By the Book: Catching Fire Predictions for Chapter 6
It’s time for our By the Book segment on Chapter 6 of Catching Fire, which includes the entrance of Head Gamemaker Plutarch Heavensbee and follows the wrap-up of the Victory Tour and ends with Katniss discovering the uprising in District 8. The image above is by peetashoneybuns on Tumblr. Thanks to Theresa from DWTC for the find! Keep reading for our chapter predictions.
Tash
I am really looking forward to the party held at President Snow’s mansion, I was blown away with how well they created food in The Hunger Games and I am fully prepared for them to impress me again with the orange filled chicken and other such delicacies. I do hope too that details like the starry ceiling and floating platform for the band are also included as Peeta twirls Katniss around the floor. But of course we’re all waiting to be introduced to Plutarch Heavensbee for the first time, and I can see the film playing out much like the book, a brief meeting and a surreptitious clue left about the arena before he disappears. At this point we need to be uncertain about Plutarch, and as distrustful as Katniss is towards him, and I have no doubt that PSH can deliver.
Because I am also a total Everlark-shipper I’d like to see Katniss and Peeta’s interactions in this chapter make it to the big screen, but I think that if they do they will be shuffled around and a bit of creative licence will be used to portray them. The biggest change I’m predicting though is the return to District 12 for the harvest festival, as it hinges on whether Madge is present or not. Sadly for Madge fans I don’t think she’ll be included, I can see Katniss overhearing a conversation between peacekeepers or accidentally stumbling upon the information about the District 8 uprising, rather than seeing it on television, and the harvest festival taking place entirely outdoors. It would be nice to see the happy children eating well, and this would provide great contrast later on when District 12 cruelly has pretty much everything taken from them.
Lines that I want to make it:
Peeta: “Maybe we were wrong, Katniss…About trying to subdue things in the districts”
Plutarch: “I thought it’d be safe to tell you”
Erin
I’d love to see the interaction between Katniss and President Snow when he’s joking about getting her married before she’s thirty, so hopefully they’ll put a line or two in earlier about her mom not wanting her to date. As far as the party at Snow’s mansion goes, however, I think we’ll get a nice artistic shot of the room with all the food, musicians, and people, but I don’t think we’ll get close ups of anything. I don’t think they’ll include the part with the prep team and they’ll delete the short conversation between Katniss and Peeta about vomiting up the food for fun. I think we’ll only see them dancing for a few seconds before Plutarch cuts in. I’m very eager to see what they do with the short conversation those two will have but I’m most excited to see Plutarch’s pocket watch! I want the audience to think that Plutarch is just like Seneca– happy to do his job, even though it means the death of 23 children in the arena.
I don’t have high hopes for Katniss and Peeta talking after she wakes up on the train, but you never know. I’m not sure if they’ll have the party at the mayor’s house in District 12. I think they might have Katniss see the news flash about the uprising in District 8 while she’s still in the Capitol to save on time and having to film another ‘party’ scene.
Lines that I want to make it:
Plutarch: “It starts at midnight.”
Crystal
You guys all know I’m a fictional food freak, so the ball is something I’m really looking forward to. I’d love to see Katniss gasp at a table full of colorful soups and try the bird coated with orange sauce. This is also the party that Katniss and Peeta find out that the citizens of the Capitol take a drink to make themselves vomit so they can eat more food. Although I’d love to see that scene in the film to give audiences a shock, there’s a lot of content to stuff into this movie and I can see the prep team getting cut here in favor of more important scenes down the line. I can’t wait for the entrance of Plutarch here, though the amusing scene with the punch joke, if included at all, may need to be changed so that he explains what happened himself.
While Erin came up with a really great idea for where Katniss sees the uprising on tv, I think it will still be in Mayor Undersee’s house because I’m of the opinion that they’re giving fans a nod by putting Madge back in the game for Catching Fire (Mystery Cast Member on the casting page!!). Upon re-reading, she’s got quite a few more potential scenes than just showing up with medicine for Gale, and I think there are many different ways they can bring her in. She could even still tie it back to Maisilee Donner by having her say that her mother gave it away long ago to forget about the pain over her sister’s death, which is how Katniss came to eventually find it at the Hob. As for the uprising itself, I’d previously been confused by the casting call for “Type 8″ in Atlanta, but that’s because I’d totally forgotten that the district Katniss sees rebelling is actually District 8!
