#not great songbirds

[jackietaylorstan]

Can we PLEASE talk about the detail in the movie about how Snow’s dad died in the woods around District 12, because it’s making me insane. I think it was Dr Gaul who said something like he’s “lost in the trees” and I’m absolutely losing my mind over the layers of influence that moment in the forest had on Coryo.

Crassus Snow was lost in the woods of District 12 and was found again within his son. Because it was that moment of finding the guns and going after Lucy Gray that turned Coryo into his father. Where he rejected his mother’s goodness and the life he could’ve had with Lucy Gray and chose to carry out the legacy his father started with the hunger games. Snow lands on top.

#I’m foaming at the mouth good god #I mean!!!! #a great addition by the movie #the hunger games #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #tbosas #coriolanus snow #lucy gray baird #katniss Everdeen #thg

[books-and-dragons]

percy jackson trailer AND hunger games tbosas trailer both within 24 hours, how we all doing?

#i am unwell #in the most intolerable of ways #me for the forseeable: prepare to be SICK OF ME #these next few months are gonna be GREAT i am so UNNORMAL let's GOOOOO #percy jackson #pjo #the hunger games #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #tbosas

[kvtnisseverdeen]

Just be careful. Okay? It's a different world out here. THE HUNGER GAMES: THE BALLAD OF SONGBIRDS AND SNAKES (2023) dir. Francis Lawrence

#[narrator] both of them did not do great #coriolanus snow #sejanus plinth #coriolanus x sejanus #sejanus x coriolanus #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #the hunger games #thg #mine* #gifs* #tbosas #tbosasedit #dailyflicks #userstream #chewieblog #userbblecher #filmtvcentral #cinemapix #cinematv #filmtvdaily #tvfilmsource #filmgifs #thgedit #panemgif

[praxidikegal]

My District 13 au

Coryo and Lucy Gray fled in this AU and ended up in district 13. Despite being safe and Coryo rose to power eventually in 13, they both hated it there. The place is no way to live a life. They made improvements but a pox outbreak happened and their son nearly dying had her husband later fully joined 13 to the rebellion. Coryo then was "elected" as President of Panem (she knows) and they moved to the Capitol and her last two children were born and grew up in the Capitol. Having raised children in district 13 where everything is surveillanced and under tight control especially before Coryo's presidency, they raised their children to trust family first and never lie to them ("lies can get you killed").

Lucy Gray is not exactly strict to her children aside from the "no lie" rule so her children gets a way with almost everything. Their shenanigans(especially Orpheus Sage's and Thalia Rose's) will never get them disowned or taken out of the will by Coryo because there will be hell to pay if he does.

The Lady of the Underground

The lady of ways, the lady of means

The lady of the upside down

People usually go to Lucy Gray first when they want her husband to approve something. They catch on that if they get Lucy Gray on their side, Coryo is more likely to accept their request or proposals.

In district 13, of course she'll find ways and loop holes to laws and rules to get what she wants (mostly to sing and for pretty things). She'd sew her clothes, make flowers out of the leftover pieces of cloth, scraps and other items she can turn to trinkets. She'd style her dull jump suit, anything really to give life to that man hole of a district

In district 13 she goes by Melanie Ebony Thorne

Here is early 50s Lucy Gray with her feather shawl. You cannot tell me Lucy Gray in the Capitol would not enjoy the over the top make up and fashion.

Lucy Gray here is singing Lady Of the Underground from Hadestown

#snowbaird #lucy gray baird #coriolanus snow #district 13 au #Lucy Gray loves make up and pretty dress #she's probably why future Capitol fashion is that way #Lucy Gray is as cunning as Coriolanus and a great cold reader #Her alias is Melanie is because I love Hadestown and Persephone and Hades #Melanie means darkness but it is also referenced to the myth of Persephone and how Demeter mourn for her daughter to come to the surface #Tbosas #If you think she won't participate or even the one to start fashion trends along with Tigris in the Capitiol YOU ARE WRONG #Youtube #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #Snowbaird au

[alorhna]

I’m sorry too ivory. You’re a weird ghostie. Who steals PCs pills.

