Katniss Everdeen

I just re-read the Hunger Games trilogy. I first read them a year ago, but I sped through them so quickly that I found myself itching to give it another go just to pick up on the details that slipped through undetected. So I did.

A few days later, hubby and I were at Outback Steakhouse enjoying Friday Night Date Night. He's seen the first movie (the only one to be released thus far) and hasn't read the books. Both of us have seen all the Twilight movies, and neither of us have read those books.

I found myself explaining to him why I love Katniss, even though she has a lot of commonalities with Bella, the protagonist in Twilight (and I loathe Bella).

First of all, the love triangles. Bella professes to be "irrevocably," head over heels, in love with Edward. She wants to abandon her human life and become a vampire so that they can spend their immortal lives together. She is still in high school. She is also in love with Jacob, to the point where she can't sever ties with him and persists in pursing him, even though it makes things completely awkward. How can someone so young be so certain about love? How can someone so certain about love be so willing to hurt that person by pursuing someone else? It baffles me. I really can't comprehend how this love triangle can even exist. Going beyond wondering why either is wasting their time with her, I simply can't understand how she can be so certain, yet unwilling to commit.

Meanwhile, Katniss. She is taken from a life of poverty, yet stability, one in which she is independent yet partners with Gale to benefit both of them. Their partnership is platonic, yet based on mutual understanding, respect, and affection, to the point where feelings have been developed, though neither has acted. She is plucked from this situation and placed in an alternate reality, one in which her skills mean life and death in a way that is more immediate and gruesome than her "normal" life. Her partner, Peeta, is initially a relative unknown but through sharing of tragedy, cooperation, and respect, she develops feelings for him. Of course, being a teenager about Bella's age, she isn't sure what her feelings for either Gale or Peeta are, and she doesn't know what the feelings mean, and she certainly isn't willing to profess a desire for lifelong companionship with either of them until she figures things out. This, to me, is a deeply complicated and yet realistic love triangle. Though I hate Bella for her insistence on True Love, I respect Katniss for her confusion and her self respect.

It comes down to this. Without Edward or Jacob, Bella is no one. She has no independent identity, no personality, no way to define herself other than as being the lover of someone else. Katniss, however, is a kickass girl who is used to relying on no one other than herself and struggles with the idea of someone else stepping in to become her partner. She struggles with maintaining her identity while also becoming part of a couple, something that many people in real life identify with.

This is why, in my opinion, Bella is a terrible role model and Katniss is a great one.