RECAP: “Drag Race Down Under” Season 4, Episode 6 (Acting)
Another great episode in a great season. “Down Under” Series 4 is fully giving, and everyone involved in it should be super proud of the job they’re doing. I honestly think this is the best the franchise has ever been.
This episode gave a frontrunner a moment of weakness, the other frontrunner a return to greatness, some charmingly bad work from another queen, and a deeply sad ending for a struggling queen who is clearly capable of greatness. Oh, and an awful guest judge who should — in the words of Alyssa Edwards — shut his no-drag-knowledge mouth.
I’ll also say that I enjoyed this approach to an acting challenge. The script was minimal, as each queen had the same lines, auditioning for a role in a soap opera. It allowed the queens to get creative with their characters and focus more on comedy than learning long — often terrible — scripts. More of this approach, please.
Let’s get into the drama and the conflama of “Platypussies on Fire.”
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I’ll go over each queen in terms of their performance in the challenge, the wet runway, and how they’re doing overall in the competition, ranked strongest to weakest.
Lazy Susan: A much-needed return to form for Susan. After spanking the competition for the first two weeks, it felt like she was drifting the for the past several episodes — I even thought she should have been Bottom 2 for the Makeover. But this week we got Susan back on top, as she brought a ton of character and comedy to the acting challenge, and then gave us yet another 5-star runway with her water-jug wig and color-changing dress fabric. THIS is the Lazy Susan I want to see every week! This is ambitious, exciting drag. This is the kind of stuff that makes you a Drag Race legend.
Freya Armani: Freya was great in the acting challenge. The entire season I’ve felt that Freya had a natural charm and charisma about her, and we saw that deployed here. I’m not sure if I knew that Freya was a trained actor, but that was on display here. The moment in the acting challenge when she dropped dead was hysterical and so well executed. Good for Freya! I’m glad she got this moment to shine, because she’s spent the whole season just on the cusp of breaking through. On the downside, I don’t understand what was going on with that runway. Pretty? Sure. Did it have anything to do with the assignment? Not that I could see.
Note that there’s a big dropoff between Freya and the rest of the queens in this challenge.
Vybe: I don’t think Vybe did poorly in this challenge. I get the criticism that she relied too much on props, but I thought there was still some funny stuff there. What was interesting was seeing the way Vybe responded to the challenge. Before judging even happened, she seemed deflated. Vybe has done incredibly well this season, basically in the top every single episode. This was the first time she didn’t seem to know how she did, and you could tell that weighed on her. Fully get that — I do the exact same thing, and it’s so infuriating. There is a part of me that wonders if this may have been strategic on Vybe’s part, her moment of vulnerability. A winner needs an arc, and we have seen again and again (Chad Michaels, Divina di Campo, etc.) that queens that are just fucking awesome and have very few slip-ups rarely take the crown. Vybe now has a blip on record heading into the last leg, which weirdly could help her in the long run. For the runway, I got where Vybe was going with the oil spill concept, but it wasn’t one of my favorite looks from her this season.
Mandy Moobs: Mandy got dinged for painting herself into a corner with her adult-baby character, and I think that’s fair. Like Vybe, I think Mandy is a smart queen who fundamentally understands how this show works, and what producers are looking for. I think she knew she was likely to struggle in the Acting challenge, and I think she gave enough to skate by without landing in the Bottom 2. But I think even she knew she did not do a great job with the assignment. I personally enjoyed her water-inspired runway, a gorgeous high-fashion caftan meant to look like a rippling puddle. I got the critique that we shouldn’t see the undergarments, but I also don’t know how you maintain the caftan shape, show off its glorious movement, and not expose undergarments. I thought it was successful.
Nikita Iman: Bless her heart. Nikita absolutely knew she would struggle with the Acting challenge, although I give her a great deal of credit for really trying. In fact, at judging, the main note was that she was trying so hard in the challenge that she was more successful in between cuts when she was just joking with Rhys Nicholson. I have warmed to Nikita considerably over the season, and think she’s a special queen. She obviously loved her runway look, but I agreed with the judges that it was confusing. The wig was giving me full Priscilla fantasy, and I’m never going to mad about that. I literally LOL’d in “Untucked” when the queens were debating who would be lipsynching, and all of them were like, “Nikita. And…?”
Max Drag Queen: I find Max’s arc on this show so sad to watch. To me, Max has EVERYTHING it takes to win Drag Race. I really do think she has all the tools — this was just not the moment for her to be there. She was obviously not in the right mental or emotional state following the recent death of her mother, and while she put on a brave face at first, once the criticism started — and in Max’s defense, some of that criticism was HIGHLY dubious — it was difficult to recover from it. The edit in this challenge did Max no favors, making her look neurotic and overly intense. I’m not convinced that’s what actually happened. Her runway was stunning, one of my favorites of the night. But once she was shoved into the Bottom 3 for the third time, you could tell it was over. She did a good job in the lipsynch — Max is a beautiful performer and a professional — but I think Max was actually relieved when she was eliminated. She has said as much post-show, referring to her elimination as a “mercy killing” per posts I’ve read on Reddit. Those same posts suggest that Max is open to returning for an All Stars season, and I would wholeheartedly welcome that. I think in another season Max would be among the top competitors, I really do. This is a combination of extremely stiff competition from pretty much everyone left, and Max not being in the right headspace at that moment. A Max Drag Queen with a little bit more time, more resources, balanced emotions, and a belly full of fire? Watch out, world.
What do you think of “Drag Race Down Under” Season 4? Drop your thoughts in the comments.
