Unravel

ABC Australia

English Documentary Society & Culture True Crime Explicit

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Episodes 59

Avg. Duration 34m

Activity Dormant

Apple Rating ★ 4.7 (717)

Since May 2018

Latest Episode May 2026

Publishing Details

Schedule

Daily

Format

Serial

Hosting

www.abc.net.au

About This Podcast

What Became of Jack? — the latest season of Unravel, the ABC's award-winning investigative true crime podcast series. 27-year-old Queenslander Jack McLennan had been relaxing, drinking beers at a picnic spot, when his mate said he looked away, and when he looked back, Jack had vanished. Jack was fit and healthy, and even though he'd just been through a break-up, he seemed positive. But now, Jack was missing, and strange clues began to surface, hinting at his last movements. With online theories about the case spreading like wildfire, ABC journalist Rob Burgin sets out to investigate. Has there been a crime or not? He traces the fragments of that night through a web of small Queensland towns, where everyone knows everyone, everyone knows something, but no one can agree on what became of Jack. Previous series of Unravel cover various investigations into crimes and crime-related topics, including solved and unsolved murder cases, missing persons, forensic analysis, gangland crimes, love scammers, con-artists, drugs, terrorism, Neo-Nazis, and miscarriages of justice — all investigated by some of Australia's best reporters and people who know the story best. In Season 7, Blood on the Tracks, award-winning Muruwari and Gomeroi journalist Allan Clarke spends five years investigating the unusual circumstances surrounding the death of 17-year-old Gomeroi teenager, Mark Haines. In 1988, just outside of Tamworth in country New South Wales, a freight train hits Mark's body lying across the tracks. When the rail worker stops the train and gets out, the scene doesn't add up. The tracks divide Tamworth in two. An Aboriginal community on one side, a largely white population on the other. Some will say it was a suicide and others a murder. Despite the strange evidence found at the scene of his death, the family feel like they're being ignored by the police. An inquiry finds no answers, and the mystery is left to fester, causing division and suspicion in the town. Allan's reporting helps to spark a resurgence of interest in the case that sees the file reopened, a review launched, a reward announced. As Allan gets closer to the truth, the story ends with a revelation no one was expecting, and the thirty-year-old mystery finally begins to unravel. Blood on the Tracks won a Walkley award for Coverage of Indigenous Affairs. This series was re-published with a bonus episode due to updates and advances in relation to the case. In Season 6, Mr Big, journalist Alicia Bridges investigates a disturbing recording of a man admitting to a murder. She finds herself in a world of lies, gangland and subterfuge, where very few things are as they seem. Her reporting leads her deep inside an international controversy, to a world of secrets that powerful institutions don’t want revealed. In Season 5, Firebomb, Crispian Chan investigates what really happened after his family’s restaurant went up in flames in 1988. He was just a kid when Chinese restaurants were being firebombed in the dead of night and a campaign of terror was underway in Perth. Thirty-five years on, most of us have never heard about it, even though it’s one of the few sustained and coordinated terrorism campaigns in Australia’s history. Crispian teams up with ABC reporter Alex Mann, and together they traverse the country to find answers and explore the darker forces that still lurk in our suburbs today. Firebomb won the ‘Best True Crime Podcast Award’ at the Australian Podcast Awards in 2024. In Season 4, Snowball, Ollie Wards investigates how his brother’s whirlwind romance with a charismatic Californian woman ultimately cost his family more than a million dollars. When Greg Wards met Lezlie Manukian, a beautiful woman whose world is full of glamour, he is immediately drawn to her. They fall in love, get married and start planning the rest of their lives together - the only catch is Lezlie is a con artist. To find out who his brother’s wife really is, Ollie must track down Lezlie herself, and it soon becomes clear that his family’s story is just one piece of a bigger jigsaw. Snowball won Best True Crime at the Australian Podcast Awards in 2020, was one of Apple Podcasts' Best Listens of 2019, and made the American Bello Collective’s top 100 list that year. In Season 3, Last Seen Katoomba, reporter Gina McKeon digs deep into the suspicious unsolved disappearance of young mum, Belinda Peisley, who was last seen in the Blue Mountains town of Katoomba, west of Sydney, in September 1998. Belinda’s life descends into chaos after her 18th birthday when she receives a large inheritance and buys her own place in town. It’s a move her family thinks will set her up for life but, instead, the house becomes a magnet for a world of drugs and a crowd of hangers-on who visit day and night. Gina pieces together the stories and evidence around the six main persons of interest named in the inquest into Belinda’s disappearance and suspected death, and what emerges is a picture of a town and a case shrouded in secrecy. In Season 2, Barrenjoey Road, reporter Ruby Jones tries to solve the mystery of what happened to 18-year-old Trudie Adams after she disappeared while hitchhiking home on Sydney’s northern beaches in 1978. Ruby exposes the dark underbelly of the seemingly beautiful and serene “Insular Peninsula,” uncovering a world where surfers run drugs home from Bali, gangs of men prowl the beaches and predators have unchecked power. Ruby will question why the case was never solved and her investigation will lead her to a criminal monster with links to organised crime and police corruption at the highest level. In Season 1, Blood on the Tracks, award-winning Muruwari and Gomeroi journalist Allan Clarke spends five years investigating the unusual circumstances surrounding the death of 17-year-old Gomeroi teenager, Mark Haines. In 1988, just outside of Tamworth in country New South Wales, a freight train hits Mark’s body lying across the tracks. When the rail worker stops the train and gets out, the scene doesn’t add up. The tracks divide Tamworth in two. An Aboriginal community on one side, a largely white population on the other. Some will say it was a suicide and others a murder. Despite the strange evidence found at the scene of his death, the family feel like they're being ignored by police. An inquiry finds no answers and the mystery is left to fester, causing division and suspicion in the town. Allan’s reporting helps to spark a resurgence of interest in the case that sees the file reopened, a review launched, a reward announced. As Allan gets closer to the truth, the story ends with a revelation no one was expecting, and the thirty-year-old mystery finally begins to unravel. Blood on the Tracks won a Walkley award for Coverage of Indigenous Affairs.

