RuPaul's Drag Race S9E11 - Category Is: GAY
Saturday, June 3, 2017 at 12:30PM 
by Chris Feil
Happy Pride Month, everyone!! This week’s episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race was perfectly timed to the start of Pride season with gay extravaganza ball on the runway, and lots of streamers, glitter, and puppets! Andie MacDowell giving us Magic Mike XXL white wine realness!
But like Alexis Michelle’s bowl of Beautiful Turquoise Embellishments, this episode became a miss with lots of unfulfilled promise, particularly on the runway. Some queens had a significant misstep on the runway and others lacked the wow factor we expect from a top five competitor. Meanwhile in the workroom, we got a lot of dismissive interview quotes to amp up an air of contentiousness that wasn’t really there. Less an extravaganza than a passable week. Some of that manufactured cattiness probably comes down to a group of queens that genuinely get along, and the eased frustrations in the room now that Nina Bo’nina Brown was sent packing.
Everybody Loves Puppets!! - Official Memorandum to get this mini-challenge the kind of excitement and prestige among the fanbase as Snatch Game. Can you remember any reads from this season that were better than Sasha’s jokes on Trinity’s plastic surgery, Trinity’s jabs at Shea’s hairline, or Peppermint dousing her Alexis puppet in green spray paint? [Alexis voice] That was rhetorical.
Sasha is the puppet master winner, meaning she has to choreograph a ribbon streamer number for the queens because winning a mini-challenge always comes with a downside. After rehearsal is where that labored bickering starts, with Alexis’s self-seriousness right in center. When Alexis starts a sentence with the words “frankly” or “honestly”, it’s like the beginning strums of John Williams’s Jaws score or the shadowy figure of Mrs. Bates entering the bathroom - we watch helplessly though we know the bloodshed that’s coming. The queens should duck for cover, but they seem to have less of a problem with her ego than us at home.
Category Is: Rainbow-She-Betta-Do - If only Kennedy Davenport’s season 7 ball look were here to show these queens how a Pride look is done. Kudos to Shea and Sasha trying to push this outside of a literal interpretation, but their very polished looks still only register as Pride-inspired if you’re told so beforehand. Sasha reads more Almodóvar than Pride, and Shea’s pastels don’t quite cut it. I rather liked Trinity’s look more than the judges, even if the rainbow is more understated.
Favorite Look: This would easily be Shea if it were in primary colors, so I’ll give a very slight edge to Peppermint’s obvious but charming look.
Category Is: Sexy Unicorn - Nina Bo’nina has to be pissed she was sent home before this! Every ball has one category that doesn’t really make as much of an impact and this was that category this year. Each queen had some polish/editing struggles here, but none to really hurt them. It’s a problem that this was Alexis’s best look of the entire ball and she’s still dead last of the category due to a lack of ideas. “My sexy unicorn is a space unicorn” is an actual thing that Peppermint says.
Favorite Look: Sasha’s Tolkien-esque creation gets points for originality, but Trinity’s ensemble took this to the Lisa Frank place of fun the category demanded.
Category Is: Village People Eleganza Extravaganza - Readers, I was gagging over this inclusion in the challenge, a nod to gay pop culture history for a season that has stayed mostly contemporary. If there was a time to embrace the costumey side of what the challenge demands it’s now, but the queens largely shy away to fashion forwardness. Sasha’s look is especially beautiful, but cowboy-adjacent at best.
Favorite Look: With some more polish, it could have easily been Peppermint for me, but this one goes to Shea Couleé for balancing her aesthetic with the challenge (and arguably the toughest Village Person assignment).
Based on the judges critique, Peppermint and Alexis are our bottom two as expected. We all recognize the clock has been ticking on Alexis for a few weeks and it didn’t help that her looks flatlined, so we can guess what’s coming. Peppermint’s attention to detail has been her downfall for most of the season, but this second time lipsyncing means she was given another opportunity to show us what she does best. If Peppermint didn't make you have a good time, I got nothing for you. This hasn’t been a powerhouse season for lipsyncs, but I would call her performance here one of the season’s very best:
For Your Consideration - While Valentina’s massive fanbase and shocking elimination will probably lead to her snatching the Miss Congeniality prize, I’d argue Peppermint as the most worthy. Not only has she stayed above the drama all season, she’s also been its humble sweetheart. Her smile is simply infectious and we know she can put on a damn show. You can vote for this season’s Miss Congeniality here!
Best wishes for Alexis, who got a lovely message from home on this week’s Untucked before being sent home. Trinity and Shea also hash out the debate on her rainbow interpretation.
Current rankings before our top 3 is revealed:
- Shea Couleé
- Trinity Taylor
- Sasha Velour
- Valentina OUT
- Peppermint
- Eureka O'Hara OUT
- Nina Bo'Nina Brown OUT
- Farrah Moan OUT
- Alexis Michelle
- Aja OUT
- Cynthia Lee Fontaine OUT
- Charlie Hides OUT
- Jaymes Mansfield OUT
- Kimora Blac OUT
Gif as Episode Grade:
Reader Comments (17)
This was a great episode.
Last week I was feeling Team Trinity but this week really showed her limitations. Trinity can't serve three looks in a row on Sasha and Shea's level. She couldn't help but fall in estimation this week.
Shea must be the overall challenge leader but Trinity can't be far behind and Sasha is the only queen who's never lip synced. I would've given Sasha the edge for the win this week but Shea's fashion pieces were outstanding. I don't think Sasha will win but her consistency is something else.
