WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Snowpiercer Season 2, Episode 4, "A Single Trade."
Season 2 of Snowpiercer finds Mr. Wilford (Sean Bean) at his most conniving, working politics over on the Eternal Engine as he tries to get his ark back and run things like he does on Big Alice. However, he's finding success is hard to come by, as most of the passengers believe in Layton's leadership, especially now that Mel's gone off to the Rocky Mountains and the Breslauer Weather Station to work on a plan to repopulate the Earth.
But in the latest episode, while he's dealt another loss, Wilford does achieve one major victory that could shift the tide of power to him.
Wilford takes an entourage over to the 994 cars Layton's running for a party as they want to cement the truce. More so, Mel's supposed to be making contact with them once a unique weather balloon is shot out from the train into the atmosphere, signaling the project she's on is off to a successful start and she's picking up the data she needs.
The selfish owner doesn't want this, however, because if people have to stay on his trains forever, he stands a better chance of being revered, as opposed to if humanity went back out into the world and forgot about him. Plus, his ego just wants Mel to suffer, making it known to her daughter, Alex, and everyone else, he'd prefer to not know she's dead. Luckily, she contacts and the party goes on, which pisses Wilford off. Even though he has some loyalists, he knows it might not be enough, so he heads back bitter and frustrated.
But when he's on Big Alice, we do see him stalking a new hospital patient: Josie. She's in the sick bay, sent over by Layton as Wilford's science team could cure her frostbitten body. Now, this gives Wilford some leverage, as he could hold her hostage and work a plan to really dig at Layton. The Tail is loyal to her and Layton still loves Josie, so she'd be the ideal pawn to use in desperation.
Interestingly, some fans think he could use his forked tongue to convince her Layton's the enemy for siding with Mel. After all, Mel took Wilford's train, life and glory, and she's the one who almost killed Josie, so if Wilford plays the revenge angle, he could win her over.
Other passengers question if Layton's joining the elites now, and the more he stalls elections, the more Josie may actually think he lied about democracy. But for now, as she sees the demented megalomaniac spying on her, Josie's filled with terror and regrets being inside the belly of the beast.
Snowpiercer stars Jennifer Connelly, Daveed Diggs, Alison Wright, Mickey Sumner, Susan Park, Iddo Goldberg, Katie McGuinness, Lena Hall, Annalise Basso, Sam Otto, Roberto Urbina, Sheila Vand and Jaylin Fletcher. The series airs on Mondays at 9pm ET/PT on TNT.