Slow and boring. I fell asleep. Disappointing.

Rating: 2/10 (24 November 2013)

An hour into the movie, I was looking at my watch, wondering when the inciting incident was going to happen. Turns out, it does not until almost an hour 10 minutes into the film! So, instead of this starting out in the exciting way the first did, it is slow, prodding, with lots of character introduction. But no excitement. So you spend the first hour and 10 minutes waiting for the adventure to happen. I actually fell asleep. This film is lacking in the excitement of the first. When they finally get to the second games, they are not as interesting. I really consider this movie to be a disappointment.
I believe the filmmakers so depended on the anticipation of the second games that they felt they could leave the action out, with the sheer waiting enough to hold the audience's interest. It did not work for me. Normally, you need a central character with a goal, moving towards something, to give the story a sense of direction, action and to involve the viewer. But this is not present. The movie just hops around, from one conversation with two people, to another conversation with someone else. Then to yet another conversation with others. And she just meanders around, like Freddie Quell in The Master, rendering the movie directionless and uninvolved. Not a fault of her acting. But her character has no goal, and therefore that through line isn't there, so the movie lags. A surprising disappointment.