Ralph Fiennes' President Snow Look Revealed In Hunger Games Prequel Set Photo

By Nina Starner
M. Gustave in his purple suit and President Snow wearing a white rose on his lapel in The Hunger Games Focus Features/Lionsgate

If you're excited for the eventual film adaptation of "Sunrise on the Reaping," the second prequel to the original "Hunger Games" trilogy, you're not alone. Fans are going absolutely wild over a set photo featuring the new version of President Coriolanus Snow, played by three time Oscar nominee Ralph Fiennes.

Over on X (formerly known as Twitter), a fan posted a snap of the "Sunrise on the Reaping" set where you can clearly see a fake propaganda poster for the upcoming movie, where Fiennes will follow in the footsteps of Tom Blyth and the late, great Donald Sutherland and play the imposing tyrant President Snow. Fiennes' version of Snow is depicted on the poster, which also says "Our President Coriolanus Snow" and "Panem's No. 1 Peacekeeper." (Panem, as a reminder, is the redrawn dystopian North America where the "Hunger Games" stories take place and which is split into 12 oppressed districts overseen by the Capitol; Peacemakers are basically this universe's version of Stormtroopers from "Star Wars" and serve the Capitol by keeping the impoverished denizens of each district in line.)

Even though "Sunrise on the Reaping" is really a prequel about a young Haymitch Abernathy (played by Woody Harrelson in the original movies and by Joseph Zada in the forthcoming film) and his victory in the 50th annual Hunger Games that enlist double the number of young contestants, President Snow plays a pretty big role, as he usually does. Plus, it'll be "nice" to catch up with the despot after learning about his own backstory in the first "Hunger Games" prequel, "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," which explains the pathology behind President Snow's horrifying control of the Capitol and Panem.

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes explained why Coriolanus Snow became a tyrant, but doesn't make excuses for him

Coriolanus talking to Lucy Gray at the zoo in The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes Lionsgate

When we meet a young Coriolanus Snow in "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," he's played on-screen by Tom Blyth and is, to put it lightly, down on his luck. After his father's death and financial issues, the high-ranking Snow family has largely fallen out of favor with the citizens of the Capitol, and, in an attempt to prove himself, Coriolanus, a young man, is determined to play a pivotal role in the 10th annual Hunger Games as a mentor. Because of his diminished social stature, Coriolanus is given District 12 — largely seen as a losing district — and works with a singer named Lucy Gray Baird (played perfectly by Rachel Zegler).

Not only is Coriolanus determined to win the Games to restore his family's glory, but he also forms a strange bond with Lucy Gray, whose sheer charisma, beautiful voice, and fighting spirit actually help her win said Games. Still, Coriolanus did cheat by giving Lucy Gray a makeup compact filled with rat poison to take down the other tributes, so he's punished and forced to join the Peacekeepers. Though Coriolanus eventually reunites with Lucy Gray in District 12 and the two plan to run away together, she abandons him when she realizes he's killed multiple people in cold blood, leaving him furious. 

This helps explain why, for years after Lucy Gray's betrayal, Coriolanus grows more and more evil, and it also explains his resentment towards District 12. This district happens to not only be the home of a young Haymitch Abernathy, who becomes the district's second-ever winner after Lucy Gray Baird, but when Snow meets a young Katniss Everdeen (played by Jennifer Lawrence) in the original trilogy and realizes she's yet another headstrong girl from District 12, he hates her right away too. So, what kind of President Snow will Ralph Fiennes portray?

The way President Snow is depicted in Sunrise on the Reaping explains the sickly version of him that appears in The Hunger Games

Snow in a red brocade suit with his white rose on his lapel in The Hunger Games Lionsgate

Throughout "The Hunger Games," Katniss Everdeen's first-person POV repeatedly tells us that President Snow is notorious for poisoning his enemies, but he also drinks the poison he uses, having built up immunity over years. He does, however, have bloody sores in his mouth that won't ever fully go away, and we see hints of both the poison and Snow's altered physical state in the book version of "Sunrise on the Reaping" (written, of course, by "Hunger Games" creator Suzanne Collins). 

After staging a public reckoning during the opening parade featuring the tributes where Haymitch Abernathy's fellow District 12 player Louella McCoy is killed in a chariot crash, Haymitch bravely carries her body to Snow's balcony to force him to see it, angering the President. As a result, Haymitch is summoned to Snow's private quarters by Gamemaker Plutarch Heavensbee (who will be played by Jesse Plemons). As Haymitch narrates, the President is in quite a state at the time:

I don't recognize the voice at first because its smoothness has deteriorated into a raspy growl. I turn and see President Snow leaning against the doorway, wiping his brow with a hand-kerchief. Once again, I'm rattled by being in his presence. The power of his position. The record of his cruelty. Evil in the flesh. Was my crime really so great that it requires a personal meeting? Especially when, on closer observation, he's clearly unwell. Perspiring and breathless and white as a sheet. His regal bearing abandoned as he hunches over his gut. For once, despite his cosmetic treatments, he looks his fifty-eight years.

Collins is definitely giving us a hint about Snow's poisonous habits, but she also smartly makes sure to remind us that Snow has a personal connection (in a bad way) to District 12. After Snow asks Haymitch about the coal-mining district, the book reads as follows: "'I'd be surprised if anything much has changed there,' he continues. 'Nothing but coal dust and miners soaked in rotgut liquor from the Hob. Everybody just waiting to be subsumed by that ghastly wilderness.'" As Haymitch notes, he's ruffled by this knowledge: "His insult disturbs me less than his familiarity with District 12. Miners soaked in rotgut liquor from the Hob — that's us, all right. The worst of us, anyway."

I'll leave the rest of President Snow's evil acts in "Sunrise on the Reaping" a secret for now, although I will say that this book features one of the worst things I've ever seen in any "Hunger Games" project ... and it'll be horrifying and weirdly fascinating to see on the big screen. "The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping" is set to release in theaters on November 20, 2026.

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