The movie, set 64 years before Katniss Everdeen entered the Games, centers on young Coriolanus Snow and features both Viola Davis and Peter Dinklage.
Ready to return to Panem?
The first trailer for “The Hunger Games” prequel film, “The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes,” dropped Thursday — giving fans a glimpse at what it was like decades before Katniss Everdeen was even born.
According to the official synopsis for the film from Lionsgate, the movie follows “a young Coriolanus (Tom Blyth) who is the last hope for his failing lineage, the once-proud Snow family that has fallen from grace in a post-war Capitol.” Coriolanus, of course, will later become President Snow — played by Donald Sutherland in the original quadrilogy.
“With his livelihood threatened, Snow is reluctantly assigned to mentor Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler), a tribute from the impoverished District 12,” the synopsis continues. “But after Lucy Gray’s charm captivates the audience of Panem, Snow sees an opportunity to shift their fates. With everything he has worked for hanging in the balance, Snow unites with Lucy Gray to turn the odds in their favor.”
“Battling his instincts for both good and evil, Snow sets out on a race against time to survive and reveal if he will ultimately become a songbird or a snake,” it concludes.
The footage shows Peter Dinklage — as the creator of the Hunger Games themselves — tasking Snow with turning the competitors into “spectacles, not survivors.” We also get glimpses of an evil-looking Viola Davis in action, Jason Schwartzman as Lucretius ‘Lucky’ Flickerman and “Euphoria’s” Hunter Schafer.
It ends with Sutherland’s voice saying, “It’s the things we love most that destroy us” from the original movies.
The movie hits theaters November 17, 2023.
