The '90s Were So Mysterious

On March 13, 1997, thousands of people across Nevada and Arizona reported to have witnessed seven lights in the shape of a V. Others reported seeing orbs and triangles in the sky. One witness account said the lights were as low as 500 feet above them. Actual Earth vehicle, or UFO from outer space? You be the judge.

Ed's secret sauce brought Good Burger back from near-bankruptcy after Mondo Burger showed up in town. But while we got a glimpse of the recipe in the movie, Ed never confirmed the ingredients himself. Sure, people have tried to make copycats of the secret sauce from Good Burger; what's more, Kel Mitchell (who played Ed) once said that it tastes like In-N-Out's sauce. But I want real answers, darn it.

One evening in 1996, journalist Brian Bethel was parked in front of a movie theater. Two boys around 10 years old approached him in his car. One of the boys explained that they went to the theater to watch Mortal Kombat but left their money at home, so they needed a ride. While this was happening, Bethel was totally overcome with fear, although it wasn't clear why. They tried to convince him to open the car door — but as Bethel was reaching for the handle, he caught sight of the boys' eyes: They were completely and utterly black. He rushed off in his car; then, when he looked back, they had vanished. The legend has persisted, though, and stories of the black-eyed kids, or BEK, can still be found all over the internet today.

Didn't people have screens? Wasn't anyone afraid of heights? Didn't neighbors ever get suspicious seeing pre-teens and teenagers scaling homes and climbing into each other's windows? It didn't stop it from happening repeatedly on Clarissa Explains It All, Scream, and every other '90s TV show and movie you can think of. I'll stick to the front door.

This has to be one of the biggest mysteries to leave us scratching our heads; and people haven't stopped talking about it.6 -year-old JonBenet was found dead in her family's home in 1996, and the murder remains unsolved. There have been articles, reports, TV specials, interviews, and movies; but authorities haven't been able to answer the one burning question: Who killed JonBenet?

As a kiddie, I would lay awake in bed at night gazing at my lava lamp, always tempted to try and bust it open and remove those magical floating orbs. It's long been a secret the truth about what's in a lava lamp, although many claim it's basically colored wax floating in colored water. Still, I think there's something we don't know. It's just so... incredible.

(And yes, I realize that lava lamps existed long before the '90s. They definitely had a resurgence in that era, though; every '90s kid wanted one in their bedroom.)

Before the Phoenix Lights, there was the Cosford Incident in March of 1993 — when hundreds of people in the UK saw patterns of lights in the sky. Some claimed that the mysterious object was as close as 200 feet to the ground, with others saying it had actually landed. The Cosford Incident is yet another UFO experience that was never truly explained.

One of our favorite '90s sitcoms included one of our favorite characters — from the eyes up, anyway. Wilson (actually, Wilson Wilson, Jr. was his full name on the show) was a Home Improvement icon, but we never got to see his face. We'd try to sneak peaks in the cracks of the fence he shared with Tim the tool man, but we never got a good view. It's true that if you're really curious, you can just Google Earl Hindman, the actor who played him (although there still aren't a ton of good pictures, so consider yourselves warned)... but still. Unfortunately, Hindman died in 2003, but those of us who came of age in the '90s will never forget him.

If the first rule of Fight Club was that you can't talk about Fight Club... how did he go on to explain the next seven rules?

I WANT ANSWERS.

Just... everything about Gak. Its ingredients. Its appeal. Its very existence. It is the very embodiment of mystery, is it not?