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The Power of Prim
We’ve all had some time to shimmer down and think about it, yet the opinions on the Catching Fire trailer are STILL largely positive! Let’s face it– We probably would have squealed and cheered for a trailer filled with LEGO characters when it was first released, so long as it was a trailer. But the fandom gets whiny and cynical after a while, most times. This trailer seems to have passed with flying colors, because whining is at a minimum!
Prim and her plait get tough!
Things have changed between the Catching Fire book and the movie trailer, for sure, but there’s one change that has got us totally psyched. It goes a little something like this:
“You saved my life. You give me a chance.”
“Yes. To live.”
“No. To do something.”
And our reaction was essentially “WAIT… WAIT… IS PRIM A PROACTIVE CHARACTER NOW?! WHAAAAATTTTT? TEN POINTS, Y’ALL!” *various loserface dance moves*
Way back when, we admitted that one of the very few problems we had with the series was the characterization of Prim… or lack thereof. Katniss loves her little sister more than anything and constantly talks about how lovable and special and determined to make a difference she is, but we never really see her being any of that firsthand until she dies, which does take away some of the power from that moment. She’s more of a sidelined victim of circumstance, who keeps her distance and tries to make the best of the whole freaking country going to hell.
Annnnnd then we cuddle!
It looks like Francis Lawrence and/or Michael Arndt might have seen it too. (It’s not just meeeeee!) In a few short lines of the 2 minute trailer, Prim gets something you never really see her display in the books: Guts and determination. She won’t be a meek child who is simply thrown into these troubled waters. She’s choosing to dive in, against the advice of her own sister, at that! While they’re still in District 12!
To be clear, Prim probably would’ve become a Healer/ Doctor either way and that is a very proactive, conscious move that her character takes. But it’s nice to see her choosing the path instead of simply falling into it. It fleshes out her character. As an audience, we get to see that she really cares and is pretty fantastic… and not just because her older sister tells us so. And when she cares, we care!
Atta girl, Prim!
Sharing Is Caring!
The Girl With The Pearl
The “Real” Peeta
Aeris, who covered the fun of Cannes for us last week, is back for another guest post! We know you’ve missed her too.
This time, The Girl With The Flowers (it’s a Final Fantasy reference! Who knew?!) is doing a little study on Peeta’s hijacking and how “real or not real” it makes his character throughout Mockingjay!
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It has come to my attention that some fans (and I use the term loosely) truly believe that the jungle scene in Catching Fire is the last time we truly see the “real” Peeta. Real as in, not hijacked, not hating Katniss’ guts, not trying to kill her when they finally reunite, and of course still completely in love with her.
Even in Mockingjay!
Yeah. I’m not getting it. See, first of all, Peeta is still very much his old self in the beginning of Mockingjay. He’s suffered at the Capitol’s hands, sure, but he’s still trying to protect by warning her about the bombing, undoubtedly risking his own life in the process. And he appears multiple times on the Capitol broadcasts during the first part of the book (let’s just assume Lionsgate makes the cut at when he tries to strangle Katniss), hurt, thin, but still the boy with the bread that we have all grown to love (or if we’re being honest, all fell in love with as soon as he was introduced in The Hunger Games). So there’s that.
But mostly, I want to talk about what happens in the second half of Mockingjay. Peeta has been tortured in such a way that everything about Katniss triggers his worst fears, and understandably, he wants to make that threat disappear. Moreover, he now sees her without the love-goggles (what, beer-goggles can exist but love ones can’t? The image isn’t very poetic I know, but it was the best way I could find to express it!), and sees her for what she is. The “real” Katniss. As Suzanne Collins puts so heart-breakingly puts it:
“All those months of taking it for granted that Peeta thought I was wonderful are over. Finally, he can see me for who I really am. Violent. Distrustful. Manipulative. Deadly. And I hate him for it.”
And yet, as Katniss realizes she’s being unfair, and they start playing the beautiful but tragic “Real or Not Real” game, Peeta is gradually brought back to us. He remembers. He bakes. He responds. He jokes a little. He puts everyone’s life before his own, because he’s conscious that he’s still dangerous. But what’s most important is that is he brought back by the one person who “made” this new version of him. Because deep down, he knows who she is and still loves her.
*dies*
Before the epilogue, this new Peeta is still fragile, but he’s working on it. He isn’t the hijacked, scary version of himself. He isn’t the steady baker either. But he’s getting close.
