Power Rankings

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 5 – Draguation Speeches: recap & power ranking!

June 11, 2022 by krisis

Welcome to my recap of the fifth episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – Draguation Speeches, a challenge that mashes up comedy with inspiration and a touch of personal branding.

This is a fascinating challenge because there is nothing quintessentially “drag” about it, yet it is perfectly representative of the direction of the show in 2022.

Drag Race constantly finds new peaks of cultural influence, and with that higher profile all of its contestants have a higher profile than ever before.

Drag Race winners used to compete to score a club tour sponsored by Absolut Vodka.

Now, winning queens are getting the opportunity to appear on stage at the Emmy awards, walk the runway for Fenty and other fashion brands, and attend the Met Gala. Peppermint, the only Season 9 finalist to not yet have her own crown, just hosted the GLAAD Awards!

Of this cast of winners, five host ongoing podcasts (Jinkx hosts two!), Raja has hosted Fashion Photo RuView for almost a decade, Viv has anchored several Netflix YouTube shows, Monét had her own talk show, Jinkx has written and produced multiple one- and two-woman shows, and Shea has appeared in multiple features in Vogue – among many other appearances and accolades.

That’s the genius of this challenge. Draguation Speeches are not about a skill critical to the foundations of your drag, but the skill of translating your drag into different contexts. A drag queen should be giving a commencement speech! A show that started as an (even-more) queer spin on Project Runway is now a public-facing finishing school that turns former bar queens and Instagram influencers into in-demand LGBTQAI+ spokespeople.

If no Drag Race queen has been invited to receive an honorary degree and deliver a commencement address, it’s only a matter of time.

(Actually, Sasha Velour delivered a commencement address to The Center for Cartoon Studies’ class of 2020!)

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Drag Race challenge without the added requirement of making Ru laugh! Which queens manage to be both inspiring and hilarious? As it turns out, Ru and I are split on the decision. Read on to find out about our disagreement. Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my Episode 4 power rankings to show where the queens stand after another week of Legendary Legend badges. (Want to skip right to the power rankings? Go for it!)

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 5 – Draguation Speeches: recap & power ranking!

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 4 – Fairytale Justice: recap & power ranking!

June 4, 2022 by krisis

Welcome to my recap of the fourth episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – Fairytale Justice, an improv acting challenge!

I have done improv in college classes and as a warm-up for rehearsals, but I’ve never officially performed improv for an audience. That still gives me a lot more exposure to improv than average TV viewer. I’d guess that the vast majority of people’s experience with improv comedy comes from watching Whose Line Is It Anyway? and having heard of the rule of “Yes, and…”

Broadly, the idea of “yes and” means that you accept what others in your scene have said as reality and then you add to it.

That might be the primary rule of improv, but it’s not a rule in the sense that people who haven’t done improv often expect it to be. It doesn’t mean that you must always say “yes, and..,”, that your character can never disagree with another character, or that the story can never contradict itself. It also doesn’t mean that everything in improv has to be done without a plan or with no preparation.

“Yes and” is simply a guideline for productive collaboration. It’s a means of always moving forward instead of pausing to correct or edit, even if that means you move forward into conflict. Any good conversation you’ve ever had involved an amount of “yes and.” So have most of your successful group projects. Even working from an agenda in a meeting requires an amount of “yes and”!

As it turns out, life is largely a game of improv.

RuPaul emphasizes improvisation on Drag Race because improv is foundational to not only his idea of comedy, but his entire career. Ru loves the idea of “volleying” – being able to trade an escalating series barbs live with another player. That quick wit has been a huge part of what has made him an enduring icon in entertainment. He picked that up from a wide array of silly 60s, 70s, and 80s influences like Laugh-In, The Sonny & Cher Show, comedians on gameshows like Match Game, and late night hosts like Johnny Carson and Joan Rivers.

Not all Drag Race contestants fully grasp this idea of “yes and,” let alone how to use it to play for laughs. That has resulted in many uneven improv moments over more than two dozen seasons of the show’s many franchises. Yet, in this episode, we saw two of the best ever examples of “yes and” in Drag Race history!

Do you know which two queens I mean? Keep reading to find out in my full recap of “Fairytale Justice.” Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my Episode 3 power rankings to show where the queens stand after another week of Legendary Legend badges. (Want to skip right to the power rankings? Go for it!)

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 4 – Fairytale Justice: recap & power ranking!

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – All Winners Pre-Season Power Rankings

May 19, 2022 by krisis

Yes, my dear readers of all ages and genders, you read that title correctly: Drag Race coverage is back for a limited time only, to cover this senses-shattering All-Winners series!

Honestly, I’m still watching every episode of every iteration of Drag Race, but that has escalated from about 20 episodes a year five years ago to almost 100 a year today thanks to Drag Race, All-Stars, UK, Holland, Canada, Espana (Spain), Down Under (Australia + New Zealand), Italy, and vs. The World; already-shot debut seasons from France and the Philippines; pending franchises from Mexico, Belgique (Belgium), & Sverige (Sweden); and the oft-rumored Ru-turn of Thailand! Plus, Dragula!

