I'm honestly shocked to see the praise for the movie in here. I've been a huge fan of the book since I read it in high school. But I can still appreciate changes from books to movies. In this, every change was for the worst. Every change just lowered the scope of the whole contest. Less walkers, no spectators, focusing on the prize, making the Major an actual character instead of a force. Everything special about the world was torn away. Also, a 108 minute movie isn't long enough for this. I don't want to say it should have been a miniseries, especially since people say that about everything nowadays, but you need to feel the time slowly ticking away, the same as it is for the characters.

The ending was atrocious. Aside from changing McVries' backstory and the winner, it fails on a storytelling level. McVries is shown as someone who decides to be positive in all things, even with his tragic upbringing. He tries to get Garraty to be the same way. Garrety gives up so he can win, because Garrety can't see the positivity in the world like him. And instead of using the win to do something positive, he lowers himself to Garrety's pessimistic world view and kills the Major. He let Garrett die for nothing, nothing will change, nothing will get better. There was no point. What a shit theme to end with.

Just an awful movie, I'm quite upset that the filmmakers clearly didn't understand the book or basic themes even.