RuPaul's Drag Race S9E4 - The Knives Are Out!
Saturday, April 15, 2017 at 4:00PM 
by Chris Feil
Hope you wanted some drama this season on RuPaul’s Drag Race! You could almost consider this week’s episode an ode to machetes for how much the knives came out across the board.
No one was safe this episode: Aja continuing to go in on Valentina, Eureka’s spoiled brat defensiveness to Trinity and Sasha, Charlie’s mean-spirited micromanaging of Cynthia. While I think this season is losing it’s eye somewhat on discussing drag as an art form, it’s at least back to the days when the drama didn’t feel manipulated by editing or the queens feared backlash on social media. And this was a fantastic challenge (ripped off somewhat from season 3, but we’ll allow it): two teams performing their own live morning talk show. Throw in Glee’s Naya Rivera for some star-gazing and you’ve got a pretty dynamic episode...
Last week’s winner Trinity Taylor and lipsyncer Aja were team captains and from the teams they chose, you could already see the the role reversal from last week coming a mile ahead. Aja’s team (“Good Morning Bitches”) had Shea, Sasha, Valentina, Alexis, and Farrah - an easy group to see getting along harmoniously regardless of how they perform. Trinity’s group for “Not On Today” (Eureka, Peppermint, Nina Bo’nina, Charlie, and Cynthia)... not so much.
Ok, I’ll be fair to the group and agree with Peppermint: Eureka’s demonstrativeness is a lot to handle. Whether or not she thinks she’s combative, her condescension has been growing each week as her actual work loses polish. The “Not On Today” team was so fraught with struggles that the “Good Morning Bitches” team was a zen garden by comparison, with even Aja and Valentina’s lackluster jokes getting an easy pass.
Choco-brocco-sexuality - While the “Good Morning Bitches” gals didn’t get as much screentime as Trinity’s crew, their standouts were Shea and Sasha as two horned up nutritionists. Some people want to complain about HD doing no favors for the queens, but that HD up-close-and-personal broccoli munching was A Sight. Don’t undervalue a newly formed Drag Race alliance because I think these two will be sticking around for awhile and it helps to have a close bond for support.
But *oof* Trinity’s team. Despite Eureka’s pettiness, the greatest discord occurred between Cynthia’s cucu-ery and Charlie’s rigidity in sticking to their script. Nina and Eureka had some good chemistry, but Trinity and Peppermint co-anchors were sloppy. But in the interview, the team had no idea how or when to end so Charlie awkwardly jumped in with an even more confusing conclusion. As Naya Rivera figures out what to do next, time approaches infinity. I’m sure her “Am I leaving?” was reverberating in each of those queens’ brains as they awaited their fate.
Best Runway - CANCELLED. If past queens have been called boring for showing up on the runway in just lingerie, why do an entire theme around that? Some queens were more polished, but even the best looks weren’t all that memorable.
Good Morning Bitches was the obvious winning team, with the complementary duo of Shea and Sasha sharing the win. The Trinity/Eureka drama resurfaced with Eureka’s overwrought blaming of Trinity for the team loss, but someone else stole the runway critique moment...
The Tears of a Clown Whore - Her first time truly facing the judges (since her episode 1 win didn’t include critique) resulted in humble tears from Nina. Ross was right to tell her to toughen up - you get one free pass here, Nina, but from now on we need you to stand proud.
The bottom two ends up being team leader Trinity and Charlie. Even if it seemed like a done deal, Trinity put on a damn show for the virtually immobile Charlie. But Trinity was moreso working her ass off to show the other competitors exactly how much they should fear her.
Oh Charlie, [insert Tyra “We Were Rooting For You” meme]. What’s most disappointing about Charlie is that she outright says gives up, which doesn’t sit well with me when you consider all the hungry queens who would kill to fight for her spot. Especially when an older queen like her has such value to impact on younger queens, like we saw in the workroom when she discussed losing friends to AIDS. I had my hopes up that her hilarious Lana Del Rey impersonation would make it onto Snatch Game, but since she didn’t make it that far, I‘ll have to settle with her delivering full snoozy Lana in the lipsync. On Untucked, she mentions she’d have done Joan Rivers anyway.