Lines that I want to make it:
Peeta: “My nightmares are usually about losing you. I’m okay once I realize you’re here.”
Ciara
The interactions between Snow and Katniss in front of the crowd made me laugh and I hope a little bit of joking and fake smiles are in there (it might change the serious tone a bit too much but I did love it). I hope we see a lot of what the Capitol has to offer in terms of food. They did that so beautifully in the 1st movie when Katniss and Peeta enter the train and I really want to see their faces with all the amazing food on show. If I don’t salivate and feel extremely peckish watching this scene, then Francis Lawrence has failed! I also really want the vomit discussion in there because it explains so much about the haves and have-nots. It’s a wonderful way to compare the differing situations in the Districts and the Capitol and it would be a well placed moment to remind why the uprisings are taking place. It really struck a chord with me when reading and I think it’d be important to have that little moment touched upon…
Enter Philip Seymour Hoffman! I’m so excited about meeting Plutarch and I don’t know if this moment will play out exactly like the book but I hope there’s enough in there to make the audience question him. Maybe if no one else at the party is wearing a mockingjay it might make the one on his pocket watch a little more intriguing. As Erin suggests it’d be easier to stumble upon the newsflash in the Capitol and as they’re already in Snow’s mansion it would flow well on screen for Katniss to see the District 8 footage somewhere in the house. It would seem much more secret (and dangerous) if she stumbled upon something that was meant only for Snow.
Lines that I want to make it:
Plutarch: “It starts at midnight.” (Or some conspiratorial dialogue clue to the arena being a clock)
Weigh in with comments and tell us your own chapter 6 predictions in the movie!
That picture is awesome
I think it’s hysterical that the original photo is of Cho Chang and Cedric Diggory.
did they photo shop it??
omg lol it IS cedric an cho! you can see victor in the background!!
@Kylie omg i just noticed that i can’t stop laughing now!
lol that’s funny
HAHAHA!! I had no idea! That is hysterical!
Although Katniss only mentions it briefly, and it would have to happen earlier in the movie, I would like to see Effie showing them how to do a “capitol dance.” And since it is totally unfamiliar, Effie asks Haymitch to help her demonstrate. It would be hilarious. I hope they keep the conversation that Katniss and Peeta have while they are dancing. For the first time she sees that he has negative opinions about the capitol.
The picture is so well manipulated that it is so creepy when you look at it.
I c viktor krum in the background!!!!
Hehheehehe… Victor Keum is in the background!!!
Hehheehehe… Victor Krum is in the background!!!
Inducing vomiting so they can stuff their faces again is such a striking Capitol/districts contrast that it definitely should be in there.
I like the idea of Katniss seeing D8 rebellion on a TV at President snows mansion! It makes it more exciting! Crystal I’m worried if they put Madge in there they might not develop her character so I think its better if they didn’t, but that’s just my opinion
@LR – That would be a really nice way to incorporate Effie some more in the film too, as well as providing some comic relief like you suggested
@Isaac – I loved that suggestion of the girls, I wrote mine first as I’ve been away pretty much all weekend (just jumping on when I can) and when I read theirs I was like “why didn’t I think of that?” lol I also really like Crystal’s idea of re-incorporating Madge, but I don’t think it’s going to happen either. We will just have to wait and see who the mystery female is!
I thought it was real until i looked closer in the background and saw it was the ball scene in Harry Potter.
I wonder if Plutarch will make an appearance before the ball, like we see Seneca early on in the first film. And I was thinking that if Madge isn’t included again (which would suck) maybe Katniss could make an excuse to go to the bathroom and on the way stumble across the uprising footage. I was also thinking they could just have the party at the mayor’s house and the public party with the rest of d12 be the same party ljke outside the mayor’s house or something. That way Katniss could notice Gale’s absence at the same time she leaves to go to the bathroom. Dunno if that made any sense, sorry. But that’s what I was thinking.
