*For the foreseeable future, some Character Review posts may not be published every Thursday as they have in the past.
*Warning: This post contains spoilers about the characters from the television series Manifest. Read at your own risk if you have not watched the show.
There is something to be said about a well written, human character. They leap off the page and speak to us as if they were right in front of us, as flesh and blood human beings, instead of fictional creations.
In a perfect world, romantic love would be a simple thing. But love, like life, is never simple. On Manifest, Jared Vasquez (J.R. Ramirez) thought he had it all. His career as an NYC detective was thriving and he was in love with Michaela Stone (Melissa Roxburgh). Though he had proposed, she had yet to give him an answer. Promising a response when she returned from a family vacation, he waited for her. Then the plane she was on disappeared and Michaela, like other passengers, were presumed to be dead.
For the first two years, his romantic life was static. Then Jared dated and married Lourdes (Victoria Cartagena), Michaela’s best friend. When the plane landed and he discovered that Michaela was still alive, he reveals that his feelings are unchanged.
But there are complications. The first is that Jared is still a married man. The second is Zeke Landon (Matt Long), a mysterious man with connections to the passengers and a checkered past. Letting his jealousy take over, their fight results in a gun going off. Michaela is hit.
Over the next few months, Jared simultaneously acts via his jealousy while protecting Michaela from those who questionable motives towards her and the other passengers. But in the end, he backs off, realizing that he needs to let her go.
To sum it up: Sometimes love means letting go. Watching Michaela walk into the sunset with another man is the hardest thing that Jared has done. But he knows that it is the only thing he can do.
Which is why she is a memorable character.
Writergurlny 