belligerent

Something I forgot to mention, was anybody else thoroughly annoyed that JBC was wearing loafers in his Prince costume? I realize it was a party city level costume but at least wear something with a heel.

I don't know who told Kandy that red and black are her colors but they were wrong. This episode was tedious to me. So far this season, we have already sat through a full episode of "Where are all the other queens? okay now lip sync! Haha, you're going home!" times six, then the same "make up your own lyrics to a rupaul B side and dance" episode twice, and now an episode with essentially the same dumb skit three times. I get that the joke is that hallmark movies are all the same plot, but it only works to make fun of them like that if you're not boring the viewers in exactly the same way. Maybe I would feel less annoyed by the repetition if I hadn't been stuck in my own Groundhog Day since St. Patrick's Day of last year? But maybe not. It was funny that Eliottwithtwots hid, but it would have been funnier if Vanjie hadn't already done that. I don't know why queens come on this show with things they can't move around in or that can't be modified easily. 100% Pure Love is one of my favorite 90's dance songs but you kind of have to move to that song. Kahmora could have at least pogo'ed or something.

Not really an appropriate question to ask.

It's interesting to watch otherwise eloquent people like Ru trip over themselves trying to figure out how to refer to Gottmik to not seem disrespectful and then end up looking that way anyway when they deviate from how they'd refer to a cis male drag queen, effectively being othering rather than inclusive. I hope this isn't a theme of the season because I'm already exhausted. I saw the pit stop video with Trixie and Shea reacting to the premiere the other day, and oh boy, Shea had no idea how to handle this, either.

I missed the second 20 minutes of the show trying to figure out how to watch it on the CW website, which apparently you couldn't actually watch it on, so I missed a couple of the lip syncs. I think it was kind of cruel to make them sit there and think they're all leaving and then make them have to vote for someone. That should be Ru's job. I do like that they made everyone lip sync, though, now nobody gets to "hide" all season and they all get the opportunity to feel that pressure at least once before the final lip sync. I am cautiously optimistic about Gottmik, as a trans man myself. I didn't think drag race would ever cast one or might do it once as a novelty with a "filler queen," but Gottmik has some pretty good credentials and hopefully will do well. Joey Jay's entrance look resembles a girl I know to an uncanny degree.

She also referenced Sasha's "Category Is" lyrics as flavor flav with the "stranger than fiction, better than art," which I didn't realize until I watched it a couple times. I'm sure there's possibly other references she's made to Sasha that I missed or that might not have made it in the final cut.

I haven't watched television regularly for ten years so that could be why. I'm sure she's absolutely great and she seemed nice, I just have never heard of her before.

I thought Shea's joke about Blair failing her driving exam was a bit tone deaf. I know it was about her looking young but considering she had the DUI thing happen that was discussed earlier, I think she could have chosen a different kind of exam and still gotten the point across (ACT? pre-SAT?)... Unless it actually was about the DUI??? Hard to tell. Why were they trying to gaslight us into believing that Blair has been funny this whole time? We've watched this show they've edited for us, and if there's been evidence of humor, they haven't shown it. It's the queens saying it, though, so has the show been denying us actual humor from Blair for the sake of this elimination? I have no idea who Jane Krakowski is.

I'm rewatching and just got through the part where Shea helps Cracker with the sewing machine, and I need to figure out what she did because I have that machine and rarely use it because it's constantly jacked up and making bobbin nests. I have two others that don't give me nearly as much trouble.

I agree with your whole post but especially these parts. I think it's interesting that other people who have attempted and failed at Lady Gaga tried Gaga's "weirder" looks and tried to go over the top weird to match. I think Cracker had the energy more correct but there was nothing funny about it, especially in this context. I think if it had been one of the earlier Gaga costumes, it would have worked out better just because one of the things that's interesting about her (to me, anyway) is how sincere and intelligent she is while also being committed to the weirdness of her art. Cracker also isn't as well-spoken or off the cuff funny as she is so it's not going to read well. I'm also biased because I love Lady Gaga and I understand why nobody has been able to pull her off yet, but dammit. I had a hard time watching India as Jeffree. Alexis was funny but knowing nothing about Walter Mercado, myself, I feel like she was giving me about 6/10 of what I had expected based on what was said in the workroom. She also more than carried her group, though. I think the funniest thing Blair did as Ellen was take the selfie at the end, but I feel like she added to the scene as a whole by anchoring it in reality and allowing Eartha Kitt and Flava Flav to seem weirder. Also I find it ironic that by Ellen being less wacky, the comedic role of "straight man" ended up being a gay woman. I think Jujubee should have won. The thermostat answer is one of the funniest things that's been said on this show, imo. I also agree that something was missing with Flav. I watched at least two seasons of Flavor of Love (were there more? I don't remember...) and I think I was on the TWOP forum for it? Maybe, I don't know, it was a while ago. The cadence of how he speaks was off, and I kept waiting for him to do the Ernie laugh at himself after making a dumb joke. I also felt like the bit about child support was forced. I think there were organic ways a joke could have been made about that, but it seemed too "let me shove this in because it shows I know things about my character." I definitely don't think Shea's performance was bad but I didn't think it was as funny as Jujubee's. I have a headache so all I can say about the rest of the episode is that I'm glad India is gone.

