Gothy Kendoll has a legacy!
After my shock that they didn’t bill Season 13 as The Unlucky Season I have quickly come to realise that it is us, the audience, who are the unlucky ones as it becomes clear that this season is already spinning its wheels after getting stuck in the mud of its debut episode.
Chop’t
We return from whence we left off with the losing queens having to come to a decision as to who to supposedly eliminate when all they know about each other is their outfits – which obviously means the only real choices were Utica whose wig is halfway up her scalp and RUDELY nobody told her about it
and Elliott who just radiates an annoying aura at a level that I’m genuinely surprised isn’t lethal. Also Joey Jay if you’re Denali and are particularly offended by the idea that a Drag Queen would wear chicken feathers of all things
It’s ostrich or bust bitch!
The voting comes down to an initial tie between Elliott and Utica (duh.) so we get a second and it is unanimously decided that Elliott should be eliminated, which means SOMEONE CHANGED THEIR VOTE and most likely forgot Elliott existed during the first round – it’s really a feat considering just her sitting there feels like a fly repeatedly banging itself against a kitchen a window. So Elliott takes up that prestigious position of getting eliminated twice in the first episode! (3 times if you’re LaLa Ri and can’t do basic maths). “But don’t worry!” RuPaul assures her, plenty of Queens who were eliminated first have gone on to be stars, Porkchop, Shangela, Vanjie…. No mention of the likes of Penny Traition and…. Magnolia Crawford
Of course Elliott isn’t *really* eliminated and is instead, in the most transparent of twists, put in with the group of winnings Queens. It makes no sense, it feels exactly like a stunt ANTM would have pulled back in the day and I hate it. I mostly hate it because IMMEDIATLY the other queens decide they don’t trust Elliott and that she must be a mole or a spy. How would that even work on a show like Drag Race? And second of all, there are ONE HUNDRED better reasons to generally be irritated by Elliott.
Fashion, Put It All On Me
RuPaul makes his first out of drag appearance of the series and looks a bit like he’s shooting porn films in California
His industry name is Tex Drill.
He reveals that the mini challenge is, as is now tradition in the “first” episode, a two look runway! The first being a showcase of a day time look fit for a lady and the second being to wear something as slutty as VH1 will possibly allow them to.
I’m going to do these a ranking from Worst to Best in each category – it makes it fun for me.
Queen for a Day
Kandy Muse
The only reason Kandy wore this Possessed Johann Bach costume is because she needed an outfit that would match the makeup she was going to wear for the truly cursed devil costume she wears in the next runway. THAT IS THE ONLY REASON.
Elliot
The fact that Scarlet Envy basically made this exact outfit in under a day and had to bursting at the seams and still looked better is all I need to say.
Tina Burner
She certainly has a knack for choosing the worst shades for orange! I like the skirt – the top however looks like a series of fabric samples haphazardly stapled on and makes her look like even more of a linebacker.
LaLa Ri
It’s not the most wildly exciting outfit and could use some good, big gold accessories but I enjoy this, she looks statuesque and that hair is GORGEOUS. It’s a pity her heel got trapped in the hem and she had to hobble down the last half of the runway but she still looked good – if a little bland.
Symone
I think I like this a lot more just because Symone knows how to sell it on the runway because on anyone else they would just look like a niche Batman villain but on Symone, it’s that vintage supermodel of yore and no I want a deckchair fabric suit with a single arm-cape.
Olivia Lux
You could tell me that she borrowed this from fellow New York queen Jackie Cox and I would automatically believe you – it’s that frothy 60s throwback that Jackie seemed to have a penchant for. It’s fun, it’s cute, it’s Olivia Lux.
Gottmik
It was only a matter of time before Brony fetish gear made it onto the show – that’s going to get me some weird blog hits, so hello to the Rainbow Dash BroHards who have inexplicably found themselves here.
Queens of the Night
Tina Burner
It was at this point that we all really began worrying that Tina was going to show up to every runway looking like a condiment bottle from a greasy spoon café.
Kandy Muse
This look is so stupid that I LOVE IT. It is sexy, and Kandy really sold that aspect of it but surrounding it is RuPaul cracking up as Michelle’s jokes, the massive hole in the back that was obviously meant for a tail but just looked like an abyssal gloryhole
and lastly RuPaul doing a Gothy Kendoll impression
Talk about ruining the vibe.