That’s it guys. I must admit. I like the weird ghost. I’m weak I know-

DOL RAMBLES OF THE DAY

Man it’s been a while since I’ve done one of these lol-

Originally this guy was extremely creepy, like who randomly kidnaps a random person out the room.. RANDOMLY. Like unless you join the church and go through ivorys memories, you will most likely never know the full story of this ghost. So when my first Pc was really just one day abducted like that I was like”- aight- guess this is my life now-🫥”

But then after learning his lore, I must say as a writer myself I’m enthralled, I’m attached. OBESSED even.

Especially after the latest temple update. Ivory has so much potential not just as a possible future LI, but as a solitary character. They have presumably reasons to hate the PC so much that they’re willing to drag both of you down to the pits of despair.

But even if PC isn’t the one who screws them over ivory still becomes obsessed, because their obession with PC didn’t begin out of hatred, it was from love. From knowing PC in a past life, of loosing them to their enemies of the opposite faith. And finally FINALLY when they see their past lover again…

They’ve been born anew. But why? Ivory is a ghost damned to the lake, why does pc get to run around and fall in love all over again. and not with ivory?, no, no. PC has the freedom to love whomever they wish.

Because they’re Alive.

But that’s not fair, ivory and pc were bound “forever as one” they should have never been born anew!

And just for PC to even have the possibility of forming another “bond” with a member of their same faith? To have the nerve leave ivory and bind themselves to someone else!

Such a dirty, lying, retched,....lover.

I don’t believe ivory could ever truly hate the PC, because they never did. From the beginning ivory was always going to see the PC and become obsessed. Because originally PC was theirs. Solely theirs to love and defile. Their obession to the PC is only shadowed by their obession to their necklace.

Whether or not PC does anything. Ivory was always going to do something. That’s all there is to it.

((Which is a mentality a lot of the LIs internally have towards the PC. Some more obessively than others.))

All the PC can do is avoid them but that doesn’t last for long. Eventually they’ll be caught.

Because they are loved, deeply. And love is obsessive, chasing you beyond your grave, possessing each waking thought. And leaving nothing expect carnage in its wake.

#dol #alorhna the songbird #oc #sydney the faithful #sydney the fallen #dol pc #ivory wraith #kylar the loner #dol kylar #ivory wraith the forlorn #robin the orphan #Avery the businessperson #alex the farmhand #degree of lewdity #black wolf the alpha #dol great hawk

[callmefirefly]

Two badass bitches from District 12 that have mastered the sarcastic bow

#books #movies #film #the hunger games #a ballad of songbirds and snakes #katniss everdeen #lucy gray baird #district 12 #jennifer lawrence #rachel zegler #suzanne collins #parallels #what a great parallel #callmefirefly

[jaqobis]

lucy gray is peeta this, sejanus is katniss that, when are we going to talk about how peeta is who SNOW could've been

#manipulative silver-tongued snakes from rough but relatively privileged circumstances #who meet A Girl (from district 12) #but peeta has genuine love and compassion for not just katniss but also the people around him #so he uses his power for good #and katniss admires him a lot for this so i think it's easy to forget #that he's also mister “star-crossed lovers ploy” #mister “maybe we shouldn't quell the districts” #mister “haymitch i'm making you go cold turkey on alcohol” #and mister “if it weren't for the baby” #tho in all seriousness these thg/tbosas parallels posts are great keep 'em coming #the hunger games #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #peeta mellark #words

[shybiii]

Suzanne Collins signalling that Coriolanus has shit critical thinking skills by the fact that he doesn't understand poetry/art is probably my favourite bit of the prequel.

#tbosas #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #great way of getting across that he does not think about things on a deeper level #aside from how it personally affects him #of course he's easily indoctrinated

[dangerouslypassiveaggressive]

A Terribly Organized Almost-Essay About Suzanne Collins and Why I Think She Writes

Lukewarm take because it's been years, but here it goes: if there's anything I've learned over the years, it's that Suzanne Collins is not a people pleaser. (The author, at least. I don't know her personally lol). And she be pleasing the people, that's not what I mean! I just kept hearing the same question being asked over and over again. "Why Snow? Why him?? Why not anybody else? Really?? A prequel about HIM??" It really made me think.

