It’s time for the revolution to begin on Snowpiercer Episode 8: “These Are His Revolutions,” as Layton leads the Third-class and the Tailies in revolt. Up in First Class, the most privileged passengers have discovered they underwent a change in management without their knowledge. Now that they’ve uncovered Melanie’s ruse, they plan to take charge themselves, with the help of the security forces.
But what the First Class passengers and Nolan, the head of the security forces, don’t know is that Layton’s pulling some of their strings.
Meanwhile, it all looks grim for Melanie, as we barrel towards next week’s two-hour finale. By the time the train takes another revolution, we’ll have a clearer idea of who, if anyone, will be in charge in season 2.
So, with all respect to Hamilton, five thoughts on who wins, who dies, and who will tell their story:
1. Melanie & the Train
Finally, in a confession that’s been coming all season, we not only find out what happened to Mr. Wilford but also why he’s not on the train. The first, that he’s dead, isn’t a surprise. But the shocker is that he’s dead because Melanie wanted it that way. In Jennifer Connolly’s best scene so far, an impassioned (perhaps obsessed?) Melanie confesses the truth to a shocked Ruth:
“He was going to waste it! All he wanted to live as well as he could, as long as he could. It wouldn’t have made one revolution! So I took Snowpiercer and left him trackside to die.”
Cold, Melanie, literally cold, even if she did build and design the train.
But here’s my trouble with all this: The narrative clearly wants us to sympathize with Melanie, even after she murdered Josie to stop Layton’s rebellion. But if Melanie was willing to go so far to save what’s left of humanity by murdering Wilford and keeping the train running, why didn’t Melanie also try to gather real power to herself, rather than impersonating Wilford? She could have maintained the fiction of Wilford long enough to keep First Class complacent while she pulled the Tailies and Third Class onto her side. Instead, she perpetuated a broken system and seven years of needless suffering. And, well, a white woman claiming a broken system must be preserved for the greater good doesn’t look good in light of real-life events. I would guess we’re supposed to see Ruth as the true “Karen” but, still, Melanie’s awakening that real change is needed–if it happens next week–comes after so much unnecessary death.
2. ONE TRAIN
Shouting this one because it was shouted so often in the episode, to great effect. As the revolution unfolded, there were great sequences of planning, of Tailies and Third Class teaming up, of staging before the battle started. Layton certainly has a good grasp of tactics in tight spaces, especially with the plan of mechanically thrown spears to keep the security forces at bay. The ambush in the Night Car was worthy of the Marquis de Lafayette. (Sorry, couldn’t resist.) The use of sharp objects–knives, spears, axes–made the combat particularly brutal. Diggs, face splattered with blood, is symbolic of what he’ll do to win.
And, yet, plans rarely survive the first engagement with the enemy, and the “One Train” forces suffer more losses than they’d ever expected or feared. They haven’t lost yet. But they haven’t won either. Snowpiercer’s eighth episode leaves us in a stalemate.
3. Everyone Chooses Sides
Ruth comes down on the side of Melanie being a traitor, preserving her duty to Mr. Wilford, and finding her duty to First Class sacrosanct. It’s chilling but realistic because of Ruth’s near-cult-like worship of Wilford.
Meanwhile, the other prominent blonde, Bess, has irrevocably chosen sides in this eighth episode of Snowpiercer, and she’s at Layton’s right hand in the rebellion. (And she wields a nasty, nasty ax.) Bess looked at all her options and picked Layton’s side, though she still seems to have one weak spot: Jinju. I have a feeling that the relationship will come into play for the finale and that it will not end well. Or perhaps it will–given Jinju’s loyalty to Melanie. Meanwhile, Bennett picks Melanie and remains loyal, and that leaves Bennett and Miles in charge of driving the train. Yet another element that surely will play into the finale.
Continued belowNote: Ruth leads off the narration in this episode and unexpectedly gives it the title, “These Are His Revolutions.” By ‘His,’ Ruth means Wilford. But, later, revolution is applied to Layton. So which side will be the chosen one? The legacy of Wilford or Layton’s call for one train? Or even Melanie’s single-minded focus on Snowpiercer itself, who is the only true “he” in her world.
4. Welcome Back, Stephen Ogg aka Pike
Ogg attended the press roundtables at New York Comic Con last fall, leading me to believe he played a big part in the show. So when he was almost immediately sidelined, I wondered if he’d show up again. And here Pike is, out of the drawers, and eating cake in First Class, claiming that Layton will crumble because he doesn’t have the resolve to take the losses caused by a continuing rebellion.
Is Pike playing the First Class or is he sincere in wanting to become one of them? You could ask this question of nearly everyone in the show, especially for Melanie, which is part of what makes the show so compelling.
Aside: Layton was sidelined for almost two episodes as he recovered from the drawers. Pike seems to recover much faster, as do the others taken out of the drawers by the rebels. Smells to me like plot convenience though perhaps this inconsistency will be explained in the finale.
5. What’s the Train’s Endgame?
All season long, it’s been hinted we may be nearing the end of the lifeboat that is that train. First, the cattle car was lost, then the damage Melanie alone would fix, and now Melanie admits to Miles that the train might be slowing down and that may well spell doom.
Add that information to Melanie’s confession that Snowpiercer was basically supposed to be one big long party before the end of the world, and all the passengers may, by the end of the season, come to the conclusion that either something big changes mechanically or they’re all going to die much quicker than expected.
