'...and DON'T *bleep* IT UP!' -- the RuPaul's Drag Race thread

Yes, Nicky improved immensely from the first season. She's a real pro now ! I still have to watch season 2 of Belgique. I've been on a Dragula binge lately. Season 666 was incredible and made me want to rewatch the old seasons.

I took a break and skipped UK.

UK is my favourite one, I think. Maybe just because it's closer to home and the references are more familiar to me. The BBC also have a new sitcom about drag queens in Middlesborough, called Smoggie Queens, and I am really enjoying that too, even if it is ninety percent laughing at accents and badly drawn eyebrows.

UK was fun this season because right up to the very last minute I wasn't sure who would have it and I honestly thought for a couple of seconds it would be a tie.

Same, a tie would have been a good call.

I loved Queen of the Universe Season 1. I will have to watch season 2.

We're almost back!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rP2okfO48Uk

Kicked off the season well, I think. (The weak spot was Katy Perry, obv. -- rather PERFORMATIVE guest judge moves, however much she can draw on her Voice stint, and crosspromoting her failed comeback single was a bad gamble.)

Even more importantly, Monet back as Pit Stop host!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3DlnZg8X2w

That was a fun episode. Lots of great queens and I always like when they bring back Lil Pound Cake.
The talent show was more diverse than recent ones.
Nina Bonina's daughter really stood out to me. I thought she could've been in the top.
Miss Suzie Toot has got to have the weirdest make-up since Tammy Brown, but she's a cutie as a boy.

Yeah Suzie is all "I am so a 1920s cartoon!" and I'm thinking "Well...you don't HAVE to be."

I always like when they bring back Lil Pound Cake.

For once a pop culture reference lands exactly when something is currently happening! (My guess is they did that fairly recently and they asked the season 17 queens to come back with their opening looks for it, since otherwise them all 'meeting' each other in the werk room right after makes even less sense when they're all right there!)

Oh and

Nina Bonina's daughter really stood out to me.

Yeah, Lucky Starzzz definitely has fascinating chops -- and they're already hyping up the backstory (terrible what happened to her stepdad, man!) so I'm guessing a long run.

(My guess is they did that fairly recently and they asked the season 17 queens to come back with their opening looks for it, since otherwise them all 'meeting' each other in the werk room right after makes even less sense when they're all right there!)

Sounds right !

The Vivienne died :( cause unknown

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gw1v51yezo

Holy shit!

32, so young. awful :(

Rotten enough when Cherry Valentine passed but this compounds it.

yeah this fucking sucks. what a talent she was

and now Tyra enters the chat on a *stale* 5 year old beef w Viv & confirms that she is the spiteful troll she’s always been :/

https://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/drag-races-tyra-sanchez-slammed-for-joke-about-death-of-the-vivienne/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=bluesky

Good grief.

so gross

the last people you would expect drama from...

i finally watched the first ep of S17 .. fun group, i sense that a few of these gals will pop the hell OFF once they settle

Rooting for Lucky Starzz for sure! <3

some of this homegrown makeup is so funny … some on-camera finesse is desperately needed

Arietty’s “badger realness” with that white nose bridge is wtf. girl that’s your thing every look? you look demented

Suzie Toot in the talent portion looked like a 1920’s Richard Simmons dragged through an ash-pile. YIKES . Nightmare lol
(but clearly very talented!)

oh and i think my fave is Lexi Love. I like her vibe & i alway stan an older seasoned queen. Oh and Sam Star because she’s Trinity’s baby!

Canada judging is less woden than before and Brooklyn is less irritating than before but still manages to be cringe worthy here and there.

happy for Minhi Wang to make the final four - i thought Pearl was going to make it for sure. rooting for Virgo, she started so strong - in the first couple of episodes it was like she was on a different level compared to the other girls. and what a lovely human being <3

---

after the pit stop i can't stop seeing Hormona as Sadness from Inside Out in her confessionals (good on her for owning it though)

surprised the judges haven't read Suzie (and yes, Arriety) for her makeup yet (and i really want to see what she would look like in glam makeup). she's prettier out of drag!

sad that Acacia is not long for this season as we are strangely attracted to her confessional look. but at least she'll be one of very few people who got to parade their hairy ass in front of RuPaul.f

has Jewels been cast as Frodo for the next LOTR remake yet?

