r/rupaulsdragrace

(Advance warning this is an extremely long ramble that I wrote instead of working on a paper)

When Briar was eliminated, I saw a lot of fans complaining that the season's only drama disappeared. While that's more or less accurate, I think that framing her elimination as a mistake is a misunderstanding; I think she was eliminated at the right time, in fact I would argue that character arcs like Briar's are practically essential to crafting strong seasons of reality TV, it's just that her elimination underlined how weak this season really was.

Part of what made the early seasons so great is that we almost always got characters like Briar and Joella. I'm thinking of queens like Tammie, Akashia, Mystique, Nicole, Venus, Mimi, Serena, etc. All of them were sort of destined to fumble in the competitive aspect of the show, but they served a narrative function that was far more important than simply being bad at Drag Race (while early outs like Princess and Honey and India were sidelined).

I'm sure most fans would agree that Mystique or Mimi or Serena staying around longer than they did wouldn't have made sense, because production understood explicitly, as most viewers do intuitively, that their best contribution as a cast member was to detonate right away, create a big early moment, and draw reactions from their fellow cast mates (particularly in the context of them being a character, not a competitor) but then clear the way for the season-long arcs to become the focus.

In particular, this is partly why Season 5 is (imo) not only the best season but a masterclass in reality TV story production. All of the elements of the two season-long stories (which escalated and resolved in near-perfect fashion) began taking shape and establishing intrigue right away, yet at the same time, Serena's shenanigans were the locus of the first 2 episodes. Serena really was a stroke of flawless casting, just the right foil to bring the bigger characters of the season into sharper relief, and as she leaves, the Coco/Alyssa tension immediately starts metastasizing. Mwah.

This is something that Drag Race hasn't done right in a long, LONG time--the best example I can think of is Jasmine Masters, maybe--and has actively suffered for it. In fact, even the less memorable early outs of Logo-era seasons surpass what we've been given since, especially in the double digits (the move to VH1 being a hurdle that the show imo never cleared). This is because they were more readily utilized as characters in the show's narrative, not as fat to be cut away from the show's runtime.

Recent seasons are basically front-loaded with interchangeable cannon fodder while production tries to push unripened storylines of the "real" characters to the center, which creates a situation where a conflict that is still developing has to do the show's heavy lifting too soon, inevitably leading to either climaxing early or gradually becoming very stale (Amanda vs. Plane, Vixen vs. Eureka, Yvie vs. Silky, Malaysia vs. Mistress, Loosey vs. Luxxstress, they literally plot armored Kandy because of her feud with Tamisha AFTER Tamisha's elimination for her to have no storyline for the remainder of the season).

Additionally, the beginning of the season has gotten longer and longer. WOW's recent commitment to starting with non-elimination episodes hobbles a crucial element of a season's early progression, and it also shows how much less confident production has become in their ability to cast exciting characters and produce entertaining stories. It suggests that you (and production) need extra exposure to these queens to actually care about them, which was never an issue from the beginning.

That's why I get so excited about characters like Briar and Joella and even Hormona in spite of and also somewhat because of the fact that they're fated to be early outs, because it shows me that WOW is still capable of making some compelling reality TV. The fact that people were annoyed over Briar leaving after a weak run, and even though her drama with the Dions really had few places to go, underlines the problem that the show has consistently been failing to hone the kind of long, gripping arcs that they did so adeptly in the early goings, when the absence of memorable early outs wasn't even something you'd think about.

The defining storylines and conflicts of the original run of seasons were clearly defined and well-hewn, but more importantly they were embedded seamlessly into the show's formal structure and protocol and supported it symbiotically and often completely, rather than the other way around (it's chocolate). Production doing what it does was actually a good thing. The problem now is not that the show is over-produced, as so many fans argue, but that it's become so incompetently produced that production's machinations are both increasingly visible and something fans are less and less willing to tolerate.

Season 18 is definitely the nadir. Season 17 at least had things like the season-long frustration over Suzie (which eventually became a failed Jinkx reboot), Season 16 had the consistent warring of narcissistic personalities, what did Season 18 have narratively? Lovely girls, some nice drag for sure, too safe, not enough conviction among its myriad nonstarter storylines to honestly even justify tuning in at times.

It's hard to crystallize in words how far removed this is from, like, Roxxxy and Jinkx arguing about what Drag Race itself should be as a competition as they're cleaning their drag out of the werk room before the finale, genuinely riveting shit that was also a meta-narrative on the artform. Of course most of us expected Jinkx to win for most of the season, but that was the right, satisfying culmination of everything preceding it, not a foregone conclusion that you struggle to even care about.

I really do not mean to be cynical or shit on recent casts (because in a lot of ways I don't think this is truly a casting issue) but as a very very long-time Drag Race fan I do find it both engaging and therapeutic to try and rationalize what's changing about the show that's making it feel less and less like the one that I fell in love with. <3

I personally think she’s become too big of a drag icon to ever go on the show. I also quite frankly don’t think she needs it. But then again we have had queens like Sasha Colby who had a huge following and impact on the drag community and went on to participate in the show. Side note: I’ve been so obsessed with Lushious recently. She’s such an icon. Something about her just makes me happy. Her activism, her charisma, her humor. I’m obsessed

After the initial shock of the butterfly release and the iconic Monique/Vanjie reaction, what got me was Kameron registering the butterflies after a whole ass acrobatics/dance performance, then me thinking about how the camera crew was frantically planning to try and get that shot as the drama and performance unfurled - just encapsulates the whole season 😂

Would love to hear y’all’s underrated moments of S10!

Vanity 💖💅

&gt;Purse First Impressions is back for Episode 4 of Drag Race Down Under vs. the World, and this week Courtney is joined by the fabulous Vanity to unpack the season’s second design challenge: Franken-Drag. The queens are cutting, swapping, sewing, and serving as they turn three different looks into one brand-new runway creation... with some results far more monstrous than others.

&gt;Courtney and Vanity get into the growing Down Under alliance, whether Art Simone has a target on her back, Miss Jade’s not-so-secret design skills, and which queens actually understood the assignment. Then it’s onto the runway, a 1999 lip sync, and a very sad goodbye as the competition officially hits the halfway mark.