Characters / Snowpiercer (2020): First

Snowpiercer Main Character Index
The Engine | First Class | Second Class | Third Class | The Tail | Staff of Snowpiercer | Big Alice

First Class Passengers

The First Class passengers are the few cosmopolites and privileged mega-rich guests who bought an exclusive one-way ticket from Wilford Industries or invested early in the project. Among them are the world's rich and most influential, some of whom were industrial tycoons responsible for global warming before the Freeze. They live lives of luxury compared to the lower classes and live as if there was no significant change in the world's environment.

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In General

• Be Careful What You Wish For: In season 2 many of them wished for the return of Wilford to restore their privilege, with Eugenia taking an active role in his plans. Come the following season their homes are evacuated and frozen over (with Kevin's incompetence meaning their possessions might have been left where they were) and they themselves are forced into menial jobs like being Jackboots to serve Wilford.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • First Class might mostly be filled with rich dicks, but even they draw the line when L.J is revealed to be a serial killer. Afterward, they even treat her and the rest of the Folgers like pariahs.
  • In Season 1 during the rebellion, some of the kinder First Class passengers know that having the Folgers in charge is a horrible idea.
• Irony: In season 1 they, through the Folgers, are one of the major groups trying to get rid of Melanie. After the anarchy of Layton's first regime, horrors and deprivations of Wilford's takeover and Layton's lying to the whole train, Javi indicates they're now some of the main ones backing her as she takes over the Engine.
• While Rome Burns: In Snowpiercer's case freezes. First Class passengers are indifferent to what's going on outside their cabins and live their lives in luxury. Nowadays, they complain about the littlest things, such as singing in the sauna or body shaming.

The Folgers

Lilah

Lilah Folger

Portrayed By: Kerry O'Malley

A former corporate lawyer from old money who is fiercely protective of her own, particularly her daughter LJ and the rest of first class with whom she shares a vested interest in maintaining their security and privilege.

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• Abusive Parents: Not physically, but it's suggested her coldness was part of the reason LJ turned out like she did.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: She's the face of First Class and a very selfish, elitist and unscrupulous character.
• Big Bad Wannabe:
  • Her conversations with Javi make it clear she has no idea how the train actually runs, or the kind of damage Grey's plan to wantonly gas Third and the Tail will do their small cadre of experienced workers, leaving it startlingly plain how unfit she would be at actually leading Snowpiercer.
  • She also seems to be oblivious to the extent her coup relies on having Grey and his army onside, and completely misses his intentions of betrayal.
• Death Glare: Has a very effective stonily enraged look whenever things don't go her family's way. LJ even jokes the following season that her corpse is still out there somewhere with a frozen look of disapproval.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: For all her many faults, she does seem to sincerely love her daughter. Her first thought when they're separated from the train proper is that LJ is now all alone.
• Evil Is Petty: Insists she has photos with Layton waving a white flag at the Tailies' surrender, just so people can see she was the winner. Even Layton, whose entire plan hinges on them coming in person to said surrender so they can be detached from the rest of the train, has a "Jesus, really?" facial expression as she poses.
• Evil Matriarch: Of the Folgers, being far more assertive than her husband. It's strongly implied she knows L.J. is off her rocker - but she's a Folger and her daughter, so she'll upend the entire social order of the train just to protect her.
• Evil Redhead: Like mother, like daughter.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • She's terrified any sort of uprising based on fairer power-sharing will pose a threat to their status and particularly to L.J. Come the success of the Tail revolution, their carriage is ransacked by an opportunistic Pike and the janitors, and L.J. is thrown out into the wider train to survive on her own (and a deleted scene which aired in a promo for the finale had Pike directly threatening a terrified L.J. with a shiv).
  • She also callously points out to Melanie that post-Freeze anyone has the capacity to kill. A few episodes later Melanie crosses this line in a big way by (seemingly) killing Josie.
• Lack of Empathy: Her reaction to hearing Grey's gas will cause heavy casualties in Third regardless of allegiance is to callously reply the train is overpopulated anyway.
• Mama Bear: Played with; she does love L.J., but her conversations with Melanie around the trial make it clear she's less concerned with L.J. as a human being and more with her bloodline and image being tarnished.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: She's a major classist, believing there should be strict segregation between the train cars.
• Slave to PR: Image is everything to her. When it looks like Erik is the serial killer, her sole thought is that it can't be known her family sheltered a murderer rather than be horrified at the deaths of the Third Class men. Later, during LJ's trial, she mentions her fear of how their daughter being a murderer will look to the other members of First.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: She believes that the fact that her family was wealthy enough to buy tickets for the train entitles her to more rights than anyone else.
• Small Name, Big Ego: When she hears about the killings, offers her services to Melanie as a lawyer with 25 years' experience - to which LJ points out her firm didn't do murders. More seriously, clearly believes she can rule the train in Melanie's stead when she can't even control her own daughter most of the time.
• Smug Snake: Classist, elitist and even more openly entitled than the rest of First, among whom there are at least a few good eggs.
• The Starscream: She slowly turns into this towards Melanie. Fittingly, she misses Commander Grey's intentions of becoming this to her in turn.
• Stupid Evil:
  • She was prepared to completely upend a status quo on the train that heavily favoured her and those like her because Melanie dared to try and discipline her psychopathic daughter.
  • Not only that, when it's pointed out that Grey's gassing the populace will kill the workforce the train needs to survive, she blithely replies they'll train more - something extremely unlikely with a population as small as Snowpiercer's and First's incredibly limited knowledge of how the train actually works.
• Uncertain Doom: She, her husband, Gray and many others are detached from the train and left to freeze, but Word of God teases that they might not all be dead.
• Unwitting Pawn: Layton fed knowledge of Melanie's true identity to LJ knowing it would make its way to Lilah and Lilah would rebel against Melanie as a result, thereby distracting Melanie while he own revolution got underway. He didn't anticipate her being so stupid that she would unintentionally destroy the train just to win, however.

