The television show Manifest (2018- ) recently aired the final two episodes of a 13-episode third season on the National Broadcasting Company this past Thursday, June 10th. With news that the series won’t be returning for another season on NBC, cliffhangers raised in the two-episode finale offer questions that in my estimation deserve to be answered. Much like learning the number of licks it takes to get to the Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop, the cliffhangers raised questions whose answers the world may never know.
Recurring rules for Daryl Edwards as Robert Vance, Josh Dallas as Ben Stone and Parveen Kaur as Dr. Saanvi Bahl intersected in an important storyline concerning the notion of redemption concerning the tailfin of Montego Air Flight 828, which vanished for five and a half years, returning at the beginning of season one. Vance’s role resurrects with a career at the NSA, bringing storylines to bear through the agency for Saanvi and Ben with biblical and supernatural implications.
Ben Stone’s family remains central to another supernatural storyline involving what Grace and Ben’s baby girl, Grace’s step brother Tarik, and the Cal Stone storyline that had ended season two. The resolution to the second season brought a storyline for brothers Jace and Pete Baylor plus Kory with deep resonance for Tarik, Cal and Grace. Angelina Meyer becomes tied to Pete Baylor before another storyline appears. Warner Miller, Jack Messina and Athena Karkanis portrayed Tarik, Cal and Grace, respectively. James McMenamin, Devin Harjes, DazMann Still and Holly Taylor portray Jace Baylor, Pete Baylor, Kory and Angelina Meyer, respectively.
The storyline introducing the Baylor brothers, Kory and Angelina intertwines with the marriage of Zeke Landon and Michaela Stone, as portrayed by Matt Long and Melissa Roxburgh. While Drea Mikami, as portrayed by Ellen Tamaki, continues a storyline of supportive policewoman and partner, the support Jared Vasquez has had in supporting his ex-fiancé and partner Michaela Stone, the feeling becomes something less than absolute as the Stone / Landon marriage, a Saanvi Bahl and Michaela Stone storyline with The Major interferes with feelings between Vasquez and Sarah Fitz. J.R. Ramirez and Lauren Norvelle portray Vasquez and Fitz, respectively.
Olive Stone, Cal Stone’s twin sister, returns in season three with instincts at first sympathetic to Angelina Meyer. Olive, as portrayed by Luna Blaise, begins to have doubts surrounding Angelina in the aftermath of the end of Angelina’s feelings for Pete Baylor. At first the sense is that the distrust has to do with misplaced feelings for college archeologist Levi, as portrayed by Will Peltz. Further reasons for distrust eventually reveal themselves for the Stone family, which roles into questions that are raised between Michaela and Ben Stone, for Cal and Grace Stone, and for fellow 828 passengers Adrian Shannon and Eagan Tehrani, as portrayed by Jared Grimes and Ali Lopez-Sohaili, respectively.
Threads of storyline in 13-episodes are raised in a reasonable degree of detail to let you see that there is intrigue, conflict, and a growing narrative complexity that had grown-up in the third season of Manifest. There were further, important storylines beyond these that we haven’t tugged. The questions posed as end of series questions deserve a place to be told, in my estimation. That the place for this telling isn’t NBC is unfortunate, though this seemed inevitable with more than one week of two-episode airings of this final season of Manifest. The third season of Manifest earned a rating of 3.75-stars on a scale of one-to-five.
Matt – Wednesday, June 16, 2021
Matt Lynn Digital 
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