But when you take a big swing like these three, you risk an equally big whiff. While the original songs have a harder time standing out, they’re also a safe choice. Next up, let’s chat about the queens who took (relative) risks with the format: Raja, Jinkx, and Monét. At the very least, she undeniably earned her win this week, bringing her to two challenge wins along with half the cast. I think it’s part of why it’s hard for me to be mad at the idea of the episode being “rigged.” If the performances had been closer together, or Shea didn’t stand out this much, this week would definitely have felt like a heavy-handed attempt to gerrymander the top four according to producerial whims. With a masterful performance channeling the swagger and dance skills of Michael and Janet, Shea stuns this week. Yvie begins hers with an effective and well-executed switcheroo where she’s crammed her bendy body into a trunk, the Vivienne boasts the Diane Warren as a songwriter for her number, Trinity’s has Vegas-like production value, and Jaida leans into charisma, humor, and likability. All five queens are great performers and have created songs that play to their individual strengths. The popularity of this format makes perfect sense, as it touches upon three resolute pillars of the drag community: lip-syncing, self-promotion, and circumventing music copyright statutes. Let’s start with the megamix girlies - Yvie, The Vivienne, Trinity, Jaida, and Shea - who each perform a lip sync to an original track. Production value aside, the content is that of a rather typical Drag Race Variety Show, which is pretty great! No one’s performance bores, and the standouts are truly remarkable. The dancers have matching outfits, costume changes, and full choreography for every number the queens are lit by specialty gobos and flanked by fog machines. For what proceeds is undoubtedly the most high-budget variety show in Drag Race herstory. So, with rekindled fires under almost everyone’s asses, the queens get to work. The one and two-star queens all have a shot at the top four Trinity and Jaida, who just last week considered themselves locks, now have to fight for their spots, and Jinkx, well, she’s earned a little break. It ensures that this episode has some stakes for just about everyone. On its face, I’m not as outraged at this twist as my internet cohort. Most notably, our only competitor with one star, Shea Coulée, is back in the race. And there’s something to that: by making this challenge worth three weeks of competition, it’s now weighted such that the queens who win it are guaranteed a spot in the top four, regardless of their star count up until now. “Rigga Morris!” They cried, borrowing the old Alyssa Edwards adage. As soon as the clip with this announcement went live, Twitter became incensed. But before the queens get to work brushing out wigs, scheduling put-in rehearsals with dancers, and warming up their vocal cords, Ru announces The Gag: this challenge will be worth three whole stars. After all, how else would we have experienced Tatianna’s iconic spoken word piece or Derrick Barry’s ingenious impressions? Indeed, the Variety Extravaganza must stay. Hell yes! While in recent years, this challenge has tended to become more of a demonstration of DJ Mitch Ferrino’s producer talents rather than a means for the queens to showcase an underutilized or unique talent, I think it’s nonetheless a net positive for the show. This time, each queen picks a charity to support that has a chance at a $30,000 payday. And while the penultimate twist of this All-Winners season won’t go down in herstory as one of the best, I think it’s getting an unnecessarily bad rap.įor the season’s final challenge, we return to an All-Stars staple: the Variety Extravaganza (née “the Talent Show”). All Stars 2 is considered one of (if not the) best the franchise has to offer, and safe to say that’s more than a little due to an early twist that overhauled the season’s entire format. And before you trash the very concept of a twist, don’t forget that some of them work pretty well. From the calorie-burning (LollapaRuza) to the carbo-loading (“it’s chocolate”), RuPaul has tried just about everything to create viral moments and maintain interest in a show that’s been marathoning for over a decade.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |