The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes - The Petition for an Extended Cut
A new fan petition urges a rumored four-hour extended cut of The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes to be released. The prequel installment is directed by Francis Lawrence and stars Tom Blyth and Rachel Zegler as young Coriolanus Snow and 10th Hunger Games District 12 tribute Lucy Gray Baird, respectively. The Ballad of Song Birds and Snakes has been met with positive reviews and is having a respectable box office run in theaters.
The Fan Petition
A new petition is pushing for the release of an alleged four-hour-extended cut of The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. The petition on Change.org currently has over 26,000 signatures and is headlined “Release an Extended Edition of The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.” It claims that the movie “felt incomplete to hardcore fans due to the substantial amount of content from the book that didn't make it into the theatrical cut.”
Lucy smiling in The Hunger Games The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
Why The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes’ Runtime Is Complicated
Rachel Zegler as Lucy Gray Baird Closing Her Eyes in the Arena in The Hunger Games The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
It is important to note that the rumored long cut of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is unsubstantiated. According to the source provided in the petition, this rumor is partially based on a Reddit thread from Lauren2102319 that discussed the movie’s length before the unveiling of The Hunger Games prequel’s current runtime. Said thread was based on a misconstrued quote from Lawrence in which the director mentioned that The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes would be “the longest of all the movies.” In the same interview, however, Lawrence mentioned that he hoped to keep the prequel under three hours long and never mentioned a cut anywhere close to four hours in length.
Rachel Zegler bowing as Lucy Gray Baird in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.
Speculation and Confirmations
Although the rumored cut is only speculation, there have been a few scenes that were confirmed to be cut from the final edit. Zegler revealed on Twitter that a scene between her and Coryo at the Hanging Tree in the Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes' final act was cut from the prequel. The movie also greatly condenses Coryo’s relationship with his Snow family and other Capitol Academy classmates, such as Clemensia Dovecote (Ashley Liao), which provides a prominent understanding of his motivations throughout the book. Thus, it makes sense that book fans are somewhat upset about the movie’s omissions, as the production did have to simplify significant portions of the story.
Rachel Zegler as Lucy Gray singing into a microphone in The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
As it stands, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is a 2-hour and 38-minute long movie. While this runtime makes sense based on the fact that the novel comes in at 528 pages long, it has already been criticized for pacing issues in its current state. While the first and second acts move relatively quickly, The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes’ third act loses momentum fairly quickly, suggesting that a longer cut may have made the Panem story even more plodding.