LaLa Ri
I’m mostly just really glad she obviously had some good wigs because her entrance wig had me WORRIED.
Gottmik
This is VERY GOOD. And I like it as a statement that she’s incredibly comfortable in her skin after her top surgery. I jjust think there were a few other gowns that had a little more pizzazz or were a little more unique and fun. Not that I don’t appreciate a pearl studded nipple pastie as much as the next person.
Elliott
This is good high drag and she must be PISSED that she wasted it on a mini challenge that barely counted for anything. You don’t dress up as the ringmaster of the Mistress of the Damned’s travelling circus for NOTHING!
Olivia Lux
It helps that this is my favourite colour and it looks SO GOOD on her. But the dress is so interesting with it’s draping and cutouts – it elevates would have been a very simple minidress into a statement piece.
Symone
At first I was a bit confused by this, just because everyone else looked like they could be in some sort of niche brothel – whether your kink be satanism, the circus or bottles of ketchup. And yet this looks like it would be straight off the set of Queen of the Damned and somehow is sexier than everyone else.
It was a good set of runway and gives me hope for the rest of the season – it’s just slightly annoying that we’re obviously going to have to go through with this whole process again next week…
Condragulations!
With the mini challenge over with Ru tells the queens that their main challenge is to write a perform their own verses of his song Condragulations and on top that, because of obvious Covid precautions, the queens will have to choreograph themselves – there’s no way this could go wrong and be slightly underwhelming! Certainly not with Elliott the trained dancer on their team…
But first it’s the time to write the lyrics and everyone is obviously very aware of the meme potential and longevity of these songs, because you know, everyone remembers these opening numbers from Season 12 beyond Rock M. Sakura’s fart….
Tina thinks of herself as a bit of a lyricist – SHE’S A NEW YAWK LEGEND DONTCHA KNOW? *eye twitch*. And Olivia is also confident in her abilities seeing as she writes music and can play the piano – and it’s a real pity that she most likely wont get to showcase this ability at all this season.
Because so much time was dedicated to the truly pointless and flaccid twist we don’t even get to see the queens recording their lyrics – which is often the best part of these challenges. WHAT ARE YOU DOING GUYS?
You would think that Elliott, being an obvious outsider, would have relished the opportunity to finally ingratiate himself with the group and own up to being a dancer and prove his usefulness to the group, right? No. That’s exactly the opposite of what happens and Elliott hangs back dithering in the background like a nervous cockatoo, just terrified that someone is about to rumble his charade. You could see the physical yearning on his face when Tina and Kandy just had everyone doing a simple one-two step and wave that Symone could just not get to grips with
This bodes well.
And then LaLa, another self confessed dancing queen, stands in the background huffing and rolling his eyes that they’re doing some 60s Supremes nonsense dance steps to a RuPaul pop song
And he’s not wrong but he’s certainly not being helpful about it! Elliott eventually snaps and takes some sort of control of the situation, or as much control as you can take over the likes of Tina Burner, NEW YAWK LEGEND.
Obviously they also all have little solo bits and Gottmik gets a little thrown by it because his lyrics are all about his transition and it literally starts off with “I was born a girl” and he hasn’t really had time to discuss it with the rest of the group and I can imagine that that was scary, especially when trans people taking part in drag is such an unnecessarily divisive issue. To be honest, the editing around Gottmik talking to the queens about his transition was weird – it felt rushed and heavily cut up and didn’t feel like Gottmik actually got to say very much on the subject and I imagine it’ll come up again when the other queens have finally joined this group in 208 episodes or so… I did appreciate the pronoun discussion and Gottmik making it clear what pronouns to use and when, which is why I’m making the effort to use he/him whenever anyone is out of drag, just to make it absolutely clear.
The Main Stage
It looks like Baga Chipz’s scouring sponge fashion caught on.
Our guest judge this week is Jamal Sims who is about to go through his own personal as he witnesses 7 drag queens doing terrible choreography!
Gottmik is clearly the weakest and most out of their depth – it probably benefited her to go first because she didn’t have to follow anyone’s much better performance but it also meant the song started on a bit of a whimper – she’s also a terribly white dancer
it’s like an angry, boneless fawn. But the padding? Incredible, I like it when a Queen has a severely exaggerated silhouette.
