The young adult dystopian genre has, after a steady and cringe-worthy decline, seemed to finally hit rock bottom. Recent releases like Uglies (2024) have hammered the final nails into YA dystopian’s coffin, but even earlier films like Allegiant, the last installment of the Divergent franchise, were poorly executed and disappointing to audiences. Critics, bloggers and fans have studied and theorized on the decline of the genre, from the glory of the first Hunger Games films to the latest sad studio attempts to suck every last dollar out of the beloved premise of young adults living under fascism and fighting corrupt governments. From top to bottom, the genre seems to have run its course.
Most theorists conclude that the young adult dystopian genre disintegrated because studios and filmmakers failed to evolve, relying on similar plot structures, world-building techniques, and tropes–more or less trying to recreate the most popular elements of The Hunger Games. Audiences quickly tired of the same story, altered ever-so-slightly by changing characters and settings but relying on the same themes and narrative structures that previously yielded wild financial success. As new iterations of the same story were recycled, they became more reliant on cheap CGI and superficial gimmicks, prioritizing flashiness over substance and ignoring meaningful storytelling in the process. And maybe this approach could have worked, but these elements only made the movies worse. The CGI in Uglies, for instance, is objectively horrendous. On top of horrible storytelling and a complete lack of character development, its VFX led the movie to an onslaught of awful reviews (and a handful of great ones from viewers who found the entire spectacle absolutely hilarious). The true disappointment with Uglies and many YA dystopian films is that the books they are adapted from are often intelligent and insightful, offering rich commentary on governments and social order. But Hollywood has mastered the art of distorting these stories to fit whatever formula they believe will sell, often reducing them to sex, romance, and shallow action, devoid of relevant social critique except of the most surface level and fashionable variety.
However, Hollywood is not entirely to blame for the genre’s decline and demise. Many YA dystopian tales rely on similar plot structures, often borrowing heavily from The Hunger Games—a young protagonist is reluctantly thrust into a revolution, but not without the obligatory love interest or other glamorous hook. I absolve The Hunger Games, which goes far beyond these narrative bones, offering rich insight into the functions of authoritarianism, social and financial inequality, and collective resilience while also using its protagonist’s unwilling involvement as a tool for commentary. However, many stories constructed after The Hunger Games often focus solely on the glamour of surface-level plot, relying on romance and spectacle rather than addressing the complexities of political revolution and social injustice. This phenomenon worsens during adaptation, with studios focusing solely on themes like romance and sex positioned over a vague backdrop of political revolution. The more challenging narrative elements become a vehicle to deliver stock-standard YA romance or action filmmaking.
