Find someone that looks at you the way Anubis looks at a Dusty Springfield lipsync.

Welcome to the finale, we’ve got fun and reindeer games!

But First, A Reunion of Sorts

With Vanity gone she of course gets to leave her mirror message and displays a fundamental misunderstanding of the word “conquered”

I wonder if Napoleon left the same message on a Moscow mirror in 1812?

Having just done the roast, the Top 3 are eager to pat themselves on their backs for thoroughly roasting the other queens when all of a sudden all of them coming marching back in, lead of course by Choriza May’s exploding tits and Vanity having to slink in at the end

is it a little awkward to have Vanity Milan having to come back almost immediately after just being eliminated? Yes, but I’m pretty sure she must have seen it coming more plainly than we could have seen Krystal churning out a Drag Race By Numbers Verse in the finale song

I thought it was a nice touch to have everyone come back, I do imagine it was mostly done so that the show could make absolutely sure that nobody was offended by anything in the roast, VERONICA WAS COOL WITH IT GUYS

although I’m not sure anyone was UwU-ing over Veronica when you have certified cinnamon rolls Choriza May and River Medway on your cast.

There is of course a significant amount of time dedicated to Badge Talk and assuring us that this is DEFINITELY, ABSOLUTELY THE FAIREST TOP THREE IN EXISTENCE – there ain’t a badgeless Ellie Diamond amongst them.

One Last Song!

The final challenge is the standard Drag Race fare: write a verse for a RuPaul song, this time they were really gambling over being able to film and air this in time because the song was RuPaul’s alleged Christmas banger *checks notes* Hey Sis, It’s Christmas and the Werk Room had been bedecked in all the decorations a B&Q gift card can buy

which I did see confused a lot of American viewers who don’t seem to understand that the UK doesn’t celebrate Thanksgiving or hold parades to Gods of pop culture such as Boss Baby and that we just bring out the Christmas decorations as soon after Halloween as our shame allows us just to bring some joy to our rapidly diminishing daylight hours.

Of course on top of the lyric writing and choreography learning, the queens would have to face the most perilous part of a Drag Race finale: an interview with Ru and Michelle in which they will be diagnosed with at least three mental health disorders, recommended kale as a cure to depression and have a childhood trauma that they haven’t thought about since the age of thirteen dredged up for all a sundry.

With the lyric writing the queens are obviously obligated to have the tittering conversation about how they’re being too raunchy for The BBC by making jokes about Santa Claus pulling their knickers down or using the word “ass” in their verse as though the episode didn’t open on a shot of a pair of cross-eyed nipples

I realise we have to export this idea that the British are prudes and the very idea of sex and swearing ages us 15 years at a time but on a show with drag queens it kind of just reads as gratingly false and annoying.

With Krystal having received a very middling critique in the Girl Group Challenge in which she was accused of not telling us enough about Krystal Versace other than the fact she likes fashion and sparkly things, which you could work out just by reading her nametag, she was under the most pressure to prove herself during this performance. As pointed out earlier, her verse was the most Drag Race-y in that she mentioned a crown, rhymed it with the word “down” and devoted an entire line to kind of spelling out her own name – accentuated of course by doing various splits

I do think making it a Christmas song did make the challenge a little harder because usually you can get away with just singing about how you deserve to win the show but this time you also had to work in Christmas buzz words – with Ella Vaday going for broke and successfully weaseling in “mistletoe”, “sleigh”, “jingle bells”, “naughty list”, “ho-ho-ho” and of course “Christmas” – so if the challenge was to be a singing Christmas word search, she was winning on that front!

As for Kitty, she had agonised over whether she should go Christmassy or Drag Race-y in this Drag Race Christmas song and ultimately made the incredible decision to… do both. So of course, like Krystal, she mentions the crown AND rhymes it with the word “down” – you know given the quality of the sound mixing and the fact none of the queens really sounded like themselves, I could almost believe this entire performance was rendered by the Drag Race algorithm or 1000 Merle Ginsbergs bashing a typewriter. I was mostly surprised that Kitty allowed them to clearly reference the Mean Girls Jingle Bell Rock performance

I would have thought it was too obvious a reference for our niche reference queen of 1000 voices, all of them suspiciously Birmingham-y.

For the most part, I thought they all did really well, especially considering in the choreography session with Jay Revell, Krystal was a good continental timezone out from both Kitty and Ella. It was however a performance that rather dated itself with how much it was clearly drawing from WAP

I didn’t say they were *good* at it.