Robert

Robert Folger

Portrayed By: Vincent Gale

Lilah's husband.

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• Doting Parent: To L.J., despite everything - unlike Lilah he's seen to play games with her and show her actual affection.
• Extreme Doormat: He'll do anything his wife and daughter want, to a fault. Taken to a disturbing extreme when he admits he can't say no to her when discussing LJ's deeply inappropriate relationship with Erik (that probably started when his daughter was underage).
• Glass Eye: One of his eyes is made of glass. Because his Enfant Terrible daughter stabbed the real one when she was seven.
• Henpecked Husband: Tends to be dominated by his wife rather easily.
• Papa Wolf: He's willing to do anything to protect his daughter and ensure her happiness, especially after Lilah convinces him that any instance of Third getting uppity will have dire consequences for their daughter.
• Small Name, Big Ego: As soon as the news of Layton's surrender comes in, he immediately starts ordering the time and date of their victory to be recorded. Grey, whose army, plan and casualties actually secured said victory, can only look on in exasperation.

L.J.

L.J. Folger

Portrayed By: Annalise Basso

The isolated teenage daughter of Lilah and Robert Folger.

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• Ambiguous Situation: Her relationship with Erik; who initiated it? How old was she when it began? How consenting was it? Is she a victim? As the series skated over this during her trial in order to progress to the revolution storyline, all of this is open to interpretation.
• Asshole Victim: When Pike kicks her out of her own home just as she's grieving her parents, it'd garner sympathy for anyone else in her shoes. A sociopath like L.J. on the other hand? Not so much. Terrence and his fellow janitors even toast her fall with her parents' own champagne.
• Ax-Crazy: Killed two people with her lover just to feel something for the first time in her life, and later helps upend the social order that protects and shelters her just For the Evulz.
• Batman Gambit: When the trial isn't going her way, she takes the stand and, in the midst of a contrite speech begging for forgiveness, hints that she knows the secrets of the Drawers and what they're actually for. While she's found unanimously guilty, this rattles Melanie enough that she (as Wilford) commutes her sentence and leaves her in care of her parents. When Melanie tries to figure out exactly how much she knows in the aftermath, LJ drives it home that it's between her and Wilford only - which leaves Melanie stuck, given that she's been posing as him the whole time.
• Break the Haughty: In the first season finale, she loses her parents and home in quick succession, and is forced to live with nothing to her name among the Third Class that openly hates her. In season 2 the Janitors humiliate her further by forcing her to work as one of them after laughing off her claims of friendship with Wilford.
• Bridezilla: Befitting her power-hungry character, she's absolutely fine with Wilford turning her and Oz's wedding into a grand spectacle for train morale, ignoring her new fiancé's wishes for a quiet ceremony. That Wilford himself encourages this is even worse news for Oz, who gets a not-so-subtle pep talk/set of threats from the man himself to get him to go along with it.
• Buy Them Off: She tries and fails to do this with Layton, offering to arm the tail if he lets Erik take the blame for everything.
• Comically Missing the Point / Skewed Priorities: The one time her Lack of Empathy and first-class entitlement are Played for Laughs is when Oz proposes to her:
  Oz: [After a long, heartfelt speech] Lilah Junior... [Dramatic pause, reveals a big diamond ring] Will you marry me?
  LJ: Holy shit! That rock is huge!
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Her death comes completely out of the blue by total accident. Yes, there is some poetic justice tied to her backstory, as seen in the Karmic Death entry below, but it still has nothing to do with LJ's monstrous actions aboard the train.
• Dumbass Has a Point: While it's only due to her immense dislike of Layton, she's the only one outside Layton's inner circle to believe that New Eden is likely bunk.
