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

About time for this, I figure! Fifth season premiered yesterday.

condragulations

Quite right!

this show is kind of fascinating in a "gender is all performance!" way - everyone congratulating each other (incl the judges) on how well they achieve some kind of archetypal female-ness

Okay come on, I KNOW I'm not the only person on here watching.

I promise to start now.

Marilyn Monroe should've been in the bottom. She didn't do anything.

Yeah that was an epic flop. I like Ivy well enough but that made me go "Whuh?"

Jinkx, Alaska and Roxy were the best overall, but Jinkx just owned it period.

I like Ivy too and I think she was lucky she didn't have to lipsynch against Lineysha. I didn't expect her to do so well (but her Celia Cruz was unforgiveable).

Deep clusterfuck, that. Also what WAS Detox thinking.

um hi I just started watching season 5 online having never watched and omg I'm hooked

I'll be caught up in no time :D

Don't forget to watch Untucked, an essential part of this show!

Yeah I just figured that out...gotta love these bitchy girls. MORE drag homework? *twists arm*

Very good. Join us, join us...

Shanté, you stay!

Season 2 still the best so far, I think.

I just binge-rewatched season 3 over the weekend on Netflix and I might have to vote for that one. Then again I just like Raja a hell of a lot, so.

Yes for Raja and Manila. But the rest, not so interesting. Yara-Sophia maybe...

It actually came down to the right final four I thought, Alexis was a character in her own right. But yeah Yara (Xara?) was next level.

I still haven't seen season four! For some stupid reason it's not on Netflix -- it was for about two seconds and then went away again without explanation. (Already know who won, obv., but I'd like to see it happen.)

Wait what!! Can't you watch it on logo online or something? We can't in Canada but I thought you could in the US.
Season 4 was pretty good, although they tried to create too much unnecessary drama. But I'll let you see by yourself.

You can see the Untucked episodes from season 4 on the site but not the main shows. Since you can buy all the shows from iTunes maybe they want to go that route? Who knows!

Makes sense. If RuPaul had a dollar everytime she mentions iTunes...

Hey, house payments are probably up there. (And I don't begrudge Ru ANY success and trappings.)

I don't either. At least she's very upfront and funny about it.

Fun fact we learned during the All Stars season: Jujubee's real name is actually Airplane!

Hahaha yeah I remember thinking "Wait, what?"

I also love that Manila's real name is the none-more-Minnesota Karl Westerberg.

Lol wow

Almost caught up on S5 now yay!

Every single time Alyssa glams up for the runway all I think is JOAN COLLINS JOAN COLLINS JOAN COLLINS

I don't know why but I think I like Detox. Jinkx is great but I dunno if the unglam thing is going to hold out for her or not. I love her for it, but it could wear thin.

I will say this, have started following her on FB -- win or lose she seems to be having a blast and is booked for other live appearances and things and more this year already, so I like to think of her as winning already!

Meanwhile, it's a little surprising to see such a mostly white group at this point. Not that I think the show is biased, appears to be more luck of the draw season by season in terms of who survives.

that little edie impersonation was fuckin awesome in the last ep. too bad her fashion totally sucks.

I found s2 streaming on Amazon Prime, so yaaaay

Meantime:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/02/27/drag_race_grey_gardens_and_jinx_monsoon_why_the_queens_need_camp.html

I do have to quibble with some of the assertions there -- while Sharon's success in 4 is great, in 3 Raja was more than a little disruptive herself -- as was Manila really; if anything Alexis was the one let go at the end precisely for being full pageant.

I haven't watched all the seasons, but I don't get the impression that they are only seeking pageant or necessarily favoring that. And while I noticed the lack of "camp history" in the S5 girls, isn't there an argument that maybe a lot of queens are trying to let go of that, like that cliche of teens not wanting to know about older music? I mean, I'm bummed that they don't know who Little Edie is but maybe when they see Jinkxs win they go find out. And it doesn't mean they're any more terrible for what they don't know of their history. If anything, it's kind of fabulous that they all came to that same place *without* it.
I dunno. That article seemed a little too buttclenched.

