Reborn

Will is a man who has been working for months to get a promotion and is extremely excited to tell his mother Sarah, the most important person in his life, about it. When he arrives at her house, he discovers that that she has been murdered by her neighbor, George. Will struggles to control his anger and even attempts to kill George in an effort to seek revenge. Though he fails, George ends up dead shortly after he goes to prison. Will realizes that George's death can do nothing to bring his mother back and his pain won't go away so he commits suicide. After his death, he wakes up in the afterlife with a woman about his age sitting in front of him named Sam. She claims to know him and explains that she must guide Will as he acclimates to his new life. Everyone who dies ends up in the afterlife, but are born into new families and new environments and live completely different lives. Will and Sam are two of the very few people who can remember their previous lives, but they can't remember their lives in this new world. Sam tells Will he is a writer who wrote a very popular mystery novel 5 years ago. Will is at first uninterested in his new life. He comes to the realization that if everyone who has died is in this life, that includes his mother. Sam helps him find her address and he goes to visit her, but when he knocks on the door, he's met by George. In his rage, he starts to beat up George and is only stopped when he notices a 4-year-old girl in the house watching him. He finds out that his mother is married to George and has a son and a granddaughter. Will discovers that Sarah will be receiving an award for charitable work and purposely runs into her at the event. Will gets Sarah to agree to get coffee with him under the promise that he'll make a sizable donation to her charity with the money he made from his novel. The next day, Sam makes Will eat dinner with his new family in the afterlife: his parents Bill and Sophia and his sisters Taylor and Amy. Will is surprised by how much he likes his new family and quickly develops a strong relationship with Taylor. Will then meets with Sarah for coffee and develops a strong relationship with her. Everything seems to be going right for Will as he gets closer to his new family, Sarah, and Sam. As his friendship quickly progresses with Sarah, he realizes that she is very similar to the mother he knew before. Will believes this to mean that George is the same man he was before too. Will begins to push his family and Sam away, focused only on what Sarah thinks of him. Sam reveals to Will that he helped guide her in the afterlife before his death in the first life. She encouraged her college friend Grayson to come out, but when Grayson was unaccepted by his parents, he committed suicide. Feeling responsible, Sam turned to drinking and hard drugs, eventually leading to her overdosing and dying. She explains that her and Grayson were miserable in their first lives, but are happy in this new world, encouraging Will to forget about Sarah and allow her to be happy and to try to find happiness himself with his new family. Shortly after this, Will learns that Bill has had a heart attack and visits him in the hospital. On his death bed, Bill reveals to Will that he remembers his past life and he is at peace with his death, believing there will be another life after this one. Will continues to meet Sarah, but she invites George to get coffee with them. When George arrives, he recognizes Will and leaves with Sarah, telling her he'll explain everything later. Will believes this to be the end of any relationship he could've had with Sarah, but Sam tells him that there is a preacher named John in Alabama who can help people remember their past lives. Will and Sam travel to Alabama and witness John performing a ceremony to give a woman her memory back. Sam reveals to Will that Grayson came with her to this place before and had his memory restored. Grayson was furious at Sam for making him remember such painful memories. This does not discourage Will and he speaks with John. John tells Will that anyone who remembers their past life can make others remember, meaning Will can give Sarah her memory back if he chooses to. Sam and Will get into a fight about what the right thing to do is, but Will is determined to restore Sarah's memory. When Will and Sam return to their home, they learn Taylor has overdosed and rush to the hospital. Will and Taylor have a heart to heart in which Will tells Taylor that she can't just rely on him and has to stop pushing other people away. At the same time, Will realizes he should take his own advice. After this, Sam tells Will she'll support whatever decision he makes if he reads the novel he wrote. Will agrees. A week later, he invites Sam over and reads her the last page of the book. The book describes a detective named Jean, whose career has been plagued for many years by the one suspect he let get away. When Jean finally tracks the man down, he is at the park with his granddaughter. Jean realizes that the man he let get away is no longer the man he once was and lets him go. This forces Will to realize he must let Sarah go. In the final scene, he sees her at the grocery store with George. As she walks away with him, Will can't help but smile, knowing she is happy and he can now be happy too.