People Are Reacting To The “Hunger Games” Director Admitting He Regrets Splitting “Mockingjay” Into Two Parts

    "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."

    Mychal Thompson
    by Mychal Thompson

    BuzzFeed Staff

    Director Francis Lawrence realized the fans had every right to have mixed feelings over the final Hunger Games book being divided into two different movies.

    closeup of katniss with fire behind her
    Lions Gate / ©Lions Gate/Courtesy Everett Collection

    Francis directed the film adaptations of Suzanne Collins' science fiction dystopian novels, Catching Fire and Mockingjay, the second and third novels. Gary Ross directed the first adaptation.

    closeup of francis
    Jim Spellman / WireImage

    The Hunger Games was among the highest-grossing franchises and garnered a very intense following.

    The 52-year-old filmmaker returned to direct the upcoming origin story, The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, and now he's addressing history with the film franchise.

    two of the characters lying on a blanket on the ground
    © Lionsgate / courtesy Everett Collection

    Other notable film adaptions he's directed included Constantine, I Am Legend, and Water for Elephants. 

    In a new People interview, Francis admitted he regrets splitting the final book into Mockingjay - Part 1 (2014) and Mockingjay - Part 2 (2015), which is quite validating for the fandom.

    Lions Gate / ©Lions Gate/courtesy Everett Collecti / Everett Collection, Lions Gate / ©Lions Gate/courtesy Everett Collecti / Everett Collection

    It was announced in July 2012 that the film would be separated into two films, similar to the final entries of the Harry Potter and Twilight series.

    "I totally regret it. I totally do," Francis said. "I'm not sure everybody does, but I definitely do." He recognized that while the trilogy's final novel was robust enough to be two halves with their "own separate dramatic questions" and arcs, he understands why fans were angry about the delay between the films' releases.

    closeup of him
    Araya Doheny / WireImage

    "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," he added. "And I can understand it."

    katniss with an army of people behind her
    Lions Gate / ©Lions Gate/Courtesy Everett Collection

    "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," he said. "Our intentions were not to be disingenuous."

    "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," Francis expressed. "But, I see and understand how it frustrated people."

    Lions Gate / ©Lions Gate/Courtesy Everett Collection, Lions Gate / ©Lions Gate/Courtesy Everett Collection

    And that's true. The fans, critics, and everyone involved had mixed feelings about Mockingjay being spread out into two movies. Some people definitely weren’t a fan of the split:

    Twitter: @LukeFlux1

    Twitter: @Bangerang17

    Twitter: @juaangng_

    Twitter: @VarunDonBhai

    Twitter: @vanman_1000

    And other folks were surprisingly cool with it:

    Twitter: @Ending13Sad

    Twitter: @beammeuplucas

    Twitter: @onpurposevinyl

    Twitter: @therealokeke