And don't get me wrong! I'd slash someone's tires for a Finnick prequel just like the next person (Suzanne please!), but that has never been the point of her writing. The Hunger Games novels, and by extension, the prequel book The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, aren't just fun fiction reads. Yeah, they're gripping. The world-building is superb. Young people are at the center of it. And all these characteristics are great, but the thing that draws us in, that keeps us consuming her media like hungry little caterpillars, is that they are, time and time again, a captivating and accurate criticism, analysis, and deconstruction of the broken systems society experiences in the real world. I can only speak from my own experience as a Mexican American woman in the United States, so take all of this with a grain of salt.

The Capitol is colorful and fun and interesting and horrible and sadistic. And it is all those things because it is a symbol of our own real-world 1%, except our own glittering Capitol members here in the real world feed us the hope that we may reach their status if we only work hard enough for long enough. The Hunger Games system never makes that claim. In fact, they are fed the narrative that the system only works because they're stuck where they are. Suzanne Collins is taking everything one step further in her writing because it is a type of satire, a critique of the things we already know. So as an author, she blows it out of proportion so that her reader will say "look at this! How ridiculous! How would someone let the system treat them this way!" And it is ridiculous, it's downright laughable that an entire society, an entire country, would let itself be oppressed in such a cruel way by just a few people in charge instead of rising up and- oh wow, yeah, I see it. She wrote about us.

Suzanne Collins just organized everything neatly into boxes- well, districts. Because every district comes with some form of product that they manufacture, but much more importantly: a class. We go in order from 1-13. District 1 manufactures luxury items and District 2 makes weapons (but mostly trains Peacekeepers), so they have the most privilege and wealth. On the other end, Districts 11 and 12 are the agricultural and coal mining districts, respectively. That's back-breaking work. Not to mention District 11 puts kids as young as 12 to work, and District 12 is poverty-stricken and starving. "But what about District 13?" You may ask, "They make nuclear weapons! Why aren't they up there with 2?" Fantastic question. If we know, and the people of Panem know, that the hierarchy is very clearly set by literal number order, why would one of the most powerful and competent districts be given more power and be put at the top? Placing them at the end lets them believe that they aren't powerful or competent. I mean, jeez, look at 12 and they're before 13? I wouldn't believe I could make it on my own either. (We know now that's not how things go down, but it's a clever power move regardless.)

But after all this, would it hurt Suzanne to give us a single book just for fun?

Yes, I believe it would, that's the whole point. We're not meant to fall for the Peeta/Katniss/Gale love triangle. We're not meant to be interested in Finnick's secrets and early life. We're not meant to want to know the morbid details of how Haymitch won his Games (with double the contestants! Ooh. Aah.) We're meant to be horrified at every turn, at every story. We're meant to ask ourselves how things got so bad, how anyone let this happen. Suzanne Collins has written wonderfully fleshed out characters that grip us and make us want to know more, but the point has never been them or even their loved ones. It was never about Katniss or Prim or Peeta or Finnick or Annie. It's always been about the systems that let this story happen, and where Suzanne got her inspiration: the very real lives we lead. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes shows us the same thing.

So why Coriolanus Snow? Because he is the catalyst to a broken system that only serves the powerful. If Suzanne were to write a novel about any of our much more beloved characters, then she would be writing the exact same book over and over about the same oppression happening in the same system. She does not write for the sake of bringing her very well-written characters to life, but to flesh out the poverty, the starvation, the power struggles, the horrors they experience. We know this because she writes a lot of her characters as symbols. (Coin, for instance, as the symbol for a power-hungry figurehead, or Prim as the innocent during war.)

Snow is living in a slightly different biome than what we know from The Hunger Games series. He has to make sacrifices and decisions for him and his family, but it's different. It is a view and critique from the inside looking in. This is not Katniss getting to experience the Capitol for the first time and understanding just how terribly unfair everything is. This is someone who is very aware of the way things work and playing the game to stay in power and keep their privilege. Not only that, but it's someone who feels entitled to all of it. In this novel, Suzanne plays around with power and people's position in it. What if a mad scientist was in charge? What if the creator of the thing that brought a semblance of peace was just as horrified as the reader? How far is one person willing to go for power? What if we saw the dawn of a world we're already familiar with?

So I hope she keeps writing, because I love seeing our world through her eyes and the parallels she writes from our world to hers of the injustices happening every day. Even though we'll probably never get the stories we crave, but that's okay. Keep putting those kids through hell, Suzanne.

