Mockingjay
question
Thoughts and Conspiracy Theories of Mockingjay
Andrew
Jan 28, 2012 02:12PM
Questions and Conspiracy Theories Regarding Mockingjay: (Contains Spoilers)
1) How is it that the Capital has the technology to put hidden cameras throughout an entire environment (wildernesses, urban centers, even homes) all completely wireless and undetectable, but the rebels only have bulky insect like suits to take pictures with… even though the cameramen are the same? And, when the suits won’t work, they use smaller cameras, “each about the size of a shoe box, and probably works about as well.”
2) I think district 13 should have given Katniss a riffle sooner. I understand the bow and arrows was sort of her thing, and they wanted to provide a solid image, but they could have given her a real gun and still had the Mockingjay. She wasn’t fighting the Lord of the Flies when she went to district 8, she needed to be armed. Also, a bow that talks to her is corny. (As is a trident that comes back to the thrower. Trident's arn't throwing weopons, and this is a bad idea.)
3) When Katniss and Gale are moving towards the president’s palace near the end, dressed as refugees, we read about peacekeepers directing the group to a special area moments before someone opens fire into the crowd. Katniss tells us it is rebels with bad aim on the roof, and this is the point the story falls apart (see below). I think it wasn’t the rebels. I think it was the peacekeepers because the rebels were well trained, good shots, and would not fire into a civilian crowd, while the peacekeepers had done this sort of thing before, and would again.
4) It is never explained how Peeta got burned at the end.
5) Katniss spends much of the second book afraid of what President Coin would do if she turns back from her mission. When her mission fails, President Coin doesn’t even bring it up.
6) Why does the capital only attack 13 one time? How did Peeta know about the one and only attempt to attack 13? And why was the capital silly enough to put Peeta on TV on the one and only day it would have benefited them NOT to?
7) Why were Avox still living under the capital when the rebels were attacking? Why didn’t they join the rebels?
8) The book might have been better if it had been left as a cliffhanger, making you wonder. Or maybe Collins did exactly that, but too well because nobody sees what really happened.
We are supposed to believe that the fascist capital and communist rebels were equally evil, and Katniss saved the day by turning at the last moment, paving the way for a utopia to be born and she could live peacefully at home for the rest of her life. But really, she’s a crazy anarchist, and Snow was lying.
Let me explain. He was using children to shield his palace, had no intention to bring refugees into his compound (and had the peacekeepers shoot into the crowd). He knew the war was nearly over, and not in his favor. So, he plots a way to kill his arch enemy, President Coin. He allows the rebel army to approach the crowd of children (The large group is the first we see of the rebels in the city. Rooftop snipers were peacekeepers and Katniss never saw who was shooting.) When the army was within view, a capital ship appears and drops parachute bombs to the children. Some explode, the rebels rush forward, and the rest explode. This accomplishes two objectives for Snow. 1) It kills off rebels, Snow goes down fighting. 2) It lays a foundation of distrust and conspiracy against Coin.
Contrary to what Katniss comes to believe, Coin did not send the bombs in herself to turn the tide against Snow and to mess with Katniss. Snow was all but defeated already, and Coin didn’t know where Katniss was. (She would have had no way of knowing Katniss would be at that particular flag pole the instant the bombs went off, especially if she had arranged the event weeks before as Katniss suspects.)
As a result of Snow’s last move, Katniss comes to suspect Coin. Snow spends the entire series playing mind games with the tributes, and he doesn’t stop. You could argue that Snow had no idea Katniss was on that flagpole either, which is fine. He didn’t have to; she would have learned of the event and come to suspect Coin even if she had been someplace else. The fact that she was there, and she witnessed her sister’s death, only helped to aid Snow. Or, you argue it was only chance Katniss walked into Snow’s cell, and he could not have planned on the opportunity to plant the seed of doubt in her mind. But again, he didn’t have to. Gale never talked to Snow but he was beginning to have is doubts about Coin as well. (Gale was also not a witness to the bombing, proving that conspiracy against Coin as spreading, as Snow would have planned.)
I think Coin was good all along. She even said she wanted to give each district the chance to govern themselves, an idea Katniss scoffed at (she is an anarchist, remember). She didn’t send Peeta in to harm Katniss, she felt he was rehabilitated enough that he could help. And you know what, he was.