Lexi is amazing, but really it's a strong cast all around this season. looking forward to Sam's delusion levels reaching those of Loosey

happy for Minhi Wang to make the final four

Yeah that's great! Loved the chat with her brother too.

after the pit stop i can't stop seeing Hormona as Sadness from Inside Out in her confessionals

That was SO sharp...and accurate.

has Jewels been cast as Frodo for the next LOTR remake yet?

...you're onto something here.

looking forward to Sam's delusion levels reaching those of Loosey

Oh my god, after Sam's talent number I was singing "Let LOOSE" to myself.

Also I did appreciate the 'battle of the white girls' there

i’m so mad that no one went home >:(

but it was a fun episode & i love how bitchy these queens are. Kori clowning on Joella’s wig behind her back was so fkn funny

Hahahah yeah that was great. And I'm not surprised at the last minute save but yeah, c'mon. (I think pretty obviously ANYTHING she pulled would have resulted in a dunk, I'll bet.)

oh of course. as soon as i saw the tank there was no way Michelle wasnt going in lol

There was some comment from one queen about how that means there's now a one out of nine chance for the rest of the season and so I guess we're getting the 'it's chocolate' setup for the future here.

i’m terrible at math but everytime a queen quoted a ratio i was like hmm i dont think that’s right

yeah once they introduced the tank there was no way there were going to send the queen PERSONALLY INVITED BY RUPAUL home

and this way they could let her lose the lipsync after she said on camera that there is no way Ru would let the queen PERSONALLY INVITED BY RUPAUL lose. so shady!

but yeah, we're 2 episodes into it without anybody going home yet..

i do like that that they are feeding the PERSONALLH INVITED BY RUPAUL mythology by having her stay

if you thought she was insufferable before miss Hormona is going to become MechaInsufferable now

her church lady vibe is just nails on a chalkboard for me i haaaaate it so much

Lexi Love is far and away my favorite queen after this week. Everyone else: DUST

lexi love rules so hard and is a walking dream blunt rotation, i loved onya nurve tho. she feels teleported in from an earlier, scrappier version of the show

"church lady vibe" haha otm
it's just so bizarre, even in drag she somehow manages to look like she's about to start handing out chick tracts

onya reminds me of kennedy davenport a lot (in a good way)

i see onya in the lineage of queens i've loved like dida ritz, heidi n closet, chi chi devayne (RIP legend). there's no elaborate concepts or crazy tricked out couture fashion, you can tell they're scrapping the outfits together, which might not even fit properly, so it's just all about going on stage and selling their charisma uniqueness nerve and talent. the lovability of the underdog. it's the true essence of drag permeating into a show that has created its own ecosystem that is related to, but also a distortion of, what being a drag queen really is

yeah Onya is great, her talent song was SO good

Excellent description re Onya.

yeah J0rd otm

in other news i realize I somehow completely skipped s16 so i am finally watching that as well <3

the last part of j0rd's post articulating what I've been feeling re: Drag Race for years - increasingly resentful of the show for molding drag into what Ru deems to be drag - and barely allowing any colouring outside the lines (and the one or two queens per season that are allowed outside its narrow definition and confines of what is drag - see the queens j0rd listed - are still predictable in its own way), ofc I'll still watch every season (but not All Stars, I have a limit ffs) but I'm fucking sick of it

when I go out and see drag irl and see creativity that is not on Carson fucking Cressley's radar, it's a balm

i agree with a lot of this but i think certain credit should be given to Ru for openly favouriting queens like Jinx, Yvie, Sasha Velour, Sharon Needles, Willow Pill etc

Yeah, it’s not all pristine glamour, but in the end both points are accurate.

