‘Unsolved Mysteries’ Volume 4 Review: A Haunting New Case Load
Unsolved Mysteries is more than a TV show. Since it first debuted in 1989, the prolific docudrama has shined a light on hundreds of mysteries—including unsolved murders, abductions, missing person cases, and strange crimes—over a dozen of which have since been solved. The show’s impact on these cases is often inarguable: just last year, a missing girl was found in North Carolina after a shop owner recognized her from the show. This positive track record puts the beloved series into an echelon reserved for a rare few documentary projects: true crime that has done undeniable, measurable good.
This is a lot of responsibility for one TV show, especially when its legacy also involves cryptids, aliens, and some decidedly ’90s moral panic moments. The newest Unsolved Mysteries reboot, now in its fourth year on Netflix (the latest season is technically its third, with its first split into two parts), has so far done an admirable job filling its predecessor’s shoes. The new show immediately found an enduring formula; gone are the voiceover narrations and multiple cases per episode, replaced with sobering, detailed, interview-heavy looks into some of the most mystifying open cases of our time. As expected, the show occasionally intersperses these dark stories with episodes about ghosts or UFOs, but it takes those accounts seriously, too, often emphasizing the very real fear witnesses felt and ending with a call to action.
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The new season won’t disappoint longtime viewers of the franchise, though it does feature a small handful of odd narrative miscalculations. The Shawn Levy-produced reboot has often made ethical true crime storytelling look effortless, relaying its cases in a straightforward, compelling way without the camp of the original or the wild conjecture of today’s online mystery-solving communities. This time around, though, the show sometimes tilts oddly towards the lurid and unconfirmed. It relishes the near-constant inclusion of blood-soaked crime scene photos in one episode and invokes Satanic Panic-era superstition in another. In one case, an expert talks about lie detector tests as if they’re good evidence, while in another, they’re more accurately described as limited in their accuracy.
Mostly, though, Unsolved Mysteries remains thoughtfully put together and blessedly unsensational, but never, ever boring. Two of the cases featured in the five episodes available for review have gotten so much media attention before that one might at first question their inclusion. But they’re presented with ample firsthand accounts, expert interpretations, and fresh details that make them feel urgent and interesting. Others feature cases that, like so many in the series’ history, are at once baffling and seemingly solvable, captivating puzzles with just a few tricky pieces missing.
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Of course, they’re not just puzzles but real-life tragedies, and the new show’s understanding of that is one of its best traits. The new Unsolved Mysteries never worries about getting too heavy, instead giving its subjects all the space they need to grieve their often unthinkable—and in some cases, nonsensical—losses. Fans of the older Unsolved Mysteries, with its corny re-enactments and “catch this crook” throughline, may balk at the depths of despair on display in some of these stories, but that raw emotion makes them feel deeply human. The show isn’t afraid of lingering in the uneasy feeling of ambiguity, either, and some of its best episodes leave viewers with the strange, haunting pang of pain that often comes with such vast, unanswered questions.
Decades after the show’s initial run, the revamped edition of Unsolved Mysteries shows no signs of stopping. Assuming it does continue, I hope the show’s writers and producers continue pouring the same level of care and attention into the stories it will continue to tell. Outlier moments like the bloodied crime scene photos and questionable talking points seem to be included in the show as a way to fill time or to push an already unusual true story into the realm of unbelievably unique. Perhaps the show’s best path forward would be a return to its old ways: episodes that focus on more than one story (two feels ideal), and therefore never feel stretched thin or padded with iffy material.
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Like another famous crime show that hinges on audience calls to action, John Walsh’s America’s Most Wanted, Unsolved Mysteries is by now as much an institution as it is a form of entertainment. A generation of viewers who were raised on the original was shaped by the ways in which that series portrayed the world, and though the cultural cachet of any given show is different in the options-filled streaming era, the new Unsolved Mysteries remains overtly influential. The new season mostly takes that legacy seriously, opting out of oversimplified narratives and instead focusing on the messiness and complexity of human life. At its best, its attempts to make meaning out of mystery take on an existential undertone, one that parallels humankind’s natural search for meaning. But Unsolved Mysteries is better than our own search for meaning, because it has Mothman.
Summary
The latest season of ‘Unsolved Mysteries’ mostly takes its legacy seriously, opting out of oversimplified narratives and instead focusing on the messiness of human life.
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