Glad to know we’re all still looking for the reason Art Simone came back.
It’s the makeover episode where the people are lovely and the judging criteria is decided by ferrets playing a rigorous game of Twister.
So Long, Farewell, Aufwiedersehn, Etc. Etc…
Etcetera gets a very nice send off from the rest of the queens who proclaim her as “The future of the human race” and entirely erase the fact she spent an entire episode mocking a wrongfully vilified woman who suffered one of the most horrific losses you could possibly imagine but you know, she had good takes on gender and racism.
Maxi isn’t too distraught about having been in the bottom and is mostly pleased about having the accolade of being the oldest queen managing to send the youngest queen home – hold on to the small things! Meanwhile Karen is doing mental gymnastics to try and work out a way to prove she wasn’t in the bottom 3 last week
me too Elektra.
And Art Simone of all people is the one reminding everyone of how important it is to have a win at this point as though she wasn’t sent home in the second damn episode and how she and Karen are being held to a much higher standard because the judges knew who they were prior to coming in to the competition. Ma’am, take several uncomfortable seats. You’ve both been mediocre to outright terrible since the second episode and it’s alarmingly apparent that you think you could coast on your minor celebrity status of which Karen’s is mostly based on Trixie Mattel finding her name incredibly funny.
While Art tries her best to undermine Elektra’s win, Elektra is eagerly planning the downfall of one Scarlet Adams which almost certainly means Elektra will be going home next week, such is The Curse of Scarlet.
Well, This Is Pants
In what is truly the most cursed Mini Challenge since the one that had to be excluded from Season 6 for being *incredibly* transphobic, the queens have to guess which cute Australian animal is hidden inside the boxers of the extended Pit Crew and for entirely scientific reasons, here is said Pit Crew
and no, they will not just have the name of the animal written on their underwear as would have been the sane thing, they each have a cute little plush toy thrust down their boxers, and yes there is nothing more uncomfortable than a platypus being pressed up against a guy’s dick
as someone with an extensive soft toy collection, this is deeply upsetting to me specifically.
The queens were each given 3 clues to name the correct animal which most of them managed to navigate with relative ease, except for Karen who thinks a bucket is an animal and Scarlet who stared through everything into another dimension with her cold, dead shark eyes
and ironically couldn’t guess a shark to save her life
anyway, here’s Pit Crew Member No. 2 to cleanse your eyes
Maxi wins the challenge with a total of 17 points, which given that there were 50 on offer is *incredibly* bad and Australia and New Zealand might want to revise their zoological curriculum. Especially because Kita seemed to think the kiwi, the national bird of New Zealand, was introduced to New Zealand in the 1800s…
Kiss and Makeover
For the Maxi Challenge this week we see the return of the makeover challenge in all its usual glory after taking a little break during the Covid seasons of US Drag Race and Drag Race UK. For this one the queens have to each transform a member of the Falcons Rugby Club into a member of their drag family, which as usual is a very fine, indiscernible line between having to look absolutely identical but not too similar and most of the queens knew to bring in matching outfits beforehand. I personally wish they’d just make the makeover challenge into less of a family resemblance and more about making their partner into the best drag persona for them – it would breed a lot more creativity and your success wouldn’t pivot almost entirely on how similar your lip shape is.
Because she won the Mini Challenge, Maxi gets to pair everyone up, giving Kita the honour of making over Karl
while Art gets Jonah in all of his adorable glory
Karen gets Wolf (not the Gladiator)
while Elektra gets Fara who is the hottest one and we will not be debating the subject
Scarlet gets Brad and will proceed to call him old for the rest of the episode because he has the gall of being over the age of 40
and Maxi leaves Dan for herself because they could just about pass for brothers
all the guys are absolutely the most lovely people you could possibly come across, to the point where I might actually demand we restart the season but instead of the queens, it’s just them. And I think it really helped the episode that they were all gay men, whereas we’ve done the whole sportsman makeover thing in the past where the queens in season 3 had to makeover the jocks and who could forget Matt who played baseball, hard
I still don’t know what that meant.
So with these rugby players we didn’t have to go through the whole “OH MY GOD! Now that I’ve walked in heels, I finally understand how hard life is for my girlfriend!” and instead we could have a decent conversation about toxic, macho posing between Fara and Elektra, which felt like a genuine authentic moment, that admittedly did have to unfortunately happen while Elektra was painting Fara like Beebe Bluff from Doug
Honestly, Fara was the star of the show from the very moment he put on those patent leather boots of Elektra’s and full stomped through the Werk Room
King Shit.
