Real vs Reel: Is Manifest season 4 a true story based on 2014 Malaysian Flight's disappearance?

Manifest Season 4 is not a true story based on the mysterious disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 in 2014 but its plot has been taken from real-life events.

Manifest-4 Manifest-4-true-story Manifest-season-4-true-story

Manifest season 4 has been buzzing on social media and among OTT fans ever since it was released on Netflix on November 4, 2022. In fact, Manifest 4 has become the top web series on Netflix in multiple countries including India in a matter of just a few days. Created by Jeff Rake, Manifest has been produced by Cathy Frank, Laura Putney, Margaret Easley, Harvey Waldman, Marta Gene Camps. Manifest Season 4 star cast includes actors like Melissa Roxburgh, Josh Dallas, Athena Karkanis, J. R. Ramirez, Luna Blaise, Jack Messina, Parveen Kaur, Matt Long, Holly Taylor, Daryl Edwards, and Ty Doran. Bow, the question arises, whether Manifest 4 is a true story or Manifest 4 is a real story or not.

The answer to this question is yes and no at the same time. Manifest Season 4 is not a true story based on the mysterious disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 in 2014 but its plot has been taken from real-life events. As reported by Hollywood media, creator Jeff Rake opened up about the Manifest 4 true story at the San Diego Comic-Con 2018 when he was asked if the web series is based on the disappearance of Malaysia Flight 370 in 2014.

Rake shared that the real-life event has a 'pivotal role” in the story (kind of… if you squint a little), but was mostly drawn from personal experiences. Rake had further stated, "The truth of the matter is, I thought of this idea almost 10 years ago, driving in the minivan with my family to the Grand Canyon, thinking about family togetherness and separation. The big idea hit me, I pitched it around. Nobody wanted it."

"And then seven years later, Malaysian Airlines happened and suddenly this crazy idea felt a little more real and more relatable in the context of Malaysian Air. Suddenly, people were interested," added Rake.

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Malaysia Airlines flight 17 disappearance 2014

For the unversed, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 went missing on a journey from Kuala Lumpur International Airport to Beijing Capital International Airport on March 8, 2014. The Malaysian airline flight's last communication with Air Traffic Control (ATC) came just over 30 minutes into the flight, and military radar lost sight of the plane about an hour later. An extensive search began for the Boeing 777 plane, but it was never found. All 227 passengers and 12 crew members were presumed dead.

Then, in 2019, The Atlantic reported that proper protocols were not in place during the flight’s disappearance. They found that the controllers did not notify authorities in a timely matter after witnessing the flight disappear from their radar screens. Instead, they 'tried repeatedly to contact the aircraft, to no avail.' The outlet further states that the rescue center wasn’t contacted until roughly 18 minutes after the flight’s disappeared from their radar, which they referred to as 'an exercise in confusion and incompetence.' Due to continuing inefficiency, emergency response didn’t begin until roughly five hours later, when the plane was set to land.

Notably, there was another theory related to the infamous 2014 Malaysian flight disappearance. One of them was that the plane was damaged before takeoff, that a fire occurred in the cockpit, and that the plane was shot down mid-flight. However, according to Britannica, an analysis of an Inmarsat satellite found that the plane veered off-course and traveled over the Indian Ocean. Then, the U.K. Air Accidents Investigation Branch determined that the plane crashed in the Indian Ocean. Analysts on 60 Minutes Australia later concluded that the pilot, Zaharie Ahmad Sha, crashed the plane on purpose.


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