RuPaul’s Drag Race: Queens of America

Posted on March 15, 2011

PinThere we go, darlings. Now your computer is awash in gayness. In fact, you may have to clean your cache after this (and it’s up to you if that’s euphemism for something less savory than computer maintenance).

PinIf there is any disappointment with this season (aside from the big girls all turning out to be kind of sour and personality-free), it’s the poor usage of the Pit Crew this year. Come on now, Ru. We know you don’t want anything outshining your girls, but throw a gay a bone here. Literally.
PinWhy is Ru dressed like a cowboy here? We thought a bra challenge was cute, but we were disappointed that the only tools offered were some jars of glitter. Not that we have anything against glitter, especially as it pertains to drag, but the results were a bit limited and a bit like something you’d make at drag summer camp.
PinAlexis Mateo

One of the better ones, actually.

PinYara Sofia

Enh. A bit uneven.

PinShangela

This was so bad and her Ru ass-kissing was so off the charts that we would have sent her home for this one.

Seriously, girl. That’s supposed to be Ru? Were you trying to insult her?
PinRaja

Compared to the others, this is practically tasteful, which means it kind of fails, since “tasteful” shouldn’t be the first word that comes to mind when discussing a drag queen in a glittered bra.

PinCarmen Carrera

Enh. Christmas Tits.

PinManila Luzon

We can’t honestly say it’s any better than the others, but just cutting out the nipples and having a little pretend showdown with Ru was enough to set it apart and give her the win.

PinShe seemed nice enough, but we were on Michelle’s side (which, can we say? Is not something that happens often) when she took her to task for claiming to be offended. It’s drag, honey. Leave your high-mindedness at the door.
PinCredit where it’s due, he was a surprisingly good judge.
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So congrats to Alexis! We’re not sure we agree with the win, but we can’t honestly say anyone else did it better. Besides, bringing her heart into it (whether it was sincere or merely playing for the cameras) was a wise move and a big factor in her win.
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PinWe can’t really say we love this look. Taking an actual dress uniform and adding sequins and a huge, unflattering skirt to it may be a nice way to remember your boyfriend, but it doesn’t make a very flattering drag look. We were with Manila on this one. It just looked big and mannish. Why not take that jacket and pair it with a sassy sequined mini-skirt?
PinHer PSA was good; not great, but good. Like we said, it helped tremendously that she brought a personal story to it. It also helped that her energy was high, unlike a lot of these sad queens, who inexplicably shut down when faced with a camera and the need to fill air time. We get why the judges awarded it to her, we’re really not arguing against that, but neither her runway look nor her PSA were anything to get all that excited about. We couldn’t roll our eyes hard enough when Michelle claimed they were “rolling on the floor” laughing at it.
The lip synch came down to Yara Sofia and Carmen Carrera and frankly, we were ready for the latter to go, even though we saw where the judges were coming from with their critique of the former.Pin
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PinWe get it. Really, we do. It’s just that now wasn’t the time to wave your Puerto Rican Pride flag, even if you can rightly say that it makes you as much an American as a cowboy holding a hot dog in one hand and an apple pie in the other. It was pretty obvious what the judges were looking for here – campy, old school style, “You’re a Grand Old Flag” patriotism in the drag tradition. We totally support the multicultural thinking here; we just don’t think it was the right time for it.
PinAnd yeah, her tendency to turn the dials up to eleven with every single performance, to the point that it’s almost impossible to understand what she’s saying, gets a little less impressive each week.
PinA drag superstar should demonstrate a little bit of nuance now and then. We’re not talking Dame Judi Dench here or anything; just a demonstration that you can do more than shriek and run around with your hands in the air.
PinUgh. We just can’t with this one.
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PinCompletely devoid of any personality and utterly lacking in any performing skills whatsoever, she’s this year’s Tyra: a very pretty girl with a very blank face. Except even Tyra knew when to pull out the stops to impress the judges. This sourface just stands there and expects to be worshipped.
PinAnd while Yara’s PSA was too over the top, we’ll take a drag queen with too much personality than one that has none at all.
PinAnd the fact that she’s so snotty about it really grates. She’s definitely a very pretty queen, but someone told her she was the prettiest girl in the world, and Carmen? Someone lied. You ain’t ALL that.
So Auntie Ru listened to her heart and didn’t send anyone home. We think a non-elimination outcome was more than likely already built into the schedule and it was up to Ru to decide when she was going to deploy it. Think about shooting schedules and episode numbers. You can’t just decide right in the middle of shooting to fool around with that. Even low budget cable shows have every minute of the schedule accounted for. There’s either a double elimination planned for a future episode and this was decided upon ahead of time in order to ramp up the drama or they’re planning on having more than the usual number of queens in the finale.
Not that we’re complaining, really. We wanted to see Carmen go home, but she actually did a semi-decent job on the lip synch. We definitely didn’t want to see Yara go home yet. Carmen’s never going to change the way she does things, but Yara will probably take their critiques to heart. We’re curious to see if either of them will take this opportunity and run with it.
[Photo Credit: logotv.com – Screencaps: tomandlorenzo.com]

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