And after the epilogue, Katniss and Peeta slowly heal, helped by one another. I don’t like to say they “grew back together” because that would imply they went their separate ways, and I don’t believe they did. They went through a lot, they got separated, yes, but physically, not mentally. The Capitol tried to turn Peeta into a customized Katniss-destruction weapon, but they failed. Katniss was devastated and almost destroyed by Peeta’s temporary loss, but they never ceased to be the Girl on Fire and the Boy with the Bread.
So I truly believe the “real” Peeta was shining through all along. Sure, sometimes it was only very short peeks, but he was there. Somewhere, deep inside.
Which is why people saying we don’t get to see him ever again bug me. Have we actually read the same books? I mean, if we take that logic, shouldn’t they also claim that Catching Fire is the last time we see the “real” Katniss? She may not get hijacked by Trackerjacker venom in the aftermath of the district 13 rescue mission, but she does a complete behavioral 180 nonetheless.
That being said, I have to admit I don’t look forward to seeing Peeta hurt. If I’m perfectly honest, I’m probably going to bawl all through Mockingjay Parts 1&2. But then again, who isn’t, right?
“You love me, real or not real?”
“Real.”
I Am Not A “Hunger Games Fan”, But A (Real) Tribute,
Aeris (or, if you’re a Final Fantasy fan, “The Girl with the Flowers”)
O Peeta, Where Art Thou?
In my absence, Peeta has become the topic of the week! Not that we blame our brilliant guest writers, of course! There’s just so damn much to say about the future Mr. Katniss Everdeen!
Today, Hunger Games Bookclub is taking the reins to take about the Peeta we know from the books and the first movie vs. the Peeta we’re going to get in Catching Fire and beyond!
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I hate to break it to you, but there are multiple Peetas running around out there. It all started when The Hunger Games was first published. This version affectionately has been termed Book!Peeta. As soon as you read THG, another alternate version came into existence… the Peeta that lives inside of your mind. Let us call that Imagination!Peeta. Once the movie of The Hunger Games was released in 2012, we had a third version alive and kicking: Movie!Peeta
Sometimes there was conflicts between these three versions of Peeta. People couldn’t understand why Movie!Peeta didn’t have the blue eyes of Book!Peeta. Folks were heartbroken that their Imagination!Peeta had a real life name of (the guy from Weeds, the guy from Vampire whatever, the guy from you fill in the blank) but that person wasn’t hired as Movie!Peeta. And Josh Hutcherson had brown eyes and movie magic blonded hair instead what Book!Peeta described. If you have been around THG fansites at all, Victor’s Village included, you will know that fans get quite passionate about who they believe Peeta should or should not be.
Just look at that babyface!
Here’s the rub: Coming November 2013, there will be another Peeta to add to the mix. I know, I know, Josh Hutcherson is playing the role of Peeta in both movies. However, there are some other significant differences between the two films. The CFMovie!Peeta, as I shall now dub him, comes from a script that is written by a completely different team than THGMovie!Peeta. Although Suzanne Collins and Gary Ross both expressed their pleasure at working together to write The Hunger Games screenplay, they also expressed how difficult it was to take a book and adapt it into the visual format and time constraints of a movie. This go-around, we have a script written by Michael Arndt, who has won an Oscar for adapting books into screenplays. The Catching Fire movie will also have a new director: Francis Lawrence. Fans have already seen the upgrade in costumes and some of the other visual aspects in the teaser trailer that was released recently. We’ve also heard from interviews with cast and F-Law that there were some parts of the first movie that he wanted to maintain and others to which he adjusted to his own personal vision for the series. He has already been hired to direct Mockingjay Part 1 and 2 as well, so we can expect continuity in his vision across the films. Francis Lawrence brings more to the table than the visual. For example, Woody Harrelson commented that Lawrence encouraged him to research Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for his character. Most fans agree that the signs are pointing toward Catching Fire having more depth in some of the themes of poverty and war.
The innocence is gone.
So what does this mean for Peeta’s character? Will the Peeta in Catching Fire have more depth to his character as well? Obviously, we won’t know until November. But I can tell you from reading countless comments on popular fansites about THGMovie!Peeta, that he did not come across to some viewers (especially those who had never read the books) with the emotional strength and verbal savvy that we attribute to Book!Peeta. In the books, Peeta is not known for his physicality as much as Gale (although Peeta can lift heavy sacks of flour and hold his own in hand to hand combat) but is a person who is known for his quick brain and smooth tongue.
