There’s something almost rebellious about a comedy as proudly, aggressively stupid as Stop! That! Train! In an era where even the lightest studio entertainment can feel burdened by franchise mythology or the need to justify its own existence, Adam Shankman’s disaster-movie spoof has a refreshingly uncomplicated ambition: make people laugh. Preferably with a dirty joke, an extravagant wig and a speeding pink train threatening catastrophic destruction.
Taking its cues from the gloriously straight-faced absurdity of Airplane! and The Naked Gun, Stop! That! Train! isn’t particularly concerned with subtlety. Some of its punchlines can be spotted approaching from several stations away, but knowing where they’re headed doesn’t necessarily make their arrival any less funny. There’s a gleeful commitment to the stupidity here, and Shankman understands that the difference between a terrible joke and an incredibly funny terrible joke is often simply how confidently you tell it.
Drag Race alumn Ginger Minj and Jujubee lead proceedings as Tess and DeeDee, best friends working aboard the decidedly less glamorous Stank Rail who dream of graduating to the luxurious Glamazonian Express. When circumstances finally give them their opportunity, they find themselves contending with a trio of impossibly polished first-class attendants, headed by the deliciously cruel Amber (Brooke Lynn Hytes). Unfortunately, professional humiliation soon becomes the least of their concerns when a catastrophic weather event threatens the train and pretty much everything unfortunate enough to be sitting in its path.
The plot is deliberately ridiculous, essentially functioning as connective tissue between an increasingly manic collection of sketches, visual gags, double entendres and celebrity appearances. But Christina Friel and Connor Wright’s screenplay is smart enough to recognise that this kind of comedy works best when the characters don’t seem aware they’re starring in a joke.
One of the smartest choices Stop! That! Train! makes is resisting any temptation to treat the drag queens themselves as the punchline. The aforementioned Ginger Minj, Jujubee and Brooke Lynn Hytes, as well as Symone and Marty Lauter aren’t playing heightened versions of their drag personas; they’re playing genuine female characters within this ridiculous universe. Nobody stops to explain it, wink at the audience or congratulate the film on its inclusivity. These women simply exist.
Ironically, playing everything comparatively straight – or as straight as this movie could ever conceivably manage – makes the comedy considerably gayer and much funnier. The performers are allowed to concentrate on character rather than novelty, and the film trusts its audience to go along for the ride. Minj and Jujubee make for an enormously likeable central pairing. Minj gives Tess just enough sincerity and ambition to keep the story emotionally grounded, while Jujubee proves particularly adept at turning DeeDee’s obliviousness into something endearing rather than exhausting. Their friendship provides an unexpectedly sweet centre to a movie otherwise occupied with sex jokes, cocktails and impending mass transportation catastrophe.
But it’s Hytes who very nearly steals the entire train out from underneath them.
As Amber, the vicious head stewardess of the Glamazonian Express, Hytes delivers every insult and withering observation with the gusto and commitment of The Devil Wears Prada-era Meryl Streep. Amber could tell someone their uniform was crooked and make it sound like she had personally ordered their execution. Hytes understands exactly what movie she’s in but, crucially, never behaves as though Amber does. The absolute seriousness with which she approaches such spectacular nonsense only makes her funnier.
RuPaul similarly knows how to occupy the absurdity as President Judy Gagwell, presiding over an alternate America where political catastrophe apparently takes a back seat to fabulousness. The entire world of Stop! That! Train! operates according to its own cheerfully queer logic: luxury high-speed rail is the preferred transportation of society’s elite, class warfare can be determined by access to cocktails, and the greatest threat posed by an impending disaster may well be what happens to Laurie Metcalf’s house.
Then there’s Sarah Michelle Gellar.
Playing an exaggerated version of herself, Gellar becomes the subject of one of the film’s strongest running jokes: nobody seems particularly impressed by her celebrity. Her repeated expectation that someone will finally recognise her, only to be met with indifference or outright dismissal, becomes funnier through sheer repetition. And just when the bit seems to have exhausted itself, the film finds another gear with a perfectly timed gag involving her appearance in I Know What You Did Last Summer. It’s exactly the kind of obvious joke you know is coming and still find yourself laughing at when it lands.
That philosophy extends across much of the movie. Stop! That! Train! isn’t afraid of the obvious punchline. Sometimes it actively races towards it. The screenplay understands that predictability and effectiveness aren’t mutually exclusive, particularly when the cast sells the material with such conviction.
And what a cast Shankman has assembled. Rachel Bloom, Joel McHale, Chris Parnell, Nicole Sullivan, Missi Pyle, June Diane Raphael, Matt Rogers and a seemingly endless procession of familiar faces wander through proceedings, sometimes for little more than a single gag. The abundance of cameos could have easily turned the movie into an exercise in celebrity spotting, but their brevity suits the anything-goes structure. A joke arrives, detonates and the film is already speeding towards the next one.
Not everything hits, naturally. Comedy this densely packed practically guarantees a few derailments, and there are stretches where Stop! That! Train! feels less like a movie than a particularly expensive series of sketches sharing the same production design. The narrative is knowingly flimsy, character development is hardly the priority, and viewers resistant to camp excess may find the relentless silliness exhausting.
But complaining that Stop! That! Train! is too ridiculous would be rather like complaining that its train is too pink.
Shankman commits wholeheartedly to the film’s artificiality, and that commitment gives it an infectious energy. There are echoes of Airplane!, certainly, alongside the unapologetically feminine silliness of something like Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion, but the film ultimately develops a comic personality distinctly its own. Its queer sensibility isn’t something pasted over an existing disaster spoof; it informs the rhythm, performances and entire universe of the picture.
You certainly don’t need an encyclopedic knowledge of RuPaul’s Drag Race to enjoy Stop! That! Train!. Those who recognise its callbacks and understand the particular comic rhythms of its queens will undoubtedly get an extra layer of pleasure from proceedings, but the movie has enough pratfalls, sight gags, filthy innuendo and inspired stupidity to accommodate newcomers too.
Most importantly, it’s funny.
That sounds like faint praise until you consider how many modern comedies seem almost embarrassed by the prospect of simply making an audience laugh. Stop! That! Train! has no such reservations. It’s camp, crude, sweet, knowingly ridiculous and occasionally so stupid that resistance becomes futile. Not every joke reaches its destination, but enough arrive with such spectacular timing that you’re happy to stay aboard.
And if the only available seat happens to be back in coach beside an increasingly irritated Sarah Michelle Gellar? Well, whoever she is, she seems lovely.
THREE AND A HALF STARS (OUT OF FIVE)
Stop! That! Train! is screening in Australian theatres from August 13th, 2026.
