Rodney Curtis

Jennifer Lawrence and Liam Hemsworth conspire in a scene from The Hunger Games.

Of all the important, absorbing, world-changing events we could’ve banded together to write about here at the home offices of ReadTheSpirit, our crew chose the impending release of the Twilight movie, err, The Hunger Games.

If you haven’t been living under a rock, you’ve heard about The Hunger Games, the Suzanne Collins trilogy which has been made into a movie and opens early Friday morning. Aimed squarely at the young adult audience, it has spilled over into the grown-up market. Parents have consumed the books, some of whom — like my wife — pulling all-nighters. I can’t really explain why something so brutal is so compelling. The series focuses on a future where kids are forced to fight to the death so rich people can be entertained. (I prefer the present-day version where rich people fight to the death for our entertainment, also known as the Republican Primaries).

So far, a few of our writers have weighed in on the subject. Jane Wells talks about the differences and similarities between Twilight and Hunger Games (note: there are no pouting vampires or shirtless werewolves that I’m aware of in this one). And Ed McNulty expounds on the dystopias Hollywood has explored including The Lorax and WALL-E.

Dystopia, by the way, is my new favorite word.

My daughters and their friends have purchased their tickets for the 12:01 a.m. Hunger Games showing already, and will be bleary-eyed come school time, mere hours afterward. Still, their mother and I think it’s just fine for them to attend classes on a pop and popcorn high.

Personally, I loved the first book and became less enchanted as the series wore on with Catching Fire, then Mockingjay. Perhaps Hollywood felt the same way since they supposedly delayed filming the two sequels until they could gauge audience reaction.

More of us at ReadTheSpirit will be chiming in as we see the movie, unless something more important comes up. If you haven’t already, you’ll see and read a lot about the film in the upcoming days. Hopefully we here will have amazing and life-altering comments to share with you once we actually know what we’re talking about.

Until then, go outside and enjoy this lovely weather and be thankful you don’t live in a dystopic future where global climate change has made winters mild and bearable.

Now THAT would be scary!