What really happened to the passengers of flight 828 – now that the latest season has been released, we explore that question.
Part 1 of Manifest season 4 just landed on Netflix in full for your binging pleasure. This season of the mystery box drama delves further into the mystery of flight 828 and the struggles faced by the passengers. Set two years after Grace’s brutal murder, season 4 feels darker than previous installments as the Death Date is nearer and the stakes for the passengers are higher than ever.
Manifest Season 4 – what happened to the passengers of flight 828?
In episode 1 of Manifest season 4, we catch up with our main characters. Ben has stepped down from the role of Lifeboat captain and is spending his days searching for his kidnapped daughter, Eden. Mick and Zeke have moved in with Ben, Olive, and a now older Cal, who’s hiding his identity to avoid becoming a government experiment. After the plane disappeared at the end of season 3, Eureka was shut down, which left Saanvi and Vance forced to continue their research into the 828 phenomena off the grid.
A passenger who was presumably executed in Singapore, Henry Kim, escaped a research facility he was held and made his way to New York. The man had the 828 black box with him and was adamant he was supposed to give it to Cal. Before he’s apprehended by the authorities, Henry tells Cal he’s now the Dragon, which bizarrely leads to a dragon-shaped scar appearing on Cal’s arm.
Rescuing Eden is the show’s main focus in the first five episodes. Despite being presumed dead, it’s revealed that Angelina has been raising the youngest member of the Stone family as her own and hiding with the help of various passengers, including Anna Ross, the woman who previously helped save Cal’s life. Eventually, Angelina ends up hiding at a commune for passengers run by Adrian, the former 828 cult leader. However, Adrian makes the mistake of confessing he’s harboring Angelina to Eagan, who’s now in prison for having held Vance’s son at gunpoint last season. Eagan uses the knowledge to cut a deal and secure his release.
Ben tries saving his daughter by himself from Adrian’s compound but ends up tied up in the basement. Luckily, the Callings lead Michaela and the rest of the team to his and Eden’s location and they manage to rescue her. Angelina, having blown up the house, is on the run again and hides at her mother’s house.
The relationship between Ben and Cal is strained this season. In season 3 Cal allowed Angelina back in the house after Grace kicked her out and gave her a key, which is how she was able to enter the home, kidnap Eden and stab Grace to death. Olive outright blames him at first, but by the start of season 4, she seems to have forgiven her twin. Ben, on the other hand, can barely look at his son. All that changes though after Eden’s rescues, and especially in the last three episodes when he learns Cal’s cancer returned.
This season we learn that the Callings are not enough to save the Lifeboat. One constant Calling that everyone keeps receiving of ash and an erupting volcano seems to suggest there’s something more apocalyptic at play here and that what happened to the plane was no accident. We find out that the passengers were inside the Divine Consciousness while the plane disappeared and the Callings are memories of information they had access to inside the bright light.
It’s revealed that the Major managed to connect the detained, now catatonic, passengers to the Divine Consciousness during her experiments by using sapphire. However, she couldn’t get her hands on the Omega Sapphire, an ancient gem of unlimited power. Conveniently, the last Omega Sapphire turned out to be hiding in plain sight, right in the boiler room where the Stones hid the stowaway passenger from season one. Less conveniently, Eagan helped Mick and Saanvi uncover the gem, before running off with it.
Another main plot point in the second half of the series is the serial killer who starts targetting 828-ers. The first victim is a man named Sam, who was also being extorted by the police Captain, the second victim is Anna Ross and the third is a passenger Cal went on a date with. After the killer kidnaps Adrian, it’s revealed that Angelina’s parents have been murdering any passengers that helped their daughter while she was on the run. Their end goal was to murder Eden as a way to prove to Angelina that the toddler isn’t really an angel. Thankfully, Zeke and Olive were home when Angelina’s dad attacked and managed to stop him.
Speaking of Zeke, he spends many episodes struggling to cope with his powers. After feeling a passenger’s rage at Adrian’s compound and shooting her to protect Michaela, he has a relapse on alcohol but gets straight back on the wagon.
Jared, Michaela’s other love interest, spends most of the season in uniform after having been demoted by getting in a fistfight with a fellow officer. On the bright side, he and Drea (Mick’s former NYPD partner) are now in a friends-with-benefits type relationship, but there are hints of stronger feelings developing between them. Eventually, he earns his detective badge and is back working for the Registry.
Fellow 828 passenger and Olive’s love interest, TJ returns this season from his trip to Egypt.
Manifest season 4 ending
Towards the end of the season, it’s revealed that the Death Date is the apocalypse. If the 828 passengers don’t save the Lifeboat, then everyone in the world dies with them.
Angelina steals the Omega Sapphire from Eagan and starts wreaking havoc, both literally and figuratively. Her misuse of the gem creates actual cracks in the Earth. She also invokes fake Calling in the form of Grace to get Ben to return Eden to him. Eventually, a dying Cal defeats her and shatters the Omega Sapphire. But of course, Angelina recovers one small piece of the gem that becomes embedded in her hand. As a consequence of Angelina’s misuse of the Omega Sapphire, all 828 passengers are detained by the government.
As Cal is dying from his cancer, Olive and TJ realize that he’s the one person capable of saving the Lifeboat. Zeke, who’s been struggling with his abilities all season, makes the ultimate sacrifice and takes on Cal’s cancer, cures him and dies in his place.
The first half of the season (Manifest season 4, episode 10) ends on a cliffhanger. Angelina is more dangerous than ever, and her actions are causing the Earth to crack, literally. Mick is mourning Zeke, while Ben is grateful to see Cal healed, yet it’s only a matter of time until they too are detained by the Registry. Stopping the apocalypse might be a bit challenging from a prison cell. Saanvi and Vance are also arrested at the end of the season during a SWAT raid.
And so, that’s our deep dive into what happened to the flight 828 passengers. What are your thoughts? Comment below.