I read the article and that was....certainly a lot of words she wrote. Oh boy. For some reason, it doesn't surprise me that her writing style seems more about convincing people she's intelligent than actually saying anything. I can't figure out if I like Miz Cracker or not. I want to, but she keeps giving me counterarguments why I shouldn't. I could never be a judge on this show because not only do I not know what a good lip sync is (usually), I apparently don't know what's funny, either. I laughed the most at the last sketch just because it was the dumbest. I don't think it was very coherent. I think it's interesting that all the queens kept saying they thought that skit was going to win. Were they being genuine or was this shady? I actually thought the skit that won was the least entertaining. How did they choose what roles the characters had? The last challenge I remember being somewhat like this (was it 11? with the COPS parody or whatever it was?), they were allowed to choose who did what so each queen kind of had a bigger hand in how successful they were. I thought Mayhem's character gave her the least room to do anything with because it was harder to be "herself" whereas all the other queens could just play themselves in that role because they were all "drag queen in situation that drag queen would plausibly be in." She was somebody who worked at a store...who happened to be a drag queen? Is this her day job? Maybe addressing this somehow would have made it funnier, I don't know. I liked her reaction to SheMZ being there and actually didn't think she did a terrible job in the role. Oh well. So much for the India/Mayhem alliance, too.

I couldn't figure out if she was trying to be shady by saying that, like in a "I'm glad that you can read my mind instead of listening to what I'm saying" kind of way. I've listened to it a few times and go back and forth. Cracker took her at face value and it seemed like Alexis let her do that, but I'm not sure that was totally the correct way to have read it.

I think she's more well known as her drag persona, Coral Fixation. I didn't like the song this week for whatever reason. I tried to watch the episode three times and my computer kept rebooting and I didn't pay attention to the episode very well any of the three times. It seemed like they did a ton of editing/autotune/timing/something to get some of those takes to fit the song.

I just listened to the two songs back to back to confirm and I now don't think they sound as much alike but Miz Cracker's song reminded me so much of Britney Spears' "Womanizer" that I was surprised Derrick didn't say something about someone doing a Britney song. Of course, I also didn't realize that Willam's "Boy is a Bottom" was a parody of another song for a while, so maybe I'm overcompensating this time. I wish they had shown more of them getting their acts ready. Some of them obviously had to involve other dancers for choreography and I wonder what difference that made in preparation. Are they also being scored on that? For example, did Alexis and India choreograph and teach their backup dancers? Did they make their own props and bring them or were they given the opportunity to work with the show's crew? I'm also curious how the tip money rolling over is going to affect their strategies. As much as I dislike interpersonal drama, whether real or manufactured, I do enjoy watching strategy when everyone is on the same page that this is a game and not a contest of morality.

I feel bad for Derrick in some ways because I'm not sure he doesn't have residual issues from coming out to his mom, thinking she'd totally accept him, and her having a bad reaction. Like being himself is too painful so he has to be someone else all the time? In other ways, I don't feel bad for him because he is kind of a dick to people when they don't always deserve it, and his own insecurities are not really an excuse to treat people poorly. Either way, I don't think he's a "fun" villain because it's hard for me to watch his house of cards collapse in slow motion, so I'm glad he's gone. At least in the first season, he seemed more confident in his delusion which ironically made him more enjoyable to root against. I really enjoyed seeing Yvie. What she does is mesmerizing. It's not just her body and contortion, but how she emotes and really everything she puts into the performance. I'm also excited to see Jujubee again.

You're right, I didn't even think of that. It was posted May 30 and it was probably filmed after he released his new makeup palette, which was apparently May 16. I watched a little of it to see if they said when it was filmed. (I don't want to give him ad money so I only watched a few minutes.) They make reference to Gigi not having filmed her last episode yet but talk about quarantine and that there's "nothing to do but go outside." Maybe his was the studio Gigi tried to use for the finale video. I'm not sure what his setup is. I think (but someone please correct me if I'm wrong) in California some of the social distancing stuff has been lifted since before this was posted, so it's possible she wasn't technically breaking quarantine but it's still very tacky that she's clearly not socially distancing. What was that word again? Oh, that's right. Choices.

He's kind of a shitty person, imo. Here's a list of incidents, and you can decide for yourself what you think of him: https://www.reddit.com/r/BeautyGuruChatter/comments/bduvox/a_comprehensive_list_of_jeffree_stars_many/ (to play devil's advocate at myself, it's not like RuPaul is a saint, either, and we obviously all watch his tv show.) Back to the episode, I forgot to mention before but I really enjoyed seeing all the different setups people had and think it's funny how people were just filming out of their backyard or closets or whatever. Did anyone else feel like Brita was in front of a green screen background? I swear it looked like she was casting shadows weirdly. I'd have to watch it again though to make sure.

That's a really unfortunate choice of people to associate with on Gigi's part.

That's the thing that makes it funny, though, imo. The song is obviously not literally about birds, so the dumbest thing you could do is ignore that and perform it literally. I don't know, that's the kind of humor I enjoy the most, so even though I agree that the performance wasn't as strong as the other two, I still appreciated it a lot.

There was also a brokeback mountain reference from Gigi about Crystal.

I consider myself "homoflexible," so I mostly am attracted to men but occasionally find women attractive. Jackie in drag looks like the type of woman I am usually attracted to but out of drag doesn't look like the type of man I am usually attracted to, even though he is good-looking. There's no way in hell that sherrypie didn't know she was going way over her time limit and there is no way she can gaslight me into believing otherwise. A few minutes over I could believe was an honest mistake, but not 12 minutes over the limit. She was fucking Jaida over intentionally. It's interesting that in the mini challenge that Jackie's puppet impersonation was about her being a self-centered attention whore. I wonder if sherry herself was intentionally trying to create a villain storyline for herself that we just haven't seen due to so much of her being cut. I also don't think Jaida is as much of a bitch as she claims to be because it was very gracious of her to not throw a shoe or something at her head by minute six and not to say more about it to the judges. I didn't really understand her story at all, but maybe it would have been more cohesive if she hadn't had to wait through twenty minutes of bullshit. I feel like the problem with Heidi's act is that the best thing about Heidi is that she's Heidi. That's what Ru loves about her. Why then did she spend the entire act being other people who aren't as funny or charming as she is?? I get what she was trying to do, but I think if she'd let herself be the main character in the skit, it would have gone over better. I'm surprised they didn't give her that feedback during the practice. I agree with Ru that she's a superstar, though. I would watch anything she's in.

I agree, that would have been a better take on it, but I'm not sure she could have led anyone to ask the questions to get that out, either. I would have had less issue with the Canada thing if it was something we had been led to associate with her character before this episode. In all the previous challenges whenever they mention politics or whatever, Jackie's talking about this country and her mom coming here, etc. So when she mentioned being Canadian, I was like "...what?" Contrast to Brooke Lynne from last season, who was pulling the Canada card immediately. In a challenge like this, she probably could have successfully done what Jackie was trying to do, without even as much planning, because the audience has had enough exposure to her "first ever Canadian!!!" to fill in the backstory. I don't think it really worked for what we knew about Jackie. I thought her lip sync was beautiful, though, so I'm all right with her having been in the bottom. When I saw what song it was, my immediate question was "how do you make an interesting lip sync to a boring song like this?" and I definitely got my answer.

Considering what she's done outside of the competition to people, which she has admitted to doing, I am not surprised at all that she lacks empathy and chooses when she feels it's advantageous to fake that or not. I also would not be surprised if it's a conscious choice made to throw Crystal off her game or control the atmosphere backstage. She is incredibly manipulative, and I would not put it past her to exploit any weaknesses she can in others or create tension. I am glad they're showing as much of her ugliness as possible.

I very much prefer when they do the singing on these musicals themselves vs. the ones that are sung by other people. I know not everyone is a singer but it seems more personal when they do their own parts instead of the really produced musical numbers. Beyond that, thank god Brita is finally gone. I feel like there's a level of Dunning-Kruger effect to her that's become more obvious as the season has progressed. Considering we have the same "boy name," I take it personnel-y. Loved Heidi speculating that maybe she, herself, was the trade of the season. I love her in general, though. I don't think she's going to win the competition but I think she definitely has enough charisma that has shown through that it will only help her after this. I think Jan was competent but it's really super hard to take my eyes off Gigi when she's doing anything. She has an "it factor" that I'm not sure Jan has. I'm not sure if it's her emoting, the proportions of her body making everything look really exaggerated, or what. I think Jan also has the misfortune of the association with Jan Brady that everyone is kind of making, especially since she can't be "Jan Sport." We expect her to be outshone by someone, so that's what happens to confirm the unconscious bias. I haven't put a ton of thought into it, but I wonder if anyone's looked into if drag name ever seems to factor into how well a queen does.

She consistently looks like if John Wayne Gacy's clownsona had done drag, imo. I wonder what they would have done if she hadn't made a statement admitting to the claims against her being true. Like, I'm pretty sure that's what has led to the producers making the decisions they have. Has Brita addressed the allegations against her at all? If she hasn't, I think the best the editors can do is allow her to look unlikable. I personally feel like Gigi and Jackie are the ones to beat, although I love Heidi and Crystal, too.