“Go-Around” – Aired on November 4, 2022
Writers: Matt K. Turner & Ezra W. Nachman
Director: SJ Main Muñoz
Grade: 4 out of 5
Notice: All episode reviews contain spoilers
Note: This review was published more than a year after the episode aired, but written without any knowledge of the events taking place in future episodes.
The cold open shows Michaela from a distance jogging outside, but I honestly thought it was a woman in her 50s judging by the running style (small strides) and posture, until it showed Michaela up close taking off her hoodie. She is at the cemetery to visit the grave of her once best friend Evie. It’s the fourth-year anniversary of her tragic death in the car accident.
Michaela then gets a calling during which a layer of heavy fog appears just above the ground and a bird with lightning blasting out of its eyes appears to fly in the sky above Michaela. When she returns home, she finds Ben rushing to leave. He reluctantly admits that Eagan is his new lead on Eden, recalling the closing moments of “High Flight.” He is leaving to meet with him at the prison. Michaela naturally reminds Ben to remember what a scumbag Eagan is before adding that he needs “proof, not hope.”
“Go-Around” is a transitionary episode hinting at the finish line approaching with regard to Ben’s relentless search for Eden. In general, the hour is entertaining and includes some great sequences of acting performances by the members of the main cast, notably Luna Blaise, Josh Dallas, and Daryl Edwards. The simultaneous running of too many story lines squeezed into less than 45 minutes prevent the smooth progress of the more meaningful plots and negatively impact the pacing, but overall it’s a respectable entry that extends the show’s solid start to its fourth season.
Drea arrives at Shinnecock Indian Nation Territory with an arrest warrant for a man named Kyle Boyd (first credited TV role for Makela Yepez, according to Imdb) who is on the list of the 828 Registry and skipped all his mandatory check-ins. She is greeted by an Indian resident named Tela (Taylor Red Fox) who deliberately makes her feel unwelcome, reminding her that this is Indian Nation territory where arrest warrants issued outside carry no clout. She advises Drea to leave.
Back to Michaela who types “bird lightning thunder mythology” in the search bar on her computer to dig deeper into her calling. She notices the image of a bird with lightning coming out if its eyes with the subtitle “Native American Thunderbird Mythology.” Drea calls her to rant about the arrest she could not make due the rules and regulations within Indian sovereign lands. During the call, the search page begins scrolling down rapidly on its own in front of Michaela before it abruptly stops at the sign of Shinnecock Nation land – one thing I have not been able to dismiss off-hand throughout Manifest is how blatantly callings have been used as convenient plot devices in the name of advancing the narrative. They also come in any shape or form, including this latest “google-search” calling. Hey, you wanna move the plot from A to B but can’t figure out how? Just cook up a calling and, voilà!
Michaela arrives at Shinnecock. Tela thinks Drea sent her, but Michaela quickly assures her that she is not even a cop, and that she simply needs to talk Kyle as soon as possible. She then gets another calling with the same bird from earlier hovering above a house at a distance. She figures out that it must be Kyle’s house and asks Tela for permission to visit him. Is Tela the official president of the welcoming committee at this place? Did I miss something? Anyhow, she accompanies Michaela to Kyle’s house. As they approach, Michaela notices the heavy fog on the grounds surrounding the house, also noticed by Kyle when he opens the door to let her in. Obviously, the calling meant for them to meet, but why?
Michaela’s use of the phrase “it’s all connected” piques Kyle’s curiosity because it’s a phrase used often by his mom. He tells the sad story of how she got sick, and how she currently lays in a hospital bed in New York alone, waiting to die. He cannot leave the Indian sovereign land to visit her due to the arrest warrant issued by the Registry. Michaela will help him out on that, and she believes that this is the reason for which the calling brought them together. This is confirmed when another calling with the heavy fog causes her to stop driving away from the Indian land and forces her to relive in a vision the nightmare of the evening leading to the car accident that killed Evie. She turns the car around to take Kyle immediately to his mother.
