All-Call
Episode 2 of Manifest Season 4 starts with Grace’s funeral. All our characters attend, there are plenty of tears and of course, the emptiness felt from Eden’s disappearance still hangs heavy over our players, especially Ben. Saanvi is in a much more cheerful mood though, and she shows up at the Stone residence, buzzing about the black box recording. She tells them all about hearing Captain Daly calling for help. Saanvi sees the state of Ben, including a whole bunch of clippings up in the attic and tries to get through to him. Ben refuses to listen, despite their Death Date fast approaching in 18 months’ time. Saanvi is shocked by his nonchalance and eventually leaves Ben to wallow in grief. Determined to do something, Ben decides to over-expose himself and go on Aaron Glover’s podcast. Cal doesn’t think it’s a good idea and tries in vain to talk him out of this. Meanwhile, Angelina continues to look after Eden, taking her into a really busy center to get changed. It’s a miracle how no one has actually spotted them in all this time. They head to a public library next, where Angelina acts super suspiciously and hurries out when the librarian begins asking questions. Michaela shows up at the Registry for a series of questions. When her old partner Drea appears, asking about Henry Kim, Michaela lies and fabricates a story. Drea covers for her, and holds up a file with a post-it note on, asking to meet outside on a park bench to talk more, away from the prying eyes lurking around them. Michaela shows up at her and Jared’s bench, of all places. Jared appears and reveals that he has crucial intel. China are aware that Henry is on US soil and the NYPD have a taskforce standing by to try and find his location. The authorities are working with China to extradite him. Jared warns that she needs to be careful. She immediately races to the lab and warns Vance and Saanvi, telling them they need to move Henry to somewhere more secure. Michaela drives Henry out, and with Vance using his intel and tracking the police, things don’t go to plan. The police close in on them, and Henry is held up at gunpoint by the police. However, he ends up having a vision with Cal back on the plane, and seeing a volcano outside. Elsewhere, Zeke heads over to talk to Ben about his current behaviour, but instead Ben turns it around and decides Zeke should stick around for his interview and see if any witnesses call in with clues. He gives a description of Angelina, which is a smart move given Angelina has been all over the place in public. Surely, someone is going to pick up on this? Angelina does manage to find accommodation under the name of Violet, but it’s a trap and she’s locked up. Cal and Angelina both listen in though as Ben writes off Cal on-air, claiming that he ran away on his own volition and she’s not the focus here. After the show, Ben receives a call from Glover, confirming that calls and messages are pouring in, including someone who actually saw Angelina. Saanvi learns that the Black Box recording has a strange electromagnetic wave undetected by human ears running through it. Now, it seems to be caused by ULF (Ultra low frequency), which seems to point toward an earthquake being the culprit. The group learn where Henry is being kept. It’s the 828 Register Office. It’s not going to be easy to break in, but Cal goes it alone under the name of Gabriel. At the same time, Ben takes Zeke with him to see Anna, where he learns she’s been lying and knows all about Angelina. She eventually breaks the news that she was manipulated by the young woman, who’s still alive with Eden. A stunned Ben heads down to the basement, tears in his eyes, as he sees Eden’s drawings and holds her clothing. Cal arrives to see Henry, who calls him a dragon and tells him he has everything he needs. He has faith in Cal and reassures him that he’ll understand soon. While Cal leaves, Adrian shows up and saves Angelina from the house, driving out with Eden to the woods. While she’s still in the car, he confronts her and questions why she kidnapped Eden. Angelina asks for help and he concedes, agreeing to do just that – but only for one night. Off the back of this, Ben heads back home and doubles his efforts to find Eden, whilst simultaneously trying to patch things up with Cal. Cal however, ends up having a strange vision of that familiar dragon scar on his arm. At the same time, Saanvi checks the Black Box recording again and this time, she hears overlapping chatter, coming from our characters and discussing “saving her”. It’s all the Callings and somehow they’re overlapping one another.
The Episode Review
So Manifest starts to deepen the mystery whilst simultaneously presenting a rather head-scratching predicament. If Angelina has really been in hiding for 2 years, and people are aware of what she looks like, how come nobody bothered to flag her up before? This episode in particular presented the whole librarian subplot as if it was going to be here that had information but then that never comes to fruition. To be fair though, it could be important in the episodes ahead, so we’ll have to wait and see. Given how quickly Zeke realizes Anna was lying, it’s actually surprising that the gang haven’t brought him along to help suss people out before. It might have saved a lot of headaches that way! It seems this cat and mouse chase is going to continue for a while, but beyond that there really isn’t a whole lot going on this episode. That’s perhaps not surprising given the cable run was quite similar, with some episodes not really doing much to progress the story forward. With the reveal of Cal’s scar though, it seems to hint that bigger things are on the horizon.