Kandy, while giving a very good vocal performance, lost the choreography almost instantaneously and sort of stood in the middle of the runway looking around in bewilderment like a lost child and I thought she was going to start vamping like Ashlee Simpsons on SNL all those years ago
I honestly would have hugely enjoyed that and it might have even put her in the top two, it’s hard to tell with these judges. But she looked TERRIFIED in the final pose because she knew she fucked up pretty badly
Everyone else is very much of a muchness, I didn’t find anyone’s verses to be particularly good or inspired – in fairness to Tina hers probably was the best lyrically (even if she did make a pop culture reference as weirdly dated as The Hunger Games) but that’s not to say I didn’t hugely enjoy LaLa Ri’s nonsense lyrics
She really is a great queen, as is Olivia who obviously has the best outfit for this challenges
You just can’t help but stare at her! I think whoever did the sound editing really did her dirty, they could have helped out with those vocals a little more – it was no Roxxxy Andrews but it was certainly jarring!
Symone also gives a very good performance, I didn’t love her outfit but it served its purpose for the challenge and she just has a very magnetic stage presence and hey, you’re destined for the Final when RuPaul just likes the way you walk from one end of the stage to the other
And lastly we have Elliott who is good dancer, obviously, and does a very impressive drop splits
I’m just confused by her aesthetic choices, this isn’t even a bad outfit, I’m just wondering why it’s HERE, now, in this challenge? And why the furry hip tumour? It looks like something a Real Housewife would wear to a loosely safari themed party. And she would be the one who has the drink thrown at her, rather than the one doing the drink throwing.
All in all, it’s one of the weaker versions of this challenge but nothing absolutely dire or worth being mortified over.
The Runway: Lamé You Stay
The Good
When she turned the corner of the runway my immediate reaction was “WOW! She looks like a sea urchin enchantress!” or what Ursula and her eels would look like if The Little Mermaid got the Snow White and the Huntsman treatment. And then Gottmik said her inspiration was Sea Dragons which is close enough!
What a great start to your mainstage runways! And another step closer to that gender swapped Rocky reboot that I keep threatening everyone with!
The Fine
The dress is beautiful, it’s elegant and has that lovely old age Hollywood vibe to it but it just lacks a level of oomph.
I would probably put this higher up if it weren’t the new year and I hadn’t eaten approximately 3 boxes of Ferrero Rochers in the last week. The silhouette though is FIRE but the leggings when in the light of day are terrible and need burning.
The Bad
It’s a boring concept that we’ve seen before and she’s lucky she used this outfit in an episode without an elimination. but her face is always cute.
I have 100% seen this exact dress in an advert for Toddlers and Tiaras while I watched a marathon of Say Yes To The Dress! And I’ll tell you what, Mikaela Mckenna Toddington-West wore it better.
I hate this with a vehement passion. It reminds me FAR TOO MUCH of The Simpsons cosplay from Strictly Come dancing and anything that conjures the image of Max George sucking on a shoe should be grounds for immediate disqualification. And then there’s the reveal of the glittery heart that Ross MASSIVELY overreacts to
My dude, it was basically an iron on patch. Calm your tits.
It became immediately obvious that nobody was getting eliminated in this episode because the judges only said nice things and completely glossed over the likes of Gottmik skittering across the stage or Kandy Muse just rebooting halfway through the performance – and it would have been those two lipsyncing. Elliott did just enough to at least escape that firing range.
Our winners our Olivia Lux and Symone – both of whom Ru takes the time to tell have utter starpower and I’m so glad that my favourites seem like genuine contenders!
Because nobody is being eliminated Olivia and Symone get to lipsync for a £5000 tip and they’re doing it to Break My Heart by Dua Lipa and I don’t know if her songs are great for lipsycs, there’s just not much to really connect to and I think it really showed in this lipsync because Olivia is hamming up and it just looks weird with Dua Lipa’s kind of lackadaisical vocals
She was also hindered by the fact her dress was very expensive and she has a deposit on it and can’t risk getting it damaged so she sort of tentatively creeps around the stage. Meanwhile Symone has a full boxing outfit on and layers to slowly peel off and remove and really give full show and it’s really great, I think it could have been better with different song but she swished those braids and I think she thoroughly deserved that win
She really is a star!
NEXT TIME
Please eliminate someone! I BEG OF YOU. I can’t deal with 3 pointless episodes of Drag Race in a row.