There has become a trend to always compare the latest emerging movie franchise with the previous ones in order to get people to notice and spend their money on movie tickets, merchandise and such. In the past few months I have more than once read articles concerning the Hunger Games, comparing it franchises that have done well before them, most notably Twilight. I don’t hate Twilight, but the comparison still bugs me just because aside from both of them being written by women with a girl as protagonist, they really are nothing alike. It also worries me that they took no time before comparing the two series, making me fear that they will use the same promotional strategy for Hunger Games by making it about team Peeta or team Gale.
In my opinion Twilight is not at all comparable to the Hunger Games. While Twilight is a book about a teenage girl who falls completely in love with a boy who she later finds out is a vampire, Hunger Game is a series about growing up while oppressed by the government and trying to break away from their control. Bella is driven by her own desire and love for Edward, and at times Jacob, while Katniss is driven by her need to stay alive and protect her family, friends and in the end, all the districts.
More importantly though, the characters themselves are so fundamentally different. I don’t want this to sound like I’m bashing on Twilight, because that is not my intention. I have read them all, seen the movies so far and I used to enjoy it a lot. Now I find it very tedious and do get annoyed by the hysteria that surrounds it, but I don’t feel the need to make it heard all the time. Back to the point, Bella is not a strong female character. I think she grows into it towards the end, but in much of the series she is only driven by her love for Edward. Just take a look at New Moon and how she just shut down when Edward left and how she is willing to just pretend to leave and never see her family again just so she can be with her boyfriend.