• Dying Alone: How she ultimately goes out, choking to death on her father's glass eye after another passenger jostles her while she has it in her mouth, in an otherwise empty corridor with no one to come to her rescue.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Doesn't act like it most of the time, but her breakdown in the last episode shows she loved her parents enough to be utterly distraught by their deaths.
• Evil Redhead: A natural redhead, and the culprit behind the serial killings on Snowpiercer.
• Fille Fatale: Despite being a teenager, she has a seductive edge and sexual experience.
• For the Evulz: She is the one behind the murders, just for the heck of it. Layton exploits this later on by showing her Melanie's secret, knowing L.J. would reveal it to First for no other reason than to watch the chaos unfold.
• Generation Xerox: From the looks of it, she and Oz seem to be heading to repeating her parents' dynamic of Evil Matriarch keeping her Henpecked Husband by the balls before they even get married.
  Mr. Wilord: We'll transform the Night Car, LJ. Or should I say Mrs. Osweiller?
  LJ: Oh. Oof. Folger-Osweiller?
• Go Mad from the Isolation: By all accounts she was already showing sociopathic tendencies before getting on the train, but her actress has suggested that the isolated environment of Snowpiercer, lack of any people her own age and coldness of her parents certainly didn't help.
• Hated by All:
  • Ends season 1 despised by absolutely everyone. Most of the train hates her for her role in the serial killings, while it's mentioned First refuses to help her after Pike kicks her out of her own home because they blame her and her parents for the disastrous revolution that puts Layton in charge. The only person on her side in the finale? The equally despised Oz.
  • Lampshaded in season 2; not only does Oz mention they're working so hard as janitors so that they'll be seen as essential even if they are despised, but it leads to their having a Relationship Upgrade over the course of a conversation on on this topic where they admit they're each other's "favourite".
• Hidden Depths:
  • She's visibly very emotional listening to one of Miss Audrey's performances, indicating her claims to feel nothing might be exaggerated.
  • Against all odds, she turns out to be a pretty decent Janitor, shown advising others on the best mop strokes to clean up a mess, and actually doing a pretty good job of helping clean up the water leaks created by Wilford's sabotage.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Her odd fascination with the Taillies keeps causing her to believe she understands them and can bargain with them.
  • She tries to bribe Layton with support for the Tail if he overlooks her being the mastermind behind Erik's murderous actions. She doesn't understand that his morals as a cop trump letting her away with her crimes.
  • Later, she's the only one of the First clique to be nice to Pike (albeit in the same way you might interact with a zoo animal), and is uncomprehending when his previously-stated desire for luxury leads to his stealing her family's car after her parents are killed, leaving her to fend for herself.
• It's All About Me: Her opening narration for episode 7 shows she views human nature as being fundamentally self-involved, and believes absolutely everyone thinks this. Also subverted in that she goes on to say she believes that being so is pointless, as the universe doesn't care about any of their plans or hopes.
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: After the trial's conclusion, she doesn't even try to hide how blatantly unhinged she is any more.
• Karma Houdini:
  • Played with in Season 1 after Melanie commutes her sentence. She's able to go to the Night Car to listen to Audrey's performances and mingle with other passengers with no consequences for having Nikki, someone very close to Audrey herself, killed. The very next scene, on the other hand, shows her parents being ostracized by other First passengers for her actions.
    • Gets hit by Karma Houdini Warranty when her parents are killed in their attempted coup: without their protection and influence, she's quickly kicked off of First and left to fend for herself in Third, where everybody hates her.