In the meantime, Ben arrives at his dreaded visit to the prison to talk with Eagan. As expected, Eagan wants something in return before revealing the whereabouts of Eden. Oh, it’s not much, just his release from prison! When Ben brings this to Captain Colvin’s attention – first appearance of the Registry’s chief, played by the veteran TV actor Philip Casnoff – he gets swiftly rejected. He next turns to Vance for help – who’d a thunk it?
Vance is pissed off with Ben to say the least, because even though he did everything he could to find Eden, Ben stopped talking to him about a year ago. Heck, Ben didn’t even know that Saanvi is working with Vance! But he promises Vance that “this time, it’s going to be different.” I chuckled! Vance huffed! Ben basically needs Vance to use his contacts to arrange some type of a deal for Eagan, the very scuzzball who broke into Vance’s house and held his son hostage. Yet, every viewer probably guessed by then that, in one way or another, Ben would convince Vance to help him, once again. “Let me see what I can do,” the latter finally replies.
There is also a C story related to the background of the sibling dynamics between Cal and Olive. Couple of flashbacks show a bitter Olive who seems to blame Cal for the loss of their mother because he secretly allowed Angelina to remain in the house after Grace kicked her out in season 3’s “Compass Calibration.” But, much to Cal’s relief, Olive no longer seems to resent him. Another flashback later shows (see more below) that Zeke’s acquired supernatural powers — sigh!! — had something to do with that. Olive genuinely tries to help her brother figure out what Fiona meant when she said, “you already have the answer” in “High Flight.” She recaps to Cal (and to viewers who may not remember) how they figured out the death date, and more – the peacock, the Roman Goddess Juno, the year of the dragon, the compass, the Al-Zuras journal, etc.
Yet, none of it shines a light on what Fiona meant. Olive quickly realizes that she is in possession of one more piece of the puzzle, the tarot card she received from a reader at an amusement park when she was much younger (see season 2’s “Coordinated Flight”). It’s called “The Star Card” and has the image of the same unique star also found on the compass, in the journal, etc.
Jared, for his part, offers to help Drea with her workload at the Registry by following-up on a call about a passenger making a “suspicious purchase of fertilizer.” It leads him to a garden center to meet with a salesman named Lewis, played by the underrated actor Brian Anthony Wilson who smashed it with his recurring role as Detective Holland in all five seasons of the The Wire. Lewis saw red flags when a woman bought an exuberant amount of fertilizer considering the upcoming season of the ground freezing up for months. Jared requests that he sent the footage from surveillance cameras to the precinct.
Next, we see Ben and Vance visiting Eagan at the prison to offer him a chance at his release, provided that he coughs up Eden’s location. The most powerful moment of the episode occurs here, partly thanks to Darryl Edwards’s gut-wrenching performance. Vance loses his temper with Eagan and accuses him of causing his son to have nightmares for months and his wife to blame him for that, eventually leading to their divorce. In other words, Eagan ruined Vance’s family life. What is striking in this potent scene is how, during Vance’s diatribe, Ben comes to the realization that Vance coming to his rescue time after time has led to the demise of the ex-Director’s family. Josh Dallas also shines here, aptly depicting Ben’s sense of compunction upon seeing Vance’s suffering, and realizing that the world does not revolve around him and his search for Eden after all. He tries to mumble, “Vance… I.. I didn’t know,” but Vance has zero interest in Ben’s feelings of remorse. He turns to him and unloads: “How would you? You only care about one thing! I’m glad one of us gets to put our family back together.” Amazing scene!
After Vance leaves the room, Eagan finally signs the release conditions and provides Ben with an address on a piece of paper that burns away as Ben reads it. He informs Vance waiting outside that he will text him the address before offering his genuine apology once again about being selfish.
Michaela and Zeke sneak Kyle into the hospital to see his mother. She is not able to talk but thanks to Zeke’s superpowers — sigh! again — allowing him to act as a medium between Kyle and his mom, the young man understands that his mother deeply loves him. He decides to take her to their homeland to spend her last moments together.
