Oh yeah, I had a watch of the viral Netflix documentary about people stranded on a cruise ship having to poop in little red baggies.
Honestly, I don't know what all the fuss was about.
Dont get me wrong, obviously it isnt very nice at all and my heart goes out to all of those poor people stranded, they would have been so afraid. But all I've been hearing about this doc was 'it's so gross', 'it's really graphic', 'not to watch over dinner'. They referenced poop, there was no graphicness, nothing particularly gross, the poor stranded passengers were told to poop in bags and then the loos overflowed when the ship was towed back to shore, they then told us about their experience during the interview sections.
So, Trainwreck as a whole looks into those little disasters that could have been prevented had the money not been chased. In this event, a large American cruise ship had an almighty disaster when the engine room caught fire. Now this ship had been advised of a few faults which would cause the inevitable fire but they were ignored. When the fire hit it burnt through the ship's power cables and left the THOUSAND+ passengers on board with no way to cook food, no phones, and more importantly, no flushing mechanisms for the toilets.
The crew of the ship have been commended for their handling of the situation, however I'm not sure the open bar policy was helpful in any way, but hey ho, and the ship got through a couple of very painful days before rescue came. No one died, no one was really in any danger, it was just very uncomfortable.
The documentary was only 55 minutes long so quite short in the grand scheme of things and they only interviewed three sets of affected passengers. I'd love to know the process for which these were chosen, you had the three ladies from the bridal party, a gentleman who was at the time holidaying with his future in-laws, and a father and daughter duo. All three had a different viewpoint of the experience and to be fair my heart only really went out to one of them.
The bridal party I could not take seriously. If I was in their situation I'd do one of two things; make the best of it, or cry and say the whole thing was ruined. Have a do over when back on land. The entire interview with these women was the disappointment that they could not get drunk and how gross the situation was. They expressed their disappointment the bar wasn't open, and then complained of peoples behaviour when it was open as people literally went wild. There was no winning with these ladies, it was all about them. I found myself with no sympathy for them at all, there's more to life than drinking, and in a situation like that the last thing you want to do is get drunk. No, this point of view just summed up bridezillas for me. No mind for a crisis.
The gentleman who was on holiday with his future wife and in laws garnered a little more sympathy from me, but not much. His absolute refusal to use anything other than a toilet annoyed me. Everyone was in the same boat and the way he was behaving was part of the problem. This man hunted a working toilet when there was only a rumour of them and was so against the idea of pooping elsewhere he was causing a health issue to his own body by holding it in and of course massively contributed to the overflow when it happened. They said dont use the toilet for a reason, not because they were hiding working loos. Toxic behaviour for sure, but clearly it impressed his in laws as he still goes holidaying with his FIL. For me, stubbornness is a turn off especially when in a crisis and maybe it is a culture thing, but this jut massively annoyed me and gave me the ick. I would never dream of causing half the fuss these guys did, I'd just be scared and hoping help would come and that the crew would do their best for me.
The last set of passengers my heart was with fully. It was a father with his teenage daughter. She would have been scared, plus it was clear she was missing her mum, and he was alone and trying to do the best for her with an entire boat of drunken wild people. He'd gone into papa bear mode and was just trying to keep her safe. These were the ideal passengers to deal with in a crisis, sure they were also against pooping in a bag but that isn't the most savoury of ideas is it, but minimal complaints from this family, they just wanted to go home.
We now turn to the crew. We have director of the Carnival Triumph, Jen. She single handedly saved these people from themselves. By staying as calm as she could and as upbeat as she could, this woman got these people through a horrific ordeal. You can tell she loves her job and you can tell she stepped up when they needed it. Obviously she would have had help, but aside from a chef she was the only crew member interviewed and it was clear she was front and centre for most of it.
We then go below deck to the kitchen and chat to a chef who talks about how bad this was for the crew. He was also adamant he wasn't gunna use the bags but we got to see how the staff were affected through him. The air con cut out so the heat especially below deck would have been boiling and it wasn't like they could just swan off to the top deck like the passengers, they were trapped in the service of over a thousand terrified people. It's an awful position to be in.
Another staff member was interviewed, a lady, and her shrug-it-off attitude caught me off guard. She mentions how when the alert went off for the fire she was in someone elses bed and that sleeping with one another amongst the crew happened a lot. No doubt it does, but I'm not sure that was needed in this interview, also how pleased she was about it. I'm all for people doing what they want, just there is no need to kiss and tell about it, especially when we are talking about shitting in a bag. We didn't really cut back to her after that so her input was purely about the behind the scenes life of the staff.
In terms of documentaries, I didn't find this ground breaking but it was interesting. It wasn't really an attention grabber or presented in a factual sense or anything. This was a shock factor snapshot into a cruiseship scandal/malpractice case and nothing more. It seemed like a throwaway documentary, we didn't really learn anything, we just got to see what would happen when a cruiseship goes out of power and how it brought out the very worst in people.
I'm giving Trainwreck: Poop Cruise a 6/10. This was a reality for people, they lived this and it was horrible. But I'm not sure this documentary did them justice in any way. I'm just thankful no one died.
As always, recommendations for reviews are welcome, just drop me a message!
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