In Defense of Mockingjay

Disclaimer: If you have not read Mockingjay, please know that this post contains spoilers.  You’ve been warned.

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At least once per day I see someone posting on twitter or a blog about their disappointment with Mockingjay, particularly the ending.  The thing is, Mockingjay is my favorite book of the series, but I know there are a lot of people who don’t agree.  As I see it, there are a few main beefs people seem to have:

Issue 1: The deaths.

We lose Prim, of course, but the deaths of Cinna and Finnick were equally as painful.  Then, of course, we have the death of Boggs and Madge, as well as a host of other endearing, nonessential characters.

Why did Prim have to die?  Why did she have to die in such a horrific way?

The bombing of the children bothered me.  It was probably the only time in the whole series that I felt like looking away, as it were.  However, when I think about what children all over the planet endure on a daily basis, I realize that this really isn’t as fictional as we would like to think.  My squeamishness came from the realization that this has happened, and could happen again.  If the Nazis can gas millions of children, can this type of massacre be so far fetched?  The uncomfortable and tragic answer is no.  When Prim was killed, it seemed almost unthinkable that the one person that inspired all of this could be taken away.  Katniss did everything in order to protect her sister, to help provide a better future for her sister.  She thought by fighting with District 13 she would be able to finally achieve a better life for her family.  Yet, who ultimately destroyed her?  Coin did.  Coin ordered the bombing to end the war and Coin sent an underage and under-trained medic to a place that she knew would be bombed.  Coin used fire to try to destroy the Mockingjay’s last desire to fight for anything.  In killing Prim, she hoped to destroy Katniss, as well.  Prim had to die because this was war. One message that stays consistent throughout the series is  that war is unmerciful.  It might have been more satisfying to let Prim live, but it would not have been as good of a series if she had.  That emotion you feel when you realize she is gone is your investment in the story.  It was the horrible truth about conflict that the author was trying to convey.

Issue 2: Resolution of the love triangle

Oh, but what about Gale?  Ah, Gale, the hot one, the brooding one.  What could be more appealing than a childhood friend who is always there for Katniss?  There’s only one problem:  he’s not really there for her.  Let me ask you this:  If Gale and Katniss had gone into the arena together and Gale was faced with killing Katniss or being the one to die, leaving his own family, what would he have done?  I don’t think he would have spared Katniss.  I also don’t think she would have spared him. They were survivors and their friendship was ultimately based on their usefulness to each other that grew into something more.  When he was given a chance to develop weapons, horrible weapons, was he reluctant?  Did he see or even consider the moral implications of revenge?  As he was written, I think the answer is no.  I am not saying that Gale is an unfeeling monster.  Just the opposite, in fact.  He was as fiercely dedicated to his cause and his cause involved protecting his family and destroying The Capitol.   His hatred burned hot the entire series, but what Katniss learned in the arena was the actual cost of killing.  Suddenly, the reality of taking lives and destroying large numbers of people didn’t seem as appealing.  There is a psychological cost to everything.  While Katniss still focused on survival, Gale moved towards revenge.  What was missing from her ability to rebuild her life was not fire, it was kindness and hope.  There was never any doubt in my mind that she would end up with Peeta.  In the end, Gale’s hatred and anger blinded him and I think his retreat to District 2 implies that he knew it.

There are things I wonder about, though.  What happened to Johanna?  What happened to Annie?  I also wonder what becomes of Gale?  Was he able to move on, as well, or did he carry that guilt, heavy in his heart, forever?

In the end, Katniss got a life that was as good as she could ever have hoped for, given the circumstances.  The thing is, you might know someone like her.  You might know someone who has gone through terrible struggles in their life and come out the other end. I love the realism in this.  I love the hope within a less than perfect ending.  Katniss makes it clear that she never feels 100% again, but her children grow up without the fear and worry she had as a child.  The arena and the past are relegated to lessons in school and that is a happy ending in itself. 

