Now that it’s the second episode and we’re beginning to meander into the gooey pink insides of the meat of RuPaul’s Drag Race, the queens are starting to show their true colors—and almost always, that color is the snippy, grabby hue of cattiness. Yes, I know I just mixed a metaphor. My brain is just so rattled by all the sniping!
On the premiere, Ru started the drama early by asking the final queens, one by one, which contestant they thought should be sent home—a tactic she usually reserves for the later episodes, but I guess by season seven you gotta do a little something to spice up the relationship, no?
Sasha Belle’s answer to the question was that Pearl should go home—an answer she admitted was strategic, as she saw Pearl as her major competition—but Pearl obviously didn’t take too kindly to the ordeal. Her response was not to talk it out like a normal person not filming a reality show might do, but to lob barbs when Sasha’s back was turned, with the camera squarely in her face: “I’m pretty,” sniffed Pearl, “and she looks like John Goodman in a wig.” Ladies, the gloves are off, weirdly dated man-references and all!
Other than a mini-challenge featuring guest judge Moby (?) and a leaf-blower, the episode was somewhat uneventful until the end—a challenge in which the queens had to learn an elaborate dance sequence and song that cast them as randy flight attendants instructing their naughty passengers (a host of babely, masculine boy-toys, shirtless of course). In rehearsals, they did the usual song-and-dance, both literally and figuratively—you know, a couple queens can’t dance, somebody blames their lack of steadiness on a “prior injury,” et cetera.
But for the actual sequence, oooh child: it was one of the top five most surreal moments in Drag Race history, which, as you know, is saying a lot. In what seemed to be an homage to Virgin Airlines’ elaborate in-flight safety video, they presented a multi-act musical about how to maintain safety on an airplane straight to Jetset Eleganza (which was the runway category), but with more sexual entendres than you can shake a bag of peanuts at. Pre-recorded and matched with sometimes very dicey lip-syncs, it was as though Ru had thought it up in a NyQuil haze after watching the movie Airplane and cannily said, “Put them to WORK!” (Please, do yourself a favor and watch it here.)
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