Battle Royale vs. The Hunger Games: A Mostly Positive Discussion

In my secret identity, I'm a reporter for a small weekly newspaper. It was on assignment at a library when I learned about The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. Trying to entice a preteen to give me a candid quote, I asked her what her favorite book was.

"The Hunger Games," she said.

"Oh, what's that book about?" I asked, both trying to get her to open up more.

"It's about a bunch of kids who are put in an arena and have to fight each other to the death until only one is left."

"Huh ..." I said. "I thought I already read that book ..."

Of course I hadn't only read that book. I'd seen the movie and read the 12 volume manga series as well. I was first exposed to the story of Battle Royale, a story about teenagers who are put in an arena and forced to fight each other to the death until only one is left, when I bought the first movie on VHS tape at a comics convention and loved it. Then I read the novel by Koshun Takami upon which it was based and loved that a lot better. Then I read the manga by Masayuki Taguchi and that was ... um, interesting ... I won't say I like it, but I appreciate how it at least didn't change as much of the story as the movie did.

So I was a little skeptical of this newcomer on the block with largely the same premise. Yet my best friend really liked it, so I decided to give it a try. Friends and strangers, if you have loved Battle Royale and have been avoiding The Hunger Games because of that, don't. It's a great story, and there's enough differences to make both stand on their own.

Actually, for me. If you wanted me to sum up the novel Battle Royale vs. the first book of The Hunger Games I would say this:

Battle Royale is a better exploration of the premise. The Hunger Games has better central characters.

There are a couple of superficial differences so let me get them out of the way through the use of a chart ...

	Battle Royale	The Hunger Games
The setting is ...	In an alternate present Japan where the country won WWII and is run by a dictatorship that keeps the populace in a state of perpetual fear	In a future North America that has been ravaged by natural disaster and is run by a capitol that keeps its surrounding 13 12 districts in a state of perpetual fear
The government runs the contest to ...	Terrorize the country and keep the populace from revolting	Terrorize the country and keep the populace from revolting AGAIN
Contestants are chosen ...	By picking one high school class at random, gassing them and surreptitiously moving them to an arena	By holding a lottery of all children from the ages of 12 to 18 and picking two from each district - one boy and one girl - to fight in the arena
Contestants enter the arena	Staggered one by one, each getting a few minutes head start	All at once
How they distribute weapons/supplies	Each contestant gets a backpack at the beginning with supplies and one weapon or special item, which can range from good to a piece of crap (although they fight in their school uniforms)	Contestants fight over them in a free-for-all battle at the beginning, or get them through "sponsors" watching the show who choose to send them items (although the gamemakers give them appropriate clothing at the beginning)
The gamemakers keep track/control of the characters ...	Through collars around the contestants' necks	Through unseen cameras
They keep the players moving throughout the arena ...	By rigging certain areas after a period of time so if contestants walk into them, their collars will explode and kill them	By flooding an area with dangers such as fire, floods, lightning or mutant animal attacks
The novel centers around the struggles of ...	Shuya Nanahara and Noriko Nakagawa, whom he likes	Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark, who likes her
The "veteran" player is ...	Shogo Kawada, who won a previous Battle Royale and acts as mentor to Shuya and Noriko in the arena	Haymitch Abernathy, who won a previous Hunger Games, and mentors Katniss and Peeta before the games begin
Speaking of which, the names ...	Are normal for the country where the novel takes place	Are stupid

In many ways, the story plays out largely the same, with teenagers killing other teenagers but more people surviving than they should. Yet both novels are different in their focus, which causes strengths and detriments in both works.

Battle Royale is more concerned with the contest itself, and the effect it has on the players, whereas The Hunger Games is more interested in the main characters and the world itself. This isn't a bad thing for The Hunger Games, especially as the trilogy goes on, and we end up learning a lot about the world of Panem whereas the dictatorship government in Battle Royale is very vague.

Yet it does mean Battle Royale comes off as the more realistic of the two, and not just because in The Hunger Games the arena will occasionally get flooded with mutant werewolves. With a larger cast of characters and an omniscient viewpoint that jumps from student to student, the novel plays out as a series of episodes of mini-tragedies, from the couple that would rather kill themselves than play to the alliance of girls that ends up self-destructing in a hail of suspicion and bullets after some poisoned food is delivered to the wrong person. Not all of the pieces work. There's a stereotypical gay character that angered me so much I considered giving up the book after his chapter, and the main villains' origins aren't great, but I feel like these stories are the heart of the book. These stories are mostly absent in The Hunger Games, too, which sticks mostly to Katniss' point of view and draws most of the rest of its characters (except for Rue and Thresh) in broad, flat strokes.

So much so that in all of the incarnations of the story I find the main characters Shuya and Noriko dull by comparison. Even if you set aside their terrible manga versions, whom reach their nadir when Shuya cries to the corpose of the psychopath teenager who had been stalking them for three days that they could have escaped the island together, I never remember them as well, despite their prominent pagetime.

Still, one could say - as my best friend did - the advantage they have over The Hunger Games heroine Katniss is that they are mostly normal people, whereas Katniss' history of hunting and trapping makes her more powerful and self-sufficient than the average teenager. (Although, as another friend of mine pointed out, the scene where they and the more-experienced Shogo [SPOILER ALERT] take out a ship of armed guards after three days of trauma is rather superhero-like. [/SPOILER ALERT])

Yet at the end of the day I do feel more of an affinity for Katniss than for Shuya or Peeta than for Noriko. Part of this is probably personal preference. I'd rather see a story where the female character is the active fighter while the male character needs to be protected but can camouflage really well, than a story where the two main male characters fight while the female character makes encouraging speeches and loads the magazines.

On the other hand, for all of her skills, Katniss is one of those rare beasts in genre stories: a heroine who takes damage but keeps going. Katniss being a 16-year-old who can shoot squirrels with a bow and arrow may be a little unrealistic, but the explosion that knocks out the hearing in one of her ears brings her back to earth again. She may have some advantages in the fight, but the road is never easy. This isn't to say that Shuya and Noriko never get hurt -- they do, and badly. Yet I can't help but be taken in by a heroine who remains active even through her struggles because it is so rare. In an age where most superheroines in movies have to be beautiful rather than hurt, it's very refreshing.

I also like Katniss and Peeta better, I suppose, because their story continues. They have more time to grow before and after the games, and more time is focused on their romance (and, yes, the notorious love triangle with Gale). Of course this is due to the story structures. [SPOILER ALERT] The destiny of Shuya and Noriko is to run off into the sunset forever under the eyes of the government, whereas Katniss and Peeta will both have a role in changing it. [/SPOILER ALERT]

Once again, this is because the stories have different goals. That one doesn't do what the other does doesn't mean either story is bad. I'd encourage people who haven't read one to read the other, and vice versa. It's impossible to not compare, and undoubtedly what will attract a person to one story may be a repellent for another. Yet just because one exists doesn't mean the other can't, and they're, in the end, both worthy of consideration.