And you know, as is want to happen in this cursed show, they hit the runway as Elektra Shock and Riri Action, in two perfectly good looks that were absolutely identical to both each other and Miss Fame’s entrance look; Michelle and Ru hated it
It’s like two different people edit the Werk Room footage and the runway footage because everything about the pre-runway stuff should have suggested an Elektra win and with these looks I was sure she was *at least* in the top 3, turns out not because apparently Riri Action’s makeup was bad?
Where?
I’m not going to say it’s the most stunning makeup job but it’s not *that* bad and at least you could see it whereas Karen hid as much of Wolf as Debbie From Reception’s makeup behind a pair of overwhelming glasses
the judges were also a little cold no their runways, it’s fair: their outfits were not the most aesthetically pleasing garments but I think Debbie got a few moments on the runway to really shine and show some personality and wasn’t as trapped in the ominous shadow of Karen from Finance as they made out
and she had significantly improved her walk from the Werk Room in which Wolf ranged from thinking women walk in italics or like T-rexes
but nobody had a bigger struggle with shoes than Dan who made absolutely everything into a trip hazard and likely had the floor manager on the verge of a cardiac arrest at all time
He was standing still at this point.
I would have quite liked to see someone do the whole bearded queen look outside of a challenge that’s focused on it specifically but alas, Dan agreed to shave which did make the whole family resemblance thing a little easier
And then with this incredible likeness, Maxi’s grand idea was to turn the two of them into… beanbag chairs?
they both look very cute, their turbans and chord wigs needed to be a little fuller, especially as when they turns around it’s just barren neck
and how dare they let a moonlight sliver of their black undergarments show… Calm down Michelle, it’s not that serious.
I was surprised that as many as two of the queens had to make the outfits for the Makeoveree and more so that it was Scarlet and Art who had made this particular rod for their backs. Art went down the slightly easier route of making just a little slip dress and tethering flip-flops to it like a mole-catcher hanging their victims from a fence in Denbighshire. Art wasn’t worried about the aesthetics of the makeover, after all she is an ~artiste~ but coaxing out a big drag persona from Jonah, who seemed quite shy, was the bigger task and I think they ended up doing quite well
especially considering most of the pre-runway time was spent with Art being attacked from every angle for leaving Jonah’s makeup as the last job and making fun of his apparently very damp eyebrows.
As for the outfits, their a fun Priscilla nod and the general theme of found family was sweet and the makeup was obviously stunning
Can’t wait for Craft Simone to win season 2.
While Art tailored a square of fabric and marvelled at her sewing abilities, Scarlet was very proud of the fact she was boning a whole corset all by herself while Brad sat at the desk looking like he was weighing up whether or not he should be Marilyn Monroe or Grace Kelly for Halloween
as for their outfits, they were two perfectly fine corsets
they’re just a little lost amongst everything else that had such strong narratives or style but hey, at least Brad had fun as Sapphire Adams scattering faux fur as far as the eye can see
She is beauty. She is grace.
Brad’s partner, Karl, who was paired with Kita was getting very into the whole thing and while maybe not going The Full Fara and revelling in the art of corsetry, was allowing Kita is wrestle him into one like someone trying to rope start a lawnmower
as they say, break a rib!
As we know, Kita Mean has a very distinctive, mildly terrifying way of painting her face and she quite frankly replicated it so well it was genuinely a struggle to tell the two of them apart
and yes, their outfits did look a bit like they were auditioning for Cruella: The Only Dalmatian Musical!
at least it was fun and silly, you can always rely on Kita Mean for a good time – read that however you want. I would mostly be pissed if I was Karl because my drag name was Feta Mean…
A Makeover Challenge Ranking
- Kita and Feta: An Even Unlikely Cruella Origin Story.
- Elektra and Riri’s Martian Endeavour.
- It’s a Little Art and Craft-y.
- The Office: Australia.
- Maxi and Maxi.
- Scarlet’s Very Well Made Corset.
Continuing the general theme of winning by a country mile, Kita gets the win while it’s Scarlet and Maxi who find themselves in the lipsync with one another.
Speak Of The Devil…
For their lipsync they get Better The Devil You Know by Kylie (FINALLY!) and as much as I wanted Scarlet to go home, this was undeniably a serve and while yes there was some strange vamping choices at certain points
she did a stellar job of drawing the judges’ attention with her burlesque style striptease towards the end of the routine
and Maxi just unfortunately paled into the background while doing a hot shoe shuffle
which admittedly is quite impressive in a pair of pleasers but it’s not quite enough and sadly Maxi is eliminated
I ended up enjoying Maxi a lot more than I initially thought I would based on the Meet The Queens videos and I’m curious to know how next week will go down without Maxi there to break any negative energy with a well timed absurd quip.
And so, 5 Queens remain
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