As movie theaters across the nation creaked back to life, it was The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes that reigned supreme in the periodic battle for box office supremacy. The fourth installment of the dystopian, adolescent-survival saga made a whopping $44 million in its opening weekend, effectively pilfering the coins from the pockets of rival films. Meanwhile, languishing in the cold shadow of the Hunger Games juggernaut were a smattering of two-bit offerings. Almost as if their film studios had muttered, "May the odds be ever in your favor," and then abandoned them to their fate in a brutal Darwinian selection process. 'The Marvels,' which saw its debut last week, mustered only a meager whimper in its second weekend, landing just behind a home video of a toddler solving a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle on Youtube. "We were almost certain that our Marvelous superheroes would outshine rebellious teenagers fighting off bloodthirsty birds," a Marvel studio executive sobbed into his Spandex super-suit, clearly astounded at the sheer force of the Hunger Games phenomenon. Simultaneously, the family-friendly flicks 'Santa’s Elves: The Resurgence' and 'Mr. T-Rex's Thanksgiving Adventure' debuted to the shrugs of audiences nationwide. After all, why involve oneself with Yuletide elves or Jurassic periods when you can partake in the delight of watching your favorite characters being hunted for sport on a dystopian reality TV show? One cinema-enthusiast, Balloo Bigpants, summed up the national mood with his insight. "Honestly, I got confused. I thought this was the Hunger Games where Jennifer Lawrence cooks Thanksgiving dinner. When it turned out to be just people killing each other, I was a little disappointed, but then I remembered that’s basically what happens at our family Thanksgiving. It felt oddly comforting.” At this rate, movies that don't involve fighting to the death for the entertainment of a futuristic, post-apocalyptic society might have to start scrambling for other viable tactics. Perhaps a dystopian bake-off or apocalyptic knitting competition? But then again, only time will tell if the rest of Hollywood can successfully outsmart and outmaneuver their formidable adversary, The Hunger Games.