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Here are some stray thoughts after episode 2: I am really excited about this season of drag race because I think this is collectively a stronger group of queens then we've had in seasons. That being said, I thought this challenge was pretty weird. I know these over-produced "Ru"sical challenges have been a staple for a while now but the topic being pharmaceuticals, really? I didn't quite get what this has to do with gay/drag culture, or anything at all. I also thought that the team that won had the easier song out of the two and had more to work with. I thought the Runway was a little weird too. It sucks if the queens were told "trademark drag" because several of the queens got called out specifically on whether or not it was their "best drag", which is a much different category. Either way a theme like that makes sense for the very first episode or one of the last but not the second. Good for Rusty Bottoms for figuring out how to navigate the challenge but I think it sucks for any queen that shows a signature look (like Rusty's spots, because who wouldn't on the first challenge), then get critiqued for it, then asked the very next time for a "best" or "trademark" look. After last week I was hoping that every challenge would be a re-do from a previous season. I guess that trend is still holding but we'll see. Lots of people in this thread love Blair St. Clair and I just don't see it. From the first instant she walked out I thought she looked like she needs more real world experience and looked outclassed by many other queens. Also, I didn't watch her MTQ or look up anything about her but the way I am interpreting her "bringing the Broadway" is that she is a 22 year old swishy gay kid from Indiana that grew up listening to way too much musical theater. She has by far the most baby-face out of drag of anyone in this competition ever and looked like a baby giraffe trying to learn that choreography. Alyssa Edwards was great in this episode and great to see. More Legendary Children, please and less Todrick this season. Untucked continues to deliver but I don't like the little changes they've made since it's actually airing as an episode instead of on Youtube. Any chance someone is watching Untucked for the first time and is lost? Thank goodness there are little slides telling me that the queens are going backstage while the judges deliberate while it shows the queens walking backstage or I would have no clue what was going on. I've also noticed that the episodes used to be about 30 minutes long on Youtube and are now 20 minutes so they are aired with commercials and they have largely been cutting the eliminated queen talking while packing and getting loaded up. Has anyone noticed that there is MUCH less showing of the crew now? I miss the clap-slate. I do like the new "Guuuuuuuurl" as the commercial intro/outro though. Re: Drag Race Thailand. Episode 7 is great. The twist of Double Maxi Challenge is genius and I'm surprised hasn't happened in Drag Race USA before. I am also in love with Pangina. She always looks like she is having great fun with her looks.
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Apr 3, 2018 03:40
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| # ¿ Apr 26, 2024 03:27 |
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I think the group of queens this season is really good. There are a few that are still too much in the background but by this point its usually easier to see who will make it to the top 3/4 and who doesn't have what it takes. But at this point I feel like it truly is anyone's game. The longer format is great and I love seeing all the mini-challenges again; it really adds flavor to the show. In my opinion the weakest aspect has been in the maxi-challenges. They all seem like recycled concepts of previous seasons and I refuse to believe that Ru and crew couldn't come up with more original ideas if they wanted to. For example the "comedy challenge" for the past few seasons have specifically been a Roast of some sort. The "acting challenge" seems like its always the queens split into two teams to act out a parody of something from the 90's. I miss when Snatch Game, a 3 look Ball, and the top 3 make-a-video-with-Ru were the only guaranteed challenges and everything else was more surprising. I feel like this show is suffering in the same way Project Runway is where Ru/the producers are so focused on keeping to the same format that made it popular that they don't realize how stale and unoriginal it's become. It's still good tv but they've raised the bar so high that I expect so much more. For this past episode I thought all the queens did a pretty good job and brought pretty good performances. There were some standouts but if you compare this episode to AS3's "Bitchelor" episode (exact same format, the queens split into pairs to play contrasting archetypes on a reality show) no one really poo poo the bed like Milk or Chi Chi did. I was annoyed at the judging though and I don't think it was fair for some of the queens to get the feedback that they were too one-dimensional when the assignment was literally to play an over-the-top stereotype. I also thought that Kameron deserved to be in the top or possibly win because it's obvious that she isn't one of the louder personalities and this type of challenge seemed well out of her comfort-level but I loved what she did and thought she was hilarious. I also thought Miz Cracker's Dr. Pickle was way better than Eureka but I guess Ru can't resist a fat man dressed up like a baby. Finally, even though Mayhem's lipsynch was lackluster I thought Monet's was straight up messy. This would have been a good opportunity for Ru to send the message that "lipsynch gimmick" doesn't always mean an automatic win but alas.
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Apr 24, 2018 01:03
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Personally I miss when Mike Ruiz would show up for photography stuff. Did he and Ru have a falling out or does this have to do with the unspoken "No Gay Men Allowed" rule for guest judges?
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Apr 24, 2018 02:55
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I loved reading about all the behind-the-scenes fuckery that's going on and I'm glad Willam is dropping the T. I get the impression that most of the other queens would never speak out like this, out of respect for Mother Ru, but Willam is the only one smart enough to realize that no one is giving out crowns for respect. I never liked him as much as lots of other queens and his Beatdown was never really my kind of humor but I respect Willam for realizing that there are other ways to *win* Drag Race besides making it to the finale. And from what I've heard he is good with his fans, works hard and is mostly professional. Can someone help me parse something though. What exactly did Willam do to get kicked off the show? It was the major mystery of Season 4 with the only on-air clue being that Phi Phi accused Willam of "breaking rules". At the finale/reunion they came out with the tale that Willam had contacted his partner to come and visit him when they were supposed to be sequestered but in these recent tweets Willam is now saying that that's not true and it instead had something to do with him strategically trying to get kicked off by lying about his computer being stolen? Can someone help me make sense of what happened?
