The Hunger Games: Who Does Katniss End Up With?

Unlike some YA adaptations that flopped hard, "The Hunger Games" has proven to be a stunning success. The series began as a trilogy of Young Adult novels set in Panem, a dystopian post-United States where the land is divided into 12 strictly separated districts. Every year, each District is forced to send two people as tributes to the Capitol, where they compete in a bloody battle royale that's televised for the entire country to watch.

"The Hunger Games" franchise has transformed into a multimedia endeavor, inspiring a prequel novel and five feature-length films. The series is filled with political intrigue, intense violence, and more than a few heart-rending tragedies, but like so many other YA stories, "The Hunger Games" has a love triangle lodged in its core. Our protagonist, Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence), might have been thrust into becoming the nexus of a national rebellion, but she's still a teen girl who wants an ordinary life like anyone else.

The events of the series don't leave Katniss much time to pursue a love life, but that doesn't stop her from developing feelings for her two closest friends, Gale (Liam Hemsworth) and Peeta (Josh Hutcherson). Unfortunately, even her personal relationships become part of the various games she's forced to play, and the question of who she'll spend her life with remains open until the very last moments of the story.

Katniss grew up in District 12, an overwhelmingly poor place where most people struggle to earn enough to feed their families. At a young age, Katniss became a provider for her family, and along the way, she met her childhood best friend, Gale. Like Katniss, the young man needed to help his family survive, and the two of them bonded while helping each other sneak into the woods outside the district to illicitly hunt game they could use to feed their families or earn a little extra cash. By the time "The Hunger Games" begins, Gale is already head over heels for Katniss, though she doesn't seem to realize it at the time.

Katniss's other love interest, Peeta, also grew up in District 12, but his family was slightly better off than most others. They owned a bakery, and Peeta spent his childhood working alongside his parents. Peeta also developed a crush on Katniss at a young age. He once saw her starving in the street and threw her a loaf of bread from his parents' store, though Katniss didn't remember that particular incident until Peeta reminded her about it during their first Hunger Games. When she was growing up in District 12, Katniss was too busy helping her family to focus on love, and, ironically, it took the Hunger Games to make her think about relationships beyond her and her family.

Katniss and Peeta both end up competing as tributes in the Hunger Games, and they quickly learn that they need to charm the audience and win over donors to get an edge in the competition. The violence in the Hunger Games may be real, but the tournament is still built like a reality show. Since theatrics are as important as survival skills, Katniss and Peeta end up posing as star-crossed lovers forced to compete against each other, a story that has a huge impact on the audience.

Once the tournament actually begins, Katniss and Peeta are separated for a while, but they still end up relying on each other more than ever. Katniss finds Peeta injured and hiding, and she helps nurse him back to health. While they're hiding out together, Katniss, aware that the cameras are watching, plays up her love for Peeta in the hope that their tragic story will convince a donor to send them the supplies that they desperately need. Katniss' gambit works, and, in the books especially, the narrative explores how Katniss is starting to develop real feelings alongside the ones she's performing.

At the end of "The Hunger Games," Katniss and Peeta are the tournament's final two survivors, and they threaten to eat poison berries rather than fight each other. By that point, the audience has become so invested in their love story that the Capitol is forced to allow both of them to survive the Games. Katniss and Peeta's relationship ultimately saves their lives — but even Katniss isn't sure if the relationship is real or just another part of the big show.

In "Catching Fire," the stakes are even higher. After Katniss and Peeta were crowned co-winners of the Hunger Games, the oppressed districts of Panem are feeling more inspired than ever to break the Capitol's rules. President Snow, whose own backstory includes a tragic romantic relationship of his own, demands that Katniss and Peeta play up their love for each other even more during the Victory Tour in order to convince people that their actions in the Hunger Games were motivated entirely by love and not rebellious attitudes. Along the way, the two of them get engaged on camera, but it's still not enough to prevent President Snow from throwing them back into the next round of Hunger Games.

In the book, we get to spend much more time with Katniss' thoughts and complicated feelings for Peeta. At this point in the story, even though their relationship is being played up for the camera, Katniss is starting to genuinely fall for Peeta. Her feelings are confused, though, because she also has grown more attached to Gale, who's at home in District 12 and in extreme danger. President Snow threatened Gale and the rest of Katniss' family to get her to help him quell the rebellion brewing throughout Panem. The fact that Katniss' performances with Peeta are, in part, a way for her to protect Gale only makes her feelings even more difficult to truly sort through.

Katniss' love life gets even more complicated in "Mockingjay," and, at the same moment, she finds herself with less time to ponder her feelings than ever before. At the end of "Catching Fire," Katniss was saved from the Hunger Games by rebels from District 13, and Peeta was captured by the Capitol. Luckily, the rebels are able to rescue Peeta, but not before the Capitol tortures him and brainwashes him to be violent toward Katniss.

While she's unable to even get near Peeta, Katniss finds herself working closely alongside Gale, who's become a key player in the rebellion against the Capitol. Katniss finds herself more torn than ever between Gale and Peeta, but the ongoing war prevents her from really pursuing a relationship. Then her life is shattered when her sister, Prim, is killed in a bombing at President Snow's mansion. Later, Katniss realizes that rebellion leader Alma Coin worked with Gale to plan the attack that ended Prim's life.

At this point, all hope of a relationship between Katniss and Gale is gone. Peeta is still recovering from his brainwashing, and a hopeless Katniss decides that she'll kill Coin before allowing the new president to reinstate the Hunger Games after the rebellion. After executing Coin, Katniss tries to swallow a poison pill, but a recovered Peeta steps in and saves her life.

Ultimately, Katniss ends up spending her post-Hunger Games life with Peeta. He is able to overcome the Capitol's brainwashing and, instead of punishing Katniss for killing Coin, the new government simply sends her home to District 12. There Katniss and Peeta pick up their relationship and get to experience being together off-camera for the first time.

"Mockingjay's" ending extends "The Hunger Games" timeline 20 years out from the end of the rebellion. Because of this, we get to see that Katniss and Peeta are still happily together two decades after the rebellion, and they've got children of their own. Their story isn't an unqualified "happily ever after," though. Both Katniss and Peeta are scarred by what happened to them throughout the series, and the books in particular emphasize that even though they've managed to find some happiness and peace, that's in spite of the trauma that will never leave them. It's a bittersweet way to close a series that's never afraid to get dark, but for all the romantics out there, it still counts as a happy ending.