The whole thing did get a little messy when the song has its breakdown moment and all of the eliminated queens came out dressed as our favourite Christmas characters, Elf With a Bad Dental Plan

and it wouldn’t be Christmas without Festivus, The Yuletide Murder Unicorn

and it was nice of Veronica to actually coordinate with everyone this time and not show up in a completely disparate Easter Bunny fursuit

I’ve said all along that Krsytal would be the winner, and then she was given the 3rd verse of the queens and it was basically confirmed, but Kitty got the big moment in the song where she beheaded Father Christmas and for a second I thought “Wait, that’s a Drag Race winner right there.”

but alas there was still a runway to walk…

Final Look Ladies

Of course the last runway is to just look as glamorous and opulent as possible which I think they all pulled off to varying degrees of success… First up was Ella Vaday

I adore the colour and the bow on the back was of a size that would please Esme Young no end but I’m not sure I’m ever going to like this sort of very balloon-y Mermaid skirt, I just think it looks a little ungainly and really drags the dress down. As for the hair, I appreciate she’s giving us volume

I’m not sure it’s the most flattering colour on her, especially with the very faux-gold jewellery that’s already washing her out a bit, I think something darker would have helped combat that. But her eye makeup is, as ever, utterly impeccable.

Second to walk was Kitty who, I’m at least 90% sure was wearing a theatre rental costume for The Reluctant Debutante

I do like it, I think despite it’s layers and ruffles it still feels a little flat and I’m very confused as to why she chose silver for her final dress given that her whole thing is that she’s blonde, has a well-heaved bosom and wears pink – this would have looked phenomenal in a really dusty pink. I did think it was a little shady of Alan to say “She sold it to me because she felt pretty in it.” – it’s hardly an ugly dress, it just doesn’t fully live up to the operatic diva look that it’s kind of operating on – the fit of it on her is as good as anything Krystal as worn but of course they’ll never compliment Kitty on that because she’s not a size 4.

Speaking of Krystal, I can’ help it – it’s black and it’s velvet and it’s everything I want to wear at Christmas dinner this year

it’s the usual ultra-glam Krystal fare, and I think that’s fine to bring again in the final – my one issue is the way she absolutely flattens those tits in the front and doesn’t let them go out at all at the side which then makes her hip padding a little jarring. But yeah, she looks phenomenal and it was basically confirmed that she was the winner the moment she turned that corner and it looked like RuPaul was about to leap across that desk and suck the life essence out of her

HOLD HER DOWN MICHELLE.

And of course the eliminated queens all got to walk the runway again. First up was of course Anubis who was very much drawing from her Egyptian heritage, this time it did read much more clearly than her entrance look where it turned out that the Egyptian flag doesn’t have the biggest brand identity

it’s a stunningly intricate look and I’m glad she got to show another one because her planned looks that she’s posted on Instagram have all mostly been top tier. The skirt here does become a little directionless and very much feels like a panicked addition to a very clearly conceptualised bodice and wig.

I’m assuming they were also doing the whole Final Runway Eleganza category but at the same time, if like Elektra Shock, you’re eliminated second you’re not exactly going to keep paying a rental fee for an additional month just to wear a big dress for 5 seconds of air time. But also, I wouldn’t be surprised if Elektra did consider this Top Three Eleganza Extravaganza

Chuck some opera gloves on anything and it becomes 30% fancier I suppose. I have much the same issue with this as a I did Ella’s in that that particular shade of purple with that particular shade of yellow gold is distinctly unexciting and all a bit Cadbury’s to me.

Victoria Hopefully-She’ll-Be-Back-Next-Season Scone was next and… I want to like this, I love the play on volume but the colours aren’t really doing it for me

it’s all a little bit diner booth-y to me and after the high glamour of her entrance look I was expecting a little more. But also, perhaps she’s keep the real fuck-off-amazing stuff for her triumphant return in Series 4 in which she’ll hopefully not Veronica Green herself.

Speaking of Veronica Green…

I think it’s very striking but I think deployed in the wrong place – had she had the opportunity to talk about the look? Great, perfect, I’m sure it would have been a real Moment™ – she posted the look over on her Instagram and I really like the explanation of it and I wish she’d had the opportunity to fully explain it on the show because she’s obviously incredibly proud of it. But what I really loved was that her nakedness did make her look even more like a woodsprite when she stood next to imposing force of Anubis’s garment

I did wonder if Veronica had come out barefoot as well, but she was just wearing a rather formal church shoe – the look was confusingly accessorised but that’s kind of just Veronica for you.

And joining us as Creepy Pasta Betty Rubble was Charity Kase doing The Absolute Most

Am I confused about why she had wings? Mostly yes but also, Betty Rubble gets bitten by a WerePterodactyl and the episodes of The Flintstone are actually Barney Rubble’s tales of Bedrock from before The Biting that he’s telling BamBam is at least a C Tier CreepyPasta.
The best bit about this look was the fact that with her sitting amongst the queens in all of their finery, it was very much the infamous Babadook at a wine party Twitter episode

God bless her.

