The Hunger Games and the Star Wars franchises have risen during a period of world turmoil and suffering, of tragedy suddenly inflicted on innocents by angry malcontents, and of growing inequality.

They provide escape, as movies and books do when times are evil. J.R.R. Tolkien wrote much of The Lord of the Rings in Britain during the dark days of World War II. France had fallen with most of Europe. The United States was still officially neutral. England stood alone as German bombers rained death on the island nation, contested only by a few remaining British pilots.

The Hunger Games follows this tradition but is flavored with today’s anxieties. The leaders in the capital preside over the ultimate consumer society. The workers in the districts receive only crumbs, providing the capital with goods and, once a year, giving their blood for entertainment.

The heroes of this series are conflicted. The winners are not always pure. Evil is not completely banished, but must be guarded against, for humans are morally frail creatures.

Yet these kinds of stories forever show the little guy against the storm troopers, victims pushed too far, willing to risk all they are and have for the sake of a more just order.

When we are threatened, we are less interested in pleasure and more sympathetic to sacrifice.