One of the big questions about Snake is how much of what he says actually comes directly from his snakes.
A prevailing opinion among his fans is that he often uses the snakes as a cover in order to say what he is thinking without feeling as nervous about communicating. This certainly happens sometimes, most noticeably on the Campania.
Dan is a very small snake, and is unlikely to care about fitting in with people. This is clearly Snake’s low confidence talking, and his habit of sharing messages from the snakes is helping him to express his thoughts.
However, there are also many times when it appears that the snakes actually are communicating through Snake, such as when they tell him things he could not have otherwise known. An example is when Emily gave him the idea of throwing the plate he was holding to distract the zombies.
Keeping in mind that both scenarios probably happen quite a bit, I’ve come up with a tentative idea of how to tell when Snake is communicating his own thoughts or simply passing along a message from the snakes, and I’d like to run it by you guys.
My idea is all about Snake’s face and expressions. A lot of the time, he has a very neutral expression, as seen here:
When Snake is speaking about his own ideas, I think that he’s more likely to be expressive with his face and actions. When he is simply relaying information from a snake, he keeps his neutral expression or emotes in a way that does not match what he is saying.
I’ll give some examples to show what I mean.
Snakes communicating through Snake:
Snake is speaking for Webster here. His expression is neutral and he does not appear to be alarmed by the sight of hundreds of zombies. Webster, on the other hand, looks like he’s disgusted and says as much via Snake.
Snake doesn’t seem to care about having been misidentified. Oscar, on the other hand, is hissing in annoyance. Oscar is the one speaking here.
Snake expressing himself through the snakes:
Wilde is not even in this picture, and certainly is not attempting to restrain the sheep. This is Snake talking.
It’s a little hard to see Snake’s face here, but just a moment previously he visibly reacted to hearing Finny speak German. He is curious, and asking this question for himself.
Finding clear-cut examples of each of these scenarios turned out to be difficult, because it looks like what’s happening most often is that Snake and his snakes are thinking approximately the same thing.
The snakes often mirror Snake’s expressions at dramatic moments, suggesting that they are sharing his feelings.
If you look closely here, several snakes are squinting at the light too. We’ll ignore that this is physically impossible (snakes don’t have eyelids!) because it’s just a silly manga.
A good explanation for this is that Snake has known his snakes for years, and has spent all of his time with them. Snakes aren’t usually social animals, but the stress of their caged environment may have encouraged them to bond. They now work together and understand each other almost effortlessly.
The way Snake speaks. Patterns, etc.
One of the big questions about Snake is how much of what he says actually comes directly from his snakes.
A prevailing opinion among his fans is that he often uses the snakes as a cover in order to say what he is thinking without feeling as nervous about communicating. This certainly happens sometimes, most noticeably on the Campania.
Dan is a very small snake, and is unlikely to care about fitting in with people. This is clearly Snake’s low confidence talking, and his habit of sharing messages from the snakes is helping him to express his thoughts.
However, there are also many times when it appears that the snakes actually are communicating through Snake, such as when they tell him things he could not have otherwise known. An example is when Emily gave him the idea of throwing the plate he was holding to distract the zombies.
Keeping in mind that both scenarios probably happen quite a bit, I’ve come up with a tentative idea of how to tell when Snake is communicating his own thoughts or simply passing along a message from the snakes, and I’d like to run it by you guys.
My idea is all about Snake’s face and expressions. A lot of the time, he has a very neutral expression, as seen here:
When Snake is speaking about his own ideas, I think that he’s more likely to be expressive with his face and actions. When he is simply relaying information from a snake, he keeps his neutral expression or emotes in a way that does not match what he is saying.
I’ll give some examples to show what I mean.
Snakes communicating through Snake:
Snake is speaking for Webster here. His expression is neutral and he does not appear to be alarmed by the sight of hundreds of zombies. Webster, on the other hand, looks like he’s disgusted and says as much via Snake.
Snake doesn’t seem to care about having been misidentified. Oscar, on the other hand, is hissing in annoyance. Oscar is the one speaking here.
Snake expressing himself through the snakes:
Wilde is not even in this picture, and certainly is not attempting to restrain the sheep. This is Snake talking.
It’s a little hard to see Snake’s face here, but just a moment previously he visibly reacted to hearing Finny speak German. He is curious, and asking this question for himself.
Finding clear-cut examples of each of these scenarios turned out to be difficult, because it looks like what’s happening most often is that Snake and his snakes are thinking approximately the same thing.
The snakes often mirror Snake’s expressions at dramatic moments, suggesting that they are sharing his feelings.
If you look closely here, several snakes are squinting at the light too. We’ll ignore that this is physically impossible (snakes don’t have eyelids!) because it’s just a silly manga.
A good explanation for this is that Snake has known his snakes for years, and has spent all of his time with them. Snakes aren’t usually social animals, but the stress of their caged environment may have encouraged them to bond. They now work together and understand each other almost effortlessly.