A Shot-By-Shot Analysis Of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire Trailer (Spoilers)

It’s here—the first teaser trailer for The Hunger Games: Catching Fire! Our first glimpse at the second film in Suzanne Collins’ dystopian trilogy aired during the MTV Movie Awards, and it looks pretty damn fantastic. It’s exciting to see Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen again, especially because we get such a keen sense of how much emotional torture she’s going to go through even before the major plot-driving twist of the second book is revealed…

[Warning: the post below contains some spoilers for those unfamiliar with the original books.]

In some ways, we saw so much more than the typical teaser trailer, but also less. Fans hoping to catch a glimpse of victors like Finnick Odair (Sam Claflin) and Johanna Mason (Jena Malone) will be disappointed; the scenes are mostly taken from Katniss and Peeta’s (Josh Hutcherson) Victory Tour and the District 11 riot. That said, the dichotomy between their reality-TV existence in the Capitol and the injustices back home in District 12 is chilling.

Let’s break the trailer down:

I really love how the movies show us so much of President Snow’s side of things. In the books we only saw through Katniss’ eyes how Snow stalked her, but here we get a true sense of how early on he’s identified her as a threat.

Ooh, Philip Seymour Hoffman is super creepy even though we know that Plutarch Heavensbee is on the rebels’ side. He is playing Snow so hard right now.

Yep, the quickest way to turn Katniss crazy is to torture and kill people in front of her. Like this poor old guy in District 11 who gets beaten to death just for showing his solidarity. Since the next time we see Katniss she’s playing along with the Capitol’s decadent games, it’s no wonder everyone thinks she’s a phony.

“This trip doesn’t end when you get back home. From now on, your job is to be a distraction until people forget what the real problems are.” Haymitch, telling it like it is.

Really digging the anti-Capitol graffiti in the districts. It’s futuristic, but not.

”Chins up. Smiles on.” Oh, Effie. Never change.

Not gonna lie, it will never stop amusing me how they draw parallels to today’s celebrity culture, with Caesar Flickerman (Stanley Tucci) hosting what looks exactly like Entertainment Tonight.

Um, can we get that mockingjay poster? Because it’s rad.

The Katniss/Gale kiss! There’s actually very little Peeta in this trailer, because it’s time for the other ’shippers to get their moment.

And here’s the beginning of Prim’s storyline. When she talks about helping out in the fight, you just want to hug her and never let go, y’know?

There goes Katniss, protecting her men from The Man.

My very favorite part comes right at the end, as President Snow knits together the two disparate plotlines of Catching Fire with one line: “Her entire species must be eradicated. The other victors. Because of her, they all pose a threat. Because of her, they all think they’re invincible.” Yeah, I shivered.

Catching Fire comes to theaters November 22, 2013! Can’t wait to see more detailed trailers—with all those dangerous victors—in the coming months.

Natalie Zutter is a playwright, foodie, and pop culture blogger. Her writing has appeared on BlackBook, Ology, Bookish, and Crushable, where she discusses celebrity culture alongside internet memes (or vice versa). Weekly you can find her calling in to the Hunger GamesFireside Chat podcast, reviewing new releases at Movie Mezzanine, and on Twitter.