#tbosas #The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes #books #The Hunger Games #Suzanne Collins #reading #author #essay #spoilers #THG #tbosas spoilers #thg spoilers #i didnt have a great ending or conclusion for this my bad #i just have a lot of thoughts #finnick odair #peeta mellark #katniss everdeen #primrose everdeen #coriolanus snow #president snow #district 12 #catching fire #dangerouslypassiveaggressive

[leviathiane]

Them! :)

For my PLA wingfic series in which in the future, everyone has wings. 

#depths' art #PLA #pokemon legends arceus #pokemon #pkmn #ingo #akari #i hate maintagging nvm just take it lol #decided tentatively on ingo being a great tailed grackle and akari being a common cuckoo chick #ingo was always going to be a corvid and akari a songbird #just wasnt sure what kind #was initially gonna have ingo be a bellbird but theyre white #so #can u tell i STILL phoned it in on ingos wings LMFAOOOOOO #i love being self indulgent. dont mind me

[mswyrr]

lucy gray baird's philosophy

I want to "yes, and" this great meta post by @burst-of-iridescent​. Specifically this part:

by the end of the book, coriolanus gives in fully to dr gaul’s way of thinking simply because it excuses him from accepting blame for his actions. if he killed sejanus, it’s because he had no choice. if he betrayed lucy gray, it’s because she would’ve betrayed him first. coriolanus refuses to believe in the goodness of humanity because that would have meant accepting the goodness that existed within him, and with that came the potential for making a different, better choice - potential that he knew, deep down, he had wasted. attributing his crimes to an innate evil that no one can overcome means that he can’t be held accountable, because it’s out of his control.

This got me thinking about how much Lucy Gray's worldview rejects of this way of thinking (and of a Calvinist*/ableist "some people are just born evil" pov people try to impose on the text, which people think is condemning him but actually... accidentally agrees with him that he was born evil and therefore can't help it??????). The book begins with several quotes chosen by the author, but I believe the one that represents Lucy Gray's worldview is Rousseau, who believed people were born with fundamental goodness.

Here's a source on him:

(Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

And here's the quote Collins opens with:

“Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains.” — Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract, 1762

That's Lucy Gray's pov she's come to through living and reflecting as an artist; someone can disagree with it (of course, all of these questions are open for endless debate; they have been debated endlessly!) however, it's important to respect that is where she's coming from, not being foolish or naive. It is a worthy pov that should be respected, even if you disagree. And that she came to this pov through a hard life and from much thinking and she expresses it beautifully in her art.

Here's the key exchange from the book, after Coriolanus has taken on the idea that people are just awful and her articulating her philosophy in response:

(Ballad, 495)

She's not naive. She recognizes the nuance that Rousseau does, that society shapes us. And Panem is pretty clearly a society led by people applying all the pressures they can think of on people toward evil. (And, after his heel turn, Coriolanus' is going to innovate some new pressures...) Clearly there are situations and circumstances that form us before we have much say in it, but that's not the same as being born evil.

The difference between inherent goodness and a corrupt society is, for Lucy Gray, a lot of hard work. It's a struggle. This repudiates both the version of "born evil" Coriolanus himself takes on, which relieves him of responsibility, and the self-righteous, Calvinist and/or ableist pov people keep arguing for, which makes "normal" people feel like they can be sure they're good (and ignore how we are all complicit in evil to some degree or another) because they have a "good" normal brain or they were just born so pure as a soul predestined for heaven. No, for her, everyone has to do the work. To her it's everyone's "life's challenge to try and stay on the right side of that line."

Even more pointedly, the love song she wrote him before his betrayal, "Pure as the Driven Snow," articulates her philosophy in the opening lines:

(Ballad, 481)

Again, we have her personal focus on the work of "staying on the right side" of good and evil after being born good into evil circumstances. She knows it hurts; she's led a hard life herself. "It's rough as a bair" to do that work, it's "like walkin' through fire." But it is doable.

Lucy Gray meant it as a love song but IMO "Pure as the Driven Snow" ends up a lament for the boy Coriolanus was and her love that he betrayed when he betrayed himself. And it is a direct rejection of his excuses, it is inadvertently reading him for filth for the lies he tells himself that all the world is the Games arena, all people are selfish and bad, and he isn't to blame for what he's done because he just wants to come out on top/be the victor of this "natural" "war of all against all" that is Gaul's philosophy (related to the Hobbes quote Collins begins with; I wrote a meta on that here) that he adopts.

