Early into last night’s episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race, something crossed my mind that I almost dare not speak aloud. During the mini challenge, as the queens were throwing shade at one another and nearly all of them were terrible at it, this thought started forming. Today I will get out my library card (because reading is fundamental), and throw some of my own shade: maybe none of these queens are actually worthy of the title of America’s Next Drag Superstar. Blasphemous? Maybe. But consider the evidence. Post-elimination, we have six contestants left, and one of them is Dida Ritz?! What do we really know about Dida Ritz? She is as opaque as Mitt Romney is cyborg-like.
But back to the library. As anyone who’s seen Paris is Burning knows, the ability to read someone is one of the most important weapons in a drag queen’s arsenal. And yet no one but Latrice Royale (who, of course, won the mini challenge) was even halfway decent at this. Phi Phi came at Sharon Needles with another Party City-based insult, only to have it thrown back in her face when Sharon sassed, “That’s where I got your Lady Gaga wig.” Burn? Ah, for the days of Jujubee and Raven. As the winner, Latrice got to assign each queen the title of the “dragazine” they had to make for the main challenge. This would have been a lot more fun to watch if they’d been given computers loaded with InCopy and Illustrator and were told to go at it. I imagine it would have ended like this. Also, they should have let Stefon guest-edit the travel magazine.
Unfortunately, all the queens did was glue stuff on poster board and then take pictures with an extremely attractive photographer who caused several of them to lose focus. Before the runway show, when Ru announced that Regina King would be a guest judge, Willam made sure to tell us that she guest-starred with Regina on Southland once. That may be true, but Regina doesn’t seem to remember this, and correctly points out that Willam’s unmoving runway smile is really, really creepy. The judges said more of the same things they always say (Chad is too perfect, Sharon is too crazy) and ultimately awarded the win to Phi Phi for being the least terrible of the bunch. Willam and Jiggly were up for elimination, lip syncing to “Mi Vida Loca” by guest judge Pam Tillis (side note: Pam Tillis is the BEST). Jiggly was finally sent home, and Willam will live another week to tell us what other cop dramas have employed her as a guest star. Great, can’t wait.
Catch RuPaul’s Drag Race Mondays at 9/8c on LogoTV