That’s a lot of drag artists to consume every year and I love every single second of it, but this new season of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 takes the crown because it features eight winners crowned by RuPaul herself over the past 11 years – starting with the incomparable legend Raja from Season 3 through All-Stars Season 5 winner Shea Couleé.

Who has the best chance to walk away as the QUEEN OF QUEENS in this 12-episode special event? I’m breaking down all eight of these queens based on their track records of Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve, and Talent… plus, their Fashion sense and Lip Sync abilities, and what common Drag Race challenges they might actually win on this stacked cast!

Then, in two days, come back for my RuCap and Power Rankings of Episode 1 – “Legends”!

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win!

RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 10 Power Rankings, Episode 04 – The Last Ball On Earth

April 14, 2018 by krisis

This week brings back an interesting conundrum I last faced in my Season 8 and All Stars 2 recaps, but never this early in the season: What happens when the judging completely diverges from my take on the performances?

And, for bonus points: what happens when despicable personalities get rewarded by the show?

I came to Drag Race in Season 6, which you could accuse of being the beginning of “RuPaul’s Best Friends’ Race.” Sure, Gia had her shady moments and Darienne had it in for BenDelaCreme, but it was mostly a sweet season about being great at drag – and I loved it. There was no villain and everyone pretty much got exactly as far as they deserved to get.

That became my model for Drag Race – that it was a total meritocracy and that it had evolved past the nastiness I glimpsed when going back to prior seasons. Even if her fashion was aces, how could I love Raja when she was a mean girl who labeled other people “Boogers”? Even if their fashion was stellar, why would I root for RoLaskaToxxx if their sole reason for being became bullying Jinkx?

We haven’t really seen a serious villain since then, but it’s not a coincidence that the two seasons I quit ranking before the finale were the two that really turned my concept of drag meritocracy on its ear. I couldn’t understand the departure of Acid Betty and the lack of rewards for Thorgy in Season 8, and I was puzzled by the EZ-Pass given to Alaska (and, sometimes, Detox) in All Stars.

A broken meritocracy and the return of villainy have converged here on Season 10. This is the third week in a row the judging hasn’t even commented on an obvious challenge winner in order to serve a heavy-handed narrative. We have Monique Heart being criminally ignored and the early emergence of an “always a bridesmaid” story for Miz Cracker. Meanwhile, the judges fawn over any decent look from Aquaria, and Eureka gets a comeback narrative while she comes off as the nastiest queen we’ve had since original-flavor Roxxxy.

I love drag and I love this show, but I can’t get excited about parroting misguided rankings based on the judges’ feedback and the edit. From this point out, I’m going to simply write this up as “Krisis’s Drag Race,” and boost the queens I am personally living for – which so far has not included Aquaria.

Start your engines, readers. And may the best woman … win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 10 Power Rankings, Episode 04 – The Last Ball On Earth

RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 10 Power Rankings, Episode 03 – Tap That App

April 7, 2018 by krisis

This is an all-time classic episode of Drag Race, with a difficult marketing maxi-challenge, a stunning runway theme, and a helping of drama (if you like that sort of thing) (and I don’t).

This episode’s feather-themed runway is one of the strongest themes in the history of the show. The majority of these looks would be winners against any other runway lineup, and a two of them will probably go down as a pair of the most memorable looks in Drag Race history.

Behind the scenes in Untucked, the queens get into a serious discussion of Drag Race and race when Aquaria suddenly turns timid after coming for The Vixen’s borrowed red wig. The debate isn’t that Aquaria’s argument is valid (and it’s not, really), but that their confrontation is the perfect model of how white queens never get the blame when it comes to drag drama while queens of color get vilified for clapping back.

Vixen really appeals to me here as a queen who understands the tragedy that playing the game her way – which includes calling out bullshit where she sees it – is going to earn her hate just because of the color of her skin. A white queen with the same strategy would be an all-time fan favorite, but she will inevitably go down as a more divisive contestant.

Yet, instead of playing the coquette, she chooses to lean into her personality. That recontextualizes her “here to fight” entrance line. It’s not that Vixen is mean or messy. It’s that she is unequivocally herself, and she’s not going to back down from that.

I have zero interest in the petty side of Drag Race, which means a contestant who is “here to fight” is a total turnoff for me no matter the color of her skin. Yet, I’m conscious enough of my implicit bias to understand that I can be quicker to dismiss a black queen who is being messy even without intending to be racist. Just because I love Bob, Shangela, and Chi Chi doesn’t mean I don’t have my own racism to confront.

By contrast, Aquaria now looks extra-bad for her equally deliberate confrontational nature from these past three episodes. She’s a brainy queen who knows exactly what she’s doing whens she provokes Vixen or Cracker, but she also knows she can squeak by on the power of being an easily-forgivable pretty white queen.

Wow – that got heavy pretty fast! Let’s get light as a feather with this stunning runway and another week of major shake-ups in the rankings compared to the previous rundown.

Start your engines, readers. And may the best woman … win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 10 Power Rankings, Episode 03 – Tap That App