I am not bashing the Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2 because I feel that it is a cynical cash grab, which it is. My issue with it does not necessarily have anything to do with how I feel about the actors. Jennifer Lawrence is a very gifted actor who can take on demanding parts.
My problem with the finale of this series is that it fails at the script level. It retains all the flaws of the Hunger Games series and then adds several more, resulting in a form of entertainment with a lot of sound of fury and special effects but very little underlying substance. The Hunger games series should have played itself out like a Marxist dialectic: the young hero Kantniss Everdeen discovering that she is part of an oppressed proletariat, incorporating communist teachings, and then leading a communist revolution to topple the capitalist elites and install a social utopia. This series should have been about the intellectual evolution of Everdeen into a revolutionary leader, determined to reshape the world in accordance with a communist ideology.
Yet the first Hunger Games, despite being OK as entertainment, lacked these characteristics. Instead, this first Hunger games played like a re-run of survivor. The second instalment was a step down from that. It regurgitated all of the predictable survivor program material, but then added that scene in the end when Everdeen realizes that the enemy is the capitalist elite. The third instalment was even worse: Katniss is not playing even second fiddle to Plutarch and President Alma Coin. She is just used for propaganda purposes. I don't know about you, but I think Jennifer Lawrence deserves much better than being put into multiple tiresome propaganda reels in order to boost the morale of the troops. After all, haven't women's rights gone a long way since the Second World War when women were sent out into the field to make the lives of male soldiers seem less miserable.
Then came the finale, with incorporates all the flaws of the previous programs and adds fresh ones. Once again, the makers of this series denigrate Katniss. Now she is put as head of a small uncover team going deep inside the capital in order to assassinate the villain, President Snow. Big deal! To add salt to her wounds, Katniss is expected to give up power voluntarily first to President Coin (played horribly by Julianne Moore) and then Plutarch (played by Seymour Philip Hoffman) who is really put on screen as a thoughtful elder statesman than anything else. The other major problem of the series is that it is not really about anything, except a group of young people strategizing about how to penetrate the capital and then going through the motions of dodging one special effect after the other. There is really no new material presented here and the worst part of it is that all of the trials and tribulations befalling these heroes are boring and predictable. The palace square is flooded with oil at one point, which would be exciting except we know from medieval history that spilling boiling oil over an army is one of the methods employed to protect a castle. Then come the attack of the ogres -- again not that exciting, because we have seen the same material in previous Hunger game movies and even King Kong for that matter. Admittedly watching Katniss brutally murder President Coin did bring some joy, since it is good to see a terrible actor put out of commission. Yet ultimately, the finale of the Hunger Games is ineptly made, morally and intellectually bankrupt, and uninspired. I suppose it is fitting for the finale to get the lion share of the blame. I have gotten into the habit of assuming that the flaws in the first, second, and third episodes would somehow be resolved in a later episode. Then when the finale comes and fails to address these flaws, the result is a massive disappointment.
My problem with the finale of this series is that it fails at the script level. It retains all the flaws of the Hunger Games series and then adds several more, resulting in a form of entertainment with a lot of sound of fury and special effects but very little underlying substance. The Hunger games series should have played itself out like a Marxist dialectic: the young hero Kantniss Everdeen discovering that she is part of an oppressed proletariat, incorporating communist teachings, and then leading a communist revolution to topple the capitalist elites and install a social utopia. This series should have been about the intellectual evolution of Everdeen into a revolutionary leader, determined to reshape the world in accordance with a communist ideology.
Yet the first Hunger Games, despite being OK as entertainment, lacked these characteristics. Instead, this first Hunger games played like a re-run of survivor. The second instalment was a step down from that. It regurgitated all of the predictable survivor program material, but then added that scene in the end when Everdeen realizes that the enemy is the capitalist elite. The third instalment was even worse: Katniss is not playing even second fiddle to Plutarch and President Alma Coin. She is just used for propaganda purposes. I don't know about you, but I think Jennifer Lawrence deserves much better than being put into multiple tiresome propaganda reels in order to boost the morale of the troops. After all, haven't women's rights gone a long way since the Second World War when women were sent out into the field to make the lives of male soldiers seem less miserable.
Then came the finale, with incorporates all the flaws of the previous programs and adds fresh ones. Once again, the makers of this series denigrate Katniss. Now she is put as head of a small uncover team going deep inside the capital in order to assassinate the villain, President Snow. Big deal! To add salt to her wounds, Katniss is expected to give up power voluntarily first to President Coin (played horribly by Julianne Moore) and then Plutarch (played by Seymour Philip Hoffman) who is really put on screen as a thoughtful elder statesman than anything else. The other major problem of the series is that it is not really about anything, except a group of young people strategizing about how to penetrate the capital and then going through the motions of dodging one special effect after the other. There is really no new material presented here and the worst part of it is that all of the trials and tribulations befalling these heroes are boring and predictable. The palace square is flooded with oil at one point, which would be exciting except we know from medieval history that spilling boiling oil over an army is one of the methods employed to protect a castle. Then come the attack of the ogres -- again not that exciting, because we have seen the same material in previous Hunger game movies and even King Kong for that matter. Admittedly watching Katniss brutally murder President Coin did bring some joy, since it is good to see a terrible actor put out of commission. Yet ultimately, the finale of the Hunger Games is ineptly made, morally and intellectually bankrupt, and uninspired. I suppose it is fitting for the finale to get the lion share of the blame. I have gotten into the habit of assuming that the flaws in the first, second, and third episodes would somehow be resolved in a later episode. Then when the finale comes and fails to address these flaws, the result is a massive disappointment.