Josh Dallas-Melissa Roxburgh-starrer Manifest has manifested a super season finale for fans of the sci-fi Netflix series. The hour-long episode ties up all the strands of the main story, delivering a satisfying conclusion that we, along with the passengers of Flight 828, were hoping for since the first season. The Jeff Rake-created science fiction drama released the second volume of the final season on June 2, known to be the ‘death date’ in the series that the passengers were trying to avoid for six long years since their landing.

Manifest revolves around the lives of the passengers and crew of Flight 828 who landed five-and-a-half years after the plane went missing. The aircraft took off on April 7, 2013 carrying 191 passengers and crew, and touched down in New York on November 4, 2018 after encountering mid-air turbulence of some minutes.

On returning, the passengers discover they have acquired a special power which allows them to receive ‘Callings’ of events before they occur. This leads them to help people out of dangerous situations.

The Stone family is at the centre of these mysterious events, particularly the brother-sister duo of Ben (Josh Dallas) and Michaela Stone (Melissa Roxburgh) who are made the co-captains of the passengers to figure out the death date of the world — which they find out is June 2, 2024 — which can possibly be averted by solving Callings and balancing the scales between the good and the bad of humanity.

The buildup to a neat ending

The first volume of Season 4 revealed that Cal Stone (Ty Doran) — the son of Ben Stone — is their only shot at saving the world as he’s the bearer of the Omega Sapphire stone. On the other hand, Angelina (Holly Taylor), a devout Christian, had also absorbed the powers of the shard of the Omega Sapphire, which gave her the ability to manifest false Callings on her own.

Manifest fans had anticipated that the mystery behind the Callings, the jump in time, what Cal saw when he looked outside the plane and how the passengers would stop the world from ending would make up the remaining 10 episodes of the second volume of the series. And the finale did not disappoint.

The beginning of the second volume shows how almost every passenger is captured by the government and kept locked up to solve Callings. The outside world is getting more and more agitated as Callings start going unresolved, leading to the Last Judgement-type events. In Christian belief, the Last Judgement is an apocalyptic event where God makes a final judgement of all people on Earth.

The plagues before the Final Judgement

Bill Daly (Frank Deal), the captain of Flight 828, was earlier shown to have vanished along with meteorologist Fiona Clarke (Francesca Faridany) only to be brought back from the ‘glow’ as witnesses. The two are given the ability to curse the world with plagues after their death, according to Revelations 11.

In comes Angelina who thinks she has been given the responsibility of killing the two and is successful in doing so. Captain Daly curses the detention centre with a plague of locusts before dying and later fills the river water with blood after his death. The events lead to the apocalyptic event which had been predicted by Ben’s daughter Olive Stone (Luna Blaise) in the earlier seasons.

Ty Doran as Cal Stone in Season 4 of Manifest Instagram

Cal is the saviour

Despite Angelina’s misgivings about her being the Archangel, it is Cal (Ty Doran) who first saw the ‘glow’ when travelling by Flight 828 who becomes the saviour for the passengers after sacrificing himself. After becoming one with the remaining piece of the Omega Sapphire stone in the piece of Noah’s Ark, Cal becomes the blue beacon light that the pilots had seen while flying the plane through the storm in Season 1 of the show.

The combined power of the now-joined Omega Sapphires not only becomes a beacon for all passengers of the flight who come together for the Final Judgement but also brings back Flight 828 completely restored. The plane is the modern-day ‘Noah’s ark’ which would aid the passengers to go on their final journey as the world ends around them.

What the final episode means

The final episode shows Jared (J.R. Ramirez) and Olive realising that forgiveness is as important as the good deeds. When Ben chooses to forgive Angelina for causing his wife Grace’s (Athena Karkanis) death, he is able to get past the Death Date and lead the passengers in fighting the Grim Reaper who comes to take the lives of those on the flight.

While three passengers – Saanvi Bahl (Parveen Kaur), Eagan Tehrani (Ali Lopez-Soahili) and Adrian Shannon (Jared Grimes) – are able to get past the Death Date by proving themselves worthy, 11 passengers including Angelina are reduced to ashes the same way they would have been had the plane crashed on the fateful day. The passengers who have been left alive are a mix of 191 good and bad people to determine whether humanity is worth saving, making it the perfect experiment.

After getting past the Death Date, the passengers find themselves in the ‘glow’ — which Cal had seen while on the plane — and walk out of the gates of Flight 828 in the year 2013 when they were meant to land.

Every passenger remembers what happened over the past six years except Cal, who comes back as the child version (Jack Messina) with no recollection of anything – which perhaps has something to do with him becoming one with the Omega Sapphire.

Ben is reunited with his wife Grace and his mother, several passengers who died during the past six years are revived at the end and Michaela finds Zeke (Matt Long) driving a cab right outside the airport, giving them a chance to build their relationship once again. The finale gives the passengers what they had been asking for all along – ‘the ultimate second chance’.