I see her demeaned as a foolish girl who just "like bad boys" and I get so frustrated. I also get frustrated by the view that she must not have ever been sincere in loving or trusting him because IF SHE WAS then she would be a fool and his betrayal would somehow be her fault. And she'd reject the idea that she's "good" just because she's so pure or that anyone can claim we're good without doing a lot of hard work.

(Ballad, 482)

She is so thoughtful and interesting as a character. And she didn't just "like bad boys" - Coriolanus showed only his good side to her until the very end, once he'd decided to kill that part of himself. She had no way of knowing. Sometimes you trust someone and they betray you, it doesn't make you wrong, the shame is all theirs.

*Strict Calvinist predestination is some people are just predetermined to be bound for heaven and some for hell, some people are just born good and others are born bad. A lot of people in fandom seem to love Calvinism idk why. The ableism bit of this should be self-evident: there is no such thing as a "bad" brain type completely incapable of morality or a "good" brain and neurodivergence is not the source of all evil!

#lucy gray baird #thg meta #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #the hunger games #disagree with her if you want - but respect that her pov is philosophically sound and insightful #and i prefer the reading of the text where she's right and gaul and post heel turn coriolanus are wrong... #he could have kept trying to be good and loving for that girl #people dismissing her or being like 'she was constantly lying like a GIRLBOSS' is just so annoying - she's great as herself thank you #reject the idea that women are to blame for bad things people do #reject the idea that women are to blame for loving #that it must have been her fault somehow

[moon-mirage]

This is part of my series of sketches I did for the victors (so far I did Johanna and Annie) but I really liked this so I'm posting it separately.

It's such an outrageous look and I absolutely get how it made waves, even in the Capitol. I feel it's easy to tone it down, not giving Lucy Gray the heavy makeup up and over-the-top outfit but really, it's so iconic. She absolutely knew what she was doing. The other sketches will a bit more muted but really how I could resist drawing the reaping scene in all its colourful glory? 😁

#the ballad of songbirds and snakes #tbosas #the hunger games #lucy gray baird #i don't think she's bowing in the books but i already have her singing in another picture #the movie is visually great but I feel it went a bit too subtle with what book!Lucy Gray went for #coriolanus associated with circus performances so this is what i went with

[katnissandpeetamellark]

The Academy but it’s like Degrassi

Someone’s being stabbed, a teen pregnancy happens once a year, bi-panic runs rampant through the halls—

#I’m rewatching Degrassi if you can’t tell #but put TBOSAS characters in this situation please 😭 they’d be great TV lmao #the hunger games #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #tbosas #thg #hunger games #coriolanus snow #sejanus plinth #clemensia dovecote #festus creed #arachne crane #Gaius breen #pup harrington #persephone price #lysistrata vickers

[sunnys-side-upside-down]

Commission batch for @reversal-mushroom

#what a fun batch of characters!! #I had a great time working on dynamic poses for each that corresponded well with their personality #commissions #mlp #digital art #procreate #songbird serenade #maneiac #mane iac #glamour gleam #king sombra #sombra #chrysalis #queen chrysalis #pony #mlp commissions #pony commissions

[lukeskywalking]

Lucy Gray Baird is my sweet lil rainbow girlypop she did nothing wrong ever and Coriolanus Snow is a headass BITCH it ain’t over til the mockingjay sings BITCH I hope seeing Katniss Everdeen wreck your whole life while singing Lucy’s songs sent an ungodly chill down your spine BITCH!!!!!!

#HUNGER GAMES PREQUEL MOVIE GOOD!!!!!!! #RAAAAAAH!!!!!!!! #I AM SO PLEASED #what a great villain I love to hate him #tbosas #shut up gwen #ballad of songbirds and snakes

[booksandpaperss]

in my opinion the movie didn’t make snow seem better than he was at all. like you can still see his internal monologue and his paranoia on his face and in his actions you just have to pay closer attention cuz a movie is visual and part of snow’s character is that he’s constantly putting on a performance

#watching his face closely when he thinks no one is looking rlly will tell u all u need to know it’s great acting #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #tbosas #coriolanus snow