Speaking of Untucked, this week's episode is a great extension of all the bickering and clashing personalities. TAG YOURSELF! I'm Aja's pure delight as Eureka and Trinity attack eachother.
Will the pressure only create more drama to come? When is that Eureka vs. Trinity lipsync coming? Here’s my updated ranking:
- Shea Couleé
- Nina Bo'nina Brown
- Sasha Velour
- 🔺 Trinity Taylor
- Valentina
- 🔻Eureka O'Hara
- Peppermint
- Alexis Michelle (girl, give us something!)
- 🔺Farrah Moan
- Cynthia Lee Fontaine
- 🔺Aja
- 🔻Charlie Hides OUT
- Jaymes Mansfield OUT
- 🔻 Kimora Blac OUT
Gif as Episode Grade:
Who do you think is next to go home?
Reader Comments (13)
*le sigh* I loved Charlie preseason, so it was tough to see her tank HARD and then just give up.
Once again the gif as episode grade is perfection. We have zeroed in on DRAMA. From here on out. The competition is officially on... and it's going to get bloody.
I feel like this episode was a mess--no runway to speak of, halfhearted attempts at dramatic edits, and where are the mini challenges?? The challenge was a good one, though.
Charlie Hides... she doesn't lip sync, all the London queens sing live, she didn't know the words to the song, she had a cracked rib. Which is it!? Gurl, bye.
BD - oh I've been bitching about no mini-challenge all season. And no Pit Crew!
yes i'm really starting to miss the pit crew. the episodes feel so much shorter than they use to (which makes no sense but they do)
In general, I've been pretty underwhelmed by this season. I think the talent is there (I'm rooting for Nina and Valentina), but something is missing, and I think these reviews have hit the nail on the head. Without the mini-challenges, etc, there are fewer events per week, so the episodes do feel shorter, less happening. I'm left at after each week feeling like I didn't get my fix. Maybe there are still just too many queens, and that's why things feel a little thin.
My big fear is that in moving to vh1, they've been asked to tone down some parts of the show. Is that why we haven't seen the pit crew? I'll have to pay close attention in the next weeks to see if there has been a decline in the number of double entendres and innuendos that were such a hallmark of the show's humor too. I would hope RuPaul would push back against any attempted de-gaying, but who knows if she'd win if she did.
nice post http://talkersten.com/
the winning team was so telegraphed by their lack of pre-challenge coverage i thought i was watching survivor
01. valentina
02. nina bo'nina newton-john brown
03. shea
04. sasha
[surely the winner is somewhere in that group]
05. peppermint
06. farrah
07. aja
08. cynthia
09. trinity
10. alexis
11. eureka
charlie hides: gurl, anybody who's owned a radio knows how to lip synch
This week's epi was horrible. No pit crew, no mini-challenge, and now a de-emphasized runway!? Wtf.
Re: Eureka, I don't think she ever had polish. Her hometown challenge was incredibly obvious (a dirty redneck woman... "How original," said Ginger Minj), her Gaga creation was a poorly fitting knockoff of the original, and so on... She and Trinity can point out the character flaws in one another, but they both seem like people I'd rather avoid.
The winner is either Valentina, Shea, or Nina methinks. Trinity, Sasha, and Eureka will go far, but none seem to be getting the winner's edit. The rest seem like fodder. Farrah will go home next week, I'd bet.
As an aside, I found a video of Alexis Michelle that's amazing, far better than anything she's done this season, where she sings "The Witch's Rap" from Into the Woods. It can be found by searching "Alexis Michelle reveal" on Youtube.
It feels like they eliminated the mini challenges to make way for more Werk Room time/potential drama, but the mini challenges only amp up the competition. Plus, The Pit Crew is nowhere to be found. My thirst needs quenched!
Charlie was my favorite after seeing his youtube vids - especially the Lana Del Rey you mentioned... was in tears the first time I saw that
pretty disappointed he's gone before Snatch Game
not seeing a front runner yet, but I'm sure that will emerge soon enough
Just caught up with this episode. Charlie's lip sync summed up this season so far.
Fingers crossed it finds its feet once there's less queens.
This feels like when Project Runway moved from Bravo to *sigh* ... Lifetime.