Related but I think better expressed post, linked off the official site

http://www.newnownext.com/drag-race-jinkx-monsoon-snatch-game-little-edie/02/2013/

Oh and in checking Twitter Alyssa DID apologize to Ms. Perry.

Also this exchange is interesting (notice it's everyone else BUT Jinkx and Michelle who get riled up -- and as Michelle notes, in noting the obvious, there's always editing).

https://twitter.com/JinkxMonsoon/status/306550634079977473

This is better than what they showed on the show:

http://www.newnownext.com/jinkx-monsoon-little-edie-rupauls-drag-race/02/2013/

My Top 5 Snatch Game contestants from all seasons:

1. Sharon Needles as Michelle Visage
2. Pandora Boxx as Carole Channing
3. Tatianna as Britney Spears
4. Jinkx Monsoon as Little Edie
5. Alexis Matteo as Alicia Keys

Only three eps in (S5; no previous exposure to the show). Anyone care to rank the hottest queens out of drag? So far from S5 I'm into Lineysha and, oddly, Ivy.

xpost I just watched the S2 Snatch Game, Pandora's Carol Channing was hysterical, so good.

Lineysha's gorgeous. Ivy's not a crazy answer either, that bone structure really is something else. I was thinking about her terrible Marilyn and found myself wondering why the hell she didn't do Joan Rivers. Eh. Hindsight

Yes she would've been a great Joan Rivers!

Yeah, I know this is probably the exact rongest angle to take on the show, but I'm finding it very interesting navigating my impressions/levels of attraction to certain contestants when they're in drag vs. when they're not in drag.

Alyssa's *almost* attractive but it's like her lips are too big for her and she keeps tripping over them when she talks. Beautiful eyes though.

Coco's blue contacts freak me out. I keep expecting them to shoot lasers

Haha Alyssa looks like Will Arnett in AND out of drag.

Hottest out of drag:

S1: Jade
S2: Tyra, Raven
S3: Raja, Carmen, Mariah
S4: PhiPhi, Lashauwn
S5: Lineysha

xp otm

Well, actually, in drag he often reminds me of Hugo Weaving.

xpost elmo otm! Defnitely Will Arnett out of drag. In drag as mentioned upthread I just get constant Joan Collins, lol

Also, this almost-nothing from Spain

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5JsmAzELzU

i mean. ok fine. but also WOULD IT KILL YA TO MAKE A DECISION

the Whitney handkerchief!
Crown Symone. Just crown her.

Yeah, the handkerchief surely has to go a long way with Ru, even if Symone wasn't already clearly the winner.

I just cannot warm to Gottmik. I know it's mean of me, but I just can't. I thought Kandy's interview with Ru was one of the least sycophantic and most natural chats they've ever had in that section, and I really think Kandy has pulled herself together massively since the early days of the competition (which feel like years ago now).

I mean this season started before both the Georgia Senate elections and the Capitol riot.

Yeah a nothing of an episode in terms of any progression but I figured as much and give Symone the crown plz and etc.

I did like we got Rose's baby bro (who was almost more Scottish than Rose is) and Symone's mom, who is clearly great.

yeah the family stuff was so lovely

Anyway now VG can tell us more about these characters. Maybe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-ugX-KmhMk

Premiere date has been announced as May 1.

i guess i am not feeling Kandy in the top 4 compared to the other 3. she has truckloads of personality & she’s great but i thought her runway outfit looked like a pool toy & i dont think her song portion or dance were that good? idk. i suppose i get why they are keeping her but she def feels a step down from the other 3

kandy did improve a lot but yeah, she’s not on the same level as the other 3, which makes non elimination feel even more forced at this point (and just plain lazy).

i don’t remember any family stuff - was it in untucked?

yep

Yeah it most always ends up there unless family members actually join them for challenges. Which is always cool too.