When I first saw pictures of Peeta from the Catching Fire teaser trailer, I immediately noticed the determined set of his jaw, the simmering anger, and the grimness. Perhaps CFMovie!Peeta will be different. Stronger. A bit jaded.
Maybe If The Odds Are In Our Favor, We’ll Catch A Glimpse Of That Peeta In Our Imagination,
Hunger Games Bookclub
Victor’s Village’s Panem Vacation
After a certain point of vacation planning, you begin to measure everything in your live by how far away it is from your vacation like “Four more nights of sleep before vacation!” or “One more day of work before vacation!”
Today, my Victor’s Village declaration is “One more post until vacation!”
The closest we’ll ever be to “going to Panem”!
It’s not that I don’t love writing posts or interacting with you lovely people, just that I’m pretty damn excited to sit on a beach and sip mojitos (oh yeah, and attend my only sibling’s wedding)!
Of course, that got me thinking about vacations in Panem, where there’s really no option to travel to a faraway beaches to simply sit around and only drink things with those little umbrellas in there. Their beaches are crazy eroded versions of ours, used for practical purposes like fishing. District citizens along the coastline seem to do their share of swimming, but Katniss certainly doesn’t recognize it as something people do for fun. It’s a skill set! When you work on a boat, being a strong swimmer is preferable to dying in the midst of hard labor.
Plus, District citizens are too deprived for days off, let alone vacations! Those fancy schmancy things are reserved of the elite class of Capitol citizens!
There’s a really disturbing quote in the books in which Katniss explains that Capitol citizens really only have a few places to vacation: THE OLD ARENAS. Because those pampered little prisses sure as hell ain’t gonna make it in the districts! The Capitol citizens travel to the secure former arenas, where they go on tours, witness reenactments, and get to explore the life of a tribute… except with way less things that can kill them. Scarely, it’s not all that different from those “Live Like A Hunger Games Tribute” fan tours out there right now! It probably doesn’t hurt that most of the arenas are in charming, exotic locales that are breathtaking once you remove all the DEATH from the equation… and the food is scrumptious.
The way to vacation, right thurrrr!
Capitol citizens are narrow-minded and spoiled and not that bright, we know. But don’t they ever wonder what’s going on the the world outside those arenas?
There’s 12 districts! Probably with uncharted territory in between! All sorts of different people! No matter how much they love themselves and their way of life, were none of them curious about something that DIDN’T involve the games? Didn’t Finnick fangirls want to do to District 4 and kiss the ground he once walked? Or see the places where famous, glorious battles happened during The Uprising 75 years ago? Or not be in The Rockies because it’s not exactly known for the amazing weather?
Some vacations are panem et circenses, but others are much more than that. We see the sites. We try new things. We go to museums, for goodness sake! We get lost and eat too much and stay in questionable temporary living spaces! These Capitol types don’t know what they’re missing out on, but let’s hope they wonder.
Adios, Mi Amigos!
The Girl With The Pearl
Write For Victor’s Village!
No, you didn’t stumble upon an extra post for this week! This is just a quick messy post asking for longer, less messy posts from YOU.
The Girl With The Pearl is heading to the land of no Internet access for her sister’s wedding next week and we need your help! With new posters, the Instagram, and the fandom going as crazy as ever, do you have an opinion to share about The Hunger Games books, movies, or fandom?
We’ve got your opportunity right here! We’re seeking out some stellar guest posts because, believe it or not, we know that our opinions aren’t the only ones that matter!
If you’ve got ANYTHING to say about The Hunger Games books, movies, merchandise, fandom, etc. that you’d like to share with tons of members of the fandom, write it up and send it to thevictorsvillage@gmail.com! Wit preferred, but not required. As long as your writing isn’t a hot mess (we have faith in you!), we’ll post it up to be share with other fans!
Oh, and if possible.. send them our way soon!
Any questions? Send us an e-mail or sound off in the comments!
With posters like this, how could you NOT want to get your discussion on?
The Enigma of Mrs. Everdeen
What makes a good mother?
There are plenty of elements, but there’s certainly not a specific recipe to being a successful, loving parent. It’s not easy for everyone and some people deserve the benefit of a doubt.
Does THIS look like she doesn’t care?
During the time we spent reading The Hunger Games trilogy and a long while after, we tried to figure out whether we loved or hated Mrs. Everdeen. She, the overworked but often considered saintly Hazelle Hawthorne, and the vicious Mrs. Mellark are the only living representations of motherhood we see throughout the story. Of the non-abusive two, Mrs. Everdeen is the “worse” mother, in the most basic sense, but it’s hard to tell whether or not she’s a bad mother…
We’ve heard the theory that after her husband died, Mrs. Everdeen stopped loving her children. Like “Oh, your dad is dead? BAM! Forget you then!” Or better yet, that she NEVER loved them, which the books don’t imply at all. We don’t buy it.
