u/thefinalitfan

Here’s all that we do know about the mysterious 25th hunger games in canon:

- The twist was that the districts had to vote in their tributes

- It was the first time an arena was built with the purpose of hosting the hunger games

- It was the first time the cornucopia made an appearance

- It was also the first time that they did the tribute chariot parade

- Dr. Gaul was a commentator alongside Lucky Flickerman, and she said the now iconic phrase of “May the Odds be Ever in Your Favor”

- Drusilla was the escort for District 12

It has also been speculated that Snow was the head gamemaker for the 25th games, though that has never been confirmed in canon.

Now, in Catching Fire, Katniss and Peeta come to the conclusion that the victor of the 25th games must be dead since Effie only gave them the tapes of the victors they would potentially be facing the in the 75th hunger games. And at the end of the day, itdoesn’t seem like such a stretch that someone could’ve died in a fifty-year timeframe.

But here’s where things get murky. I could understand why there wasn’t any mention of the 25th victor during the 3rd quarter quell, but what about during the 2nd quarter quell?

We still don’t have anymore of an understanding as to who the victor of the 1QQ was or what those games were even like after SOTR than we did after Catching Fire. And even more interestingly, in SOTR, they do a recap of all the games, and they only include a couple of clips from the 1QQ, iirc it was the cornucopia bloodbath and Lucky and Gaul hosting; nothing else from the games.

This vagueness and secrecy surrounding the 1QQ leads me to believe that something went down either with the games, with the victor, and/or Suzanne is purposefully being vague about the 1QQ because she wants to eventually revisit this game without having to retcon or contradict anything said in previous books. I'm inclined to think it's a mix of both.

So what happened to the victor? He's some ideas that would lead to the capitol being hush hush about them:

1: They escaped.

Like Lucy Gray before them, they left their district and was never seen again. Maybe they couldn't handle the pressures of being a mentor or having to perform as a victor, or maybe they were the first victor to be trafficked by Snow. Since the capitol couldn't exploit this victor or use them for propaganda, they did their best to erase them from the history books, and they were eventually forgotten about.

2: They committed suicide.

Yes, this is dark, but it is a possibility. Maybe they had so much PTSD from their games and they couldn't handle having to relive them as a victor and mentor, and they ended up taking their own life. This could explain why the capitol is so obsessed with keeping their victors alive by Haymitch's time. And, like the last theory, since they couldn't use this victor and their suicide makes the capitol/the games look bad, the victor was erased.

3: They did something rebellious and was either executed or turned into an avox by the capitol.

Not sure how much I believe this, but it is a possibility.

4: There was no winner of the 25th games.

It has been speculated by some that 1QQ didn't have a victor because the gamemakers went too far and didn't leave a lone survivor as a victor. This could explain why the capitol is so quick to pull the victors out of the arena once they win and fix their wounds by the Haymitch wins.

I'm gonna be honest, I don't really believe this theory. I feel like if the gamemakers royally fucked up and the 25th games didn't have a victor, that would've been mentioned in SOTR.

5: The victor was a deplorable human being, and the capitol didn't want to use them as propaganda.

Since for this QQ the districts voted in their tributes, it can be assumed some districts voted in criminals they wanted to get rid of. But what happens if one of those said criminals actually goes onto win the games? What does the capitol do then? Maybe the victor had an "accident" and was subsequentially erased by the capitol.

These are just a few ideas that I have as to why the victor of the 1QQ was never mentioned by name in SOTR or Catching Fire. I wholeheartedly believe the reason why Suzanne is so vague about this game and its victor, is because she plans on visiting this event in a prequel.

So yea, here’s some ideas that could explain the secrecy surrounding the victor of the 25th Hunger Games, id love to hear your thoughts and ideas as well!