Zack Sharf Digital News Director Welcome back to Panem! “The Hunger Games” franchise is officially revived with the release of “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes,” a prequel film set many years before the rise of Katniss Everdeen. Based on the Suzanne Collins novel of the same name, the prequel centers on a young Coriolanus Snow as his experience mentoring District 12 tribute Lucy Gray Baird in the 10th Hunger Games shapes him into the villain fans of the franchise know well.