Sunrise On The Reaping Trailer Is Full Of Familiar Hunger Games Characters With New Faces

The first trailer for "Sunrise on the Reaping," the new prequel movie in the "Hunger Games" franchise, is finally here — and it's giving us a major first look at the backstory of a young tribute named Haymitch Abernathy.

Haymitch, who's played by Woody Harrelson as an older adult in the original "Hunger Games" and Joseph Zada ("We Were Liars") in this new movie, is accidentally chosen to compete in the Hunger Games during a special outing that doubles the number of child tributes. (Interestingly, unless Zada has a really, really good impression of Harrelson's pretty unique voice up his sleeve, it sure sounds like Harrelson contributes a voiceover cameo to this teaser as a nice little Easter egg for fans of the original film trilogy.)

This fast-paced, quick, and super-stylized teaser introduces us (briefly) to some of Haymitch's fellow tributes, gives us a glimpse into his relationship with his District 12 girlfriend Lenore Dove (Whitney Peak, known for the "Gossip Girl" reboot), and his overwhelming and terrifying experiences both in the Capitol and the Arena. Plus, the action really lingers on the Capitol representative Drusilla, played by Glenn Close, whose actions during the reaping lead to Haymitch's eventual and basically accidental inclusion in the 50th Annual Hunger Games.

I already clarified that "Sunrise on the Reaping" goes back in time — long before Haymitch serves as an unwilling mentor to seemingly doomed District 12 tributes Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark, played by Jennifer Lawrence and Josh Hutcherson in the original trilogy — but the specifics are a lot more disturbing than that. After one of the properly chosen tributes tries to escape and is shot on the spot, Haymitch is basically grabbed by Capitol officials and told he'll take the boy's place, despite the fact that his name wasn't picked at random (something that should have exempted him from the Hunger Games).

From there, Haymitch bands together with his three other District 12 tributes — Maysilee Donner, Wyatt Callow, and Louella McCoy, who will be played by McKenna Grace, Ben Wang, and Molly McCann, respectively — to try and survive the arena. Amidst all of this, he faces off against Capitol bigwigs like Plutarch Heavensbee (Jesse Plemons, taking on a role originated by Philip Seymour Hoffman) and the corrupt President Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth in this movie's prequel "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes," Ralph Fiennes in "Sunrise on the Reaping," and the late, great Donald Sutherland in the original trilogy). 

It's not just the number of tributes — which jumps from 24 to 48 to "celebrate" the 50th go-around of the Hunger Games, known as the Second Quarter Quell — that makes "Sunrise on the Reaping" so horrifying; in fact, something that happens in this book is, to my mind, the worst thing that happens in any "Hunger Games" story thus far. As for the movie, we'll have to wait to see it all play out on the big screen. "Sunrise on the Reaping" releases on November 20, 2026.