What actually happens
The 1962 dance has a cable problem
In May 1962, off the Labrador Coast, passengers on the Italian ocean liner MS Antonia Graza are dancing while a singer named Francesca performs. A little girl named Katie Harwood sits by herself until the ship's captain asks her to dance. Meanwhile an unseen passenger pulls a lever that tightens a metal cable. The cable snaps, tears through the stage and the dance floor, and bisects everyone except Katie, who screams. This is the scene people dread, and it is the opening of the movie, so you now know exactly when it comes. The story then jumps forward forty years.
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Free gold, with a minor sinking problem
Forty years later, Captain Sean Murphy, Maureen Epps, Greer, Dodge, Munder and Santos run a salvage tug. A weather service pilot named Jack Ferriman tells them he saw a ship drifting in the Bering Strait that belongs to whoever tows it into port. They set out on their tug, the Arctic Warrior, and find that the ship is the Antonia Graza. On board they discover nine wooden boxes, each holding 28 gold bars. Strange things start happening and the ship is sinking, but the crew decides to take the gold and leave. Then an unseen force sabotages the Arctic Warrior with a gas leak and the tug explodes, killing Santos.
Everybody gets a personal haunting
With the tug gone, the only way home is to repair the Antonia Graza and sail her to port. Greer meets the ghost of Francesca, who lures him into an affair behind his fiancée's back and then tricks him into a fatal fall down an elevator shaft. Sean meets the ghost of the ship's captain, who tells him that the crew had taken gold from a sinking cruise ship called Lorelei, along with its only survivor. Sean is shown a photo of the survivor and recognizes him. Before he can warn the others, a hallucination makes him see Maureen as Santos's ghost and he flies into a rage. The others decide Sean has lost his mind and lock him in a drained fish tank. An unseen force opens a valve, and Maureen later finds him drowned.
The helpful pilot has a second job
Maureen meets the ghost of Katie, who tells her what happened on the Antonia Graza. The survivor of the Lorelei talked members of the crew into killing the passengers, the captain and the officers for the gold. Once the passengers were gone the crew began fighting among themselves, and Francesca finished off the one officer still alive. The mastermind then dealt with Francesca himself, by letting a hook swing loose across her neck. He turns out to be Jack, a demon whose job is to push people into sinning and then collect their souls for Hell. Maureen works out that Jack lured the salvagers to the Antonia Graza so they would repair her, and she decides to sink the ship. Munder goes scuba diving in the flooded engine room and is crushed by the machinery. Maureen asks Dodge to keep Jack busy on the bridge while she sets explosives.
The ending, explained
Jack mocks Dodge as a coward for never telling Maureen how he feels, and then charges him. Dodge fires a shotgun at him and believes that settles it. He finds Maureen setting explosives and says they can take the gold and start a life together, but Maureen notices he has not asked about Munder. Then Dodge's face changes into Jack's. Jack had already murdered the real Dodge. Jack explains that the ship is his trap: while it floats, he can take the souls of everyone who died aboard down to Hell when he goes back. Maureen detonates the charges, Jack is torn apart, and Katie guides Maureen off the sinking ship. Then Katie and the rest of the trapped souls rise to the afterlife. Maureen is picked up by a cruise ship and brought ashore. As she is loaded into an ambulance, she spots crew hauling gold aboard the cruise ship, with a resurrected Jack supervising.
The post-credits ruling
Nobody has confirmed whether there is a scene after the credits.
✓ Spoiled safelyDog status: fine, no dog dies.
Questions people ask at 1am
Is Ghost Ship scary?
Yes. Ghost Ship is a 5 out of 10: a haunted-ship story with jump scares and a gory opening scene, and the dread is mostly gone by the time the credits roll.
How does Ghost Ship end?
Maureen blows up the Antonia Graza, which destroys Jack and frees the trapped souls. She is the only survivor of the salvage crew, and she sees a resurrected Jack overseeing gold being loaded onto the cruise ship that rescues her.
Does the dog die in Ghost Ship?
No, no dog dies in Ghost Ship.
Is there a post-credits scene in Ghost Ship?
Nobody has confirmed whether Ghost Ship has a scene after the credits.
Who is Jack Ferriman in Ghost Ship?
Jack is the weather service pilot who points the salvage crew to the ship. In Ghost Ship he turns out to be the mastermind of the 1962 massacre, a demon who tempts people into sin and takes their souls to Hell.
