Ready to return to the Games?
Eight years after the last installment to the series, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2, was shown, Lionsgate has unveiled the first teaser for the movie’s prequel on June 5.
Titled “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes”, the prequel will revolve around the life of a young Corionalus Snow before he became the president of Panem.
No movie footage was shown in the almost one-and-a-half-minute clip as it is still in production, but the enticing teaser shows a snake and a bird frozen on a tree, as both eventually start to shed the snow that encrusted them, revealing their golden bodies underneath.
As these happen, the trailer shows the text “In 2023, the world will discover who is a songbird and who is a snake.”
Tom Blyth of Billy the Kid will star as the young Coriolanus Snow and Rachel Zegler of West Side Story will be playing Lucy Gray Baird, a tribute from District 12, set during the 10th Annual Hunger Games.
An official synopsis for the prequel states, “Years before he would become the tyrannical President of Panem, 18-year-old Coriolanus Snow is the last hope for his fading lineage, a once-proud family that has fallen from grace in a post-war Capitol.”
“With the 10th annual Hunger Games fast approaching, the young Snow is alarmed when he is assigned to mentor Lucy Gray Baird, the girl tribute from impoverished District 12. But, after Lucy Gray commands all of Panem’s attention by defiantly singing during the reaping ceremony, Snow thinks he might be able to turn the odds in their favor.”
Francis Lawrence, who directed the last three films in the series — The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and Parts 1 and 2 of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay — has been chosen to direct the prequel.
And…May the odds be in everyone’s favor as The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes hits theaters on Nov. 17, 2023.