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Recent Episodes

S8 INTRODUCING — What Became of Jack?

May 11, 2026 2m Trailer

When a fit young man disappears from a picnic spot, leaving a trail of strange clues behind him, a community begins to suspect the worst. The belongings he leaves behind are discarded in a way that…

S8E6 06 Huntsman | Lisa's family speaks

Dec 02, 2025 44m

Lisa Lynn's family members break their silence after years of declining to speak to the media.Rachael Brown has been in Tasmania to hear from Lisa's mum, Kim Searle, her dad, David Searle and her two…

S8E5 05 Huntsman | Missing campers

Dec 02, 2025 44m

When Lisa's friends hear that Greg Lynn has been arrested, their painful memories of his abusive behaviour are brought up all over again. In clinical detail, Greg Lynn tells police how he disposed of…

S8E4 04 Huntsman | Final call

Dec 02, 2025 43m

When Lisa's body is found in the front yard of her bluestone cottage, her friends are in disbelief. The coroner says no suspicious circumstances were found. Lisa's friends are left searching for…

S8E3 03 Huntsman | Separation

Dec 02, 2025 40m

The couple have two children, but Lisa discovers Greg's been keeping secrets. Greg leaves Lisa, but doesn't leave her alone. Lisa starts pushing back on Greg's demands, his behaviour escalates.If you…

S8E2 02 Huntsman | The pig

Dec 02, 2025 28m

More strange signs of a cruel streak emerge after Greg Lynn and Lisa Lynn settle in a bluestone cottage in the sought-after postcode of Mount Macedon, Victoria. Lisa's friends are horrified by what…

