TV Review: SNOWPIERCER: Season 1, Episode 8: These Are His Revolutions [TNT]

Snowpiercer These Are His Revolutions Review

TNT‘s Snowpiercer: Season 1, Episode 8: These Are His Revolutions features the desolation of one character’s power and the ascension of another, a person who is fueled by a thirst for equality, fairness, and liberation from a miserable existence.

The Bath of Blood

The battle to the front of the train in These Are His Revolutions, a collaboration between The Tail and Third Class, is just as horrific as the major battle in First, the Weather Changed. In fact, even more horrors are unleashed on the populous of Snowpiercer during the confrontation.

Unlike the other combatants, Snowpiercer Security Force Commander Nolan Grey (Timothy V. Murphy) kills with relish. When he slits the throat of a young girl hostage, Commander Grey is joyful. Grey doesn’t have to kill her, he wants to do it to spite Police Detective Andre Layton (Daveed Diggs), to make Layton feel the full consequences of the rebellion that he is leading.

Layton does but he doesn’t need Grey’s help in that regard.

The mounds of dead, maimed, and injured, plus the fact that the rebels don’t make it to Snowpiercer’s engine room, all drive home the failure of the day’s battle for Layton.

The question is, when the tear gas fades and the wounds are bandaged, what will Layton do next? Push forward, retreat? My guess – Melanie.

Melanie’s Big Secret Revealed

There has been a clock ticking on Melanie Cavill (Jennifer Connelly)’s big secret in Snowpiercer and the alarm on that clock rings magnificently during These Are His Revolutions. Cavill is lined up in front of all those she formerly oversaw and her facade is dismantled in front of them. All of her pivots and grasps at control fall flat and her second command post (Hospitality) is turned into a prison.

The one thing that Cavill always had was control, even when things outwardly were chaotic, she still maintained control in a larger sense. She always kept her guard up, not just for self-preservation, but for the train and for humanity. All of that fore-thought and composure is stripped away in These Are His Revolutions as she sits shackled to the desk she tortured Josie Wellstead on in The Universe Is Indifferent.

The woman who “wears many hats” is reduced from Mr. Wilford in These Are His Revolutions to merely Melanie Cavill, a regression that culminates in an illuminating, bitter, and heart-felt confrontation between former friends. The viewer previously saw how chummy Ruth Wardell (Alison Wright) and Cavill were but as each character cries and bears their soul to the other in These Are His Revolutions, the true depth of their former relationship is revealed – they implicitly trusted one another.

The Ludicrous Death Sentence

Sentencing Melanie Cavill to death for a seven-year-long deception is nonsensical (especially after a  murderer just had their sentence commuted). Cavill lied. How is that a capital offense? If the upper-crust of Snowpiercer wants Cavill permanently out of the way, an indefinite Drawer sentence seems like the logical choice. Cavill is an engineer and knows every inch of Snowpiercer. How many people on-board the train can say that? Her skill set, like Detective Andre Layton’s, make her invaluable, if not sacrosanct, on a giant machine that can never stop for repairs, maintenance, or a tune-up. The Drawers is the logical choice. It was for Melanie’s Layton problem i.e. keep your resource out of the way and on ice for later usage. I don’t know why the “smart” and “well-educated” people on-board Snowpiercer don’t see this as the solution for their Melanie problem as well.

The Engine Coup

Javier de La Torre (Roberto Urbina)’s attempt to hand-over the engine to Commander Nolan Grey is short-sighted. De La Torre doesn’t know the entire situation that caused Melanie to click the engine lock-down button. He doesn’t even know half of it. The viewer gets that de La Torre is tired of lying and of deceiving people but he is one of the caretakers of humanity aboard Snowpiercer. Snowpeircer, for all intents and purposes, is The Ark, and he is one of its oarsmen, one of its crew.

Letting the truth out and Nolan Grey in might be a giant weight off of de La Torre’s conscience, but it completely lacks fore-thought. De La Torre has no idea what Grey’s intentions are for the engine or the train. How, after all these years and sacrifices, can Javier de La Torre be so flippant, capricious, and negligent with the control center for the human races’ Ark? It’s baffling.

Pike’s Betrayal

Pike (Steven Ogg)’s betrayal in These Are His Revolutions makes absolutely no sense. He was the most ardent advocate for bloodshed, revolution, and liberation in First, the Weather Changed. Now he betrays everyone (One Tail!) for cake? Please. It has to be a ploy on Pike’s part. He’s tricking the rich and the desperate, making them think he is on their side. I hope it’s a ploy, for the sake of consistency with Pike’s character.

If it’s a full-blown betrayal, with no artifice on Pike’s part, it’s nonsensical and will be detrimental to: a.) Pike’s character arc, b.) any part that he plays in upcoming episodes, and c.) the series in general.

Lingering Questions

There are the questions that linger as the episode closes – how did Snowpiercer’s security force get Pike out of Drawers without Dr. Klimpt (Happy Anderson) knowing it? Klimpt oversees all the Drawers and is the only person with keys to them. How did Snowpiercer’s security force open the Drawers without Klimpt’s keys? He is also the only person that knows what exact drawer everyone is kept in. How did Snowpiercer’s security force find Pike? Why wouldn’t Snowpiercer’s security force tell Klimpt that they needed Pike and order Klimpt to rouse him?

The Pike twist (becoming a traitor and his clandestine Drawer exfiltration) in These Are His Revolutions has no foundation in the reality that Snowpiercer set up for itself. You can’t break the reality of the world that you’ve created and think the viewer is not doing to notice. Did writer Tina de la Torre really think no one would notice these glaring plot holes?

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