Disclaimer: This post discusses spoilers from RuPaul’s Drag Race season 13 episode 7. If you haven’t seen the episode yet, don’t say I didn’t warn ya!
Last week on RuPaul’s Drag Race, we said goodbye to our queen Tamisha Iman, who lost a lip sync for your life to Kandy Muse, who is feeling some guilt for sending Tamisha home after they were starting to rekindle their friendship. Olivia, on the other hand, is feeling totally ecstatic after her win, and Elliott is still having a difficult time making friends.
Nonetheless, it’s a day in the werkroom, and we still have so many queens left. And it’s episode 7. This is getting a little out of hand.
For this week’s mini challenge, the library is officially open, and the queens are reading each other.
Rosé, Denali, Gottmik, and Symone are natural readers. Meanwhile, Olivia, Elliott with 2 Ts, and Kandy are flops (to put it nicely). Gottmik is declared the winner of this week’s mini challenge.
For this week’s maxi challenge, the queens are working in groups to appear on Bossy Rossy: After Dark, hosted by none other than Ross Mathews (what a surprise!) — RuPaul will be assigning the groups at random.
The groups are Symone and Kandy, appearing in Tiffany Gibson & Lil’ Deb Deb: Where Are They Now?, Denali, Rosé, and LaLa Ri, appearing in I’m Pregnant With My Imaginary Boyfriend’s Baby, Gottmik, Utica, and Olivia, appearing in Breaking My Silence: Escaping the Cult of Mimeology, and Tina and Elliott with 2 Ts, appearing in My Best Friend’s 600-Pound Ass is Killing our Friendship!
This week’s maxi challenge is purely improv, meaning no scripts and no rehearsal. The queens will need to feed off each other’s energy in order to shine this week. As someone who did drama and musical theatre actively in high school, improv isn’t easy, so it’s always interesting to see how the queens interpret their characters with little to no guidance. And when you tell drag queens of all people to do improv, it can either go really well, or it can go completely south because both queens are trying to be large and in charge.
In the actual challenge, Denali and Rosé’s loud pregnant ladies overshine LaLa Ri’s shy doctor, Olivia kills it as Cheryl the mime while Utica falls flat, Kandy and Symone’s characters are fairly low energy, but they’re still delivering a solid performance, and Tina and Elliott? We’re not going to talk about it. I hated it, I want to forget it, I want it erased from my memory.
While the queens get ready in the werkroom, Symone is feeling nervous about her and Kandy’s performance because their characters were out of their comfort zones. We also learn Symone’s brother committed armed robbery when she was younger, which had a huge impact on her relationship with her mother. Elliott and Tina think they did “amazing,” which is delusion central. However, Elliott reveals to Tina she suffers from pretty severe clinical depression, which draws them closer together. Let it be known to not make judgements on someone’s character before you learn their story first. Okurrrrr?
On the mainstage, RuPaul is joined by judges Michelle Visage, Ross Mathews, and this week’s extra-special guest judge, LGBT activist TS Madison.
On the runway, category is: Bead It. Denali is a jaw-dropping chandelier, Rosé looks like a neon Tinkerbell, LaLa Ri went with a revealing two-piece with bouncy hair, Gottmik is wearing a 60s mod dress with huge red anal beads on her head, Olivia looks like a big sixth grader, Utica went with a bloody bride who murdered her husband look, Kandy is finally giving us high-fashion (but she’s walking down the runway at 2 miles per hour), Symone went with a Glamazon-African warrior look, Tina finally ditched the classic red/yellow/orange colour scheme (aside from her wig, yawn), and Elliott is serving in a 1920’s flapper dress.
The safe queens this week are Rosé, Denali, Gottmik, and Tina. The tops and bottoms are LaLa Ri, Olivia, Utica, Kandy, Symone, and Elliott with 2 Ts. In terms of critiques, LaLa Ri faded into the background, Olivia took a risk and did great, the judges got lost in Utica’s confusing performance, Kandy hit all the right spots, Symone also played her role well, and Elliott with 2 Ts completely missed the mark.
After the judges deliberations, the rankings this week are as follows:
Olivia Lux: WINNER
Symone: HIGH
Kandy Muse: HIGH
Utica Queen: LOW
LaLa Ri: BOTTOM 2
Elliott with 2 Ts: BOTTOM 2
That means Elliott with 2 Ts and LaLa Ri face off in a lip sync for your life to “Whole Lotta Woman” by Kelly Clarkson. Both queens are very talented dancers, so this was an absolute serve. While this could have totally been a double shantay, we are unfortunately saying goodbye to our queen LaLa Ri. While I’m sad to see LaLa go, I would have been pissed if this was a double shantay — I can’t handle an extra episode this season.
What did you think of this week’s episode? Do you think LaLa Ri deserved to be the queen to sashay away? Let me know in the comments below!
Ta-ta for now!
x
THE GAY BIBLE 