Relative Bearing
Episode 6 of Manifest Season 4 starts with police showing up and investigating the crime scene up at the factory. Ben speaks to the press about Eden, while the police are clearly suspicious over the fact that compound explosion and Ben finding his daughter both occurred at the same time. As for Angelina, she shows up at her mum’s place and hides out. That’s probably just as well, given the heat that’s surrounding them both right now. Cal speaks to Olive and admits that their Callings are not going to be enough to prevent what’s coming. He’s also still coughing – blood this time – and seemingly hiding something big, while Zeke is conflicted after killing Erika the previous night, exploding with rage that seems to be uncontrollable. For now, they’re both keeping secrets from each other. Speaking of secrets, Michaela ends up having another Calling, which leads her straight to Sam, a guy who happens to own an aquarium. When she shows up at his place, she finds him dead in his apartment. Michaela hurriedly calls Jared about it, who recognizes him as someone he tried to protect from another police officer several years ago. Sam was at a rally and Jared stopped another officer from hurting Sam, looking at him in disdain because he was one of the 828 passengers. Sam was also taking money out of his account to help others, and he lost his marriage as a result of his selflessness. His ex doesn’t seem like a culprit in all this though, given how she talks about him. Taking a closer look at his accounts, the gang realize that Sam withdraws $2000 in cash and then checks in at the Registry, meaning there could well be a mole on the inside. While Jared checks this out, he’s stopped at the Registry thanks to his partner ratting him out for getting involved in the fertilizer and compound gig. Reluctantly handing over his gun and badge, Jared is encouraged to head home. Meanwhile, Ben decides to cut his beard completely, off the back of Eden scribbling down his picture and calling him a bad man. While this is going on, Eagan is released from prison and immediately jumped by Adrian in a public bathroom. Adrian knows all about him opening up to the police. Eagan shrugs off his threat and expresses interest in the 20k reward with the FBI. He shows up at Angelina’s place and decides to squeeze Angelina’s mum into giving him money, intending to extort her for everything he can in exchange for keeping Angelina’s location a secret. I mean, you’d think the police would check there first, right? After shaving, Ben also invites Anna round, using her as a way of bridging the gap with Eden and giving her something familiar to cling to. While he waits in the hallway, Angelina calls to confirm she’s still alive and gives him advice about how to handle Eden, including when to put her down for a nap. Ben is rattled and demands she not phone again. Well, Cal breaks that almost immediately and lets Angelina speak to Eden on the phone. He deduces that this is the only way Eden will accept Ben as a good guy, but when the latter finds out, he’s absolutely enraged. He sits down with Cal and reminds him he doesn’t want Angelina anywhere near the house. He also deduces that Cal is inexplicably connected to Angelina somehow, and he’s just been trying to protect his child. “I’m your child too dad,” Cal says, hurt. Eventually he decides to leave, writing a note and slipping out the door. Jared and Michaela continue to search for clues surrounding Sam’s extortion and finally stumble upon it, thanks to a familiar ring. It turns out the police captain is the crook here, and he chases Drea up to the roof where a scuffle ensues when he’s outed for his perceived part to play in Sam’s death. Jared and Michaela scramble up to the roof, managing to miraculously avoid being stopped by cops, as the police captain immediately admits to being a dirty cop. With the captain arrested, despite a tasty offer for Jared to forget everything and get back on the payroll again, Vance catches up with Jared downstairs and confirms that he’s altered the ballistic report. Jared will get his job back regardless, hoorah! Olive believes that sapphire is linked to the prophets of the past and believes they could actually use this for unlimited Callings. Eden has a Calling upstairs with that familiar volcano again, while Zeke stumbles home after getting drunk, deciding to try and bury his emotions in booze. He slips over Cal outside though, who’s passed out on the lawn. Finally, Jared speaks to his father and expresses his concerns over the murder. He doesn’t think the police captain is the one responsible. So if not him then… who was it?
The Episode Review
Manifest continues to spin its soapy drama, with plenty of issues involving our characters and the whole saga involving Eden reverting back to where we were before. Our group are still none the wiser over how the Callings work and how everything is connected together, instead being led to another clue in the form of this sapphire. Manifest relies on the same contrived narrative beats we saw in previous seasons and we don’t seem to be getting closer to solving what happened to the plane and where the story is going next. Still, we’ll have to wait and see what’s in store for us next.
