Will There Be a Sequel to ‘The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes’?

Warning: This post contains multiple spoilers about The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes.

Returning to the world of Panem is a bit of a rush this week, as it's been nearly a decade since the last installment to The Hunger Games film franchise, Mockingjay - Part 2, ended the story on a bittersweet note. Last we saw, the leadership of the Capitol was finally being wrested from President Snow's hands after a hard-won war, and the districts of Panem finally were uniting, albeit at the cost of so much death and destruction. With The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, though, we journey decades back in time to when Snow was just a teen student working overtime to restore his family's glory. 

The film picks up with Coriolanus (Tom Blyth), aka Coryo, as an Academy student who's earned flawless grades in an effort to win a scholarship that might put his small family back on solid financial footing. However, this year, there's a twist: To win, a student will have to prove to be the very best mentor of their chosen tribute in the 10th Hunger Games, and Coryo's been assigned to the girl chosen from District 12, which is traditionally not a winning district. 

Luckily for him, though, Lucy Gray Baird (Rachel Zegler) is no ordinary girl; thanks to her firebrand behavior and striking vocal prowess, she manages to captivate the nation right from the reaping ceremony, and Coryo decides to do everything he can to help her win. As he spends every waking minute worrying about Lucy Gray and working toward her survival and success, he grows quite fond of her, and the feeling seems to be mutual.

Her time in the arena is just the start of their story, though. Lucy Gray manages to win by default when she's the only one left standing after Dr. Volumnia Gaul (Viola Davis), head gamemaker, sends in a vat full of poisonous rainbow snakes that don't touch Lucy because Snow has secretly introduced her scent to them. Coryo's cheating, though, causes him to be sentenced to peacekeeping duties in the districts, and he chooses District 12 in order to see Lucy Gray again.

The two reconnect in a cautiously romantic way, with both of their fates becoming intertwined thanks to a violent incident at the Hob, and things get even more complicated from there. The ending certainly leaves some question marks looming over the characters, and, since Coriolanus is still just a kid when the credits begin to roll, there's a lot more story to go for Snow between the end of The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes and the beginning of The Hunger Games.

So is there a sequel to The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes?

In short, there are no plans for a sequel as of now, but there could be in the future.

The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes is based upon the book of the same name by Hunger Games trilogy author Suzanne Collins. It was released in May 2020 as a prequel. No sequel to the written story has been announced.

The creators of the film adaptation are, of course, open to the concept of continuing the story of Coryo or any other character Collins might like to shed the spotlight on next.

Producer Nina Jacobson told Collider, "For me, Suzanne is my North star. If she has a story she wants to tell, I'm ready, willing, and able to tell it. If there were a story she wanted to tell that wasn't based on a book but was an idea of hers that she knew what she wanted to do with it, I'd be up for that."

However, the catch is that the producers won't be going off and creating their own Hunger Games stories without Collins' creative input. "I just would never do any of it without her at my side," Jacobson said. "She is the source of all things relevant and important to the series, and I would never presume to know how to do it without her."

As such there are no immediate plans to continue the story of The Hunger Games. However, Collins has shocked fans before by creating this unexpected new book in the series, and about a character many fans might not have expected to enjoy this much. So, never say never.

Until then, just remember, The Hunger Games' original quartet of films are technically a sequel to The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes. So fans can always just break out those home editions after checking out the prequel.

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes is now in theaters.