Manifest

I've just decided the 8th episode of Manifest will be the last one I watched.

The series started out very well. A bunch of people get on a plane, and when they land it's years later and everyone thought they were dead. Then they start experience very odd things. Meanwhile, the government is watching them all. It's all very intriguing.

Also, I love that graphic of the plane flying through the title and leaving a hole. Congrats to whoever thought of that.

Even the early, best episodes were a little problematic. There was a sort of case-of-the-week quality to episodes which didn't fit with the serial nature of the show. The characters were interesting at first but as the episodes progressed there was no attempt to delve deeper, so they seemed increasingly flat. The pacing was increasingly sluggish, the stories increasingly focused on the soap-opera aspects.

Also, the characters started acting dumber, as when one explains his odd experiences to his wife in a way seemingly designed to make her not believe him. The writers wanted the story to go a certain way and were willing to have their main characters act dumb if necessary.

It's a shame, because I really, really liked the first few episodes. But at this point I've lost all interest.