Maybe there's a way for Peppermint to knock Trinity out of the top 3, but I doubt it. I very proudly cast my vote for her to win Miss Congeniality.
shea's construction look was a+++, but i think sasha should have won for that excellent rainbow look and fantastic cowgirl get up. i understand the criticism that her looks were more fashion than drag ball, but i don't think they made that criterion clear at the beginning of the episode -- ?
Also, a weird, arbitrary statistical experiment: If each queen earned 1 point for being "high" and 2 points for winning a challenge, while losing 1 point for being "low" and 2 points for lip syncing:
Shea: 10 net points.
Sasha: 8 net points.
Trinity: 4 net points.
Peppermint: 0 net points.
Every other queen from this season left in the red except for Valentina, who exited with 3 points in the bank. Interestingly, Farrah Moan performed the worst by this measure with so few highs to balance out the lows.
Actually I lied—Shea would have 9.
I'll just say. Ok episode. Valentina would've steamrolled through her competition on this particular challenge. Meh.
I'm totally baffled by Sasha. Aside from her Snatch Game performance I've found her nothing but completely boring and pretentious (turned up to 11 this episode). I'm resigned to her making the top 3, but Shea or Trinity for the win please.
Two years on and I'm still baffled that Kennedy Davenport considered that multicoloured nightmare to be her "Best Drag".
Great write up. As much as I enjoy Shea and Sasha, I think of them as extremely polished but not especially memorable queens. Is that terrible? Both very talented but I have a hard time getting excited about a win for them. Peppermint, however, is pure joy more than any past queen I can remember. I'd love to see her pull an upset over Trinity, who might be deserving but just doesn't click with me at all. I think the choice between Shea, Sasha and a third will leave the third as the biggest "stand out" in a way, and I don't need Trinity to take the win.
Not trying to throw shade on anyone - a very talented top four, for sure - but those are my thoughts. I think Ru's done a great job the last couple seasons of hanging on to the best queens (aside from Valentina, who dug her own grave).
So the only mini-challenges this season have been Reading, Puppets and Selfies. And only one of them featured the pit crew. It is a show about gay men (and a trans woman) dressing in drag every week, but it's really hard not to read it as a way to de-gay the show for VH1. It'd make some sense if VH1 were wanting to direct people to their only streaming for extended episodes, but they're not.
It's a shame because the second half of the season has been so much stronger than the start (they simply can't have 14 queens and 42 minute runtime). I liked this episode a lot,
BUT MY GAWD, Alexis is delusional. She thinks that "skirt" (fabric wrapped around her waist) is the sort of thing you can buy off a rack at Saks? She thought that torquois-studded corset was high fashion? She thought she was being "thrown under the bus", but then what does she think of saying Peppermint should leave? Was she throwing Peppermint under the bus? Did she once tell another queer that their outfit wasn't working? It's not their job to tell her her outfit isn't good. And would she listen to them if they did? Doubtful. She thought everything she wore was hot shit. Although yet again we see in Untucked that she had some really great stuff in her wardrobe that we never saw.
choog - I get your criticisms, but there are many of us (like me) who are living for Sasha's drag.
mini-challenge - check
puppets - double check!!
ru visits the workroom - check
no very special moment at the mirrors - check
sasha and shea slay the runway - check
peppermint slays the lip synch - check
alexis finally is sent back to
broadwaycommunity theatreall in all, i'd say it was an excellent episode
untucked: a special message from home or the source of so much misplaced confidence?
I really thought Sasha had this in the bag. Shea's Village People look was breathtaking but she didn't satisfy the rainbow category at all and her unicorn was basic. I looooved Sasha's rainbow with the house reveal and her unicorn was easily the best.
I'm disappointed that we are going into the the top with yet another predictable winner. If Sasha had won, then the top 3 would have three wins each. I also struggle to see what Shea has a winner even though she has been good at everything. I don't really get that "oomph" feeling from her. Still, she's likable and has been doing well since the word go.
Really fun lip sync though sad to see Alexis get a lot of hate online. She was not the villain people keep painting her as.
I shed rainbow tears for the looks we would have seen Valentina do.
I oso feel tt Sasha shld've been this wk's winner. Her house on her head is such an eye-opener!
Poor Gal! alws the runner-up!
I think this is the first season where I'm totally fine with anyone in the top 4 winning. Casting did a great job find strong competition this season.
Shea has star power. I said from the first episode that I could only see her, Nina, or Valentina take the crown. Sasha doesn't have the charisma. She's UNT, to quote Jujubee. By that measure, Trinity is CNT and Peppermint is mediocre but lovable and knows how to slay a lip sync.
I do want to register that I saw Valentina perform live, and there are problems beyond not knowing the words there. Makes me think it was a convenient cop-out.
Valentina will slay on the next All-Stars, so no need to really cry for her that much. And I voted for her in Miss Congeniality! A final three without her in it is ridiculous (Peppermint and/or Alexis would have been long gone by now in her stead), but that bitch not knowing the lip sync words goes beyond nervousness to sheer arrogance (I'm hot shit so I don't NEED to learn the words??? ...swish, swish, bish, another one in the casket lol). Very conflicted as Miss V was my fav of the season once Eureka left. Oh wells. Shea Coulee will make a solid, if unmemorable, winner and not much more than that. I'm already looking ahead to season 10 when Eureka returns and hopefully Winter Green is a contestant outright.
Sasha should e the clear winner this Episode and so Shea, Sasha und Trinity had gotten all 3 Wins and the next Episode and the finale would be more interesting. Now Shea is locked for the Win! I am fine with that, because for me she was never be buttom two, but the real standouts for me were Valentina and Sasha. Sasha were 7 times or so Top 2, why she hasnt got a chance for the Crown is beyond me!