Let the accumulation games begin!
If you’ve watched TV, listened to the radio, surfed the Internet or paid attention to billboards you know that the biggest cultural phenomenon since the Twilight and Harry Potter series is coming today to a movie theater near you.
The Hunger Games is the much-anticipated movie based on the young-adult novel by the same name. The book – the first in a trilogy by Suzanne Collins – is set in a post-apocolyptic world in which one boy and one girl from each of 12 districts are randomly selected to compete in a televised, gladiator-style battle to the death. The last one standing is immune from future lotteries.
Since The Hunger Games was released in 2008, word of mouth has propelled it – and the ensuing books, Catching Fire and Mockingjay – into phenomenon status. According to the New York Times, more than 24 million copies of Collins’ trilogy are in print in the United States.
So what does all of this buzz mean? When people become obsessed with something, they have a need to let the world know it by owning everything that is associated with that obsession.
Enter themed merchandise: I can wear a Hunger Games beanie, T-shirt and knee socks, accessorize with a pair of Mockingjay hoop earrings and a matching necklace, snuggle up with a fleece blanket and play the Jabber Jay card game in a room where the movie poster hangs on a wall and the Katniss, Peeta and Gale action figures sit atop a shelf (in their boxes, of course, since they’re worth more that way).
When I get hungry, I can crack open “The Unofficial Hunger Games Cookbook” and whip up Katniss’ Favorite Lamb Stew with Dried Plums while listening to the soundtrack (featuring songs by Maroon 5, Taylor Swift and Miranda Lambert).
After that, I can paint my nails with one of the 12 Capitol Colours polishes (one for each district, of course) from China Glaze.
It’s madness. (I do love this ad, though.)
And apparently, it’s no longer enough to own the plain ol’ Hunger Games book. No, no. Publishers won’t stop until they fill your bookshelves with:
I loved the Hunger Games trilogy and I am excited to see how the books come alive on the big screen (though I’m 99.9% sure that the books will be better). But beyond owning the books and the movies (and perhaps one nail polish), I’m choosing to keep my home free of Hunger Games clutter. You, too, can still be considered a fan even if you don’t own everything that is emblazoned with the “Hunger Games” logo.
Posted in
2012,
March 2012 on March 3rd, 2012 by Susana Enriquez –
1 Comment
I think my boxes are regenerating.
I was helping my mom look for a picture that she had put away in a safe place (read: a place that made no sense and hence, the reason she couldn’t find it) and guess what I found? Another box full of my crap.
Did you think I was kidding when I said that my mom and dad’s house was a Museum of Me? As much as I’ve tried to leave their nest empty, the stuff somehow manages to hide from me.
It also should come as no surprise that among the contents of this box were Beanie Babies. That’s right – more Beanie Babies to add to the 100+ beanies that I donated to a good home last year.
This is what I found:
Holiday beanies (Valentine’s Day, 4th of July and Easter).
Birthday beanies. I was born the Year of the Horse and every few years my birthday falls on Thanksgiving.
Graduation beanies. Apparently, it was necessary to have two of them to commemorate the culmination of my academic career.
Random liberal beanie, miniature Christmas stocking and assorted tag protectors.
That concludes the beanie portion of this post. On to the rest of the random stuff.
Monsters, Inc. toys from McDonald’s Happy Meals (Mike Wazowski, The Abominable Snowman, George Sanderson and Randall).
Hallmark ornaments.
An I Love Lucy lunch box (I really do love her – but not in colored, lunch box form) and a pumpkin candle.
And my favorite: mementos (pictures and ticket stubs) from a relationship I haven’t been in for about 9 years.
I don’t usually pack random things like this together. My guess is that when I moved out of my parents’ house, my mom packed up some of the things I had left behind.
So what to do with all this stuff? I allowed myself to keep the holiday and birthday beanies. I did, however, promise myself that I would get rid of them if I didn’t display them on their respective holidays. I thought that was fair. The Hallmark ornaments also stayed, as did the pumpkin candle.
As for the ex-boyfriend stuff, I decided to deal with it later along with the box full of ex-boyfriend stuff that fills up one of the five boxes in my parents’ garage that I have yet to go through. I can’t wait (insert eye roll here)!
Everything else will be donated. Good riddance!
P.S. In case you’re wondering, my mom and I never found that picture.
