This post contains spoilers for the 2020 novel "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," as well as the "Hunger Games" movies.

Just to keep expectations grounded, it should be stated ahead of time: it's unlikely that the upcoming "Hunger Games" prequel movie will be as big of a hit as the original series. That doesn't mean it'll be bad — it's just that the source material is slower and less action-packed than any of the books in the original trilogy, which puts the odds of a big box office success firmly out of its favor.

The book is centered around a young Coriolanus Snow (played by Tom Blyth in the film), long before he became the Capitol President who'd make Katniss's life a living hell. This premise takes a lot of the usual tension out of the story because even though characters do die in the book, the protagonist himself is never in danger. He's not a participant in the games, after all.

But what the book lacks in high-stakes excitement, it makes up for with a compelling look into how you don't need to be a psychopath to support a totalitarian government. Young Snow is not a good person, sure, but he's also not an evil person by the standards of his society. At the start, he's just focused on rescuing his family out of massive debt, and when he's assigned to help out a District 12 tribute named Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler), he's capable of developing what looks like genuine compassion for her. ("Looks like" are the keywords here.)

Speaking Of Lucy…

Remember how it was mentioned in the original movie tetralogy that there'd previously only been one other Hunger Games victor from District 12? Well, Lucy is that victor. She's a 16-year-old who, much like Katniss and Peeta, ends up surviving largely due to her ability to win the Capitol viewers to her side.

Maybe more accurately, she lives because she wins Snow over to her side, convincing him to not just help her out but to break the rules to give her an edge. Snow's subtle interference in the games is discovered, and as punishment for his crimes, he's kicked out of the Capitol, seemingly forever, and forced to spend the rest of his days as a Peacekeeper in the worst of the districts, District 12.

It's that final section of the book, where Snow has the option to give up his Capitol ambitions and live an honest life with Lucy, that's filled with the most parallels to the original books. Lucy is a singer who ends up singing "The Hanging Tree" to haunting effect, just like Katniss would 65 years later. There are also countless mentions of the literal katniss flower that Katniss would one day be named after, as well as constant talk about mockingjays.

Snow and Lucy's relationship doesn't work out — once Snow sees a path toward regaining his power in the Capitol, it all falls apart — but it's not the end of Snow's District 12-related woes. In the end, Snow thinks to himself about Lucy, "She and her mockingjays could never harm him again," but this will hardly be the last time a mockingjay hurts him.

Filled With Parallels To Katniss's Story

The importance of this prequel story seems clear: it adds extra context to Snow's antagonistic relationship with Katniss. In those books and movies, Snow always seems to admire Katniss in a way — she's his enemy, sure, but he doesn't outright hate her personally. It's with the prequel that we realize that Katniss must remind him of his first love, the one he rejected due to his pursuit of power and wealth. The rebellious, straightforward Katniss represents the honest (if far more dangerous) life Snow could've picked for himself.

Maybe more important, however, is the way the prequel shines a light on Katniss and Peeta's storyline. Throughout "Catching Fire" in particular, these two characters are trapped in an uncertain emotional place, one where they have to pretend to love each other for the sake of the cameras. It's all complicated by the fact that Peeta genuinely does love Katniss, and although Katniss doesn't believe she loves him back, over time she realizes there's more substance to her relationship with him than she'd originally thought.

In the prequel, it seems like Lucy and Snow are falling in love with each other, but it's also complicated by the relationship's transactional nature. Lucy needs Snow to love her if she wants him to do everything in his power to keep her safe, and a significant amount of Snow's feelings for her are due to his desire for self-advancement. Is he protecting Lucy out of love or for his own career? It's an ambiguous mix of both, and unfortunately, the answer is probably more self-centered than we'd hope.

How Snow/Lucy Differs From Peeta/Katniss

In the end, Snow and Lucy's relationship is a tragic contrast to Peeta and Katniss's. Katniss sticks to Peeta even after he's brainwashed into hating her when it would be more convenient for everyone to just move on — Snow gives up on Lucy the moment it stops being convenient for him.

The ambiguity in Peeta and Katniss's relationship eventually gives way to genuine love, whereas the ambiguity in Snow and Lucy's relationship reveals itself to be hollow and opportunistic. I'm sure part of Snow really does love Lucy, but that part of him isn't significant enough to stop his transformation into the evil villain he's destined to be.

Maybe the central issue is that whereas Katniss and Peeta are from the same district, on the same side, Snow begins and ends as Lucy's oppressor. He's actively working on behalf of a government that's subjugating her people, and throughout the book, he's incapable of fully imagining how this might come across from Lucy's point of view.

Despite how smart and perceptive Snow generally is, it's the limits of his empathy in this regard that lead to Lucy blindsiding him at the end and nearly killing him. There's a growing gap between the Lucy in Snow's head and the Lucy of the real world, and both he and she are harmed by this disconnect.

Deepening The Original Movies

Assuming the upcoming movie is reasonably faithful and well-made, it'll likely encourage viewers to give the original four movies another look, now with the extra context the prequel provides. The conversation between Snow and Katniss at the end of the first movie is already loaded with subtext, but how will it come across once viewers know that Snow's already personally familiar with the sort of tactics she and Peeta used to sway the viewers to their side? When Snow continues torturing the couple in "Catching Fire" and "Mockingjay: Part 1," how much of that will seem like the result of Snow's bitterness over his own lost love?

As Peeta and Katniss's love becomes increasingly real over the course of the series, this is likely just rubbing salt into whatever wounds were left over from Snow's first heartbreak. Maybe that's why he goes out of his way to have Peeta brainwashed into hating Katniss: he's angry that Peeta's version of Lucy actually loves him back.

Maybe despite all the power and wealth he's successfully accumulated, Snow understands on some level that it would've been better — not just for himself but for everyone — if he'd stayed true to Lucy as a young man, instead of selling his soul for the Capitol.

In the original film series, there were plenty of reasons for Snow to despise Katniss and Peeta. Just the fact that they were figureheads for a rebellion that was out for his head was enough. But "Songbirds and Snakes" adds another layer, another motivation from Snow we didn't know we needed: sour grapes. Katniss and Peeta constantly make the sort of choices young Snow was too selfish to make, and maybe that's what enrages him most of all.

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