The world of Panem tightens its grip once again as the first trailer for the franchise’s latest prequel, ‘The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping,’ has been revealed, tracing the origins of one of its most enduring figures, Haymitch Abernathy.
Directed by longtime series filmmaker Francis Lawrence, the film adapts Suzanne Collins’ 2023 novel and takes viewers back to the Second Quarter Quell, a Games notorious for doubling each district’s tributes and infamously shaping the resentful mentor that fans met decades later in the original films.
Newcomer Joseph Zada leads the cast as a young Haymitch, whose selection in the reaping sets off a chain of events that would define his distrust of the Capitol.
The trailer opens with the tense ceremony in District 12, led by Glenn Close as the chilling escort Drusilla Sickle. Haymitch enters the Games alongside fellow tributes Maysilee Donner (McKenna Grace), Wyatt Callow (Ben Wang) and Louella McCoy (Molly McCann).
The teaser also introduces Whitney Peak as Lenore Dove Baird, Haymitch’s girlfriend and a distant relative of characters tied to earlier chapters of Panem’s history.
‘Sunrise on the Reaping’ also offers a first look at familiar faces, now portrayed by a new ensemble including Ralph Fiennes as President Snow, Jesse Plemons as Plutarch Heavensbee, and Elle Fanning as Effie Trinket.
Their appearances anchor the prequel within the series’ established timeline, set 40 years after ‘The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes’ and 24 years before ‘The Hunger Games.’
The 2-minute and 11-second trailer suggests a return to the franchise’s earlier, grittier themes: exploitation and the psychological toll of survival, this time through the experience of a single tribute whose choices would one day shape Katniss Everdeen’s rebellion.
Lawrence is once again at the helm for the prequel film, with Billy Ray on the screenplay. It also stars Kelvin Harrison Jr. as Beetee, Maya Hawke as Wiress, and Kieran Culkin as Caesar Flickerman.
‘The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping’ opens in theaters on Nov. 20, 2026.