But what about Coin’s asking the surviving tributes if the Hunger Games should continue? That was a test. She had to know which of the survivors she could trust. Maybe, in keeping with her plan of self-governed districts, she hoped to send these tributes back among their people to lead in a new era. But she couldn’t do so unless she was sure they would not hold grudges against some of the population. She didn’t want a repeat of past events.
But Snow’s last brainwashing attempt was a success. In the climax of the book, when given the chance to execute Snow, Katniss instead shoots Coin in the heart.
In the heart. Not the eye, as Katniss was so famous in district 12. Good thing for Coin too, because I don’t think she died. Katniss believes she died, but she was brainwashed by Snow to be an assassin and had to be told of her success to get her to stop. But capital hospitals conducted far more amazing medical procedures throughout the series than removing an arrow from a recently shot victim. (A shot to the eye would have entered the brain, causing more serious damage.)
Katniss is put on trial, and is determined to be mentally unstable. It is decided to tell her Coin is dead, and some other figure (one she trusts, but who isn’t as strong as a leader as Coin) is the new President. A new order is begun, in which each district is self-governed. Except for coal producer 12, which is in ashes, had always been small, unfit for rebuilding and people aren’t using fossil fuels in the new utopia anyway. So what to do? How about making the whole area a hospital for mental cases! You could even build factories to develop medicine and other supplies! Here’s a list of the first residents: A presidential assassin, a chronic alcoholic, and a mentally vacant child with her grandmother. Peeta eventually returns, even though he is mostly well (as Coin believed when she sent him back to the fight). Since he voted “no” in Coin’s poll, he was allowed to assist in rebuilding the country and was delayed in returning. Also, he was mentally deranged at one time, so he could easily get permission to live in the asylum district (self-committed, if you will.) His return is 100% keeping with his character throughout the book.
Want more proof that Katniss is nuts at the end? Remember the white lizard mutts that bit people’s heads off? They never existed. Katniss is the only one who could see them or hear them. These creatures were so uncontrollable they attacked peacekeeper, rebel, and Avox alike, but stopped instantly never to be seen or heard again once Katniss reached street level. She saw peacekeepers attacking and lost her mind, imagining these creatures. Peeta, whose mental wellness was improving, was still struggling with game-type combat situations. Yet he was remarkably calm when these things were supposed to be around. I think it is because through his eyes, they were under attack by humans in white peacekeeper uniforms.
Annie spent most of the book being crazy, so why isn’t she in the asylum too? Well, she did start to show signs of stability when she was around Finnick, so maybe she is living happily in district 3. But I doubt it, since news of Finnick’s untimely death would most likely have pushed her further over the edge. Sadly, I suspect suicide. Notice in the last chapter of the book we learn of Katniss keeping up with Annie and Finnick’s newborn baby, but there is no mention of how mom’s doing. Maybe the baby is being raised by Johanna, who finally has somebody to love. Just keep her way from water, else she’ll get all Rainman.
9) I think Buttercup is either a mutt to survive a trip from district 13 to the asylum, getting past the propped up fence designed to keep predators out (among other obstacles)… OR Greasy Sae’s granddaughter brought him along when they moved from 13. The two would be good together; she likes to play with yarn balls, after all.
10) I don’t like how Collins introduces minor characters, and brings them back books later like they were oh so important. When Katniss wrote a name on the dummy she hung before the second games, I had to turn back to look up who it was. All the way back to the first chapter, when President Snow mentions him in passing.
11) I feel sorry for Thom. Think about this guy’s sad life. He spends months as a refuge in 13, but never gets noticed or mentioned by any of his ‘friends’. He doesn’t even get to set at their lunch table! (Even Delly got to sit at the cool table once she became useful halfway through the last book, after being mentioned once in passing during book one.) He probably doesn’t even get to fight because of his age (or other hero’s got waivers). After the war, weeks pass before he is allowed to go home. What is he doing during that time? I suspect he was drafted to help with rebuilding efforts someplace more useful, like district 2. When he finally gets to his home district, he finds it is being turned into an asylum. Also, nobody from the outside has thought of helping to clean up the area. He is greeted by bodies rotting on the street, and he has to clean it up. He sits out in completing this grisly task with just a shovel and a cart. After all that, the only mention we get of him is in the very last chapter of the very last book, when crazy Miss Popular finally says hi to him… because she needs a ride home in his cart.