the end of my post isn't necessarily a criticism of the show, tho it certainly could function as one. i remain a fan and loyal viewer of the show, it's just an endlessly watchable format for a TV show, for one, and they still routinely surface thrilling artists and performers. drag race is just so unique in terms of the world its built for itself and how the enterprise interacts w/ the artform/profession that its based on. like, top chef for instance was (is) seen similarly by the food world as a legitimately meaningful competition for chefs to win or even appear in, it's made about as many multimedia careers for chefs as drag race has for drag queens. but you don't hear from chefs out in the real world about how top chef is affecting the food economy, or how it distorts the creative output of the restaurant world. you don't have 21 year old chefs who started cooking two years ago who know all the lore of top chef but have cooked in a restaurant kitchen a dozen times in their life, or maybe never, and who seem to be thinking about their food only thru the prism of what is successful on top chef

survivor is the only show i can think of that is comparable to drag race in terms of this self-sustaining cycle of fans turned contestants who come onto the show and openly talk about all these things that have happened previously on the show, and how their own experience on the show is being filtered thru what happened to previous contestants, often peppered w/ trivia and minutiae that establish the show as this own big little universe unto itself, with a hotly debated hierarchy of popularity and success which is constantly being invoked on air, all further actively cultivated by the show's host, because the lore fuels the passion that sustains the entire endeavor. but survivor has no real world art form w/ its own significant but separate legacy and present day culture that is being permanently altered by what happens on the show, so it's, obviously, a lot less complicated

all that said, i do think the show was better in the earlier seasons, because the lore was less established, and there was less money being poured into the specific act of winning rupaul's drag race. i am wowed by the nymphia winds of the world and think it's sick to see queens handmaking couture level runway outfits in the werkroom, however i always love to see someone like onya who, as i said in my initial post, seems teleported in from a scrappier, less pretentious and more pure version of the show. there is something that triggers for me on an emotional level that most of the newer day contestants just don't hit. willow pill is a mt rushmore drag race queen for me bcuz she embodies it all -- the high concept high fashion club kid runway fantasias but w/ that ragtag underdog i'm just a broke artist from some midsize city about to own this mf stage attitude and verve and worldview that was present in so many of the contestants from the earlier seasons, and which, really, in a general sense, powered the show overall

Yeah, Willow was a real delight of a breakout. And I would enjoy Onya going the distance -- I've said before about how there are good season 'narrators,' who by default go to the end or almost all the way and have a great insight into everything in terms of dynamics and how to talk about them punchily in confessionals. Onya right now seems like she can be a great one, especially since she's approaching it in a more singular fashion rather than interwoven into one scene or lineage or another.

there are good season 'narrators,' who by default go to the end or almost all the way and have a great insight into everything in terms of dynamics and how to talk about them punchily in confessionals

the Asia O'Hara of it all...

drag race is just so unique in terms of the world its built for itself and how the enterprise interacts w/ the artform/profession that its based on

otm, and i don't think one could argue that the show itself is responsible for revitalizing the art and bringing it into the general public awareness - but that came with the inevitable commercialization and all the horrible consequences of it. on the other hand, it also means that the performers get paid and get paid better now, and there is more demand for it (at least i hope it's the case but then we had a Canadian contestant who mentioned getting paid C$37.50 per performance..)

and it should be noted that a lot of this elitism comes from the former contestants themselves, like monet and raven criticizing onya's outfit.

feels like the regional franchises are going through the same transformation and there is more pressure for "glamour"

contestants who come onto the show and openly talk about all these things that have happened previously on the show, and how their own experience on the show is being filtered thru what happened to previous contestants, often peppered w/ trivia and minutiae that establish the show as this own big little universe unto itself

which also feels unique to drag race in that the trashiness of the earlier seasons is openly discussed and celebrated.

feels like the regional franchises are going through the same transformation and there is more pressure for "glamour"

I realize it was partially because they filmed in the Philippines studio for it, but I was a little bummed to lose the distinctly different Drag Race Thailand season 2 werk room for the season 3 one.

I’ve been watching old Fashion Photo RuView eps & can i just say the eps that Violet & Katya hosted together were great & adorable. I love them together.

the Taylor Swift ep is chef’s kiss
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tj4z5-GxMM

Hahah yeah I should go back to those myself!

Violet should be the next Vogue editor.