Choriza May was the first of our double eliminees to take to the runway

Slightly disappointed it’s not a power suit but I can’t be mad at the glamour of it all and the way her flounced skirt moved was exactly what I wanted from Ella’s. I truly think she won this runway with this dress, it’s stunningly high glamour and the flamenco feel to it brings a captivating drama.

River followed and is apparently on a one woman mission to make sheer forearm tubes a thing

It’s a cute look, it does read a little French maid-y to me and like most of River’s outfits, it kind of just lacks a little depth and interest to it but she looks gorgeous in that silver-y blonde hair and she did of course do The Point

Gotta get a gimmick.

And fresh from having robbed a Cinderella production of its costume was Scarlett Harlett

hey, panto season’s coming up, you might as well sell yourself any which way you can and it really is a beautiful dress if not maybe a touch boring and cliché – can’t knock the makeup though

that severe wing is everything I dream of.

And the last of the returnees, Vanity Milan

this is GREAT drag – I have never met a big old tulle coat that I don’t like and it certainly helps this not look like just a leotard. It could use a few more stones to give the bedazzled tits and crotch more impact. The black necklace that looks like it came from the backstage charity shop is a strange choice though

but you’ve gotta cover up a breastplate seam somehow. I do also love that wig, a touch more height to it wouldn’t have gone a miss but that gold sweep through it matching perfectly with her cut crease? Perfection.

A Finale Runway Look Ranking

1. Choriza May Getting Her Roses
2. Krystal Versace-Addams Terwilliger Smith
3. Anubis as… Anubis
4. Kitty Scott-To-Return-This-To-The-National-Theatre
5. Vanity Milan’s Well Deployed Tulle Coat
6. Ella Vaday’s Low Hanging Quality Street Joke
7. Veronica Green’s Wood Sprite Eleganza
8. Scarlett Harlett Will Go To The Ball
9. Victoria Scone’s Voluptuous Diner Booth
10. River Medway’s Sheer Demi-Sleeves
11. Charity Kase Doing Charity Kase
12. Elektra Shock Fancied Up Leotard

I think by the end of all this, everyone was pretty even – I don’t think there was a verse amongst the three of them that was significantly stronger than the other two, nor was there a much weaker one – I think Ella and Kitty were both stronger in terms of concept but you do have to admire Krystal for rhyming Party with Versace and her execution of the choreography was, however surprising, much sharper and more dynamic than Kitty and Ella. So a three way lipsync it was.

Own Up

The final lipsync song of the series was You Don’t Own Me, which is an A+ lipsync song but does seem a strange choice to decide a winner that is about to win and sign a notoriously iron clad contract – I mean, when was the last time any of us heard from Lawrence Chaney? The Vivienne only just reemerged on TV late last year!

While it’s a great lipsync song, I don’t think it leant itself particularly well to Kitty or Ella – Kitty because she really wanted to play it comedically

and I think she really shot herself in the foot when she deployed the reveal too early, or at all

they’re not going to wait for you to put your skirt on for a crowning Kitty and they’re not going to crown you in half a dress!

As for Ella, she played it all a bit too small and realistically and was pretty much upstaged at every point, whether it be a complete tactical eclipse from Kitty

or just the highlight on Krystal’s tits beaming out like the headlights of a car about to run her down

I do appreciate that she went for a more emotive performance – we’ve seen her do a funny, camp number and had she been given a song that leant itself to that, as Kitty’s performance very much showed that this didn’t, she’d have been a formidable opponent but this just wasn’t her gig.

And then you have Krystal who mostly just walked around the stage doing big mouth, big tits and generally being pure highlighter goals

it wasn’t a particularly dynamic or interesting lipsync performance from her but amongst the three very different approaches, I think hers better embodied the emotional bombast of the song so I can’t really say she didn’t win this lipsync but I am not sure she really won the series at large. But RuPaul sure thought she did as our winner is none other than Krystal Versace

I think she’s the right choice for a WOW Presents online series, and I do think Ella and Kitty are probably more valuable assets to the BBC – can’t wait to see which of them ends up on Celebrity MasterChef first. It’ll be Ella and she will say “mee-crOH-WAH-VAY” at least 5 times in the first 3 minutes.

And that was that! I apologise that in the last few weeks the scheduling of my Drag Race recaps got a little scattershot – I bit off a little more than I could chew during November but if you’ve enjoyed them this series and would like to support the blog, you can leave a small tip over on my Ko-Fi.

And so, we have our winner in Krystal Versace:

TOP: Kitty, Charity, Scarlett, Vanity
MID: Choriza, KRYSTAL, Victoria, Elektra
BOT: Ella, Anubis, River, Veronica