The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping

Return to the world of Panem 24 years before the events of The Hunger Games, starting on the morning of the reaping of the 50th Hunger Games, also known as the Second Quarter Quell.

ReleaseNovember 20, 2026

StatusCONFIRMED

StudioLionsgate

Why it matters

A prequel to the series that defined the young-adult blockbuster, adapting the book fans had been asking for since the original trilogy.

About The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping

The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping adapts Suzanne Collins's 2025 novel, going back twenty-four years before the original story to the morning of the fiftieth Hunger Games, the Second Quarter Quell. Joseph Zada plays the young Haymitch Abernathy, the character Woody Harrelson played as a middle-aged man in the first four films, and Whitney Peak plays Lenore Dove Baird. Francis Lawrence directs, as he has every entry in the series since Catching Fire, working from a screenplay by Billy Ray.

It opens on November 20, 2026, released by Lionsgate and filed under science fiction, action and adventure. Two things are worth knowing. This is a prequel that asks nothing of you beyond knowing who Haymitch eventually becomes, and it is the second book Collins published after the original trilogy, following The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, so the series is now filling in its own history in a deliberate order.

Science FictionActionAdventure

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