A Beacon For Us All
Episode 9 of Snowpiercer Season 3 starts three months back from our current timeline. Melanie is still alive and desperate to find the Snowpiercer. She’s on a train of her own; a single carriage whizzing up the tracks sending out a signal to try and find the train. ..
The group of adventurers catches up to the lone carriage and Layton quickly organizes traffic so that Melanie can board. Wilford can’t help but smile when he sees her on board. ..
Melanie has been using a cocktail of suspension drugs to keep herself going. It takes her three days to fully recover but eventually she comes around and regains consciousness. Alex is there to see her too, and admits that he’s been keeping Melanie alive in his head this whole time, clinging to the hope that she’d still be alive. And lo and behold, she is.
Melanie eventually recovers enough to start wandering about, looking into New Eden and learning that everything seems to be pointing toward this being the salvation they’ve been after. Mel isn’t so sure but remains determined to find out exactly how Wilford managed to find her with the signals.
Wilford visits Melanie, who is now neutered. He apologizes for leaving her to die and eventually gets down to brass tacks. He needs Melanie’s help to convince the train to see sense. He’s not happy with the fantasy regarding New Eden and has his doubts over whether this is right, “We’re running out of time, Melanie.” Wilford warns, pointing out that they need to keep the train running rather than chasing this fantasy that may or may not hold weight. ..
After her chat with Wilford, Melanie decides to study the data more closely. What she finds lends itself to inconclusive results, and as we know Layton has fabricated this whole story about the tree too, which doesn’t help. Alex bites back against her mother and points out she was dead for a long time and they needed to make a decision. For now, they’re going. ..
Elsewhere, there’s a party about to take place in the train and we see various characters scurrying around getting ready. Till asks Audrey to go with her, clearly taking a fancy in her. LJ starts to show her crazy side again, while Layton tells Josie he loves her… but is rejected outright. Josie admits that they’ve left too many of their pieces behind and for her, she believes Layton needs to focus on leading people off the train.
Ruth let everyone know that they’re passing the Great Pyramids and well on their way to their destination. The guys on the train all toast to “new beginnings” as they pass the pyramids and ready themselves for the next stage of their journey. Or they would, if not for Melanie. She takes over from Ruth and broadcasts to the whole train that New Eden is a lie. She’s studied the temperature and it’s still minus 98 degrees out there..
As the party begins to turn on one another, the party ends and Wilford smokes his cigar, pointing out that they’re at war. This appears to have been his plan all along. And as Melanie heads down to first class, she notices that several of the train workers have been poisoned, courtesy of Wilford using a vial of poison presumably mixed with tobacco.
The Episode Review
In the penultimate episode of Snowpiercer, we finally gain some headway in the storyline involving Wilford, New Eden and finding Melanie. It was perhaps obvious that she’d show up alive and after several days of recovering, she’s back on her feet and ready to seize the day.
That Layton’s entire New Eden plan is coming out, but at the same time, Melanie should be aware of the lies that are being kept from her. I’m not sure why she would align herself with Wilford, but at the same time, she’s well on her way to taking the reigns of the train back from Layton, who is going to find himself in a very tricky position going forward.
This third season has been a real mixed bag and the storyline this year has been meandering and rather disappointing across the board. Hopefully things do pick up for the finale but this has not been a season to remember.
