by Rae Leonor Ferrer Gumayan
As I was reading  Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, I was enveloped in the world of apocalyptic future, the society reminiscent of 1984 by George Orwell with a mix of Battle Royale's plot by Koushun Takami. I lay in silence when I finished the trilogy as I absorb what transpired in the realities of my mind. Beneath the book's story, themes of oppression, revolution, racism, and the mention of historical themes such as the Roman's Panem et Circenses and even modern allusions to the inequalities between the Global North and the Global South, it was difficult to comprehend whether such "adult" concepts would be injected into a YA series. However, after a bit of Google research, there were amazing analyses about the various themes that are present in the books. I was not alone in searching for something deeper in the story because feelings of frustrations, sadness, and anger arose in me, not because I empathized with Katniss Everdeen, a poor and starving girl from District 12 rising against the oppression of her people, but because there are components in her story that reverberates in our own present realities. What themes do you see? What evidences in the book are in support of your interpretation and analysis? What is the Capitol and the districts representative of? What emotions lingered after you read the book, not merely the intense brutality in having children fight to the death, but exactly what values are conflicting? Which character(s) can you relate to? Are there any discrepancies that you observed between the movie and the book that are essential in maintaining those themes? 

The link below is someone's analysis of the representation of Katniss Everdeen in the movie being "whitewashed," diverging from her description in the book. 
http://xalexiel.blogspot.com/2011/03/why-katniss-everdeen-is-woman-of-color.html