kill herself...
  • Too Happy to Live: Finnick and Annie in Mockingjay. As soon as they got married, you knew at least one of them was doomed.
  • Trauma Conga Line: By the end, try to count more surviving characters that haven't suffered one without running out of fingers. This is especially endemic amongst the victors of the games as the Capitol torments them to keep them from using their elevated status to foment rebellion.
  • Trick Arrow: Both the flaming and exploding kinds.
  • Try Not to Die: Pretty much everyone's last words to Katniss and Peeta.
  • Unlucky Childhood Friend: Gale
  • Unwitting Pawn: Katniss feels this way, since she's constantly out of the loop.
  • The Uriah Gambit:
    • Attempted by President Coin, who sends Peeta out with Katniss's team in the Capitol, with a gun, while he's still Brainwashed and Crazy and Katniss is his Berserk Button. It fails.
    • Katniss being sent back into the arena in book 2 might also qualify, if you believe it was rigged by President Snow.
  • Useless Spleen: In Mockingjay, Katniss gets shot. Not surprisingly it happens to be her spleen that is destroyed. Good thing she doesn't need it.
  • Villain Ball: The Capitol seems to hold this on occasion, especially in Catching Fire. There is a lot of Villain Ball discussion relating to the Games themselves, available on the discussion page.
  • Villains Never Lie: President Snow
  • Voice of the Resistance: Katniss and her fellow Victors, throughout book 3.
  • Wanton Cruelty to the Common Comma: There's a joke that Catching Fire and Mockingjay are written almost entirely in sentence fragments.
  • War Is Hell: Absolutely nothing glorious about it.
  • Wartime Wedding: Finnick and Annie.
  • Was It All a Lie?: Peeta's ongoing question to Katniss from the end of the first book all the way to the "Real or not real?" question at the end of the last.
  • Water Wakeup: When Haymitch is in a stupor, only this will rouse him.
  • Weapons Kitchen Sink: Inevitable, given the fact that the Capitol just spreads them around in the Arena and hopes for a sloppy death scenario to increase the "entertainment" value. There's a blackly-comic aside in Book 1 where Katniss mentions how one year the only weapons provided were horribly awkward maces.
  • What Do They See In Her: It's a bit hard to believe that a girl who is mentally unstable, is The Stoic, rarely shows compassion except in extreme circumstances, and only shows love to her little sister or a surrogate of her would be such a catch. Especially considering that there doesn't seem to be any real basis for a relationship with either Love Interest; Peeta's love came from a childhood crush from watching her sing, while her relationship with Gale seems to come from more of a familiarity and common interests (that of 'survival' and 'hunting') than genuine friendship. Although they are teenagers, and both of them seem to be catching onto her flaws by the third book. Oddly enough, the Love Triangle seems to be resolved because Katniss realizes that she can't love Gale after being partially responsible for her sister's death rather than realizing that she does love Peeta.
  • Wham! Line:
    • The very first chapter of The Hunger Games: "It's Primrose Everdeen."
    • Chapters have a tendency to end with these, such as, "Katniss, there is no District 12."
    • Or how about "And then the second round of parachutes goes off."
    • In-universe, Peeta is the acknowledged master of the Wham! Line, particularly when onstage with Caesar Flickerman. In the first book he sets up the Star-Crossed Lovers thing, and in the second he manages an even bigger one: He claims he and Katniss are having a baby.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?:
    • We never learn why Cinna requested District 12 (as he says he did in book 1) and we never find out if Portia did the same. We also have no clue why he doesn't have the Capitol accent or the Capitol sense of style, despite that not making much sense if he's a fashion designer who's lived in the Capitol for his entire life. However, there is a theory stating that his mother had an affair with a Victor, perhaps from District 12, although that would kind of complicate things rather than resolve them. On the other hand, we never learn what happened to the other Victor from 12 apart from Haymitch and whether that one came before him or after.
    • In book 2, Johanna says everyone she loves is dead. Elaboration? Explanation? Don't count on it. There's a popular guess in fanon, though.
    • In the third book Katniss gets a bow with "special properties." She never once mentions them again, uses them, or even explains what those properties are, besides the fact that it can vibrate to say hello. This could be the reason it's able to shoot down planes, though.
    • In Catching Fire Katniss comes across two refugees (Bonnie and Twill) trying to make it to District 13. When Katniss gets there herself, she asks after them, but learns that they never made it. We never find out what actually happened to them.
  • What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: Subverted. Katniss sees Peeta as The Heart and thinks his power to love is much better than her ability to kill things.
  • When the Clock Strikes Twelve: Given the nature of the arena used by the Quarter Quell.
  • Where the Hell Is Springfield?: The Districts have a few geographical clues but otherwise the readers don't really learn where they are. That didn't stop people from trying to map it, though.
  • White Knighting: Gale subtly blames Katniss of being a female version. The only way for a man to get noticed by her is to suffer so terribly that she feels obliged to tend and care for them.
  • Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Tough-as-nails Johanna Mason is undone by water... because when she was a prisoner of the Capitol, they soaked her and then electrocuted her as part of her torture.
  • Will Not Be a Victim: Invoked and then exploited. It's how Johanna won her Hunger Games.
  • The Worf Effect: Cato taking out Thresh in Book 1.
  • Working Title: The working title of the first novel was The Tribute of District Twelve.
  • Wreathed in Flames: Part of Katniss's symbology (along with being a mockingjay).
  • Writers Cannot Do Math:
    • In Catching Fire, Katniss describes the Cornucopia as being 40 yards away from the launch platform, which is located in a circular lagoon. There are twelve spokes of land separating the 24 tributes, and Katniss is equidistant from the land strip and the adjacent tribute platform. If you do all the calculations, it turns out that Katniss is about seven yards from the nearest land strip. Katniss has to swim this distance, and describes it as "a longer distance than [she's] used to swimming" back in the lake outside District 12.
    • Reapings are supposed to take place in early springtime. The reaped go to ceremonies, etc, that last about a week or two at most, the 75th Hunger Games last a few days tops, and Peeta is captured on the last day. Roughly four weeks pass between the end of the 75th games and the beginning of Mockingjay, and yet somehow five or six weeks after Peeta's kidnapping, it's a week from September.
Cquote1

 "What day is it?" I ask no one in particular. Boggs tells me September begins next week. September. That means Snow has had Peeta in his clutches for five, maybe six weeks.

Cquote2
  • Would Hit a Girl: There are just as many girls as boys in each Hunger Game, ensuring a lot of this. Marvel kills Rue, and Thresh kills Clove.
  • Would Hurt a Child: Isn't that right, Marvel?
  • You Gotta Have Blue Hair: The people living in the Capitol dye their hair some pretty wild colors.
  • You Have Outlived Your Usefulness:
    • Leads to Cato snapping the neck of District 3's boy in the first book.
    • President Coin attempts this with Katniss towards the end of Mockingjay.
  • You Killed My Father:
    • In Mockingjay, either President Snow or President Coin kills Prim.
    • Katniss understands that if the conditions were not so bad in the coal mines due to the decadent lifestyle in the Capitol and the corrupt government, her father would not have died in the mine accident.
  • Your Favorite: Katniss at one point receives food including the stew she stated in an interview was her favorite thing about the Capitol. In Mockingjay, Peeta finds a can of the same stew and presents it to Katniss when the team scavenges a meal.
  • X Meets Y: The media tends to treat the series as Twilight with gladiators. The actors have made a point of downplaying the love triangle by answering "Team Peeta or Team Gale?" with "Team Katniss."
Advertisement