It could be the opposite, in fact– Mrs. Everdeen loves her family so very much that when the realities of poverty and death hit her in the wake of her husband’s passing, she’s crippled by it. She recognizes the state of the nation and the death of her husband and the inevitable death of her children, which would have been the case for both the Everdeen and Hawthorne families had one of their children not become hunters, no matter how many jobs each mother took on.
She saw the darkness in the world that would soon consume her family and because she loved her family so much, she couldn’t function at the very thought of it. When she realizes after months and months that they are not completely doomed, she begins to come out of her stupor. She recognizes that she has an emotional condition and, the book implies, begins to take medicines. However, we’re nawwwt talking psychiatrists and first-rate care. There’s still some demons in there that she can’t deal with all on her own, which is why she can’t always bring herself to actively participate in her children’s lives and ultimately decides to part from Katniss. It’s easy to assume that she did so for her own selfish reasons, but is it possible Mrs. Everdeen stayed away for Katniss’ sake, knowing she couldn’t be the support figure Katniss needed?
Expect Ghost!Mr. Everdeen ain’t much help here…
It’s hard that tell on what scale to rate a parent in Panem, because it’s not about things we know like cheering at sports events, taking us out for ice cream, and giving dating advice. You could say that supporting the family is the ultimate sign of love and by failing to do so, Mrs. Everdeen was a “bad” parent. But think of all the people who are out of work and/or dealing with mental illness today– Do they all not love their families? We think they still do.
There’s one thing we’ve learned from the plight of many literary mothers. We are super lucky to have moms who can only be described (obnoxiously) as DA BOMB!
Happy Mother’s Day To All the Moms Out There!
The Girl With The Pearl
Erasing History
Oh look! Another post in which we analyze canon as if it’s real! Would you expect any less from us?
It’s been a long time since Panem was America! Centuries upon centuries, though nobody knows the exact date (and everyone has their own theory!) The exact number really doesn’t matter, but it does bring up a good question…
Exactly how long does it take to erase history?
If we become THIS MESS, we demand remembrance!
Admittedly, the question was brought up thanks to another YA dystopian I’m reading– Legend by Marie Lu, which takes place in the much more recent future of 2130 AD. In those books, people tell stories and occasionally find relics from the old United States, despite the government’s best efforts to pretend it never existed. In The Hunger Games trilogy, things are a little more lucid. Katniss was taught in school that District 12 was once known as Appalachia. Plutarch knows that the country was once a democracy and what that entails, but he’s also a revolutionary and a scholar who has likely had access to information that others didn’t.
For the most part, The United States of America has been stripped from the record books. No character mentioned its existence by name. How did it disappear?
Think of oral history. Stories are passed down from generation to generation, sometimes in secret when the circumstances force it. We all know family history and fables by heart that we could share with others. It’s basically the oldest form of gossip and DAMN, the world is good at it! You’re telling us that an entire country rose up from the ashes of the dissolved governments of more than one nation over the course of many years and no one discussed it in detail?! Much like Katniss’ hunting skills, somebody passed the stories to their grandchildren under penalty of death, knowing that they’d be better off for having the knowledge. Was it so long ago that as the generations went on, nobody cared about the old world? Or is the information so dangerous and secret that only a few people, like Plutarch, are lucky enough to be privy to such knowledge?
We hope historically inaccurate Patriot Barbie survives!
Then there’s this: We have A LOT of freakin’ stuff! There are people that pretty much hoard patriotic symbols and signs of North American nations that would be relics in future worlds. Sure, the majority could have been destroyed by that whole totalitarian regime thing. Other things probably deteriorated with age, but not EVERYTHING. Somebody dropped a silver dollar in a field somewhere and eventually, somebody else is going to find it. If we’ve still got art that the Ancient Mayans made in 250 AD, Panem damn well has some masterpieces of American culture floating around somewhere!
It’s safe to assume that all of American history isn’t dead and gone. Our heroine is a teenage girl from the least privileged part of society, so her knowledge is both limited and subjective. Even when we learns about democracy, she’s not that impressed and doesn’t care much, given her circumstances at the time. It’s also very possible that information on what existed before Panem is kept to the wealthy with the exception of the most basic details. Of course, it’s likely twisted to make Panem look like a shining beacon of hope.
