Effie & Haymitch Make Shippers Dreams Come True

There’s nothing that fans of The Hunger Games love more than the love triangles and relationships that abound in that series. Whether it’s in the books or in the movies, if you love The Hunger Games, chances are you love it when those crazy characters get together and start spreading the love. Especially when it’s characters that aren’t necessarily paired up romantically in the series. Like when Effie and Haymitch ended up kissing in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2 and every serious fan just about died. The kiss was definitely not a part of the original storyline, but ‘shipping Effie and Haymitch had long been talked about. So when the two characters actually locked lips in the final film, it was like a dream come true for those fans who had been hoping for them to get together since the beginning of the series. But, recently, Elizabeth Banks spilled the beans on that big kiss, and it turns out that this ‘ship was totally planned.

If you’ve been hoping that the kiss between Effie and Haymitch was a nod to their there being something more between the two characters, then you’ll be happy to know that it was. Elizabeth Banks told The Huffington Post recently that the kiss was something that she and Woody Harrelson had planned outside of the script. "We planned that moment. Woody [Harrelson] and I went into that moment, that wasn’t written, we improv'd that," said Banks. "We decided to do it, and the director was like, 'I love it. Let’s try it again.' We also did it without a kiss, and we let him decide in the editing room, and we love that he kept it."

Even though the kiss wasn’t planned by the writers to make it a big part of the story, and even though the kiss doesn’t hint at some larger romance between the characters, it definitely highlights the long history the two of them have together. And that, after all, is what has made so many fans want Haymitch and Effie to get together already.

Well, the fans thank you, Elizabeth, because you seriously made all of our ‘ship dreams come to true. Just look at these emotional tweets from fans who were blown away by the moment.

So, basically, we’re all on the same page here: Hayffie for the win for sure.

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