It’s back!!!! Yas, hunty!!! It’s RuPaul’s Drag Race Season Eleventy First (actually nine, we just wanted to be extra), and we’re here to serve and to swerve for your realness and GAGA!!! *death drop*
OK, now that that’s out of the way, it’s time for RPDR Season 9!! New night!! New network! New contestants! Let’s meet them!
Peppermint walks into the room. She’s kinda meh, but she’s also the first queen, and that can be rough. You either need to lick the walls or get naked. She’s followed by Valentina, who’s from Echo Park. We find out later she’s only been doing drag for 10 months. In her interviews, she’s wearing a turtleneck and a beret and I kinda hate her for it. Eureka shows up and it’s our resident loud, Southern, fat queen. She’s everything you expect and a bag of chips. Charlie Hides, who apparently has a YouTube following, is also apparently rude, crude, and upon entry, low-key as hell. Farrah Moan is next, is 22, and it shows, and talks about Vegas. I can’t wait. Sasha Velour enters and screams for a full minute, and I love it. Finally, someone interesting (Seriously. I love Peppermint, but she’s been kinda lack luster, so far).
Alexis Michelle enters talking a big Broadway game, but proceeds to say, “How do you like them eggrolls [INSERT NAME THAT ISN’T MR. GOLDSTEIN!!!! SERIOUSLY!!! HOW ARE YOU A BROADWAY QUEEN AND YOU FUCK UP THIS SIMPLE LINE? I DON’T TRUST YOU AND I DON’T LIKE YOU, NOW. YOU BETTER NOT BE ONE OF THOSE QUEENS WHO ONLY SINGS WICKED AND HAMILTON BECAUSE IF YOU ARE, I WILL PERSONALLY CAUSE YOUR DOWNFALL].” I feel like I’ve heard the name before, but I could be confusing her with Alexis Matteo. Shea is from Chicago. Trinity Taylor will be competing with Valentina for the role of the Skinny Bitch. Apparently, she’s had plastic surgery done, and isn’t a pageant queen, even though she competes in pageant queens. Ok.
Kimora is from Vegas and loves her butt, and I think there are Kardashian jokes or references but I zoned out and didn’t care to rewind. She’s giving us Gia Gunn, and not in the good way. Jaymes Mansfield is from Milwaukee and has a puppet. And you could drive a truck between her wig line and scalp. Just saying. Nina Bonin’a Brown is what Josephine Baker would look like if she was a mouse. Aja enters with a reveal that would put her solidly in the competition of an earlier season. Ronnie walks in, as Lady Gaga, only to find, plot twist, that she’s REALLY Lady Gaga.
Everyone screams and cries and tells Gaga how much they love her. RuPaul comes in to say no one is going home and to lay out the rules for this episode, a pageant episode. The queens have to have a look that represents their hometown and another that represents Gaga.
Farrah wanders around the dressing room looking sad. Kimora decides she already hates Aja. Every is all “Gurl, you better be prepared!!” I’m not sure if it’s editing or how many queens, but the energy is cautious.
The judges are going to be Michelle Visage (YAY!), Carson Kresley (OK), Lady Gaga (YAS!), and Ross Matthews (OK).
Peppermint first comes out as the Statue of Liberty (seriously. Side note. If it’s a hometown challenge, no matter what reality show you’re on, someone will be doing the Statue of Liberty. Pick something else. Central Park. The Empire State Building. The line for Shake Shack. The Cock. Something else.), and Lady Gaga as David Bowie. She’s safe, but not winning this thing. Valentina comes out as a mariachi band, and a red carpet Gaga. She’s safe, but not winning. Eureka does East Tennessee redneck and the Telephone video. I’m liking her. She’s kinda raw, but seems to know what she’s doing. Charlie is a pilgrim (Mass.) that reveals… a sexy pilgrim. It’s not a good reveal, and would have been funnier to reveal some sorta Real Housewives of South Boston type look. Her Gaga is that three layered kaftan thing with lace. Farrah comes as the Vegas of Westeros, and looks like Gaga’s white mage robe from Alejandro (some of you will get that joke). She’s pretty… Sasha comes as Queer Artistry (no Statue of Liberty), and the Applause video. Watch out for her.
Alexis is NY, with some stupid flip up thing. Gurl. I didn’t like you before, and now you seem just like cannon fodder. Her Golden Globes Gaga is spot on, though. Shea comes out with hot dog couture, and is Gaga’s Monsters’ Ball. Trinity does another stupid flip up dress thing, apparently as Orlando, with a generic roller coaster on the front and when she turns around, turns into a giant flaming hemorrhoid. Her Gaga is AHS: Hotel, and spot on. Kimora is also Vegas, and talks about people being predictable so comes out in a predictable outfit. You know what wouldn’t be predictable? Choosing the time Gaga went on Larry King, dressed as Larry King. Jaymes is channeling her worst Barney Rubble in a dress in both instances. I want to like you! Aja is The Statue of Liberty and the [insert French word here] flat dress thing. Nina is a giant peach, followed by the red lace thing from the VMAs. She’s one to look out for!!!
During all of this, Gaga sounds like one of those Chloe videos (“I was having lunch with Demarchelier while wearing a simple Maria Cornejo, when we ran into Alon Levine who decided then and there that Mathieu Mirano was going to be dressing me for that video”).
The judges have words, and I agree with 100% of everything they had to say, and so did you. There’s no lip sync for your life, but Nina wins… something. Bragging rights? Eureka placed higher than Trinity so you KNOW that’s going to come up later.
The episode ends with SOMEONE coming back. I swear to god, if this is a Shangela joke, I’m going to set everyone on fire.
Who is it? Will Jaymes’ wig line get more space? Will Michelle Visage say she wants to see Sasha Velour in something more glamorous? Will Eureka cry? We’ll find out!!! Join us!!
Anita Manbadly says
If you were a Good Gay and watched Untucked on Saturday morning, you would have seen Gaga (gently) clock Alexis and her stupid flip up thing. TBH, the outfit looked rushed and not completely thought out. Alexis admitted that she had someone else create the flip up thing, and it didn’t come out how she wanted. So why did she use it?