WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Season 1, Episode 8 "These Are His Revolutions," of Snowpiercer.
Snowpiercer shocked fans in the first episode with the reveal that Jennifer Connelly's Melanie was masquerading as Mr. Wilford aboard the Great Ark Train. It left everyone guessing as to what happened to the man everyone thought built and operated the Eternal Engine, with Melanie later struggling to keep the ruse up thanks to the intuitive Layton (Daveed Diggs) snooping around to solve the murder mystery of Sean Wise.
Eight episodes in, though, and as a civil war begins, Melanie reveals the truth about Wilford, and it's a nasty one that indicates his ultimate goal would have led to humanity's downfall.
Mel's plans to keep control of the 1,001 cars are derailed early on here when the sinister L.J. is snuck into Mel's quarters by Miles. She confirms what Layton told her about Wilford not being aboard the train. L.J. then takes this information back to her parents, the Folgers, and along with Commander Grey, a First-Class coup takes place. Mel's arrested, with her loyal guards incapacitated in a scuffle.
Ruth is most disappointed because she wasn't just Mel's Head of Hospitality deputy, but they also had a sisterly bond. With Mel deposed, this leads to an interrogation as Ruth wants to find out where's Wilford. Grey admits he didn't see him since they left the station six years ago, motivating Ruth to get to the bottom of things as Bennett (one of the drivers and Mel's lover) has been faking being Wilford with his British accent. When Ruth accuses Mel of deception and hijacking the train, though, it all comes out.
"I built this train," Mel adamantly states. "Wilford was a fraud... Wilford sold tickets... He didn't believe it was possible to save mankind, and he wasn't even going to try. All he wanted to was to live as well as he could for as long as he could be surrounded by accolades, booze, and whores in the Nightcar." Per Mel's words, all Wilford wanted was to have a good time and his methods wouldn't have ensured the train kept going for mankind to survive.
"We wouldn't have made one revolution," she continues. So I took Snowpiercer, and I left him trackside to die." Ruth's a true believer, loyal to Wilford who gave her a job, so she's refusing to believe Mel. She thinks Mel's audacious and arrogant, and while Mel could be lying as we haven't seen Wilford yet in flashbacks, she is partially right when she says the train is hers. She built it, she knows the ins and outs of all the mechanics and this helped her save the Ark this season when it seemed destined to crash. Mel even has a backup plan to repopulate the planet once the Big Freeze is done using the train, so personality issues aside, she is a leader who thinks ahead.
She might not have had official ownership but she takes the proactive stance to take over for the greater good. She knows order was the solution -- not clearly a drunk who was just a PR mouthpiece and a tycoon into debauchery running the show. And because her dedication to duty saw her parents and daughter seemingly get left behind, from her passionate speech, she couldn't let Wilford undo the work and all her sacrifices. Simply put, he wasn't a messiah; he was a liability. Ruth can't believe it and reveals Mel's going to be sentenced to death soon, so it appears Mel is paying a heavy toll for trying to be humanity's savior.
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 Sundays at 9pm ET/PT on TNT.