Peeta Mellark has spoken.
Josh Hutcherson is shrugging off Quentin Tarantino’s claim that “The Hunger Games” franchise “ripped off” a Japanese book and film with a similar concept called “Battle Royale.”
“There are similar themes, for sure,” Hutcherson, 33, told Variety in an interview published Wednesday. “But, you know, everyone borrows from everyone.”
Tarantino, 62, accused “Hunger Games” author Suzanne Collins of “ripping off” Kinji Fukasaku’s 2000 dystopian thriller last month while listing his top 20 favorite films of the 21st century.
The “Pulp Fiction” director placed “Battle Royale” at No. 11 before criticizing Collins’ story and the film series that followed.
“I do not understand how the Japanese writer didn’t sue Suzanne Collins for every f–king thing she owns,” Tarantino charged during “The Bret Easton Ellis” podcast. “They just ripped off the f–king book!”
“Stupid book critics are not going to go watch a Japanese movie called ‘Battle Royale,’ so the stupid book critics never called her out on it,” he continued. “They talked about how it was the most original thing they’d ever f–king read.”
Both “Hunger Games” and “Battle Royale” follow a group of young people forced to fight to the death in a controlled arena until there is only one survivor.
Each story uses the same premise as a form of societal control and spectacle, and participants in both stories are only given a limited set of supplies and weapons to start.
However, Tarantino wouldn’t be the first person to point out the striking similarities between the two works.
Collins herself acknowledged the resemblances shortly after she finished her first “Hunger Games” manuscript and learned about the existence of “Battle Royale.”
“I had never heard of that book or that author until my book was turned in,” the author, 63, told The New York Times in 2011. “At that point, it was mentioned to me, and I asked my editor if I should read it.”
“He said: ‘No, I don’t want that world in your head. Just continue with what you’re doing,’” Collins added.
Hutcherson, meanwhile, went on to star as Peeta Mellark opposite Jennifer Lawrence’s Katniss Everdeen in the 2012 “Hunger Games” movie and its three sequels.
A prequel series kicked off in 2023 with “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes” and will continue next year with “Sunrise on the Reaping.”
“I’m so excited to see the series continue and the amazing cast they’ve gotten for it,” Hutcherson said regarding the forthcoming “Hunger Games” flick.
The post Josh Hutcherson shrugs off Quentin Tarantino’s claim ‘Hunger Games’ ripped off ‘Battle Royale’ appeared first on New York Post.