12) If the lizard mutts were real, it would have been a pain to clean them out of the capital's sewer's after the war. In the process, people like Tigress were probably mistakenly killed. I don't want this sad chain of events to happen, so I again insist these mutts were just figments of Katniss's imagination. Finnick and the others died at the hands of peacekeepers in white, or when a certain trident came flying back at them.
13) We never heard back from Ceaser. That would have been a good way to end the book, a final interview with Peeta just speaking his mind. Lay the foundation of the new era, and leave us guessing which guy Katniss will pick. Cliffhangers were what Collins was best at anyway.
14) Why does Gale stay in district 2, of all places? “Hi, I blew up your mountain”
15) I’m glad Delly lived. Somebody had to do it.
1) How is it that the Capital has the technology to put hidden cameras throughout an entire environment (wildernesses, urban centers, even homes) all completely wireless and undetectable, but the rebels only have bulky insect like suits to take pictures with… even though the cameramen are the same? And, when the suits won’t work, they use smaller cameras, “each about the size of a shoe box, and probably works about as well.”
2) I think district 13 should have given Katniss a riffle sooner. I understand the bow and arrows was sort of her thing, and they wanted to provide a solid image, but they could have given her a real gun and still had the Mockingjay. She wasn’t fighting the Lord of the Flies when she went to district 8, she needed to be armed. Also, a bow that talks to her is corny. (As is a trident that comes back to the thrower. Trident's arn't throwing weopons, and this is a bad idea.)
3) When Katniss and Gale are moving towards the president’s palace near the end, dressed as refugees, we read about peacekeepers directing the group to a special area moments before someone opens fire into the crowd. Katniss tells us it is rebels with bad aim on the roof, and this is the point the story falls apart (see below). I think it wasn’t the rebels. I think it was the peacekeepers because the rebels were well trained, good shots, and would not fire into a civilian crowd, while the peacekeepers had done this sort of thing before, and would again.
4) It is never explained how Peeta got burned at the end.
5) Katniss spends much of the second book afraid of what President Coin would do if she turns back from her mission. When her mission fails, President Coin doesn’t even bring it up.
6) Why does the capital only attack 13 one time? How did Peeta know about the one and only attempt to attack 13? And why was the capital silly enough to put Peeta on TV on the one and only day it would have benefited them NOT to?
7) Why were Avox still living under the capital when the rebels were attacking? Why didn’t they join the rebels?
8) The book might have been better if it had been left as a cliffhanger, making you wonder. Or maybe Collins did exactly that, but too well because nobody sees what really happened.
We are supposed to believe that the fascist capital and communist rebels were equally evil, and Katniss saved the day by turning at the last moment, paving the way for a utopia to be born and she could live peacefully at home for the rest of her life. But really, she’s a crazy anarchist, and Snow was lying.
Let me explain. He was using children to shield his palace, had no intention to bring refugees into his compound (and had the peacekeepers shoot into the crowd). He knew the war was nearly over, and not in his favor. So, he plots a way to kill his arch enemy, President Coin. He allows the rebel army to approach the crowd of children (The large group is the first we see of the rebels in the city. Rooftop snipers were peacekeepers and Katniss never saw who was shooting.) When the army was within view, a capital ship appears and drops parachute bombs to the children. Some explode, the rebels rush forward, and the rest explode. This accomplishes two objectives for Snow. 1) It kills off rebels, Snow goes down fighting. 2) It lays a foundation of distrust and conspiracy against Coin.
Contrary to what Katniss comes to believe, Coin did not send the bombs in herself to turn the tide against Snow and to mess with Katniss. Snow was all but defeated already, and Coin didn’t know where Katniss was. (She would have had no way of knowing Katniss would be at that particular flag pole the instant the bombs went off, especially if she had arranged the event weeks before as Katniss suspects.)
