The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes' Rotten Tomatoes score is here, and it sets an undesirable new record for the franchise. Directed by franchise veteran Francis Lawrence, who has helmed every Hunger Games movie so far, the upcoming film follows a young Coriolanus Snow (Tom Blyth) and his relationship with Rachel Zegler's Lucy Gray Baird during the 10th iteration of the titular games.

Now, ahead of The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes' release date, Rotten Tomatoes has unveiled the film's critic score to be 67%, at the time of writing. With only 46 reviews, this score is likely to fluctuate, but, at the moment, it's the lowest-rated movie in the franchise, falling just short of the 70% scores for The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1 and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2. Check the franchise's Rotten Tomatoes scores below:


In contrast to the Hunger Games movies, the first two especially, the response to The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes has been varied. While a 67% score indicates that the reviews have been mostly favorable, it's still far from suggesting that the prequel has been unanimously well-received.

A common sentiment in the positive reviews is regarding The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes' cast, with Zegler, in particular, seemingly delivering quite a powerhouse performance as Lucy. The dynamic between Lucy and Coriolanus, however, is a common source of criticism. Although not necessarily a fault of the performances, the relationship between the two characters is said by some critics to be under-explored, with IGN's review, for example, writing that the prequel "doesn’t have enough time to depict the interplay of emotions and manipulations that make up Coriolanus and Lucy Gray’s relationship."


By contrast, however, Peter Debruge of Variety echoes a common sentiment that the movie is "half an hour too long." The juxtaposition of these two sentiments could point to problems in the script, with runtime complaints usually stemming from issues relating to pacing or structure. While critics are divided on The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, it's still unclear what general audiences will make of the film, and this will be the key factor in terms of whether it achieves success.