Mystery and the Supernatural

A glass window shatters in a straight line, not a spiderweb breakage like you'd expect from a baseball. Then is it some accident that happened? Or was it intentional? A logical science-minded viewer would clearly say no. Here is the usual domain of the mystery genre detective or the story equivalent. The rational tools provided must be used; no deviation allowed. Everything can be reduced to a simple method and motive. dX/dt = 5x gives a family of logarithmic solutions. And that equation is right too. Just 'cause. Mystery follows logic well in the conventional sense. As a genre it often strives to follow science’s ability to derive answers to any problem. (Science’s claim to know everything disguises its true intellectual greed.) 

What if the answer to the situation presented had a supernatural cause? Mystery after all doesn’t have to  be bound by the physical laws guiding the universe according to our collective knowledge (though it often chooses to be). I don’t know the answer to how the window broke but perhaps a well-controlled spell or attack destroyed it in such a precise manner. Supernatural can offer spectacular solutions to dilemmas, though such occurrences still – usually – follow rules that govern that system. But the logical deductions possible in supernatural mysteries require creative problem solving beyond relying upon strictly that which has been seen before. One must analyze the situation and gain an understanding of the rules at play before constructing the “answer” to the problem.

We can thus expand our imagination and understand how to respond to situations unlike those in which we have previously participated. Otherwise how does one react when the rules are clearly dismantled or only partially applicable? While Mulder seems too focused on aliens and supernatural phenomena that do not exist, Scully believes too strongly in science and logical explanations. Together, however, these two characters are able to combine belief in the supernatural and the occult with logic and science to construct creative and satisfying responses to the bizarre situations they encounter. Such is the strength of the supernatural fused with mystery. Media such as The X-Files and Rewrite remind us well of this fact.