When it comes to Hollywood, studios don’t want to overdo the buzz for any one film too much. The market becomes too saturated with hype and it makes people sick of the film before it’s even out.

Today NPR is wondering if Lionsgate is creating too much hype for The Hunger Games franchise.

One of their writers wrote up a blog post which takes a look at what they’ve done so far and compares it to other fandoms:

And the frustrated worrywart in me believes it might all be too much.

The desire to build a genuine frenzy is an understandable one. How can it not seem like a good idea to get everybody talking, to keep the buzz — an unfortunate word that can apply equally to genuine substantive anticipation as well as ginned-up hot air — as high as possible? If one teaser poster gets people cranked up to a 10, surely it’s a good idea to release ten teaser posters to crank them up to 100, right? How else do you become the next Harry Potter, able to make a gazillion dollars with a single blink?

Maybe. But driving up the event aspect of your film to a ridiculous level is dicey. (Remember Snakes On A Plane? Sure you do. How about Wolverine? Watchmen?) You can market your film as hard as you want, and it’s still possible for anything to happen once it actually gets into the wild. (For an awards-season version of this fundamental truth, consider my friend Joe Reid’s very simple but sharply funny new Tumblr, This Had Oscar Buzz.) Yes, The Hunger Games will make a lot of money from the people who will see it no matter what, but so did The Hangover Part 2, and it’s still widely viewed as a disappointment. Or for perhaps a more relevant comparison, consider David Fincher’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Hugely buzzed about, talented director, heavily promoted with well-received trailers, teasers for everything, built-in audience, and then: greeted on arrival with decent money but largely a pop-cultural shrug. In fact, it may wind up on This Had Oscar Buzz in about three months.

So what do you think: Is there too much buzz around The Hunger Games already? Certainly the fans are eating it up and not complaining. The question is, will this marketing work on those who haven’t read the books!