Are the Hunger Games a satire on reality television?

Just as the title says, are the Hungers games a satire on reality television and violence on television? I had been searching around the internet and I keep reading about how the Hunger Games is a satire although I did hear some counterarguments about how it is not a satire. One of the themes of the Hunger games is how everything that occurs in the arena is "all apart of the show". Katniss must not only learn how to survive but also how to make herself presentable to the audience that watches the Hunger Games. The Capitol is desensitized to the violence that occurs in the Quarter Quell and the games themselves are there to entertain the audience to keep them form realizing the truth about the games.

I wonder if the Hunger Games is truly a satire as it does make some good points although it doesn't play the tropes it is using entirely straight. Katniss doesn't escape the story unscathed and she even goes into exile after the story ends. Anyway, is the Hunger games a satire or not?

Depends on what you mean by satire, I guess. I haven't watched the films or read the books, so there's that against me, but from what I am able to gather by looking at them from teh outside, they seem to be far too straight faced for there to be much irony and self-mockery, which forms a lot of the satire I am familiar with, evidenced in them.

Like Monty Python, and things like that.

I'm not sure if satire is the right word. An allegory, perhaps.

It doesn't appear to have any sort ironic meta humor that most satires have. I guess it is more of an allegory than a satire.

It's...a story. There is no satire going on. Allegory to Stalinism? Yes, because that's one of the defining elements of the genre. Allegory to obstacles of growing up? Yes, because it is YA.

Even the English teachers at my school didn't find anything.

A satire can be a satire without being funny. Unfunny ones usually get qualified as "straight-faced satire."

I think you could go so far as to say that the depiction of life in the capital of Hunger Games' America and it's society's treatment of the champions could be read as a satire on modern media-saturated culture and the cult of celebrity. I mean, just look at how a lot of the characters are named, all the plastic surgery going on, etc. They, as many people have said about modern American society, have a lot of the "Bread and Circuses" thing going on.

edited 17th Apr '14 5:05:42 PM by Robbery

I know the point of satire was never to be 'funny' but to point foibles in a philosophy, politics, etc in a humorous, exaggerated manner. Katniss learns not only to survive but how to put on make up and to look good in front of a camera. It also shows the readers how television works by describing what exactly you need to do in the Hunger Games.

Honestly, The Hunger Games strikes me more as an update of the legend of Theseus with elements of near-future science fiction, totalitarian dystopia, reality television satire, bildungsroman and character study mixed in to make the situation feel more believable rather than purely mythic.

I think the books are commenting on the bloodthirsty streak in popular entertainment in general, rather than at reality TV in particular. The people who watch motorsport for the crashes, or ice hockey for the fights, as well as martial arts as spectator sports.

I read somewhere... in regards to an interview with Collins, that she came up with the basic idea for her books when she was flipping through television channels between reality shows and Iraq war footage.

So, I would say... in part, yes.

There was a segement on Jon Stewart recently that played with the premise of the books that made me think that it very well could be a poke at where current economic inequalities could be leading, too...

It isn't a satire if it hasn't got animals in it.

You believe that?

edited 26th Apr '14 9:46:16 PM by C0mraid

But it does have mutts in it.

That criterion doesn't bode well for A Modest Proposal.

I agree that it could be some sort of comment on reality television. Criticism maybe ... how those people are forced to see their children die, while real life people participate in reality television voluntarily?

"That criterion doesn't bode well for A Modest Proposal."

Wait, you mean the British didn't think of the Irish as half-animals back then?

I got to read that A Modest Proposal book to get that reference.

Those are good ideas as we are still recovering from a depression now.

A Modest Proposal is only about 3300 words. And you get the gist of it after the first couple of paragraphs.

Don't have anything really to add to the conversation. But yeah I get the feeling if there is any satire in The Hunger Games it'll be about using reality tv in a greater machine, not the show by itself.