We have known Haymitch Abernathy for years as the cynical, damaged mentor who attempts to keep Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark alive.

The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping is taking us back to the event that helped make him that man.

A new trailer for the film arrived this week, giving fans another substantial look at Joseph Zada as the teenage Haymitch during the 50th Hunger Games, better known as the Second Quarter Quell.

And this was not a normal year in the arena.

Instead of the usual 24 tributes, the Capitol demanded 48.

Haymitch before the drinking and sarcasm

Suzanne Collins’ Sunrise on the Reaping was published in 2025 and returned to one of the most important pieces of Hunger Games history.

The film takes place 24 years before the original story and follows a much younger Haymitch, long before Woody Harrelson’s version became Katniss and Peeta’s mentor.

Francis Lawrence is once again directing the adaptation, while Billy Ray wrote the screenplay. The movie reaches cinemas on 20 November 2026.

The cast brings younger versions of several familiar Panem figures back into the story. Ralph Fiennes plays President Snow, Jesse Plemons is Plutarch Heavensbee, Elle Fanning plays Effie Trinket and Kieran Culkin portrays Caesar Flickerman.

Mckenna Grace, Glenn Close, Whitney Peak, Maya Hawke and others also appear in the large ensemble.

Forty-eight tributes changes everything

Producer Nina Jacobson and Lawrence have spoken about the scale of adapting the Second Quarter Quell, particularly because the Games contain twice the standard number of tributes.

Production also took the film to Asturias in Spain for some of its major arena work.

The new footage reinforces something readers already know: Haymitch’s history was never simply a footnote.

Understanding what happened to him during these Games changes the way we see the man who later enters Katniss’s life.

This is why the prequel matters

The appeal of Sunrise on the Reaping is not simply watching another elaborate arena.

We already know Haymitch survives.

The tension comes from discovering what survival costs him.

That makes this a very different kind of origin story. It is not about discovering how somebody became powerful. It is about watching a young person enter a system designed to destroy children and knowing that even victory will not mean escaping it untouched.

The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping opens on 20 November 2026.

And this time, 48 names are going into the Reaping.