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Jun 7, 2018 16:39
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Malcolm Turnbeug posted:I can’t remember a source for this but I remember some tea that lipsynch for your legacy is out in AS4 I hope this is true. For me the worst part of lipsynch for your legacy was the awful and forced “let’s have a conversation backstage to convince me why I shouldn’t eliminate you”. It’s a pretty bad reality show gimmick that as others have pointed out hasn’t produced the drama producers imagined. I have high hopes for season 11. I wish they would go back to the first two episodes being a split premier like they did on season 6. Sometimes early in the season there are so many queens at once I get them confused. Not to mention how easy it is to figure out who will be in the top/bottom just based on who is getting screen time. King of Foolians fucked around with this message at 01:31 on Jul 14, 2018 |
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Jul 14, 2018 01:26
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I don't hold those comments against Shangela and Alexis. To me, their conversation was less "Eww, trans people are gross", and more "We want to make sure the competition we are in is fair". After all, drag is the art of female illusion and some could construe getting plastic surgery to already look more feminine as a form of cheating. As far as I know, all the contestants that have come out as trans were all competing pre-transition and that seems fair to me. After all, we know there have been plenty of queens that have had some work done. It's not a good look for Shangela to throw out the slur "tranny" but Ruapul himself has used the word in songs and as Eej pointed out awareness and respect for trans-people has changed a lot in the last 10 years since this happened. It's basically a massive gray area that I'm sure Rupaul isn't inclined to go out of his way to define unless some specific criticism is made like changing "You've got she-mail". But I'm just a cis, gay dude that loves drag queens. I try to be respectful and learn from people with other experiences than myself. Lord knows the LGBT+ community needs to collectively be allies for each other now more than ever.
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Aug 5, 2018 03:18
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jit bull transpile posted:BTW don't take that post as an attack, just attempting to educate. People like RuPaul push an ahistorical narrative of drag that has done some serious harm to drag as a positive and uplifting environment for gender expansive people of all sorts. I'm trying to di my part tonoish back against that. I didn't take it as an attack at all. I hesitated to even post because trans-topics are not my lane at all. Thank you for attempting to educate. I am attempting to learn. Let me clarify my stance though. I don't have any problem with (and no one should) a trans-person performing in a club or just living their life. Let them perform as a man, as a woman, as gender-gently caress, I think it's great. In fact, one of my absolute favorite performers that I used to go see and support locally was a trans-woman who lived her life as a woman. You would never look at her and know that she was born a man. I was specifically talking about competing in Rupaul's Drag Race and whether it is a level playing field if (hypothetically) some of the contestants are 100% cis-men and some are (trans) woman but they are all competing for the same goal, which in the world of RPDR is "female illusion". Taking this to logical extremes: Imagine if there was a person that grew up thinking that they were a gay man, got involved with drag and became a drag queen which led to them realizing that they are a trans-woman and fully transitioned into a woman. Would it be "fair" for this person to compete on RPDR? I think that's the core of what Shangela and Alexis were talking about. Not whether or not trans people should exist or be included in the drag world, but the fairness for this specific competition. jit bull, you are correct that trans-people have absolutely contributed to the furthering of LGBT issues and have in many ways led the charge for us all. Thanks for that. and Pellisworth, you also bring up a good point that "changing attitudes" is no excuse for publicly made comments in the past. You are correct that people have a responsibility to own up to their lovely words and opinions when they realize they were in the wrong. Also, thanks for the reminder that despite being on the receiving end of a lot of discrimination and hatred, the LGBT community (specifically gay men) still (unfortunately) has a lot to do to get rid of our own prejudices and lovely behavior. *Edited to remove some terms I didn't realize were considered offensive.* King of Foolians fucked around with this message at 05:55 on Aug 5, 2018 |
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Aug 5, 2018 05:04
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Nihonniboku posted:Right. I forgot about that. I never really quite got the hate that Santino got from the queens, I never thought his remarks were that horrible. But Willam reminded us listeners that they're up there on the runway for hours and there was a lot of harsh critique coming from Santino, and it wore on everyone real quickly. I haven't watched the earlier seasons in a while but from what I remember Santino seemed like most of his judging was providing criticism but not constructive criticism. He would pretty much read a queen for what he thought they did wrong but never give advice on what to improve. Like with the couch comments for Latrice, what was she supposed to do with that? Look less like a couch next time? I think Santino decided that he was going to be the "mean judge" on the show a la Simon Cowe. The problem is that this show didn't (and still doesn't) need a specific person just to be harsh to the contestants. And it was obvious that he thought way too much of himself and his importance to the LGBT+ community just because of his (losing) appearance on Project Runway. King of Foolians fucked around with this message at 01:57 on Sep 13, 2018 |
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Sep 13, 2018 01:54
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I don't have much experience with booking artists for live shows but is it really the promoters that lose money because of Alyssa being late? If I were the person doing the booking I would state in the contact that the artist (Alyssa) wouldn't get paid their full amount unless they completed all the things they were booked for. It sucks if Alyssa was still getting paid the full amount for appearances if she's the direct cause of fans needing refunds. Also, ugh. Being a person that is chronically late in an industry centered around being a certain place at a certain time is a great way to build up resentment in people.
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Sep 13, 2018 02:17
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| # ¿ Apr 26, 2024 03:27 |
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Lindsey Ellis has a really good video essay about how even though Rent was good for humanizing and putting a face to the LGBT community/people suffering from Aids/the homeless, it also is a dated product of its time, has lots of mixed messages and pretty much all the characters are terrible people. https://youtu.be/q0qfFbtIj5w
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Oct 31, 2018 05:19
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