Seems like there's a big 'justice for Denali' attitude re complaints about Kandy elsewhere. Which, yes and no?

cool, i thought maybe we got shortened episodes in canada (and the provider that has the rights to drag race doesn’t have untucked - but we now have untucked for the previous season on netflix, which is annoying)

re: denali - she kinda reminds me of rose, super professional but “bland chicken”. she certainly had better runways (and arguably lipsyncs) than kandy though..

i thought the meme making rounds is very otm:
symone - charisma
gottmik - uniqueness
kandy - nerve
rose - talent

i doubt rose will win at this point - you could tell the judges struggled to say something personal to her, and it’s rose’s mistake imo (who otherwise seems to be smart at playing the game) - she didn’t give the judges enough story.

Well that raises an interesting question: if your life has been comparatively more of a glide path then do you have more 'story'? Not saying Rose has had it easier than the rest, but still.

ehhh

I mean Kandy was definitely carried through bc she was good tv. in a way that Denali wasn’t. and kandy for sure got by with some worse performances/looks than what got denali sent home

but i also enjoyed watching kandy, knowing all of that. maybe even over the idea of seeing more of denali. idk.

i just think it’s a bit too much to elevate kandy to the point where she’s final four w no hope of winning. like, ru pushed tyra through for -reasons~ but she had that incredible look.

you push kandy all the way to the top bc she’s crazy & full of personality & you create a monster bc she now believes it was solely her talent that got her there & no one can tell her anything.

eh.

that’s entertainment lmao

^ otm

yeah not saying rose had it easier but her not having a “season arc” or not being presented as somebody who had to overcome something made it more difficult to root for her (or as kamorah would put it, to ROOT for HER). compare that with symone’s breakdown, for instance. or kandy’s story, for that matter. most praise for rose was “she’s... she’s a professional” which yes, she is. but saying that music theater didn’t give you enough chance to express yourself isn’t gonna be enough to make ru tear up.

Ramsey Clark, RIP https://t.co/rlYFi1cNXb

— Scott Lemieux (@LemieuxLGM) April 11, 2021

Ha IGNORE that, meant to be this one:

RuPaul sucking the childhood trauma from everyone pic.twitter.com/95K7DOtKgr

— ✨ (@heyjaeee) April 10, 2021

But maybe Ramsey loved Drag Race, who knows.

Kandy Muse on her $100,000 boat #DragRace pic.twitter.com/Xyo1rin12j

— Joey Nolfi (@joeynolfi) April 10, 2021

Gottmik's desperation to turn "gorg" into a meme is so exhausting.

I think I finally put my finger on what keeps me at arms length from Gottmik and it took until this ep to realize it ... even more so than Violet, Gottmik is the culmination of people coming up thru drag under the influence of this game show. The entire episode, her storyline was built around her desire to literally live within the show for the rest of her life. That flavor of desperation is not my cuppa. I’d say she and Rose are tied for third for me based on what the show’s delivering to my eyeballs.

It's definitely the blessing/curse of any such vectoring up that the show has provided, thanks to its longevity and success. But this is also probably why we're seeing more drag shows in various forms, contest-based or not, just to acknowledge alternate approaches -- some of which are from veterans carving out non-WoW spaces, others of which are just their own thing.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/y3dmav/what-does-it-cost-to-go-on-rupauls-drag-race

Take whatever they say and double it for Gottmik.

otm

long read but well worth it, so many little eye opening details.
i assumed that some designers work in exchange for exposure but doesn't sound like it's the case.

certainly puts a different light on "i can't believe she'd show up in chicken feathers" comments

still. having a creative eye & taste goes a long way when you are skint

definitely, and they touch on that - but that’s the thing, comments like “chicken feathers” explicitly make it “who cares you made it, not expensive enough”

Which is REALLY interesting in that Joey Jay had a comment on that in tonight’s special in response to Denali’s slam on that.

chicken feathers fucking suck though!
it’s not just that they are financially cheap, they are shitty & fall off!

its what you buy when you want fosse & you end up as hr pufnstuff

Aw, I love Joey.

I'm not a big fan of Utica's, but she could give classes in how to do a TV interview over Zoom. She looked gorgeous, she was properly miked up and didn't have to raise her voice, and she had a good background.

Well that was not surprising — but having forgotten the wheel, I wasn’t expecting that top two.

Also honest surprise at Miss Congeniality! But a very cool choice.

