‘Manifest’ Season 1 Episode 6 Recap: “Off Radar”

By
Kevin Finnerty
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Manifest Season 1 Episode 6 Recap
Parveen Kaur, Jack Messina, Athena Karkanis, and Josh Dallas in ‘Manifest’ season 1 episode 6 (Photo by: Craig Blankenhorn / NBC / Warner Brothers)

“Cal’s fever has something to do with all the passengers that disappeared. We’ve got to find them,” says Ben (Josh Dallas) to his sister, Michaela (Melissa Roxburgh) while his son Cal (Jack Messina) is back in the hospital fighting a dangerously high fever in season one episode six of NBC’s mystery drama series, Manifest.

The episode begins with a flashback to Flight 828 in the air and a male passenger asking other passengers something in a foreign language. Flash-forward to Cal crying out in bed with a very high fever and saying the exact same thing the passenger was saying. Grace (Athena Karkanis) and Ben hustle to get Cal to the hospital, and Michaela tags along.

At the hospital, Dr. Saanvi Bahl (Parveen Kaur) hears Cal and recognizes the language from the man on the plane. While Grace talks to the main doctor about what’s wrong with Cal, Ben looks up the man on the list he created of all the passengers. Saanvi recognizes him and Ben identifies the man as Marko Valeriev, one of the dozen passengers Ben hasn’t been able to track down.

It turns out Marko is Bulgarian and that’s the language Cal has been speaking. Saanvi remembers a woman on the plane helping Marko, and Michaela is able to figure out her name is Anna and where they can find her.

Michaela calls Jared (J.R. Ramirez) and tells him to cover for her because Cal’s in the hospital and she’s taking a personal day. She tracks down Anna and asks her what she remembers about Marko. Anna explains she helped him translate his customs forms and she last saw him get on a government bus leaving the hanger to go to a government shelter.

Back at the hospital, Grace asks Ben why he’s looking for a passenger from the flight and how that’s important. Reluctantly, Ben reveals to Grace that something happened to everyone on the flight and that it keeps happening. Ben goes on to tell Grace he believes Cal’s fever might be tied to the passenger and the mystery involving the plane. Grace doesn’t want to believe it and reminds Ben that the last time Cal got sick Ben “shut her out and then she shut him out.” Grace tells Ben she wants them to be there for each other this time and that he needs to stop being a scientist and be a father.

Michaela goes to the precinct and is working out some possible remote locations the government might have taken the missing bus when Jared spots her. He’s angry at her, thinking she lied to him. When she tries to talk to him he shuts her down, saying, “I’m done. Leave me out of it from now on.”

Michaela discovers a location she believes might be where they took the missing 11 passengers who were on the bus with Marko. She calls Ben to tell him she’s going to go check it out, and he suggests she should take Jared because it will probably be dangerous. She tries to tell Ben that Jared’s fed up with her, but Ben pushes her. He knows this is too dangerous for Michaela to handle on her own. Reluctantly, Michaela tells Jared she needs him to take a ride with her. He caves in and goes along.

Manifest Season 1 Episode 6 Recap
Melissa Roxburgh and J.R. Ramirez in ‘Manifest’ season 1 episode 6 (Photo by: Craig Blankenhorn / NBC / Warner Brothers)

Michaela and Jared drive out to a remote area and find a farmhouse patrolled by a hovering drone and armed guards. The guards come out to meet them after they pull over outside the farmhouse and Michaela quickly reacts by giving her car a flat tire. She and Jared act as though they were out for a romantic drive and got lost. With the guards standing by, Michaela and J.R. fix the tire and drive off.

As they’re pulling away, Michaela takes a photo of people outside a red door and one is a woman in what looks like a hospital gown. After driving far enough away from the farmhouse, Jared pulls over and demands Michaela tell him what’s going on.

Michaela explains about the voices helping her crack cases and that she thinks the passengers of Flight 828 have been given a puzzle to solve. Jared finds it hard to believe but tells her she can still trust him. Michaela sends the photo to Ben and describes to him over the phone what she and Jared witnessed.

Back at the hospital, Cal’s fever is getting worse. In quick back and forth cutaways it’s revealed Cal is in sync with the tests and shock treatment being inflected upon Marko at the hands of some scientists. Cal’s primary doctor thinks they should put him on antibiotics to treat the fever. However, if they do that – as Dr. Saanvi reminds Grace – Cal will be removed from the experimental drug that is helping him beat the cancer. Ben’s against it, still believing the fever is tied to Marko somehow. He and Grace argue and he gets a sense of what he has to do and who he has to go see. He asks Grace to give him one hour.

Ben visits NSA Agent Vance (Daryl Edwards) and says he knows what they’ve done, revealing he knows about the kidnapping of the missing 11 passengers. He then shows him the photo of the woman by the red door wearing the hospital gown. She looks like Lena, a passenger on Flight 828 who’s also missing.

Vance and his men claim they don’t know what Ben’s talking about. Ben threatens to go to the press with his story and Vance has him escorted out. After he’s gone, Vance looks at the photo again and at Lena’s file. He thinks it might be her in both photos. He instructs his men to follow up on the missing 11 passengers.

At the hospital, Grace asks Saanvi what she believes is best for Cal. She suggests they should be sure the antibiotics will help before putting Cal on them. Grace disagrees and when Cal starts to shake violently, she tells the primary doctor to give him the antibiotics. Saanvi implores Grace not to and reminds her if she gives Cal the drugs he’ll be kicked out of the program and his cancer will come back. He will die. Grace changes her mind.

Later, Grace goes into the ladies restroom and collapses, crying. There’s a knock on the door and a nurse tells her Cal is awake.

Back at the farmhouse, the scientists and their patients are being moved to another facility due to Michaela’s visit and NSA Agent Vance’s checking into them. Cal’s connection with Marko is broken…for now.

At the hospital, Cal returned to a normal 98.6 degree temp and seems to be doing better. Ben shows up and Grace is angry, telling him he left her when she needed him and he can never do that again. Ben, Michaela, and Saanvi wonder how Cal suddenly got better and Ben says they’ll need to find Marko because it’s not over and he has a plan. Ben’s focus is a conglomerate known as Unified Dynamic Systems that uses ex-special ops for security, like the ones at the farmhouse, and has a high interest in the missing passengers.

Vance and his men check out the farmhouse and find it’s been vacated. Vance does a little looking around and finds a small used band-aid with fresh blood on it.

The last scene in Manifest season one episode six show the same scientist who was performing tests and torturing Marko speaking to someone on the phone. He explains they had to relocate but they should be up and running again very soon.

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