Elizabeth Reuter's Blog - Posts Tagged "hunger-games"
Hunger Games and Battle Royale
There is a famous Japanese sci-fi/thriller book/movie called Battle Royal. Basic premise: an evil government forces schoolkids to kill each other yearly on TV. For obvious reasons, a lot of people suspect, even assume, the famous Hunger Games is a rip-off.
That comparison breaks down when you actually read or see them both. Aside from dissimilar characters and plots, the stories each have a different focus. Battle Royal is a blatant criticism of Japan's school system: as the children kill each other, viewers/readers get flashbacks of their time in school and how they were treated. Japanese schools are brutal, pushing kids into strict and grueling study regimens to pass tests by which they will be judged all their lives, and act as their only possible gateway to schools that can guarantee their futures. If you and your best friend are aiming for the same school which inevitably has a limited number of spots, you have to beat them to get in. Battle Royal just made the idea literal.
Hunger Games is more political. The subjects are poverty and war, and school is never even mentioned, except for the gladiatorial schools elite kids go through. Which, again, is a poverty commentary, with moneyed kids getting training and resources poor kids do not.
Talk about not judging books by their cover. Just hearing a summary, anyone would assume Hunger Games is a rip-off. The reality takes a deeper look to realize.
-Elizabeth Reuter
Author, The Demon of Renaissance Drive
That comparison breaks down when you actually read or see them both. Aside from dissimilar characters and plots, the stories each have a different focus. Battle Royal is a blatant criticism of Japan's school system: as the children kill each other, viewers/readers get flashbacks of their time in school and how they were treated. Japanese schools are brutal, pushing kids into strict and grueling study regimens to pass tests by which they will be judged all their lives, and act as their only possible gateway to schools that can guarantee their futures. If you and your best friend are aiming for the same school which inevitably has a limited number of spots, you have to beat them to get in. Battle Royal just made the idea literal.
Hunger Games is more political. The subjects are poverty and war, and school is never even mentioned, except for the gladiatorial schools elite kids go through. Which, again, is a poverty commentary, with moneyed kids getting training and resources poor kids do not.
Talk about not judging books by their cover. Just hearing a summary, anyone would assume Hunger Games is a rip-off. The reality takes a deeper look to realize.
-Elizabeth Reuter
Author, The Demon of Renaissance Drive
Elizabeth Reuter's Blog
As a huge fan of dark fantasy, horror, and the like, that's most of what I'll write about here. Most horror/fantasy/sci-fi is badly made, and there's this silly idea that that means the genres themsel
...more
- Elizabeth Reuter's profile
- 22 followers