And so All Stars will be on Paramount+ — well well.

even with the wheel, i wasn’t expecting that top two.
pretty underwhelming overall, especially considering all the forced build up

The Chi Chi DeVayne tribute was (for awfully sad reasons of course) the highlight for me. (On a funnier note, Rose getting in Ellie Diamond's name was up there.)

yeah those two were the highlights. and the whole rose family!

Oh yeah they were amazing! The sister with that crazy glass!

Also I was terribly amused at the cheering crowd sound vs. the actual drive-in audience, which struck me as, how you say, not quite the same.

I don't know, I thought it was all kind of sweet and low key. The interviews seemed genuinely warmer than they usually are, too. As soon as Ru pointed out that poor Rosé had buggered up her ankle (and was wearing some awful outfit, holy crap, that was a terrible outfit), it was clear that she wasn't going to win her lipsync.

I loved Symone's family saying "on RuPaul," as if it was Oprah.

I was so glad LaLa got Miss Congeniality, she seemed so genuinely kind & friendly. i would have been pissed if they gave it to Olivia

i felt bad for Rosé, i know she would have turned that lip sync out way more if not for her ankle. I would have loved her & Symone as top 2 but the end result was still wonderful

and Symone’s looks! fucking hell she killed it. that red look with the nails!?!?! jesus.

and yeah the interviews were really warm & funny, i enjoyed the show overall even though it was weird & low key

and yeah the ChiChi tribute was beautiful

the final final four reaction to the winner is v lovely & legit

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CODmnZlB4KS/

Did anyone else watch Down Under? After the Vice article, the gulf between the haves and the have-nots was really apparent on this show. Also, I can't believe it never occurred to me that drag queens all wear those huge-framed glasses because they have no eyebrows.

gonna sit this one out, we just came out of two simultaneous seasons, one of which lasted for roughly a decade

I know RuPaul's strategy is to basically go nonstop and smother pop culture but she needs to give it and us a rest

how.could they not use a kylie song for the lipsync

You'd think that, yes.

Bit of a thrown-together feeling, Down Under. It's kinda weird realizing it's not a full restriction production as US/UK are but now almost feels too small in a way? But I have to wonder if that was literally down to availability given everything else filming there when almost nowhere else was able to. Plus, clearly no guest judges at all except being beamed in, etc. Though in a weird way having it always be just this core three kinda means they'll see every step of the way.

Did think it wasn't the BEST look that the first queen to leave was the (apparently only?) Indigenous Australian. But was amused that the second was the one I thought they might be biased towards given the separate series they already had on WOW+...

The other thing that stands out for me is reallllly subtle but, even more so than some of the other non-US series, there's a different, distinct editing and camera 'feel' to the whole thing -- different angles and choices and the like.

Only seen the first ep so far, but am hoping they use a different Australian and New Zealand act for lipsync every week, instead of Kylie eight times!

Did think it wasn't the BEST look that the first queen to leave was the (apparently only?) Indigenous Australian.

It really sucked that she was sent to the battle, but once she got there, so did her lipsync. Presumably there aren't enough eps to do a ~dramatic re-entry~ to the competition later, either.

Cringed out of my entire skin when Ru entered saying "GEE DYE GEE DYE!"

The combination of distanced staging, remote filming and even-cheaper-than-usual facilities do make it feel especially stilted. And when Rhys was announced as the third chair, I thought it was perfect casting, but cutting and splicing his lines around pre-written puns by Michelle and written-and-recorded-later comments from Ru is absolutely hobbling him.

ok have watched #2 and there is an even bigger obvious reason not to do Kylie that week

I was waiting for your reaction

I've come out of these first two episodes of DRDU feeling like my head's been pummelled, the fast pace* and lack of relief / weird stilted editing where it feels like everybody is in different places (maybe because they are) / extremely high in the mix music and sound effects is making it very tough going

*it even feels like it's all been sped up like 10%, but maybe that's just my weary brain struggling to keep up

I think I'm looking forward to the Spanish one just because, as with Thailand/Canada/Holland, not having Ru/Michelle as the center allows for other approaches or dynamics.