One of the golden rules of fiction, whether that is by way of reading or watching a movie or TV show, is that you need to suspend your sense of disbelief. Fortunately, for most of us, that’s relatively easy to do. I have a long history of watching TV shows and movies that bear little resemblance to real life, from Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) to James Bond, and make a point of not saying, “Well, that’s ridiculous. That would NEVER happen in real life. It’s just too far-fetched.” Yet every so often, I come across a show that is just too silly for words. I’m afraid I’ve just found one: Manifest.
This is described as a “supernatural drama” series by Wikipedia and that, for me, is not a good start because, and I hate to break this to you if you are still in any doubt, the supernatural does not exist. But the storyline itself looked interesting. Here I quote from IMDB:
“When Montego Air Flight 828 landed safely after a turbulent but routine flight, the crew and passengers were relieved. But in the span of those few hours, the world had aged five years – and their friends, families and colleagues, after mourning their loss, had given up hope and moved on. Now, faced with the impossible, they’re all given a second chance. But as their new realities become clear, a deeper mystery unfolds and some of the returned passengers soon realize they may be meant for something greater than they ever thought possible.”
I mean, that’s ridiculous, How could that possibly happen? Yet in the first two seasons, as our American cousins call series’, the quality of the writing, aided by the standard of acting, makes it a decent, often compelling watch. The impossible becomes possible and I found myself binge-watching a number of episodes at a time, as certain characters experienced supernatural “callings”, presumably from a greater power (which, of course, does also not exist). We have absolutely no idea where these callings come from or indeed why the plane took five and a half hours to reach its destination (I expect some compensation must be due) but season three, which I have recently started watching, has stretched even my sense of disbelief.
The main characters of Manifest now appear to think they have been resurrected, as per Jesus Christ himself, but that’s only part of the story. To cut a long story short, the discovery of 6,000-year-old genetic material of a peacock on a piece of ancient driftwood leads a scientist to conclude that it was a piece of Noah’s Ark. Now, I have enjoyed a series, the premise of which is that a jet plane disappears for five and a half years and then simply lands in New York with the characters still alive and not having aged a day, but Noah’s Ark? This has sent me over the edge.
Noah, just in case you need reminding, was 600 years old when he built his Ark in order to survive God’s flood that killed some 20 million people, making God a bigger mass murderer than Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Ghengis Khan, if not in actual numbers but in terms of the percentage of the population (100%, except for Noah and his family). Incidentally, Noah was rewarded by God by being allowed to live to the ripe old age of 950. Given that until the third season of Manifest, not a single scrap of Noah’s Ark has been found does suggest that the story was apocryphal rather than literally true, but for me that’s just a fiction too far.
I know that a plane disappearing for five and a half years is an unlikely occurrence but I quickly warmed to the characters in Manifest and perhaps subconsciously set aside any sense of unbelief, but now, with characters I have come to like and empathise with, the inclusion of such abject biblical nonsense just made me laugh out loud. Put simply, Noah’s Ark never existed. There is not a shred of evidence to suggest that it did. And now for a chunk of driftwood to turn up suggesting that, actually it did, and flight 828 from Jamaica to New York is the same story for modern times – well, sorry, scriptwriters. What are you thinking about?
I am going to persist with Manifest, given that I am only in season three of four because, as is the case with lengthy drama shows, I just have to know how it ends. I didn’t really understand how it would be possible for a jet airliner to disappear for five and a half years but I do understand that Noah didn’t build an ark to save himself, while God, a man with clear anger issues, drowned everyone else. There is only so much fiction I can stand.
Once Manifest is over, I shall no doubt retreat to more believable viewing, such as Ozark, Lucifer and a few Bond movies. This fiction malarkey can only take you so far, can’t it?
