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Unsolved Mysteries (Documentary, Season 15; 2020)

Netflix (12 episodes)

People always pacify the grieving party to be strong. The truth is out there, and it will eventually surface, they say. That truth will prevail, and the perpetrator will be caught sooner or later. To keep mourning quiet, to give closure, we tell them that justice will be meted eventually; that the long arm of the law will catch up. Nah, these are all stop-gap measures to coo a wailing baby. Some things remain unanswered forever.

The parties featured in this series will be a testimony to that. Many of the tragedies that happened to them occurred long ago, but nothing has come their way to put an end to the many questions that have plagued minds. The family members and friends involved in the few cases depicted in the 12 episodes would probably carry their sorrow to their graves, hoping that they would know everything when they reach the Otherside. Disappointed they would be if there nothing on the other realm- just void, no heaven or hell, just nothing!

The 'Unsolved Mysteries' documentary series is a long going show that tries to highlight cold cases and paranormal activities that has been around since 1987. This particular offering from Netflix was released in two batches of 6 episodes each in July and October 2020. 

Many unexplained things are found in the first episode 'Mystery on the Rooftop' where a writer is found missing from home and later found dead decomposed in a hotel conference room after jumping or pushed off a building. How he went up on to the roof and where he jumped from and why remains the unanswered questions. The funny thing is that his associate refused to divulge any information and was gone hush with the help of lawyers.

In '13 minutes', a likeable salon owner goes missing, only to be found almost 2 years later. The secret of her disappearance lies in the 13 minutes, where there were no activities on her mobile phone. Her husband, an abusive stepfather to her son is a suspect. Another serial killer admitted to murdering her but it turned out to be a false lead.

One of the most gruesome murders narrated here happened in Nantes, France. It involved a mother, her four children and two dogs of the Dupont de Ligonnès family. The father, Xavier, is the prime suspect and is said to have escaped the country and his whereabouts is unknown. We learn about the French aristocrats here and how some have failed over the years as the country became more socialistic in outlook. The whole episode is in French.

'No ride home' is a reminder that the Western world is no more civilised than the rest of the world. They are equally quick to react to people who look and dress differently from them. Alonzo Brooks, a black boy, fails to return home after a party in the deep white country of Kansas. Police and FBI fail to locate the boy, but his body appeared in plain sight when the family and friends conducted a search party. The whole imbroglio reeked of police cover-up and community concealment of a hate crime. Lynching never stopped; it just continued in other ways.

In 1969, there was an alleged UFO sighting and alien abduction in Berkshire County, Massachusetts. Diehard fans of 'X Files' would be quite familiar with this. Unfortunately, nothing is found online about this incidence. The episode is an account of the narrative of a few who viewed a bright light in the sky. Two of them experienced being beamed up into the skyship. Radio DJs who were working that night admit receiving calls from listeners. These were pushed aside as pranks, and there are no reports of it in the local newspapers as retrieved from archives.

In one twisted episode, 'Missing Witness', a daughter helped her philandering mother to kill her stepfather. When the case somehow ended up in the court, the witness, the daughter, goes missing. Everybody hunch is that the mother made her daughter disappear, but according to her mother, she had found a man and had moved to another state with no forwarding address. The stepfather and the daughter were never found. Hence, there is actually no case to try.

'Washington Inside Murder' tells the case of a powerful man amongst the inner circle of Capital Hill, John Wheeler III, whose body was found in a dumpster in Delaware. With the help of digital tracking of his mobile device and later with the use of CCTV footage around town after he allegedly lost his phone, investigators had a patchy outline of his activities before his death. Afflicted with bipolar disease, his behaviour appeared bizarre. He was involved in many high-level deals. There is a suspicion that he could have been at the wrong end of a deal gone wrong.

'Death in Oslo' has much resemblance to the Isdal Girl, about a girl found in the icy cold mountainous area of Isdalen Valley in Norway in 1970. One glaring similarity between the Isdal Girl and the girl in this episode who apparently shot herself in a suicide bid in an exclusive hotel in Oslo in 1995 is the cutting of labels off her garments. It is said to be the practice of undercover agents to cover their tract. There were no gun residues on her hand and DNA which was extracted years later did not reveal much. 

In 1965, Lester Eubanks, a sexual predator by today's standards, abducted and killed a 14-year-old girl. He confessed to the murder and was sentenced to die by electrocution. His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment after the State of Ohio stopped the death sentence. Eubanks was an apparently reformed prisoner and was recruited in a reform programme. He was tasked to do Christmas shopping with a few other inmates and is on the run since 1973.

Another exciting episode is on the Tsunami that devasted a remote eastern coastal area of Ishinomaki, Japan, in 2011. The tragedy killed over 20,000 people. Following the event, many people there, family members and even taxi drivers started seeing apparitions. Many had nightmares, others saw bizarre creatures in the distant and shadows in the water. To an outsider, the Japanese seem to appear too religious. Their spirituality actually runs deep. Much like Hinduism, the thin veil that separates life and death is pretty flimsy. Life and death is a continuum. People who have said their proper goodbyes before dying or had close relatives who have had a closure to their loss need spiritual guidance to put people at peace. Japanese also underwent the same turmoil during Hiroshima and Nagasaki mishaps.

'Lady in the Lake' tells about a Michigan church-going lady going missing in 2010. Her body was found two months later in Canada. Police classified it as suicide even though there were family members who had a bone to pick with the deceased. The final episode discusses missing children and possibly child abduction rings.

We can wait till the cows come home (and go back again to graze) for the Truth to surface. We can waste our lives cracking our head trying to prove our point. We can make it our life long ambition to right the wrong, or just move on.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International.