This is when Zeke has a flashback to a moment where he found Olive in a state of emotional turmoil (still blaming Cal for Grace’s death) and offered to hold her hand. Once they did, somehow Olive was invaded with feelings of serenity and her sorrows were transferred to Zeke, or something like that… Is that what Zeke did here with Kyle’s mother as he was holding her hand? It’s unclear but the timing of the flashback suggests so. If Zeke indeed possesses the power to absorb other people’s dolor, it makes one wonder what damage that could cause to his own mental state over a period of time.
Of course, Kyle cannot simply check his mother out of the hospital without providing his name and when he does, it doesn’t take too long before Drea shows up with officers to arrest him. It turns out that Zeke has already sneaked Kyle and his mom away in a cab, largely thanks to Drea secretly cooperating with them. Kyle apparently left an Indian nation blanket for Michaela in the hospital room to express his gratitude for her help.
Micheala and Zeke arrive home and find Cal and Olive busting their brains, still trying to solve the puzzle of Cal’s purpose. Olive notices the star on the blanket given to Michaela. It has the same features as the one on the tarot card and the compass. On top of the star on the blanket, Olive notices the image of a button, which prompts Cal to tap on a button on the compass. A small part of the compass comes undone, and the words “Divina Conscientia” – Divine Consciousness – are etched inside the cap.
Olive’s brain goes into high gear as she states that The Star Card represents enlightenment, which means that Cal is directly connected to divine consciousness. This is when all the gadgets that the two spread out on the table with the star on them start to emanate a bright light. Cal recognizes it, because it is the same glow from the outside of the plane when he was temporarily stuck with Captain Daly and Fiona. Cal claims that “it’s all connected” and that they were all stuck inside the glow for 5.5 years. “We were in the divine consciousness,” he exclaims!
Er, can I get a wut?
Where is this story line going exactly? As John McEnroe would famously say: “You cannot be serious!”
Maybe it was my imagination, but I could swear that the expression on Luna Blaise’s face as Olive hinted at the actor herself trying to suppress a hard laugh as Cal said that sentence. I would not blame her, I barely suppressed one myself. I hope this is not going the way of Cal representing God in some form or fashion. Please, no!
Vance and his right-hand man Emmett leave in their car to meet Ben, except that Ben texted them the wrong address. He does not want Vance to be involved in his pursuit any longer. He calls him using a prepaid phone to thank him for everything he has done and informs him that he (Ben) must do the rest alone.
Jared checks out the surveillance-footage photos sent to him by Lewis, and Drea recognizes the woman buying the fertilizers. It’s Erika Burness who was one of Eagan’s disciples and whose boyfriend Randall almost killed Vance’s son in “Mayday: Part 2.” Jared sees Adrian’s name marked as her landlord! He and Drea decide to head to the location.
That location is also where Ben has arrived to retrieve Eden. As he goes around the house searching for an entry point, he gets knocked in the head from behind. That is the last scene of the outing, leaving it in some sort of a cliffhanger. It also makes it feel like this was the penultimate episode of a season — it’s not, obviously — because Ben should once and for all reach Eden in the next hour, which would bring closure to one of the longer arc plots of the season so far.
Last-minute thoughts:
– During his visit at the prison, Ben gets ultra-frustrated with Eagan and runs toward him as if to punch him. He later bangs the table with his fist from sheer anger. The guards could have at least taken a step or two toward Ben in either of those instances just to make the scene seem a tad more realistic. But, alas…
– There is a run-of-the-mill xyz story line concerning Jared’s new partner Officer Diaz – recurring officer since season 1 played by Omar Torres II – for which I did not care. It’s about Diaz eventually asking Jared to be frank and honest with him about conducting business unrelated to cop work during their working hours.
– Eagan signs the release document and writes the address on the corner of one of the pages of the document. He then tears that piece away to give it to Ben. Is that document still valid when a page has a corner torn? Yeah, I know, who cares, right?
Until the next episode…
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