In every “Hunger Games” book, there is a scene that reminds us of the humanity of both the characters and ourselves. These poignant moments tug at our heartstrings, making us root for the characters—not against each other, but against the system itself. Examples include Katniss in the hospital, Rue surrounded by flowers, Reaper with the flag, Lucy Gray singing and Haymitch in the field.
These scenes are so effective because we, the audience, succumb to the atmosphere of the games, drawn in by the fanfare and spectacle. We want our favorite characters to survive, even though doing so means that others must die. This concept is not exclusive to the Hunger Games.
A well-known parallel can be found in slasher films, the “final girl” trope. This trope leaves the last surviving female character to confront the killer and to tell the story. Examples of this can be found in films like “Scream”, “Psycho”, “Halloween”, “Alien”, “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, “Friday the 13th”, etc. It’s not exactly an indie movie concept.
There’s nothing wrong with enjoying those movies either. It’s not that different from contact sports like hockey or wrestling. You can cheer for violence because there are rules, because the people fighting volunteered, because there is a line to cross. Suffering becomes a spectacle with a clear “off switch.” It can be taken too far; look at Clint Malarchuk or Darren Drozdov. When it’s characters instead of people, there’s no need for those same rules; the audience can distance themselves from their morality for the sake of entertainment.
In his 2021 novel, “The Final Girl Support Group”, Grady Hendrix poses the question: What happens to the final girl after the credits roll? To answer this, we must ask another question: why do we even desire a final girl? The existence of a final girl demands that every other character must die.
In slasher films, the structure is less nuanced; there’s a clear villain and a group of victims/protagonists. The final girl’s classmates, such as her chem lab partner, the quarterback, or her best friend, are easier for audiences to relate to and root for. Yet, the genre demands their deaths for the audience’s full emotional investment. Their deaths give her life meaning.
This is the unsettling truth: the girl left standing at the end is only compelling when she is covered in blood. The audience gains nothing from senseless death. Other characters must perish to show that death serves a purpose and that her life holds meaning.
Real violence is far too cruel to stomach—a child spraying bullets in a school cafeteria, a bomb detonating at a finish line, a man struggling to breathe under the knee of law enforcement, a pickup truck speeding down a crowded street, or a video of a woman being killed in her car.
In contrast, the media offers a simplified resolution. The killer is caught, the system is dismantled and the final girl gets her revenge.
No one has to confront the aftermath as the credits begin to roll.
As Grady Hendrix writes, “the violence in a slasher film is a comforting blanket drawn up against the chill of the infinite moral void of reality.” Through the pixels on a screen or the pages of a book, death takes on meaning, distracting us from the harsh reality that mass death robs life of its individuality.
In this context, it becomes us versus them, with “us” being the audience and “them” being the characters in the show. This creates a division, unlike the real world, where both groups share the same crowded city streets under the same administration in the same country.
Suffering is only entertaining as long as it’s happening to someone else, somewhere else.
