Snowpiercer: The Escape

Snowpiercer: The Escape is a french graphic novel, and is the first volume to the Snowpiercer series, the book was originally written by Jaques Lob and illustrated by Jean-Marc Rochette in 1982, Which later served as inspiration for both a Movie and TV Show.

The series was later continued in two more volumes, written by Benjamin Legrand, with The Explorers in 1999, and The Crossing in 2000. A fourth volume, Terminus, was later written by Olivier Bocquet and published in 2015, as a conclusion to the series.

The book was first published under the name Le Transperceneige, before being translated and re-released by Titan Comics in 2014 and released with two volumes, being titled Snowpiercer: The Escape, and Snowpiercer: The Explorers (which includes The Crossing). A third volume containing Terminus was released in 2019.

A prequel series was later started and written by Alexis Nolent (aka Matz), three volumes were planned, with Snowpiercer: Extinction in 2019, and Snowpiercer: Apocalypse in 2020. The third volume, Snowpiercer: Annihilation, was set to publish in 2021, however for currently unknown reasons, has yet to be released.

The book later gained a TV Re-Edition in 2020, featuring a new paperback cover.

Synopsis

Coursing through an eternal winter, on an icy track wrapped around the frozen planet Earth, a train travels unceasingly through the eternal winter. This is Snowpiercer: one thousand and one carriages long. From fearsome engine to final car, all surviving human life is here: a complete hierarchy of the society we lost. The elite as ever, travel in luxury at the front of the train - but for those in the rear coaches, life is squalid, miserable and short. Proloff is a refugee from the tail, determined never to go back. In his journey forward through the train, he hopes to reach the mythical engine and, perhaps, find some hope for the future...

Summary

The story is about a man named Proloff, who boarded a 1001 car train named Snowpiercer to survive a second ice age. He lived through the years on the train in a cargo deck, known as the tail, with many other people. At the start of the book, he breaks out of the tail by climbing around the outside of the train, and smashing a window to climb through, where he is soon quarantined by security due to health concerns. He is later joined by a woman named Adeline Bellau, who is part of a movement intending to integrate the people from the tail into the rest of the train. After several health checks, both of them eventually meet Sergeant Briscard, who was instructed to take the pair up-train for interrogation. On the journey, the reader is shown a variety of cars throughout the train, including a bar, agriculture, and a butcher's. Soon a virus that is presumed to come from Proloff begins to spread, and infects everyone on the train, Proloff and Adeline then take this chance to escape the guards and make a dash for the engine. Before reaching the engine Proloff begins to shoot the final car to prevent anyone coming through, however the door to the engine was locked, and Adeline eventually dies due of the cold. Proloff is soon rescued by a man named Alec Forrester, who is revealed to be the train's engineer, the tail of the train was soon disconnected while the two are talking, and Alec tells Proloff that he needs to take care of the engine. After an unknown period of time, Proloff is shown looking at the engines cameras, only to find that everyone has died from the disease spread by Proloff. He is then left alone to look after the engine, where it appears he is hearing voices due to isolation, where the story ends just after.

Characters

Main characters

• Proloff
• Adeline Belleau
• Lieutenant Zayim
• The Doc*
• Sergeant Briscard
• Al (Historian)
• The President*
• Alec Forrester

Side Characters

• Poitrinaud
• Brochard (soldier)
• Martin (soldier)
• Dalevski (soldier)
• Sergeant Druckmann
• Little Old Man*
• Unnamed Gardener*
• The Priest*
• Rabinoff
• Colonel Krimson
• Baki
• Reverend Krawczyk

* - Name unknown.

Gallery

• 

  The original French cover

• 

  The English translation cover

• 

  The cover for the TV Re-edition

Trivia

• The engine is nicknamed "Olga" by Alec Forrester.
• There is concept art for the graphic novels that can still be found till this day.