Not Letting Go of This Netflix Series

From left to right – Jared Vasquez, Drea Mikami, Michaela Stone, Olive Stone, Eden Stone, Ben Stone, Cal Stone, Saanvi Bahl, TJ Morrison, and Robert Vance

It all started with a friend tweeting about how she didn’t want to continue watching the Manifest series because it was just going on and on and nothing was making sense in it. She said she regretted watching it. And that intrigued me to watch this series. I already knew it was about a plane that takes off in a year and lands in a different year. The time travel angle hooked me on to it as I’m obsessed with all things time travel. So, I started watching this in September 2022. But my regret was different – I regretted not watching it in 2018 when the first season premiered. I got so much addicted to the racy plot that I wanted to keep watching it.

Not everything should make sense in this world. There are so many mysteries out there that are twisted and unsolved. When we don’t get the answers we need in life, we’d surely want the movies we watch to have the answers to the questionable plot they have. We wouldn’t want to invest our time in something that drags on with layers and layers of mysteries, spiralling into story arcs that don’t contribute to the main plot. Manifest does fall into that category. And I can understand why many stop watching it midway. Most of their responses are like – ‘I don’t understand anything. There’s no sense of direction in it’ and ‘It’s irritating me with all that callings thing’.

Okay, though I was hooked on to the plot at first, it was the intense characterization that kept me glued to the series. I’m an emotional person and feel everything deeply, sometimes bordering on being an empath. So, I invested myself in the characters – Michaela, Ben, Jared, Saanvi, Cal, Grace, Olive, Zeke, Vance, Angelina, Eagan, Adrian, TJ, Drea, and so on. I journeyed along with them. The huge chunk of episodes paved the way for developing the characters well and adding emotional depth to the story. The characters shaped the plot as I watched episode after episode. I almost binge-watched the first three seasons before they dropped part 1 of Season 4 on November 4th, 2022 (yes, it coincides with the date the plane landed – November 4th, 2018).

Many would have felt that the story, all that mythology, the talk about divine consciousness, Omega Sapphire, Noah’s Ark, spirituality, etc., were too much to take in. But I’m someone who loves puzzles, enigmas, and twisted plots. And this series had them all in tons. Apart from the main cast, there were so many other characters who had a lasting impact on me. Since the callings of Michaela and Ben have always been about other passengers and helping them out, it was heartwarming to watch when all things worked for good. The series was also highly anecdotal, what with so many emotional scenes and quotable dialogues.

The final part of the series dropped on June 2nd (another important date in the series). I finished watching it yesterday evening and I almost choked with tears when it ended. To surmise, the climax was so perfect that I’m not even able to imagine an alternate ending which would have given that perfect feel. It had a beautiful completion to all that chaos. Though so many expected things weren’t the endgame, it all fitted well. And, since yesterday, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about all the possible arcs and revelations that the series had to offer. I have been tweeting about some of them (there are spoilers in it!).

These possible arcs are making me want to write my own fanfiction based on them. Though I have lots of ideas for writing a sequel or a spinoff for this series, I wouldn’t be doing it anytime soon. It’d require multiple rewatches to get into the skin of the story and then start writing. No other series has made me feel so emotionally glimmered (the opposite of triggered) that I’m still following its hashtag on Twitter and reading other fans’ thoughts about the finale. Manifest overrode my love for DARK. That must be the biggest win of this bittersweet series.

I would definitely NOT recommend this series to everyone. It’s not an easy watch. You need loads of patience and a thirst for such slow-burn intriguing dramas. I love getting tangled up in the lives of fictional people, especially if they are well-written characters. And I don’t regret even a moment of watching it.

Love,
Kavya Janani. U