Poop Cruise review – a fascinating look at a toilet disaster that still haunts passengers 12 years later

The Guardian

9 hours ago

With the latest instalments of the series Trainwreck, Netflix appears to be trying to grant us some brief summer break from the worst kind of horrors the true crime genre can offer. In contrast to previous episodes, which looked at the Woodstock 99 riots and Astroworld tragedy that saw 10 people die in a crowd crush at a massive Live Nation-organised concert – including a nine-year-old child – it has suddenly pivoted in tone.
Last week it gave us Mayor of Mayhem, the tale of Rob 'I am not a crack addict' Ford, the crack-addicted mayor of Toronto and his very un-Canadian way of doing municipal business. In coming weeks, there will be accounts of the balloon boy's story, a private investigation agency run by soccer moms, and 'the greatest shitpost ever made'. Whether this tonal change comes as a relief from having your hopes for humanity further ground down or as psychologically jarring (should such disparate subjects as child death and municipal confusion be yoked together in the same anthology series?), will vary.
Meanwhile, here is Poop Cruise, which tells the 2013 story of the Triumph cruise ship, whose engine room caught fire halfway across the Gulf of Mexico. The ship's power was cut off, strand more than 4,200 passengers and staff for five long, hot and increasingly fetid days, after the toilet flushes malfunctioned.
The story is told partly through archive news footage, of which there is plenty, because as one reporter puts it, 'Sometimes there are those scenarios that come along and just grab everyone's attention,' and a 13-storey, 272m-long cruise ship – 'a skyscraper on its side' – filling with shit is one of them. It is joined by eye- and olfactory-witness testimonies from the likes of Larry and his daughter Rebekah, there to escape the stresses of her parents' recent divorce; Devin, on board with his fiancee and his in-laws-to-be; cruise director Jan; Russian bartender Hannah; chef Abhi; and, most gloriously, Ashley, a bride, and Kalin and Jayme, her two bachelorettes. None of them appear to have come to terms with the experience one jot in the intervening 12 years.
People had to poo in bags, you see. Jan had to get on the public address system and explain to thousands of disbelieving passengers that 'number ones' could be done in the shower but 'number twos' must be done in the red biohazard bags being distributed, then placed in corridors for collection by unnamed staff, none of whom chose to appear in this documentary. Ashley starts necking Imodium; Devin promises himself he will not crap in a bag while on a cruise with his future father-in-law; Abhi, the chef, notes that the unworking loos filled with poos layered with toilet paper look 'like a lasagne'.
Every guest is appalled and fantastically humourless about the experience, even at this distance. You cannot help but wonder at cultural divides and how differently the British might have approached – or at least recalled – such events, at least in the early days. For us, surely, it would be a story for the ages. You could dine out on it for ever, so to speak. But, Ashley, Kalin ('This can't be real!') and Jayme ('No way. Not happening') seem absolutely traumatised, haunted still by the memory. It's fascinating.
To be fair, when we reach the point where tugboats finally arrive to tow the ship to shore, causing it to list sharply, and the backed-up sewage to start running across every floor and down the walls, the comedy does fade slightly. In retrospect, it was also a mistake to open up a free bar on day two. Not that Jan needs retrospective. 'I was definitely against the idea.' Jan is English and northern. Always listen to Jan.
The only happy American on show is Frank Spagnoletti, a maritime lawyer sitting at home in Houston watching the debacle unfold. 'Obviously, my antenna was piqued.' I shan't give away what the fates have in store for him. I shall say only – check your tickets' small print every time, folks. There is some raw work pulled at the contractual font sometimes, and no mistake.
Unlike the unfortunates aboard the Triumph, we viewers are in and out of the situation in under an hour and feel like we have had quite a lot of fun in the process. If anyone wants to write the sitcom or the film, I would give either one my full attention. Also, some primeval part of my brain hisses, an international reality show based on it. I think there's a real opportunity to build some national pride here. Channel 4, it's over to you.
Trainwreck: Poop Cruise is on Netflix now.