As a result of Snow’s last move, Katniss comes to suspect Coin. Snow spends the entire series playing mind games with the tributes, and he doesn’t stop. You could argue that Snow had no idea Katniss was on that flagpole either, which is fine. He didn’t have to; she would have learned of the event and come to suspect Coin even if she had been someplace else. The fact that she was there, and she witnessed her sister’s death, only helped to aid Snow. Or, you argue it was only chance Katniss walked into Snow’s cell, and he could not have planned on the opportunity to plant the seed of doubt in her mind. But again, he didn’t have to. Gale never talked to Snow but he was beginning to have is doubts about Coin as well. (Gale was also not a witness to the bombing, proving that conspiracy against Coin as spreading, as Snow would have planned.)
I think Coin was good all along. She even said she wanted to give each district the chance to govern themselves, an idea Katniss scoffed at (she is an anarchist, remember). She didn’t send Peeta in to harm Katniss, she felt he was rehabilitated enough that he could help. And you know what, he was.
But what about Coin’s asking the surviving tributes if the Hunger Games should continue? That was a test. She had to know which of the survivors she could trust. Maybe, in keeping with her plan of self-governed districts, she hoped to send these tributes back among their people to lead in a new era. But she couldn’t do so unless she was sure they would not hold grudges against some of the population. She didn’t want a repeat of past events.
But Snow’s last brainwashing attempt was a success. In the climax of the book, when given the chance to execute Snow, Katniss instead shoots Coin in the heart.
In the heart. Not the eye, as Katniss was so famous in district 12. Good thing for Coin too, because I don’t think she died. Katniss believes she died, but she was brainwashed by Snow to be an assassin and had to be told of her success to get her to stop. But capital hospitals conducted far more amazing medical procedures throughout the series than removing an arrow from a recently shot victim. (A shot to the eye would have entered the brain, causing more serious damage.)
Katniss is put on trial, and is determined to be mentally unstable. It is decided to tell her Coin is dead, and some other figure (one she trusts, but who isn’t as strong as a leader as Coin) is the new President. A new order is begun, in which each district is self-governed. Except for coal producer 12, which is in ashes, had always been small, unfit for rebuilding and people aren’t using fossil fuels in the new utopia anyway. So what to do? How about making the whole area a hospital for mental cases! You could even build factories to develop medicine and other supplies! Here’s a list of the first residents: A presidential assassin, a chronic alcoholic, and a mentally vacant child with her grandmother. Peeta eventually returns, even though he is mostly well (as Coin believed when she sent him back to the fight). Since he voted “no” in Coin’s poll, he was allowed to assist in rebuilding the country and was delayed in returning. Also, he was mentally deranged at one time, so he could easily get permission to live in the asylum district (self-committed, if you will.) His return is 100% keeping with his character throughout the book.
Want more proof that Katniss is nuts at the end? Remember the white lizard mutts that bit people’s heads off? They never existed. Katniss is the only one who could see them or hear them. These creatures were so uncontrollable they attacked peacekeeper, rebel, and Avox alike, but stopped instantly never to be seen or heard again once Katniss reached street level. She saw peacekeepers attacking and lost her mind, imagining these creatures. Peeta, whose mental wellness was improving, was still struggling with game-type combat situations. Yet he was remarkably calm when these things were supposed to be around. I think it is because through his eyes, they were under attack by humans in white peacekeeper uniforms.
Annie spent most of the book being crazy, so why isn’t she in the asylum too? Well, she did start to show signs of stability when she was around Finnick, so maybe she is living happily in district 3. But I doubt it, since news of Finnick’s untimely death would most likely have pushed her further over the edge. Sadly, I suspect suicide. Notice in the last chapter of the book we learn of Katniss keeping up with Annie and Finnick’s newborn baby, but there is no mention of how mom’s doing. Maybe the baby is being raised by Johanna, who finally has somebody to love. Just keep her way from water, else she’ll get all Rainman.
9) I think Buttercup is either a mutt to survive a trip from district 13 to the asylum, getting past the propped up fence designed to keep predators out (among other obstacles)… OR Greasy Sae’s granddaughter brought him along when they moved from 13. The two would be good together; she likes to play with yarn balls, after all.
10) I don’t like how Collins introduces minor characters, and brings them back books later like they were oh so important. When Katniss wrote a name on the dummy she hung before the second games, I had to turn back to look up who it was. All the way back to the first chapter, when President Snow mentions him in passing.
