“Mockingjay: Part 2” has been eagerly awaited for since the first “Mockingjay” came to theaters Nov. 21, 2014. The story leaves off almost immediately where the first Mockingjay left off – Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) attacked Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence), and the second part starts with Katniss getting her neck brace taken off. The conflict is right off and intense – there’s a war going on, Katniss is supposed to lead the rebel Districts, and Peeta is still hijacked and prone to attacking whoever he’s been told is evil. Gale Hawthorne (Liam Hemsworth) is also still combating his feelings for Katniss, and basically, the final installment of this series began in the middle of a mess.

The movie goes on to showcase Peeta struggling to figure out what is true and what is false and President Snow (Donald Sutherland) fighting against the Districts, which have all united to take down the Capitol and free the country of Panem from its suffering under Snow’s hand. President Coin (Julianne Moore), leader of the rebels and District 13, is slowly shown to be turning more and more into a twisted version of President Snow, but she can hide under the pretense of freeing the Districts.

Katniss escapes the headquarters of the rebels to fight on the front lines and ends up with a team of close friends, including Finnick Odair (Sam Claflin).  They’re planning to head to the center of the Capitol and have Katniss kill President Snow. It’s a long journey to get there, tugging at heartstrings and letting the character growth and plotline lead the way of the story, rather than the “love triangle” between Katniss, Peeta, and Gale taking over the story. In the end, Katniss makes a very different decision than what was expected, and has to escape back to the abandoned Victors’ Circle in District 12, where a few months later, Peeta follows her and the two build a life together.

One of my favorite parts of the movie was how Katniss was struggling with the idea of total war – destroying everything of the enemies, no matter if they were innocents or people who didn’t believe in the Capitol ideals. It’s evident in how Jennifer Lawrence portrays how her character asks for other options besides “kill everyone.”

I was also highly impressed with how close the movie stayed to the plot of the actual book. There was little to no straying away from the storyline, so fans who have read the books know what to expect. Call that a bad thing, but that gave the directors the ability to play with how they want to create the scenes and settings, so that the backgrounds and settings can help increase the mood of every scene.

The conflicts do get resolved, but the most impressive part of the movie wasn’t just the beautiful sets, the fantastic use of CGI editing, the intense action scenes that were not only believable, but realistic, or the elegant use of panoramas constructed digitally. No, it was the acting that really blew me away. There were definitely some lines and scenes that were a bit dry, like when there was a moment of conflict over possession of a map used by the group, but the important lines and conversations and character developments were performed beautifully by the actors. It felt very tangible to me, and it added to the overall feel of the movie and the personal growth of every character in the movie. This movie was a great summary of “The Hunger Games” trilogy, and fans will not be disappointed when they watch the movie.