Review of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2 (2015) by Dam1730 — 24 Nov 2015

This is an example of another series that simply went on too long and lost all of the magic and shock factor it started with. As a reader of the books, I generally knew what was going to happen and when it was going to happen.

What drew me in to the first two movies were the visualizations of things I had read about several times. With three films preceding this one, all of the "wow" factor is gone. With Mockingjay - Part 1, I said that the only way you could really appreciate the film was if you had read the books, Mockingyay - Part 2 is the opposite; you will enjoy this film more if you have not read the books.

I suppose this is to be expected as it is the end of the series. The first mistake is that the cut between Part 1 and Part 2 was put in the wrong spot. The climax of part 1 should have been the events in District 2.

In the book, it was a very important part of Katniss' character development. I felt putting it at the beginning of this film caused it to be glossed over and more of an afterthought.I wasn't crazy about how this film did not include or glossed over events that were very important for Katniss' character development.

I think it left a hole in the story. In the books, Katniss does not smuggle herself into the capital, she actually does training at District 13 and it is an pretty important developmental and rehabilitative experiment for her.

This movie does not adequately portray how messed up Katniss is after Peeta attacks her. Yes, it is an easy sequence to delete, but I feel it is an important part of the story and it is a part of the books where Jena Malone's character is pretty important.

I felt the lack of focus on the other characters was a mistake in this film. The Hunger Games series is written in first person, so one of the major areas where this film could have differentiated itself was in that it is third person.

I felt just really tired of Katniss by the end of this film. Jennifer Lawrence is a good, not great actor, so she really shouldn't have the camera on her 90% of the time as it was in this film as her weaknesses become more and more apparent the more you see her.

There were other good actors in this film, they should have been more involved. One of the best characters, Haymitch, is almost nowhere to be found for example. Overall, this is an average film. It's not terrible, but it's definitely not good.