S8E1 01 Huntsman | Lisa and Greg Lynn

Dec 02, 2025 38m

'There's more you need to know. Call me.' When commercial pilot Greg Lynn is cornered by police over the disappearance of campers in Victoria's High Country, ABC journalists start receiving messages.…

PRESENTS — Awaye on Mark Haines

Nov 26, 2025 1m

In 1988, Rudi Bremer's cousin Mark Haines was found dead on railway tracks outside Tamworth — the day after Rudi was born.Unravel explored Mark's story in our series Blood on the Tracks, culminating…

PRESENTS — The Eleventh

Nov 07, 2025 37m

If you're an Unravel and true crime buff, here's another podcast you'll love — The Eleventh.It's about what really happened during the biggest scandal in Australia's political history — the dismissal…

S7E8 08 Blood On The Tracks | Finally, a new inquest

Oct 22, 2025 57m

It's 2025, and the NSW Deputy Coroner is holding a fresh inquest into the death of Gomeroi teenager Mark Haines, who was found dead on the train tracks back in 1988.As the inquest hearings spiral…

S7E7 07 Blood On The Tracks | Face To Face

Oct 22, 2025 32m

Years of investigation have led to this moment … a major breakthrough in the case, a potential answer to thirty years of mystery and pain for the Haines family.An alleged confession has revealed who…

S7E6 06 Blood On The Tracks | Revelation

Oct 22, 2025 24m

Allan and the team shift their focus to Tamworth and the truth starts to emerge from a fog of rumours. As Allan builds on the case, he discovers the police aren't far behind.An eyewitness comes…

S7E5 05 Blood On The Tracks | The Driver

Oct 22, 2025 32m

More than two decades have passed since the coronial inquest into Mark Haines' death. The family have been forgotten about — until news reporter Allan Clarke arrives in Tamworth on a routine story…

S7E4 04 Blood On The Tracks | Whitewash

Oct 22, 2025 31m

Nine months after Mark's death, an inquest is held. The family are hopeful it will give them answers, but the police won't budge from their theory that he put himself on the tracks.As the hearing…

S7E3 03 Blood On The Tracks | The Boxer

Oct 22, 2025 27m

On the surface, Tamworth in 1988 is a typical Aussie town with rodeos, farmers and an active Country Women's Association. But beneath the friendly veneer, there's a thriving criminal underbelly.…

S7E2 02 Blood On The Tracks | Foul Play

Oct 22, 2025 30m

When Mark Haines dies, news of the teenager's death spreads quickly through Tamworth and beyond. His family are on summer holidays in different parts of the state and rush home to be together in…

S7E1 01 Blood On The Tracks | Blood On The Tracks

Oct 22, 2025 29m

Just outside Australia's country music capital, a young man's body is found on the train tracks, surrounded by shattered Christmas presents and discarded wrapping paper.For decades, the mystery has…

S7 REINTRODUCING: Blood On The Tracks (reprise)

Oct 22, 2025 4m Trailer

Back in 2018, our first season Blood on the Tracks investigated the suspicious death of 17-year-old Mark Haines, whose body was found on the railway line outside Tamworth in January 1988.Since Allan…

S6E8 BONUS | Behind the scenes on Mr Big

Oct 21, 2024 21m

Go behind the scenes of the podcast with reporter Alicia Bridges, who answers questions about how she investigated Mr Big.Asking the hard questions is Rachael Brown, the host of the ABC's first true…

S6E7 07 Mr Big | Through the looking glass

Oct 07, 2024 44m

As Alicia Bridges investigates the beginnings of an epic deception, she finds it spans across continents. At the heart of the deception is an upside-down world of gang crime, and a series of…

Frequently Asked Questions

How many episodes does Unravel have?

Unravel has published 59 episodes since May 2018, covering topics in Documentary, Society & Culture.

Is Unravel still active?

Unravel is currently dormant with new episodes daily. Average episode length is 34m.