From the moment that Tom Blyth appeared, shirtless, on screen in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, I knew he’d be the internet’s next boyfriend. (Or “blorbo,” as the kids are saying these days.) He’s beautiful, blonde, lithe, and most importantly, tortured. His character is a prime candidate for TikTok fan edits and Tumblr GIF sets. And Blyth clearly understood the assignment: sad—bordering on pathetic—and pretty.
Like Draco Malfoy, Anakin, and Kylo Ren before him, Blyth’s character in The Hunger Games prequel is a beautiful and sympathetic villain. He’s a young Cornelius Snow, the future President Snow, who was played a quietly menacing Donald Sutherland in the original movies. For the majority of The Ballad and Songbirds and Snakes, Blyth displays none of Sutherland’s cold, contained fury. This version of Snow is vulnerable and desperate. He’s just-barely keeping up appearances in front of his rich classmates. His once-wealthy family was ruined by the war between the haves (the Capitol) and the have-nots (the Districts). He intends to pull his family out of poverty via an academic scholarship at school—but then the school’s dean announces that, actually, this year the scholarship will be given to the student who can serve as the best mentor to a tribute in the tenth annual Hunger Games.
Cornelius is paired with the District 12 tribute, Lucy Gray (Rachel Zegler), and their doomed, star-crossed love affair begins. Blyth lets all of his character’s emotions shine plainly on his face. You see the moment he truly falls for Lucy—when she opts to save his life rather than escape her own terrible fate—and your heart melts. Sure, he grows up to be the ruthless Capitol leader in charge of slaughtering children every year, but right now he’s dreamy. He’s got an alluring darkness simmering just beneath the surface, but Lucy Gray (or maybe his buddy Sejanus—the homoerotic tension is strong) can fix him. And if she can’t, I can. Did he murder another tribute in cold blood? OK, yes, maybe. He was defending himself! We love a challenge.
Blyth’s version of Snow is the perfect toxic fantasy boyfriend. Would you date him in real life? Hell no. But Blyth pours his heart into Cornelius. He bats his soulful eyes, and you find yourself justifying his objectively unjustifiable actions. And yeah, it helps that he’s pretty. Director Francis Lawrence lights his wispy blonde waves like a halo, giving him an angelic glow for the first half of the film. When he’s sent away to the military and spirals down a path of darkness, those beautiful locks are shaved. His face takes on a harsher, less vulnerable vibe, but there’s no hiding his gorgeous bone structure and strong neck. Let’s hear him out! Surely a man that hot has a good reason for betraying his bestie.
I kid, but it takes real talent to bring a new tortured pretty boy into the zeitgeist. You have to have it, and Blyth does. He’s a relative newcomer, as a 28-year-old British actor whose biggest role before The Hunger Games was the lead in a little-known Epix series, Billy the Kid. But this is surely the start of a new kind of fame for Blyth. I look forward to seeing his face all over my social media accounts.