She has long dark hair (usually tied up in a braid), olive skin, and gray eyes, which are given as a characteristic of residents of the coal mining region of District 12 known as "the Seam.
"[4] She was named for an aquatic plant with edible underwater tubers by her father, who jokingly said that “If you can find yourself, you’ll never be hungry.” She lives with her mother and younger sister, Primrose (nicknamed "Prim").
When the Gamemakers renege on a promise to let two surviving tributes from the same district live, she defies and embarrasses the government by threatening a double suicide with Peeta, personally antagonizing Panem's leader, President Coriolanus Snow.
He is the same age as Katniss, with fair skin, blond hair, and blue eyes, characteristic of the town residents of District 12, whose middle-class merchants are slightly more well-to-do than those of the Seam.
Peeta is captured by the Capitol at the end of the Quarter Quell and submitted to 'hijacking', a process of torture and brainwashing which gives him a fear of Katniss and effectively turns him into an assassination weapon against her.
Gale Hawthorne is a Seam resident boy who is two years older than Katniss and shares her hunting skill, dark hair, olive skin, and gray eyes.
She is too prominent to kill, but he threatens her family and Gale unless she proves to the Districts that her act of saving Peeta was merely that of a love-crazed teenager and was not related to any desire to defy the Capitol.
[8] In Mockingjay, it is revealed that the smell of blood is due to oral sores he incurred from one of the poisons that he used to kill people in his megalomaniacal efforts to control Panem.
He is said to have prostituted winning tributes, like Finnick Odair, forcing them to have sex with wealthy Capitol citizens, under threat of killing their loved ones if they refused.
The rebels are unable to determine whether the cause of death was by choking on his own blood from his untreated mouth sores or because he was trampled by the mob in the panic following President Coin's assassination.
Lucy Gray wins the games, in part, due to illicit assistance she receives from Coriolanus: he helps her smuggle food into the arena, as well as a make-up compact filled with rat poison, which she uses to kill two other tributes.
The two of them get caught up in a rebel plot which Sejanus is part of, and Coriolanus is forced to kill the mayor's daughter, Mayfair Lipp, Lucy Gray's former romantic rival who it is suggested had manipulated her selection at the Reaping.
He is effectively adopted by Sejanus' wealthy father Strabo, who is unaware of the role he played in his son's death and pays for Coriolanus' university fees.
As he awaits execution, an imprisoned President Snow tells Katniss the rebels were in fact behind the bombing and made it resemble the work of the Capitol and timed a second explosion to kill the medical corps assisting the first round of survivors.
Lucy Gray's fate is left ambiguous as she never makes an appearance again and is swiftly erased from public memory by Dr. Gaul, who destroys all recordings of the games except for one master tape that she keeps for herself.
Katniss states that Cato's training distracted her: "I've been preoccupied with watching the boy from District 2 send a spear through a dummy's heart from fifteen metres."
However, Finnick soon proved to be trustworthy by saving Peeta by using CPR to resuscitate him (which Katniss notes as, "one of the things I will never stop owing him for") and using his skills to provide shelter.
When jabberjays that make sounds of the screams of loved ones being tortured appear in the Quell, the one made to target Finnick used the voice of Annie Cresta, his "poor, mad" lover in District 4, who was also a victor of the Games.
In Mockingjay, Finnick entered a deep depression, a result of Annie's being held prisoner by the Capitol and formed a close bond with Katniss over their mutual pain and experiences.
Mostly interested in moving up in Capitol society (and thus somewhat resenting getting assigned to manage the tributes from District 12), Effie does not appear to be especially intelligent and tends to get basic facts wrong, such as confusing how diamonds and pearls are made.
During the 75th Hunger Games, Effie's facade of perky civility cracks as she faces the prospect of seeing Katniss and Peeta forced into the arena for a second time.
At the end of the first Hunger Games film, Crane is shown being escorted by Capitol guards and locked in a room containing poisonous nightlock berries to consume.
He has served as the master of ceremonies since the 50th Hunger Games, but his unchanged appearance leads Katniss to speculate that he had received extensive surgeries to look and be as young as possible.
After her husband died in a mining accident, she fell into a deep depression and did not speak for a long time, neglecting her daughters and forcing Katniss to become Prim's primary parent figure.
Mrs. Everdeen eventually recovered enough to set up an apothecary in District 12, but it was not until after Katniss' first Hunger Games that she finally forgave her mother for not offering any support to her and Prim during her depression.
Katniss finds out that Madge does not see her parents often; her father has to run District 12 and her mother suffers from severe headaches that cause her to stay in bed.
Katniss Everdeen and Gale Hawthorne trade with her often, and make a conscious effort to remain on good terms with her, as she could be counted on to buy wild dogs, which most of their other customers decline.
Initially missing in the chaos after the Capitol's air force bombed District 12, Buttercup survived among the ruins until Katniss visited and brought him back with her to 13.
Although put on trial for Coin's murder, Katniss is ultimately exonerated due to her poor mental state at the time with the help of Plutarch Heavensbee and Dr. Aurelius.
Not long after that conversation with Katniss, Boggs falls victim to a Capitol land mine that his Holo failed to detect, losing both his legs in the blast.