What Manifest's Cal Change Could've Meant For Season 4

The Manifest season 3 finale’s ending twist with Jack Messina’s Cal could have been a game-changer for the NBC series had it not been cancelled by the network. Shortly after disappearing, Cal returned at the end of the episode as a 17-year-old. It appears that the character is now five years older than he was when he left.

During the two-part finale, the experiments of Dr. Gumpta (Mahira Kakkar) and her Eureka science team on the Flight 828 tailfin attracted the attention of Cal, who has always had Callings much stronger and more mysterious than those of the other passengers. Determined to see the tailfin, he headed to the facility, where it was discovered that his body was covered in strange sores. Later, against the will of his family, Cal touched the tailfin and vanished without a trace. Afterward, Ben (Josh Dallas) and Saanvi (Parveen Khaur) tried returning it, hoping that this move would bring him back. Unbeknownst to both of them, Grace (Athena Karkanis) was killed by Angelina (Holly Taylor). In her dying moments, she was greeted by a much older Cal, who told her that he now understood what he needed to do.

Related: Manifest: Why Zeke's Powers Are Different From The Passengers'

Apparently, Cal actor Jack Messina being recast with Ty Doran would have been a permanent change if the show had been renewed for another season, considering that Manifest showrunner Jeff Rake already bid farewell to Messina (via Twitter). That also means that what she saw wasn’t a hallucination or anything else. Somehow, Cal has been aged around five years, putting him at approximately the same age that he would be at this point had the plane not disappeared. Captain Daly (Frank Deal) suddenly appearing in the cockpit (which is where he was when the plane vanished and when he was last seen in season 1) supports the theory that the tailfin restored Cal to the way things should have been.

Manifest hasn’t offered a proper explanation for Cal’s new status quo, but it looks like whatever happened was triggered by Saanvi and Ben putting the plane's tailfin back into the ocean. Getting Cal back was what they wanted, but him coming back five years older is obviously not what they were expecting. As for what exactly did happen to him, it’s possible that the dark lightning experiments done to the tailfin propelled Cal back in time, where he lived out the next five years and gained the experience needed to guide the passengers through whatever comes next.

As previously noted, he already shared a deeper connection to the Callings than everyone else, but his messages and hints haven’t always been clear to the Stone family, or Cal himself for that matter. It may be that an older and more capable Cal would have proven to be the ally they desperately needed in Manifest season 4 if the show wasn't cancelled. That in fact may be the very reason why Cal – who seemed to have some idea of what was going to happen – seemed so convinced that he was making the right decision.

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