  • Played completely straight in Season 3: even when Layton takes back the train and deposes Wilford, and then Melanie returns, LJ is left with her new cushy job as head of the Night Car, with zero repercussions for her active role in leaving Melanie behind or clearly being a Wilford loyalist until literally the very last moment. Granted, at the time everybody had much bigger problems than her to deal with.
    • Even in the finale, the Karma Houdini Warranty is played with at best: yes, Oz leaves her at the first chance he gets and she loses her new position in the Night Car, but even with Melanie back in charge, LJ faces no repercussions for helping Wilford escape confinement and worsen the crisis at hand. Sure, that might be because she dies before everything is settled and Melanie can do anything. But even if her death has shades of poetic justice, as seen below, it's an accident and not a consequence of any of her actions on the train.
• Karmic Death: Lilah Junior's first truly monstrous action was to pluck out her father's eye, and she regularly used her family's status to advance herself on the train. She dies choking to death on her father's glass eye, after having lost everything, including whatever semblance of status she had left.
• Kick the Dog: When she reveals she's the witness to Wilford's non-existence, spitefully waves a photo of Melanie's disappeared daughter in her face - the only thing that causes Melanie to openly crack all season.
• Killed Off for Real Dies at the end of season 3, choking to death of her father's glass eyeball after a passing passenger jostles her and causes her to accidentally swallow it.
• Knowledge Broker: Her and Oz's new position in charge of the Night Car - the one entertainment spot left of the crippled train - means they hear things from their clients they're able to trade to Kevin while he hunts down the resistance.
• Laser-Guided Karma:
  • She outs Melanie's being the real Mr. Wilford to First For the Evulz, directly causing the revolution that sees her parents killed and her exiled to Third where everyone hates her.
  • Even more painfully, she's the one who suggests her parents witness the surrender personally to show leadership, leading directly to their deaths.
• New Job as the Plot Demands: She starts the series as an evil Upper-Class Twit protected by her equally terrible parents - but then they're killed, and she becomes a janitor when absolutely nobody but Terrence will take her on due to how hated she is. She's head of the janitors alongside Oz after Pike kills their old boss, and by season 3 their toadying to Wilford lands them both as proprietors of the Night Car - something they even retain after Layton takes the train back.
• Odd Friendship:
  • Ends up bonding with Oz of all people after she loses her parents and privileges, based almost solely on the fact they're both universally hated.
  • Strikes up a bond with Alex during the viewing party. A "bitch" and a "dork" (as they themselves put it), when viewing the skies they nonetheless share one of the series' few moments of friendship without an agenda, afterwards even joking that they shouldn't be friends. She predictably ruins this when she finds Melanie's puppet show death hilarious (to Alex's shock), and further when she outs Alex's plan to rescue her mother.
• Official Couple: Gets together with Oz towards the end of season 2, and marries him after he proposes to her in season 3.
• Oh, Crap!: Subtly, but definitely has a case of this at Fight Night when she sees Nikki's out the drawers and awake - which means she could identify her and Erik as the killers. Again when Wilford brings up her murderous past and looks set to get rid of her.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Despite her birth name being Lilah Folger Junior, she's always referred to as LJ, even by her own parents. The only exceptions are Alex on occasion, and Oz during formal moments like his proposal to her and their farewell as he leaves her for New Eden.
• Opportunistic Bastard: When her husband questions (correctly) whether Wilford will win against Layton, she realises they're both screwed if Layton wins, and kills Kevin to show they were on the Resistance's side all along.
  • Her loyalty to Wilford has shades of this to begin with: in Season 1 she doesn't seem as fervent as most of her fellow First Class passengers, and shows zero concerns when Miles proves to her Wilford wasn't on the train at all. It's only when Wilford returns right after LJ's parents got killed and she's lost her privileges that she starts sucking up to him in hopes of gaining her former status back.