Either way, we know we’re in there somewhere! Right? RIGHT?!
Say The Ladies From Cities That Are Underwater in Panem,
The Girl With The Pearl
Reppin’ The Fandom, Catching Fire Style
If there’s anything we love about being a part of The Hunger Games fandom, it’s the interactivity. Sure, you can love pretty much anything and thus be part of its fandom, but actually being given the ability to get involved is kinda glorious.
A lot of book and/or movie franchises got into the interactivity pretty late in the game, but The Hunger Games team has been introducing interactive components since the release of TheCapitol.PN and while they don’t always go over as spectacularly as we’d hoped, we give them ten points for trying!
Now they’ve got a new campaign to help spread the Catching Fire book love:
First off… AHHHHHH! THAT’S KIMMY FROM MOCKINGJAY.NET AND ALDRIN FROM DOWN WITH THE CAPITOL! They’re so good in front of the camera, they even make hanging sentences look cool! We’re kind of, sort of super jealous.
“So why not send in a video and try to be part of the new Catching Fire book trailer?” You ask. Because we are decidedly less cool in front of the camera and in front of the world in general! We’d be replying with a low quality iMovie video in which I have too much product in my hair as I try to quell the static electricity that is still all over the place, gesturing wildly and never quite looking into the camera.
Not the mention our “answers”…
THE HUNGER GAMES: WE ALL HAVE OUR REASONS. MINE IS… I have an addictive personality when it comes to books! Especially Young Adult dystopian and fantasy novels. Stop judging me, okay? It’s not like I’m doing crack! GAWD!
I LOVE THE HUNGER GAMES BECAUSE… The world has gone apeshit and there’s all these conspiracies and everyone is dropping like flies in these freaking arenas! My anxiety level goes through the roof but I’m also really excited, so I guess I’m some sort of twisted masochist!
THE BEST PART ABOUT CATCHING FIRE IS… The huge plot twist in the end when Plutarch and Haymitch and all the cool tributes are part of the rebellion and they actually set up the games to help Katniss escape to District 13 WHICH IS REAL. Also, that Katniss/ Peeta moment on the beach where you think “If this weren’t a fairly innocent series when it comes to teen sexuality, they would totally get it on right now, cameras and all.” What do you mean, I’m not supposed to give away the plot?
EVERYONE SHOULD READ CATCHING FIRE BECAUSE… HELLO! It’s only my favorite book in the trilogy! It’s our Empire Strikes Back and if you can’t appreciate that, well, you know where you can shove it!
Hopefully, some of you people can express your book feels a little more eloquently!
Reppin’ The Fandom RIGHT Since 2011,
The Girl With The Pearl
The Cutting Room Floor
After seeing the first trailer for The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, we’re all really excited at the confirmation that certain scenes made it into the movie: The District 11 man’s salute! The Katniss/Gale kiss! The whipping!
Potentially a 7 hour movie! ..We’d watch it.
Even though it’s just the tip of the Catching Fire iceberg (…Fire iceberg?! Whaaaaat?), the trailer also helped us come to terms with some things that were cut. When you see the man from District 11 being murdered, are Bonnie and Twill’s open-ended deaths in the woods still a huge deal? Is the brutality against Darius necessary to portray when you see the Peacekeepers being equally brutal with Gale or the rioters?
We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: IT’S A MOVIE. Things will change… or more likely, they’ll be cut. We don’t always love it, but we accept it.
In that spirit, we’ve been thinking of some other things that can be cut from the movie without really hurting our feelings.
- The Storm of the Century - No, not the Stephen King book (though that has no place in Catching Fire, obviously). Remember in the beginning of Catching Fire when there’s a massive storm that snows in all the residents of District 12 for about two weeks, thus giving Katniss precious time to try (and fail) to glean some information about The Rebellion? Since nothing really comes of it, we could probably go without it.
- Broken Foot - WE KNOW. This is the “Always” moment! Of course we need that line. If that line doesn’t make it in there, we will hit a bitch. Perhaps only figuratively… we’ll see. But the line doesn’t have to come in the context of Katniss breaking her foot after the fences in District 12 are electrified. On screen, the scene in which Katniss returns home and tries to hide her injury while the Peacekeepers give her information she and the audiences already know followed by her recovery wouldn’t seem as dramatic and would take up precious time from more deserving scenes. Peeta and Katniss have ample opportunity to be adorable elsewhere!