11) I feel sorry for Thom. Think about this guy’s sad life. He spends months as a refuge in 13, but never gets noticed or mentioned by any of his ‘friends’. He doesn’t even get to set at their lunch table! (Even Delly got to sit at the cool table once she became useful halfway through the last book, after being mentioned once in passing during book one.) He probably doesn’t even get to fight because of his age (or other hero’s got waivers). After the war, weeks pass before he is allowed to go home. What is he doing during that time? I suspect he was drafted to help with rebuilding efforts someplace more useful, like district 2. When he finally gets to his home district, he finds it is being turned into an asylum. Also, nobody from the outside has thought of helping to clean up the area. He is greeted by bodies rotting on the street, and he has to clean it up. He sits out in completing this grisly task with just a shovel and a cart. After all that, the only mention we get of him is in the very last chapter of the very last book, when crazy Miss Popular finally says hi to him… because she needs a ride home in his cart.
12) If the lizard mutts were real, it would have been a pain to clean them out of the capital's sewer's after the war. In the process, people like Tigress were probably mistakenly killed. I don't want this sad chain of events to happen, so I again insist these mutts were just figments of Katniss's imagination. Finnick and the others died at the hands of peacekeepers in white, or when a certain trident came flying back at them.
13) We never heard back from Ceaser. That would have been a good way to end the book, a final interview with Peeta just speaking his mind. Lay the foundation of the new era, and leave us guessing which guy Katniss will pick. Cliffhangers were what Collins was best at anyway.
14) Why does Gale stay in district 2, of all places? “Hi, I blew up your mountain”
15) I’m glad Delly lived. Somebody had to do it.
deleted member
Jan 29, 2012 12:56PM
1 vote
1) It's probably a good point, but then again the Capitol was all advanced and futuristic etc while the districts were in poverty with intermittent electricity and no particular technology - although the rebels had Beetee, they wouldn't have had all the same advanced technology as the Capitol
2) They were vaguely worried about Katniss' mental state I think, and also her sole purpose was being the Mockingjay so they wanted to film her with the fancy bow and arrow. But I guess she could have had both.
3) I think by rebels on the roof, they just meant people who had joined the rebel movement and were against the capitol, but not actual soldiers from District 13 - they probably would have opened fire on the crowd.
4) I think Katniss says that he had followed into the square and must have got caught in the explosion or something?
5) Coin doesn't really have a chance to? Katniss is still supposedly on the mission, and then she's recovering, and then Coin gets shot..
6) It's a good point - I don't see how Peeta could have known, and it was stupid for them to interview him that particular day.
7) Some of them probably did. But others would have been scared, and would have stayed there.
8) I think you're over thinking things. Coin always disliked Katniss, and I think she did send Peeta in to kill her - he did get close to it after all. Katniss had fulfilled her duty as Mockingjay, and dying and being a martyr would have been a perfect way to get the rebels going. She was more dangerous alive, as Coin could never control her. It doesn't make sense for her to send Peeta in thinking he was recovered enough - he blatantly wasn't, he made things harder for them and got one of them killed! I think she was planning on Katniss' tragic death.
But I might agree with you about Snow - maybe he had the children bombed, but made Katniss start thinking that Coin had done it? He was constantly messing with her mind. However, I'm pretty sure Katniss did kill Coin. Collins wouldn't have come up with the whole shot in the heart conspiracy thing and then never taken that anywhere, really?
I think the lizard mutts were real. I'm pretty sure others could see and hear them too, just their smell didn't make the others gag. [Mockingjay, page365: "No Katniss, they're not coming," says Gale. "Only the mutts are."] -- so Gale doesn't see them as peacekeepers, he saw them as mutts. Because they really were mutts.
Again, I think you're over thinking things - District 12, to begin with, had a fairly restricted and rather traumatised population - they were all that were left. But slowly, the district got rebuilt, and life went on. Katniss and Peeta's children are going to grow up in a normal place, where they have enough food and life's ok - just with slightly weird, traumatised parents. But there's nothing that can be done about that, and life goes on.
Also, after Finnick dies, all Annie has in the world is her baby. There's no way she would give the baby away. Annie is becoming more stable, and we saw that when she was with someone she loved (Finnick) she was ok - so when she has a baby to care for, her mental state would be ok, because she's got someone she loves.
9) That's just ridiculous. Buttercup was just a scraggy cat from years ago. Not a mutt.
10) I agree, that kind of irritates me too!
