Snowpiercer Paley Front Row Q&A: Jennifer Connelly and Daveed Diggs talk dangerous decisions

Jennifer Connelly, Daveed Diggs, and Alison Wright talk Snowpiercer with PaleyFest

Paley Front Row continues bringing panels to the home. The most recent is one with Snowpiercer’s Jennifer Connelly, Daveed Diggs, and Alison Wright. We get a chance to delve into the minds of the Snowpiercer characters and reasons for their actions.

The panel has been done at home, bringing the three stars of the series to us through technology. In a way, it’s like a traditional PaleyFest panel, giving the stars a chance to talk about their characters, actions so far, and what’s to come in the future. The best thing about it is that everyone can watch; this isn’t just for those with tickets.

You can watch the whole panel right now. It takes 34 minutes to get through and is most definitely something to watch from start to finish. However, we have some of the highlights from the panel.

Jennifer Connelly shares Melanie’s good goal

Melanie has certainly been one of the most dangerous characters on the train. She is pretending to be Wilford, with just a few people knowing the full truth. In the most recent episode, she made it clear that the train is hers.

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What does that mean? Does that mean Wilford was always just the face and the money? Or was there no Wilford in the first place? There are still plenty of questions we have to break down about this.

One thing is certain, though; Melanie’s actions have been to serve one goal that she thinks is the right one. It’s all about saving the people, but that means she has to make some dangerous choices along the way.

At the same time, she’s shown her humanity. She could have cut the Tail to save power, but she wanted to protect those lives back there. They couldn’t afford the train but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have the chance to survive. We’ve already seen that there are some people in the Tail that have jobs people at the front don’t. They have skills others don’t, such as Layton being the only homicide detective left.

She also showed mercy by not killing Layton. This is now a decision that will come back to haunt her, but one she possibly doesn’t fully regret. She just needs to figure out a way to contain it.

Daveed Diggs talks Layton’s need to figure out what to do next

The last episode of Snowpiercer left us with Layton free from the drawers. He’s not ready to tell everyone the truth about Wilford yet, but he knows he’ll have to eventually.

Knowledge is power. It’s also a currency. If he tells everyone, he’s lost his value and he knows that.

At the same time, he’s struggling with drug withdrawal. His mind is cloudy, so he needs to wait for that to clear. That could also help him work through his current feelings. In his drug withdrawal state, he faced against Melanie and threatened to kill her. But he also knows that she is the person to save the train.

He’s angry at the entire situation—at being lied to and for letting his guard down. He also knows that Melanie has kept order on the train and that there’s a power of faith. People believe that Wilford in around—that he’s controlling the train. Destroying this faith will cause some major problems.

Alison Wright talks Ruth being out of her comfort zone

Ruth is the one that has to deal with everything on the train. While Melanie is the one communicating directly with “Wilford,” Ruth ends up being the one to deal with the downsides of hospitality.

She’d love to deal with First all day long and clearly hates the Tail, but what does she think of Wilford commuting LJ’s sentence? That’s something Wright talks about in the panel, including touching on Ruth being out of her comfort zone.

There’s still a lot to learn about Ruth. Something we learn with the panel is that there’s more to come about her. We’ll get to learn about Ruth’s backstory a little, including seeing her get a day off on the train!

Wright also talks about why the train is so important to Ruth. This isn’t just about what she believes, but what life is like for her on the train.

You can check out the full panel below:

There’s plenty still to come on Snowpiercer. We’re just over the halfway mark in the season, but tensions are extremely high. Truths will be revealed, but how will everyone deal with the knowledge that Wilford isn’t on the train? And more importantly, where is Wilford?

You can also watch more of these panels for other TV shows from The Paley Center for Media on YouTube.

What are you excited to see on Snowpiercer? What did you love learning from the Paley Front Row Q&A? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Snowpiercer airs on Sundays at 9/8c on TNT.