Hunger Games director reveals what he “completely regrets” about finale

The director of the Hunger Games finale films — Mockingjay Part 1 and 2 — has recently revealed what he regrets about the final movies.

When it comes to the YA dystopian movies of the late 2010s, The Hunger Games completely dominated Hollywood.

With four movies spread out from 2012 to 2015, The Hunger Games franchise was the blueprint for other teenage rebellion movies, except it did follow the trend of splitting the final book into two separate films, which was first started by the Harry Potter series.

And it was revealed that one of the biggest players who worked on The Hunger Games Mockingjay Part 2 wasn’t entirely happy with the decision to split the films.

Mockingjay director regrets two Hunger Games finale films

Director Francis Lawrence recently sat down with People Magazine to reminisce about the original films and chat about the upcoming prequel film The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes.

Lawrence, who directed Catching Fire and both Mockingjay movies, admitted that if he had control over the Hunger Games finale, he never would’ve split the movies into two.

“I totally regret it. I totally do. I’m not sure everybody does, but I definitely do,” Lawerence said, “What I realized in retrospect — and after hearing all the reactions and feeling the kind of wrath of fans, critics, and people at the split — is that I realized it was frustrating. And I can understand it.

“In an episode of television, if you have a cliffhanger, you have to wait a week or you could just binge it and then you can see the next episode. But making people wait a year, I think, came across as disingenuous, even though it wasn’t. Our intentions were not to be disingenuous.”

However, Lawerence did add that he and his team had a long conversation in which they agreed that the “two halves of Mockingjay had their own separate dramatic questions” and therefore both movies had complete arcs.

Plus the director admitted that they were able to take more details out of the film book instead of cutting back on key moments and important plot beats.

“In truth, we got more on the screen out of the book than we would’ve in any of the other movies because you’re getting close to four hours of screen time for the final book,” Lawerence explained, “But, I see and understand how it frustrated people.”

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes will premiere in theaters on November 17, 2023. You can read more about the film here.