• Rank Up: She and Oz lead the janitors in the aftermath of Terence's death.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: She displays an air of cockiness and untouchability in the fourth episode, not only because of her elite First status, but because she knows the secrets of the drawers. It's telling that when she loses her parents' protection and Pike kicks her out of her own home, she can only sob hysterically.
• Serial Killer: She and her accomplice Erik are the ones who've been killing and mutilating passengers.
• Smug Snake: Arrogant and entitled, genuinely seems to believe she can get away with anything. She doesn't seem to get her position isn't as untouchable as she thinks it is until the death of her parents and Pike evicting her from her home leaves her with nothing. Even after that, she seems unaware how little the janitors think of her claims to be friendly with Wilford, leaving her stuck mopping floors when Terrence decides to humiliate her once more.
• Small Name, Big Ego: She never seems to truly understand how much of her survival is due to either powerful protectors (her parents, Wilford, even Melanie at the trial) or Layton having bigger problems to deal with. Stripped of those, she's little more than an annoyance, something best seen when just a few words from Audrey has Wilford ready to hand back the nightcar, and all L.J. can do is serve her a drink and seeth quietly.
• Social Climber: Where episode 8 sees her at her best, working hard to prove herself and initiating a romance with Oz as a result, the lure of returning to First and being in Wilford's circle again lead her to ruin the plan to rescue Melanie in an attempt to prove herself to him, leading to Layton stealing Snowpiercer's Engine as a result. Even later, she views her impending marriage to Oz as a chance for them to position themselves as future leaders of the train, to her fiancé's utter frustration.
• Spanner in the Works:
  • She's this to Melanie's regime in a roundabout way; if she hadn't gotten bored and started having Erik kill for her, Layton never would have been freed from the Tail to investigate, never would have realised Melanie was posing as Wilford and never would have led the revolution that freed Snowpiercer.
  • Recognises Alex having a Cryptic Conversation with Ben on the phone as Melanie's old trick of faking one end of the conversation while hearing another, and outs the plan to rescue Melanie as a result, leading to her seeming death.
• Straw Nihilist: Her opening narration in episode 7 indicates this, showing she thinks the universe is totally indifferent to all their hopes, dreams and schemes.
• Teens Are Monsters: She's sixteen at the show's opening - and swiftly shows she's been a murderous, unrepentant sociopath since before the train ever left.
• Tempting Fate: Her last meeting with Oz before he goes to join Layton's group to New Eden is to scream angrily after him that she's "a survivor" and she'll get everything she's lost back. She dies quite soon afterward.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Despite Wilford (actually Melanie) commuting her sentence at the trial, still reveals Melanie's posing as him For the Evulz.
• Unwitting Pawn: Revealed Melanie's secret exactly as Layton wanted, inspiring Grey and her parents to act against Melanie while he got his own revolution going.
• Upper-Class Twit: Oz is astonished when she turns out to have no clue how to peel an egg. Later, she actually physically recoils when Terrence gives her a mop for menial work.
• Villainous Breakdown: Whenever her family's influence fails her. Variously freaks out when Layton outs her as the serial killer, when she's found guilty at the ensuing trial and when she's kicked out of her own home by the rampaging Taillies and made homeless. Her last one comes at the end of Season 3 when Oz reveals he's going with Layton's group to New Eden and leaves her behind, and all LJ can do is impotently yell after him that she's "a survivor". The last we see of her before her death, she's breaking down alone in an empty corridor in Second.
• Walking Spoiler: The fourth episode makes it pretty much impossible to discuss her without giving away the big reveal.