There is a fascinating article that was run in the NYT about Suzanne Collins that gives more insight into her thought process.  Find it here.

Kate

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261 responses to “In Defense of Mockingjay

  1. Oddly, the death that got to me most was Finnick. I felt like it took the whole series to really get to know him, and I wanted him with Katniss at the end (not like that, but as a fellow survivor.) And that fact there was a baby he never met?!?

    My other issue was more just the not-knowing about so many characters. I know you think that since it was written from Kat’s perspective, that it’s more realistic this way, but I like my books to resolve, darnit. I have enough not-knowing in my own too-real life. 🙂

    It certainly is not the worst ending to a book I’ve ever read, however. I would probably reserve that title for a Jodi Picoult book. 🙂

  2. I was actually about to say the same thing as Suessgirl! The death that was hardest on me was Finnick. His death felt pointless. I do understand that pointless deaths happen in war, but it really bothered me how he died. And, it bothered me that he left Annie, and his unborn child. I felt like the baby was the authors way to make things better, but she had written Annie as a character who was unstable without her Finnik. To the point that in my head, I almost wished for her to also have died in the war, rather than live with the madness the arena had given her without him. I hope the baby helped with that, but babies aren’t cures for madness.

    Prim, I totally agree with you about. I think it was heartbreaking, but i understood why it was there. I also completely agree about Gale, but I also had no doubt about Peeta being who she would end up with in the end.

    What got to me more than anything was that they head into the Capitol, this team of fighters, and they are all on this mission to kill Snow, but then, after all of it, they fail. Their mission did nothing to further the cause. There was really NO POINT. Had they somehow been important, I would have liked the book much more. But in an odd way it felt like a filler. I get that it broke Katniss, and for the story that was important, but it bothered me that it broke her, and she had nothing to show for it. Maybe that was sort of the point.

    All of this being said, I did really like it. A lot. Not as much as the first two, and not as much as I hoped, but I truly enjoyed the entire series.

  3. I agree about Finnick. I was so upset about that! There is a part of me that hopes these unanswered questions will someday lead to more books, but that might be wishful thinking.

    I saw the journey into the capitol as somewhat metaphorical. They started with a big group, then slowly, one by one, everything was stripped away until it came down to Katniss running towards the one person she vowed to protect and watching her die. It almost echoed the series, as piece by piece, everything that Katniss knew was stripped away from her until she was alone to face her greatest fear. Then, if you recall, she was sort of “reborn”. She got new skin, she started a new government by killing Coin, and she was dumped back in 12 to start a new life. From the outside I can see how the trip to the capitol seems like a way to add some action, but I do think there was a point to it.

    In Finnick’s death (BOO!), we see someone who couldn’t quite make it to the surface, literally and figuratively. He was so close, but the capitol ultimately got the better of him. It’s almost like The Capitol becomes a character itself.

  4. Great post! Mockingjay is also my favorite book in the series. At first when I read it, I had the same objections that you mentioned above, and then some. But after re-reading it, thinking about it, and talking about it with others, I came to see how it the perfect ending — happy as it could be given the circumstances, and above all “Real.”

    Miss K, great perspective journey! I hadn’t considered it like that.

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  41. I love this post! The deaths of certain characters certainly threw me off but at the same time, like you’re saying, in reality things never pan out as we’d like them to. It’s hard to think about it that way but it makes perfect sense.
    The Epilogue hurt me a little bit, but I was also getting this feeling of ‘awe’ as (in my case the narrator) spoke of the children Katniss and Peeta birthed, and the little one Annie also winds up raising.
    I also knew the whole thing with Gale just wasn’t going to ever work. Even the strongest rope shall eventually break, and that knot between Katniss and Gale just seemed to be waiting to snap, and in this case I wouldn’t blame Gale for retreating to another District to revel in the pain that he inflicted with his own hands, or bomb.
    – Krys

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