Netflix Users Are Obsessed With This 'Disturbing' 2026 True Crime Documentary

There's a horrifying new original true crime documentary film on Netflix, and after watching "The Crash," audiences are warning each other about the harrowing true story of Mackenzie Shirilla and a car crash that killed two of her classmates.

On July 30, 2022, Shirilla, her on-again, off-again boyfriend Dominic Russo, and their friend Davion Flanagan were driving home in the early morning from a party in Strongsville, Ohio — with Shirilla in the driver's seat. According to evidence, Shirilla was driving over 100 miles per hour at the time of the fatal crash and made no attempt to brake. Russo and Flanagan died at the crash site, and Shirilla sustained a number of harrowing injuries.

The question that people are asking, after they watch "The Crash," is simple: Is Shirilla a murderer? People on the internet sure seem to think so. On X, @wisconsinsane wrote, "Just finished watching Netflix's 'The Crash' and my mind is numb. I've watched some disturbing documentaries, but few have left me as unsettled as the story of Mackenzie Shirilla. She shows no contrition or meaningful acceptance of responsibility for the lives she destroyed." Another user, @missingplutotoo, said that Flanagan's father calling out the Shirilla family's parenting style made things feel clear. "Davions dad clocked it when he described exactly the disservice [Mackenzie Shirilla's] parents are doing to her in prison," they wrote. "She will never take accountability, never show remorse, and never grow. I hope she NEVER gets out."

People on Reddit were incensed too. On one thread, u/Remarkable_Rip6231 wrote, "Kenzie is a sociopathic narcissist. And no, I'm not an expert, but I have eyes and ears. She is an awful awful human." Some people, though, pointed their ire at her parents.

Across various Reddit threads, a lot of people pointed fingers less at Mackenzie Shirilla and more at her extremely lenient parents Nick and Natalie Shirilla. As u/saerra_sea_nya wrote, "These parents have a lot of f**king attitude for people letting their minor daughter live with her boyfriend. They created this monster through their absolute indifference to giving her a single consequence. She never stood a chance." (Shirilla started living with Dominic Russo in 2021, and she was not yet 18.)

"Her parents strike me as the kind of parents who got sick of parenting when their kid was about 11 or 12 – around the time it gets a lot harder to parent because your kid starts getting their own ideas about things – and basically just mentally checked out," u/Scary_Manner_6712 wrote on a different Reddit thread. "Like, do whatever you're gonna do, kid! The 'she was mature enough to handle it' is irresponsible parenting code for 'we're sick of the responsibility here and we're just gonna let the chips fall.'" u/have_heart agreed. "I hate to be the old man yelling at the clouds but god damn there was obviously ZERO parenting involved in her life. They literally just let her do whatever the f**k she wanted and let social media completely take over her mind," they wrote. "Just terrible. And then they tried to jump in after the fact and be active parents."

Twitter user @jbeyer1831 made a sort of flip but decently interesting point. "Mackenzie Shirilla's dad wearing a shirt that says "BOOM" while being interviewed about the crash in which his daughter killed 2 people is the craziest part of this whole show," they pointed out. Yeah, that ... doesn't look great!

I'm sure I don't need to say this, but the crime at the center of "The Crash" is deeply, guttingly, devastatingly sad. I am, frankly, inclined to agree with the online chorus on two things: Mackenzie Shirilla doesn't seem to show a ton of remorse for driving a car into a brick wall and killing two teenagers, and the way that her parents Natalie and Nick handled her upbringing left quite a lot to be desired. Even in the courtroom scenes, it's hard to see true guilt from Shirilla, who seems more perturbed that she's on trial than anything else.

On the one hand, true crime documentaries are everywhere now, even though some people would argue that, in recent years, documentaries in the genre cross ethical lines. "The Crash" is ... an interesting entry into the genre, to say the least. Not only does it feature a ton of dubious figures — including one of Mackenzie's best friends Rosie Graham, who apparently refused to speak to the police about the case but was happy to chat with Netflix when they picked up cameras — but it also gives some screen time to the families of Dominic Russo and Davion Flanagan.

That, I think, is the heart of this series, disturbing as it all is. Russo and Flanagan's young lives were cut brutally short in a heartbeat, and yet the entire ordeal is, bizarrely, chronicled through social media posts (many of which were made by Shirilla herself). There's an essential emptiness here and a hollow feeling to the entire project that makes it feel even more unsettling. 

"The Crash" is streaming on Netflix now, but tread carefully.