Incorporating Madge could be cool (she maybe is the secret character on the casting page, and she could even be the last role announced. I hope there isn’t rumours so there’s definitely a surprise.)
I can’t wait to see how PSH plays this scene. He definitely gives her hints about the arena, but you don’t know that until they discover how the arena works themselves. “It starts at midnight”. Also can’t wait to see how he plays a secret rebellious character.
About the vomiting stuff, I think it’s something important, to show the cruelty of the Capitol. While the majority of districts starve, they self-induce vomit to eat more.
HARRY POTTER!!!!
I thought they could show the D8 uprising in Snow’s mansion. E.g. Katniss could decide she wants to explore and could stumble into a room with a television showing the D8 uprising.
It would save them having to make another set for the Mayor’s house.
I check to see if PSH is in fact that much taller than JLawrence.
It looked so unfamilar until I recognized the dress robe and Asian-looking dress.
I hope they have madge i connected with her most while reading the books
OT (sorry) but are the forums completely fixed now?
I swear, if we don’t get the Peeta nightmares line, I will start my own uprising
haha I kid of course, but it all goes back to the fact that (in my opinion) we need to see Peeta and Katniss connect more than we did in the first movie, establish the fact that they’re going into this conflict together. Maybe it’s just me. I’m a ridiculous Everlark shipper. 
@Emily414 – It’s not just you, believe me!
I really really hope it’s in there as well, but it will only make sense/appear if you like you said they establish more of a connection a bit earlier. If we get at least a train scene from the Victory Tour then it should make it I think. Fingers crossed!
@Tash- good, I’m glad I’m not alone in that one
I really hope that the reference to the vomit-inducing drink will be included. I agree with Ciara, Alan, Abel and others that it provides for a vivid contrast between the affluence of the Capitol and the abject poverty of the Districts. The prep team doesn’t have to be showcased in this scene, it could be Effie telling K and P about the drink instead. Though I do hope the prep team is shown, especially because it seems SC meant for readers to recall this scene when, in MJ, Katniss finds the team chained up in D13 for stealing bread, and shows compassion to them, one of the few scenes that show her growing as a character.
While Erin and Crystal seem to think it’s likely to be cut, the casting calls for “The Idiom”, which seem to be an obvious mask title for CF, does specify “extremely thin” people to play the people of D3, D8, D11, and D12. That gives me hope that FLaw is responding to the criticism the first movie for glossing over the “Hunger” part of the Hunger Games. Since the extras for that movie didn’t seem to be starving at all, even those in D11, run much more strictly than D12. So hopefully, FLaw wants to focus more on the hunger and economic disparity issue, and this scene would certainly drive that point home.
As for the K-P stuff; I consider myself a K-P shipper, and hope the romance is developed more than in THG. I think GR focused so much on the world-building, and showing how controlled the Game environment is, and developing Katniss as a heroine, that he wound up back-burnering the K-P relationship almost by default. That being said, I don’t want CF to tilt too far in the opposite direction, focus *too* much on the romance, and lose sight of the political and social messages. So if I had to choose between a K-P train scene and the vomit scene, I’d actually choose the vomit scene. Also, this seems to be the catalyst for Peeta to indicate his sympathies with the rebellion, providing more character development for him beyond just being a Love Interest.
Wow, I need to re-read CF soon because I forgot about some of these moments. From reading above I agree with the majority opinions…to include the vomit drink discussion via Effie is perfect, want small dance conversation to establish Peeta’s willingness to go against the Capitol, and of course Plutarch’s entrance and line “It starts at midnight” because that is the riddle, right? I really want at least a little conversation about Peeta’s nightmares for the P-K connection, and love the idea of K finding out about D8 rebellion at P. Snow’s mansion. You guys are the bomb! Such great ideas, cannot wait!
I love that picture!!