Manifest Season 1 Episode 3 Recap – Turbulence

Wow, we made it to Episode 3! So exciting!

So here we are again to give the recap of this hottest on the list show. In the first part, there is an episode 2 recap, but what’s most interesting is: who’s the person who shot the lady passenger while she was watching? We could have many conspiracy thoughts about this unknown person, which gets me excited! Reports on the news shocked the remaining passengers — they try to figure out what to do next. So is this the start of the tragedy for the remaining passengers?

The story goes to a flashback where all passengers were on the plane. The lady who got shot was talking with someone on her phone. She is complaining she is not going to retake the flight of Montego, and she quotes, “I’d rather die.”

Back to the present, her bloody face popped up on the screen — shocking! Officers investigate the crime scene. The lady’s name is Kelly Taylor (Julienne Hanzelka Kim).

Meanwhile, Ben is at their house when the news broadcasts the incident. Ben and Grace panic because the lady got an interview before someone shot her dead. She knows Ben and Cal are on that same flight with the lady. Grace got water in the fridge and saw the phrase “Own Your Truth.”

Saanvi calls Ben about the incident and gives updates about Cal’s treatment. Before the call ends, Ben reminds Saanvi if she sees anything different, just tell him.

Back to Michaela: She’s in her car and remembers the accident that happened to her and her best friend. She gets panic attacks, then goes back inside because she can’t drive. She asks Ben to do it for her. While they’re inside the vehicle, they keep on talking about what happened.

Michaela and Ben go to the crime scene. The suspect was already arrested. The head of the investigation accompanies them to see the victim. The result of the inquiry is robbery. Kelly is alone in her house; her husband is on a business trip when the crime happened.

Michaela and Ben are sent away when the director of NSA gets into the crime scene, saying the two are related to the Montego flight. Outside, they talk about conspiracy theories of the incident and the NSA, connecting it to what happened in their flight. They see the lady’s husband and ask him if his wife talked to someone before the incident. The husband tells them he warned his wife not to have an interview in public, but the wife insisted — it’s because of “The Calling.” Ben and Michaela think it is the call in their head.

Michaela continues watching Kelly’s interview. Jared says he got a call from Detective Donovan (Brandon J. Dirden), the guy who helped them go inside the victim’s house. Michaela meets Ben outside to tell him “the calling” is “own your truth.”

Michaela and Ben go to Kelly’s house; they ask the husband of Kelly’s whereabouts before the incident. Mr. Taylor says there were so many calls and random Black SUVs outside their house all day and night. Ben and Michaela come up with the idea that the government watched Kelly. Christine, the housekeeper, tells them Kelly had gone to the mall to dye her hair before the incident, but when she came back, she had bruises. Kelly only said she had fallen somewhere.

Michaela flashes back to Evie’s death. Evie was so mad at her in the flashback that she couldn’t go inside when she visited her wake.

Grace is at work with Cal. The guy asks if she is over with Danny (Daniel Sunjata), the guy she fell in love with when Ben was missing, presumed dead.

Michaela visits Evie’s house; Evie’s mother, Beverly (Adriane Lenox), welcomes her, seemingly happy. The house has a warm welcome feel. Beverly calls Evie; Evie’s father, Glen (Andrew Sensenig), comes out to tell his wife Evie is in the market. It turns out Beverly has dementia.

After Ben visited Kelly’s house and knew about the random static in Kelly’s phone, he checked all parts of his house to see if there was something wrong with it, like any wiretapping. While doing it, he calls Saanvi about the result of Cal’s blood. After some experiments, she notices she has the same situation as Cal and starts to have a theory on it. A few minutes later, he talks with Grace, telling her he saw some footprints in the garden. Cal confesses it’s Olive, who snuck out last night to see Kevin, her boyfriend.

After the incident in the jail, Michaela goes to Evie’s house to tell Evie’s parents the truth. But Evie’s mother, Beverly, is gone. Glen tells Michaela to find Beverly, giving her the car keys. But while Michaela is inside the car, she flashes back to the events before Evie died. Evie was drunk and wanted to drive; she needed the car in the morning. Michaela wanted to book an Uber since she also got drunk. Yet, the flashback is incomplete, so we don’t get the whole picture. For now, we think about how she is free after all the wrong things if the accident was really caused by drunkenness.

The Truth

Back to the present, Michaela is looking for Beverly. She sees her across the street, not moving, almost hit by a car, but Michaela maneuvers her car, causing a collision. Michaela checks Beverly. She is fine. Then Michaela goes to the car she crashed into; she’s shocked seeing Christine with Kelly’s necklace. Christine tries to escape, but Michaela pulls out her gun, bringing Christine to the precinct. Detective Donovan interrogates Christine about Kelly’s crime.

We see Jared ripping NSA’s calling card, turning down the NSA’s assignment. NSA is interested in the Stones because they assigned Jared to do it.

Ben Stone is in love with his wife Grace but is struggling because Grace has been seeing another man named Danny. As all the incidents happen, Ben gets paranoid, so when someone goes to their house to get the shin guard of Olive, he thinks it’s an intruder or a thief. Ben opens up to Grace about all his insecurities, including Grace’s relationship, but Grace assures she loves Ben so much and tells him he will never meet Danny again.

As it turns out, the murder of Kelly was not a supernatural event at all. She attempted to expose her husband for their illegal business dealings, which involved hiring undocumented immigrants and forcing them to pay to stay in the country. It’s genuinely a despicable crime, one which she seems to have realized by the end of the episode. Surprisingly, she is not killed for it, but the maid is jealous of Kelly’s return, angered about being treated like help. We’re not ruling out the “shadow man” as a potential character this season, but he is not to blame for this particular murder.

Jared also brings up one of the big questions on Manifest: How does Michaela keep ending up in the right place and at the right time? She doesn’t answer quite yet, but it seems destiny she saved Evie’s mom just as the maid crashed into her car.

Finally, the episode concludes with Saanvi reviewing her MRI results. It looks like an Ischemic Stroke caused by a reduction in blood flow, such as in a near-death experience. It may be responsible for her altered state of mind. She wants to examine other passengers, and her last hope is Kelly, but her name is not found on the morgue’s database. It turns out the NSA got Kelly’s body, but it is unclear what they will do to her.

Our Thoughts

After getting off to an intriguing start, the series fell into a rut of focusing on its weakest elements, namely the mystery of what exactly Flight 828 was and the passengers onboard. In the process, it became a show about believers and non-believers, which isn’t really interesting in this day and age. Thankfully, Manifest seems to have realized this and shifted their focus from this premise to something more interesting: the family drama at the center of it all.

Because let’s be honest, if you aren’t watching this show for the Stone family, you aren’t watching it for excellent reasons. The relationships between Ben, Michaela, Cal, Grace, Olive, and even Saanvi are all so genuine and heartwarming they make it easy to overlook most of the show’s misgivings.