Erik

Erik

Portrayed By: Matt Murray

The Folgers' bodyguard, who seems to have a bond with L.J.

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• Ambiguous Situation: As mentioned in LJ's entry, the specifics of his relationship with her, and precisely who was manipulating/abusing whom, are left very vague.
• The Dragon: He's the killer in the initial mystery arc but is only doing so under orders from L.J., his employer and lover.
• Ephebophile: Implied to have been in a relationship with L.J., which her parents turned a blind eye to. Which one of them instigated the relationship, and how consenting it was, is a bit vague.
• A Lighter Shade of Black: He'll do anything for LJ, but doesn't seem to share her sociopathic tendencies. During his final escape attempt, he avoids hurting anyone - even his hostage, Jinju.
• Parental Substitute: Practically raised LJ, as her mother of all people readily admits.
• Pet the Dog: He saved a cat from the freeze.
• The Scapegoat: The Folgers, particularly L.J., try to pin all the blame for the murders on him despite LJ being the instigator.
• Suicide by Cop: Chooses to die at the hands of the jackboots rather than be taken alive and implicate L.J.

Other First Class Passengers

Martin

Martin Colvin

Portrayed By: Stephen Lobo

A 1st Class citizen and ally of Melanie.

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• Butt-Monkey: Gets stuck on board the pirate train by accident after taking a nap in his quarters at exactly the wrong time.
• The Informant: He's one of Melanie's spies throughout the train, although considering that the people he spies on are mainly the Folgers and Grey, this behavior gets treated sympathetically.
• The Starscream: Frees Audrey after she convinces him they're doing nothing and they'll be able to get back to his family quicker if they convince Alex to go back to Wilford.
• Token Good Teammate: To the recurring First passengers. He may be as privileged as them but he recognises L.J. for the psycho she is in the aftermath of the trial, is the most willing to give Melanie a chance to explain when her posing as Wilford gets out (unfortunately for them all, she can't), supplies the Tail rebellion with a gun as things go sour and reacts with horror when Grey tells them it's certain gassing the rest of the train will cause a lot of innocents to die.
• Upper-Class Twit: He's nicer than most of his First contemporaries, but can still be seen laughing his ass off at Fight Night, as the contenders beat each other to a pulp.

York Lam

York Lam

Portrayed By: Yee Jee Tso

Martin's husband and another first class passenger.

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• Hidden Depths: In a sense, given that he's indicated to be part of the train's black market chain in the opening scene of episode 3, having come into possession of an access chip indicated to be the one Josie uses to infiltrate Third.
• Strip Poker: Shown losing a game of this early in season 1, much to his husband's delight.

Rajiv

Rajiv Sharma

Portrayed By: Manoj Sood

The leader of the first class committee.

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• Upper-Class Twit: The man rivals the Folgers in entitlement, pettiness and short-sightedness, with Lilah easily bullying him into speaking out against Melanie.

Edith

Edith Gusterfield

Portrayed By: Donna Christie

An older first class woman not part of the first class inner circle dominated by the Folgers and Sharma.

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• Inter Class Friendship: A literal example. She works well enough with Walter and Ms. Gillies during L.J.'s trial - indeed, her first words to them on meeting are a joking request not to judge her for being from First.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: At least in the matter of L.J.'s trial, where she doesn't close ranks with her fellow Firstie, sharing the evidence and delivering a conviction.

Eugenia

Eugenia

Portrayed By: Amanda Brugel

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• Black Shirt: One of the loudest First critics of Layton's new regime, she's later revealed to have been working with Pastor Logan to (at the least) murder the Breachmen since Wilford returned.
• Compensated Dating: She trades some contraband for sex in the third episode.
• Hidden Depths: She's apparently religious, given that she owns a St. Christopher's medal. She also takes part in the successful murders or mutilations of several stronger characters in season 2.
• Rich Bitch: She's part of the Folgers' clique of haughty elites in the first season and is loyal to the even nastier Wilford in season 2.
• Only One Name: She's the only prominent first class passenger who's yet to get a surname.
• Strip Poker: Shown losing and laughing uproariously about it early in season 1.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Despite relying on her loyalty to undermine Layton's regime, Wilford doesn't hesitate to execute Eugenia for the murders she committed on his behalf for PR.