Kaitlyn Angeles and Roxy Kalantari

Released on November 17, 2023, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes book and movie has some subtle changes that some viewers have noticed. These changes don’t necessarily alter the story, and the mystery and clarity is still alive. The clarity that “Snow lands on top” with the mystery of it not being “over until the Mockingjay sings.”

[Spoilers]

With Suzanne Collins’ prequel The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes recently becoming a film adaptation, eagle-eyed viewers noticed some subtle changes from the pages to the screen. Of course, there can never be a perfect adaptation because then it would be hours long, so screenwriters, directors, and producers have to figure out what to bring to the big screen and what to leave in the books.

Luckily, TBOSAS stayed true to many of the descriptions in the book. With that being said, here are some of the subtle differences in adapting the book to the screen.

Coriolanus Snow’s thoughts

Perhaps the biggest change that altered the atmosphere of the film was the exclusion of Coriolanus Snow’s thoughts. Many adaptations take on the role of expanding the point of view into one that is much broader than the initial perspective, to create a wider range of material to film and use. However, in this case, the exclusion of Snow’s thoughts led to a disconnect between the characters, the movie, and the audience. 

Although written in third person limited point of view, it is through the eyes of Coriolanus Snow. This greatly adds to his character arc as an antagonist because readers can understand his thoughts and motivations, especially towards Lucy Gray. More often than not, he regards Lucy Gray as an object and wants to be in full control of every situation. This need eventually leads to his hunger for power, thus revealing why he is the villain in the first place.

However, since the movie lacked his inner thoughts, the viewer could not connect with Snow and instead had to watch the story unfold from the outside. Throughout the first two parts of the film, The Mentor, and The Prize, many viewers sympathized with Snow, and it is later revealed that he slowly starts becoming more and more evil through the third act, The Peacekeeper.

The rat poison and the silver compact

The silver compact was a small, but essential part of the story. In the book, Snow subtly hints that Lucy Gray should collect the rat poison from inside the monkey enclosure at the zoo into the compact for later usage. The act of telling her where it is showcases Snow’s mind and how he is already calculating a plan to win, but urges Lucy Gray to be the one to obtain it, so consequences wouldn’t fall back on him.

In the movie, however, Snow puts the rat poison in the compact himself from a labeled drawer in his room and then gives the compact filled with poison to Lucy Gray. This change leaves many to wonder why Snow had rat poison in his possession in the first place.

Some of the tributes’ deaths were switched

Despite the 10th Annual Hunger Games resulting in 23 deaths, the deaths of Wovey, Treech, and Reaper tugged at the audiences’ heartstrings the most because of the painful and sad way they died. However, from book to screen, there were some slight differences. 

In the books, Wovey dies by a poisoned water bottle that Lucy Gray had most likely poisoned with the rat poison. Reaper was also killed by drinking the rat poison from a puddle in the ground. Treech had been killed when Lucy Gray dropped a snake mutt down his shirt, similar to when she dropped one down the daughter of District 12’s Mayor, Mayfair Lipp. 

In the film however, both Wovey and Reaper died when Dr. Gaul released a myriad of tri-color snakes into the arena while Treech was killed by inhaling the rat poison through the vents, from which Lucy Gray was in.

The differences in their deaths are significant to the story because they show that Lucy Gray killed them by herself rather than with the help of the snakes. She had used the rat poison to her advantage and won through clever trickery. This is what happens when you place a performer in the arena.

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Although subtle, these changes could have altered the trajectory of the film and a deeper understanding of both Coriolanus and Lucy Gray. Whether you liked the book better, the movie better, or like them both equally, I think we can all agree that The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes film adaptation was well made and did a stunning job of transforming the magic of imagination into real life.