- The Second Quarter Quell - We were once desperately hoping for this video or flashback, but now we’ve pretty much accepted that there won’t be a full-on breakaway to Haymitch’s brilliant bit of betrayal. New actors and new locations are probably way too much work for one scene not even featuring the main actors. Hopefully, we’ll get a quick, gritty recap for older Haymitch in there!
- “The Baby” - Some people love this moment, but we’re in love/hate with it. It’s complicated! What Peeta did was a brilliant move if Capitol audiences are stupid enough to really believe it. For some readers, it’s an eye-roll worthy first step off the Hunger Games bandwagon. A moment when you stop and go “REALLY? The majority of this society actually feel for that? C’MON.“ The alleged marriage should be enough to get Capitol interests in the film without running the risk of Peeta’s good intentions being too far out there.
Yup, those training outfits…
- Victors Training - We know there will be some of this, based on the still of Katniss and Finnick, but we could live without it being too involved. The politics of the Victors’ alliances don’t become clear until the arena, so it shouldn’t take too long to show that Katniss isn’t sure how to interact with these people when she still doesn’t know who to trust when the training session ends. The varying strengths and skill sets also become most apparent in the Arena, like Beetee introducing the crew to his specially designed wire, so we’re not missing much.
- The Spile - How many Victors does it take to get water from a tree? Four. Plus some serious thinking over the course of several hours. Or how about Mags already knows how to use a spile and we don’t watch giant tropical beaver-rats chew down the trees to drink as our protagonists dehydrate? Pretty please?!
Of course, this is an open floor! What Catching Fire book moments that weren’t already included in the trailer could you do without?
We’re Not Picky (Except We Totally Are),
The Girl With The Pearl
The Aftermath of Pods in The Capitol
“Pull it together, Four-Five-One,” he says firmly. But you can see him suppressing a smile as he’s double-checking the next pod. Positioning the Holo to find the best light in the smoky air. Still facing us as his left foot steps back onto the orange paving stone. Triggering the bomb that blows off his legs.”
In case you’re a little rusty, that right there was the death of Boggs on page 276 of Mockingjay.
We love you too.
We love to talk about how lucky we are, how good we have to compared to the dark worlds like Panem creeping in the depths of our imaginations. To a point, we’re right. We are lucky that we have basic civil liberties and no one’s sacrificing children’s lives for entertainment. But let’s get this out of the way now: Our world is still pretty fucked up.
There’s a reason why the Internet has so many articles citing ways that the world is slowly devolving into Panem or some other awful dystopia / fantasy universe. Mainly, those articles revolve around the fact that humanity is not particularly good to one another. We’re not all evil. There’s far more good than evil out there, but the evil is prevalent enough that you just can’t ignore it.
For me, what happened on Patriots Day in Boston is a scary example.
Let me just say really quickly that a lot of people in The Hunger Games community checked in with me after hearing about the bombs, remembering that I was from the Boston area. THANK YOU. I don’t actually live in the city itself and was nowhere near it when everything happened, but I’m really touched by the outreach.
I feel kind of callous connecting the death of a fictional character to the death of actual people, but I think I’m trying to make sense of things, because I’d like to think they don’t happen here. But they did. On a fairly unique day for Massachusetts residents, during an international, charitable event. I remember reading Mockingjay for the first time and totally freaking out over the above paragraph. Reading it, re-reading it with my mouth agape, then one more time for good measure, thinking “WHHHHHAAAAAAATT?! NO WAY did that just happen!” When it actually DID happen, I did nothing. I stared at a television in the back room at work and quietly assured my friend that her sister who was at the marathon, not far from from the explosions (and saw more than any person should ever have to) was fine, cell towers were just down. It’s not so rousing when it’s real.
As we think would be the case with any city affected like this, Boston banded together. We helped each other. We rose above the hate. We wish that solved all of humanity’s problems but– as evidenced by the mass shootout that killed one police officer near MIT followed by the massive manhunt going on right now– it doesn’t. All we can do is try to be better than the chaos around us. I know this city is filled with some amazing, unique, beautiful people, which is why it kills me when the worst of the world rears its ugly head here.
It seems silly considering all that’s going on, but we do hope that the Mockingjay films still shoot here. Besides having some prime locations, the city isn’t going to stop moving for anything short of good news. We geek out over movie productions here, but we’re also not crazy set stalker types. In a way, I think the city needs it. Something special, something to smile about. Plus, if you’re here, you’re one of us. And we protect our own.
The Funny Will Be Back This Weekend,
The Girl With The Pearl
