Seeing a movie in “The Hunger Games” series used to be a movie-going spectacle. Each installment was a cultural event and there was little doubt whether or not it would dominate the box office.

A new Hunger Games movie used to be a huge deal. It was only three and a half years ago that the first one debuted, but it seems like forever ago that the hype around this series made headlines.

It might come as a surprise to some of you that the final movie in the series, “The Hunger Games: Mockingay – Part 2” arrives in theaters this Thursday night. While it is still likely to do well at the box office, there is an undeniable feeling that most people have already moved on from this movie series. Some of this can be blamed on the studio, Lionsgate, for not advertising as heavily as it did for the previous films. However, the careers of the actors, especially the main trio, put the series in a strange cultural context.

The success and popularity of Jennifer Lawrence made for perfect promotion of the early films. She became the star of sarcasm and a first-choice role model for young people. At the same time she starred in “The Hunger Games,” she shot movies where she was married to Christian Bale and others where she fell in love with Bradley Cooper.

To people watching, she separated herself from the role of Katniss so well, so fast that Katniss now seems too old and nothing like the innocent and raw 16-year-old girl she was in the first movie. For Lawrence, this is fantastic for the trajectory of her career, but when it feels like she has already left Katniss behind, it’s hard to convince people that they shouldn’t do the same.

Unlike Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth have done pretty much nothing outside of The Hunger Games in the last three years. Lawrence’s success might have taken away some of Katniss’ youthfulness, but at least she brought more attention to the franchise.

The lack of starring roles for these two boys mean they’re less marketable for the finale. In the first few movies, many of the promotional posters and videos were focused around the two boys. Maybe they were trying to play up the love triangle, or maybe they wanted to promote the young shiny faces. Whatever it was, they definitely stopped doing it.

Every piece of video, poster or piece of Internet about this movie is centered on Katniss. The only ensemble they show off are the adults: Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Donald Sutherland now get more press and more airtime on trailers than Hutcherson and Hemsworth.

When you Google “The Hunger Games,” one of the first articles is about how Donald Sutherland, an old man, didn’t know what The Hunger Games was until he was asked to read the script. That’s the biggest story the week of the last installment of a huge movie franchise? Seems like we stopped caring about this series long ago, even though it was just 2012 when the series looked like it was as big as Harry Potter.

“The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2” probably has nothing to worry about at the box office, and the lack of buzz might do little to hinder the financial success of the movie. But compare it to the final movie in the Harry Potter series or the Lord of the Rings and it’s strange at how little this movie means to pop culture right now.

Kyle Stevens is a sophomore advertising major. You can email him at [email protected] or reach him on Twitter at @kstevs_.

Published on November 15, 2015 at 9:16 pm