11) Why did you even make this point? He's just an unimportant character, who was sad, yes, because his home got destroyed. When he could, he came back, and started to help rebuild the district. And gave Katniss a lift in his cart. Wow.
12) Cleaning away the lizard mutts may well have caused people like Tigress to be accidentally killed. The people in charge weren't too bothered about killing a few people.
13) I'm glad we get to know who she picks. Collins is good at cliff hangers, but I think in the final, you've got to get some facts.
14) Haha, true. But District 2 was close to the Capitol, so that's probably, even with the new government, a big and important place to be. Gale was very political.
15) Delly was nice. :)
2) They were vaguely worried about Katniss' mental state I think, and also her sole purpose was being the Mockingjay so they wanted to film her with the fancy bow and arrow. But I guess she could have had both.
3) I think by rebels on the roof, they just meant people who had joined the rebel movement and were against the capitol, but not actual soldiers from District 13 - they probably would have opened fire on the crowd.
4) I think Katniss says that he had followed into the square and must have got caught in the explosion or something?
5) Coin doesn't really have a chance to? Katniss is still supposedly on the mission, and then she's recovering, and then Coin gets shot..
6) It's a good point - I don't see how Peeta could have known, and it was stupid for them to interview him that particular day.
7) Some of them probably did. But others would have been scared, and would have stayed there.
8) I think you're over thinking things. Coin always disliked Katniss, and I think she did send Peeta in to kill her - he did get close to it after all. Katniss had fulfilled her duty as Mockingjay, and dying and being a martyr would have been a perfect way to get the rebels going. She was more dangerous alive, as Coin could never control her. It doesn't make sense for her to send Peeta in thinking he was recovered enough - he blatantly wasn't, he made things harder for them and got one of them killed! I think she was planning on Katniss' tragic death.
But I might agree with you about Snow - maybe he had the children bombed, but made Katniss start thinking that Coin had done it? He was constantly messing with her mind. However, I'm pretty sure Katniss did kill Coin. Collins wouldn't have come up with the whole shot in the heart conspiracy thing and then never taken that anywhere, really?
I think the lizard mutts were real. I'm pretty sure others could see and hear them too, just their smell didn't make the others gag. [Mockingjay, page365: "No Katniss, they're not coming," says Gale. "Only the mutts are."] -- so Gale doesn't see them as peacekeepers, he saw them as mutts. Because they really were mutts.
Again, I think you're over thinking things - District 12, to begin with, had a fairly restricted and rather traumatised population - they were all that were left. But slowly, the district got rebuilt, and life went on. Katniss and Peeta's children are going to grow up in a normal place, where they have enough food and life's ok - just with slightly weird, traumatised parents. But there's nothing that can be done about that, and life goes on.
Also, after Finnick dies, all Annie has in the world is her baby. There's no way she would give the baby away. Annie is becoming more stable, and we saw that when she was with someone she loved (Finnick) she was ok - so when she has a baby to care for, her mental state would be ok, because she's got someone she loves.
9) That's just ridiculous. Buttercup was just a scraggy cat from years ago. Not a mutt.
10) I agree, that kind of irritates me too!
11) Why did you even make this point? He's just an unimportant character, who was sad, yes, because his home got destroyed. When he could, he came back, and started to help rebuild the district. And gave Katniss a lift in his cart. Wow.
12) Cleaning away the lizard mutts may well have caused people like Tigress to be accidentally killed. The people in charge weren't too bothered about killing a few people.
13) I'm glad we get to know who she picks. Collins is good at cliff hangers, but I think in the final, you've got to get some facts.
14) Haha, true. But District 2 was close to the Capitol, so that's probably, even with the new government, a big and important place to be. Gale was very political.
15) Delly was nice. :)
I'm really liking your conspiracy theories here. Katniss just seemed to go into mopey and rebel-without-a-cause mode in Mockingjay. And I was never really convinced by her justification for killing Coin (it was obvious she didn't like how Coin led District 13 and would eventually lead the Capital). Frankly, the story pretty much came apart for me after Primrose was bombed. And it is interesting to consider that the lizard mutts were a hallucination...
now that i think about some of the points you raised i totally agree with the problems and the theories are interessting
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9) Being part mutt wouldn’t make him evil or anything. My suspicions that he is more than just a regular cat (or more ...more
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