RECAP: “RuPaul’s Drag Race UK 6” Episode 2 (Group Design)
It’s Episode 2 of “RuPaul’s Drag Race UK” Series 6, and we got our first elimination — but not in the way anyone expected. Mid-way through this week’s design challenge (more on that in a minute), it was announced that queen Saki Yew was leaving the competition. Apparently back at the hotel in which the queens are sequestered, Saki slipped in the shower and badly injured her knee, so much so that she required crutches to get around. Even walking was painful, to say nothing of dancing or wearing heels. And so a tearful Saki informed her sisters that she had to leave the competition, immediately, literally in the middle of a challenge (a group challenge at that!). It was a sad moment, and I was sorry to see Saki go.
Especially because, apparently, Saki was initially cast to be on Series 5, and was either pulled or dropped out at the very last minute. So this is two seasons in a row where this poor queen has put her time, energy, and hopes into this competition, only to get it ripped away from her. That is truly tragic. It almost feels unbelievable.
Also unbelievable, but true: this is the fifth consecutive season of “Drag Race UK” in which a queen was pulled from the competition instead of eliminated. We have not a season since Series 1 where every queen cast completed the race by either being eliminated, making it to the finale, or winning. In Season 2 Veronica Green was pulled after contracting COVID-19 and Ginny Lemon quit in the middle of a lipsync (icon); in Season 3 Victoria Scone was pulled for injuring her knees in a lipsynch; in Season 4 Baby quit the competition after a lipsync; in Season 5 Naomi Carter injured her knee and a queen was DQ’d behind the scenes and then digitally erased from the footage. Honest question: has anyone brought in an occult specialist to check the studio(s) where this show is filmed? Because there 100 percent appears to be a curse at work here.
All that said, Episode 2 provided us an interesting twist on the design challenge, a truly incredible job by the winning team, a laughably bad job by the Bottom 2, and some terrific television all around. I love just watching this group of queens interact. They’re gelling beautiful just two episodes in — the queens themselves even commented that having a team challenge so early was a blessing, as it really made them all mix it up together — and several of these queens know how to dish out the quips and quotes. Loving it so far.
Read on for my takes on “Drag Race UK” Season 6, Episode 2, “Stitch & Strut.” SPOILERS AHEAD!
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The basic gist for this challenge was that it was a design task, but the queens had to work together in four teams of three. The queens did not know it was a sewing challenge before self selecting into groups, which made for a very lopsided — but entertaining — result.
The teams were as follows, listed with the “room” in “Ru’s house” from which the queens had to take materials to create their fashion collections (each team had to create three looks, a cocktail dress, a red-carpet look, and a boss lady outfit):
*Charra Tea, La Voix, and Kiki Snatch got the “basement” — AKA Michelle Visage’s room
*Kyran Thrax, Zahirah Zapanta, and Actavia got the “game room”
*Dita Garbo, Rileasa Slaves, and Saki Yew (prior to elimination) got the “disco room”
*Chanel O’Connor, Lill, and Marmalade got the “spa/wellness center”
One of the queens asked how posh RuPaul’s house is. Spoiler: it really is that wild. She literally can convert her living room into a disco. You can check out a house tour she did for Architectural Digest by clicking here. (Confidential to RuPaul: are you taking applications for a house boy? I am open to work.)
There was fairly little drama during the actual design and construction phase. Kiki could not settle on a concept and completely restarted her look five or six times; that whole team was wildly ambitious given that none of them really know how to sew. Team “Game Room” relied quite a bit on Zahirah, who provided guidance to the other two gals. Dita was the unoffical leader of the disco team. Team Spa — which featured three experienced seamstresses — took an unconventional approach, in which they each focused on their individual strengths, such as patterning/sewing (Chanel), accessories (Lill), and conceptualizing (Marmalade), and then worked collaboratively on their three looks.
I’ll go over how each team did on the runway, from most successful to least. The ordering was frankly pretty self-evident.
Haus of Zen
Three of the best design looks of all time, all from one team? I do think. This team absolutely devoured this challenge; not a single crumb was left for anyone else to sample. Chanel got some notes about her cocktail look, which was clocked for being overly busy — but I loved it. I loved everything about it. I thought the mixing of materials was so exciting, and the rococo styling of the whole thing worked for me. Lill got a lot of praise for her bossy-lady pants look. It’s a bold outfit, and executed well for the time they had. For me, the best parts of the look were the accessories — that hat, the bag — which were made by Lill, while the bulk of the look was not (Chanel made it, as she announced on the runway, which annoyed more than one judge, and viewer at my party; more on that in a second). Marmalade was perfection in her flowing red-carpet look. Not only was it absolutely flawless, she sold it so beautifully on the runway. I also thought her 1920s-style make-up had major impact here. All three queens were the top looks of the week, and rightfully so. A new bar has been set for design looks, “Drag Race” queens.
Haus of Mirrors
We only got two looks from this group, as Saki Yew would have been presenting the cocktail look, which allegedly was the “connecting” look in this collection. Even without Saki’s dress, I thought these two pieces made sense together. Dita incorporated the base fabric from Rileasa’s red-carpet dress into her boss-lady skirt. The vinyl record + CDs + disco-ball headpieces were polarizing in my house, but I thought they were fun and eyecatching. Rileasa was swallowed up by all the fabric in her look, but it was perfectly serviceable and met the challenge. Dita’s look could have believably been worn by Patsy on “Absolutely Fabulous” and I suspect that’s what she was going for. The bra top has wonky proportions but again: it was fine. This team was Safe.
Haus of Kardz
Kyran had immunity after winning the challenge last week, and I’m sure that was a great relief to her. That said, she did have the best look of the three — but even that had problems. The giant seam on the front of the skirt? The wonky fit of the top? The shape of the whole thing is interesting, and her styling is excellent, but clearly design is not Kyran’s strength. Zahirah led this group and she had some good ideas — she’s the one who led the charge to incorporate gaming pieces and cards into accent details in each look, and that’s the best part of this collection. Her cocktail dress was very simple, but with a weird cape thing that she festooned with poker chips and playing cards. Actavia’s look was supposed to be “red carpet,” but the only thing I could see was the carpet that may or may not match her drapes. Her tuck was barely concealed by just a strip of fabric — girl, where are you wearing this?! Everything about this look was insane, and not a good way. At least she knew it was bad and she rolled with the punches brilliantly. It actually made me like her more. Kyran was marked safe, but the other two ended up in the Bottom 3.
Haus of Cellar McCartney
Fucking hell. As good as Team Spa was, Team Basement was equally as bad. All three of these could have ended up in the Bottom 3 and it would have been justified. Charra was the best of the three, and I think she looks good from the waist up. But that asymmetrical skirt is INSANE. Ma’am YOUR PUSSY IS FULLY OUT. And you KNOW it is out, because you kept pulling down the fabric every few steps. This is not a cocktail dress, this is a look for a long night of hooking, and you better hope that trade likes that session. La Voix, on the other hand, gave us a perfectly safe skirt and tiger-print top for her boss-lady look — very Whitesnake video as styled by Chico’s — and then went straight to insanity by having stuffed cheetah paws reaching out from behind and cupping her breasts. What in the Janet Jackson Rolling Stone cover is going on here? But all of that I can forgive, because what Kiki Snatch gave us for her red-carpet look may be one of the all-time worst garments in “Drag Race” history. Of any franchise. This was so awful it almost wrapped around to brilliant — but it remains terrible. LaLa Ri likely felt a chill go down her spine when this hit the stage, because her reign as queen with the legendarily bad outfit is imperiled. Even before RuPaul clocked it in the private judges chat, I screamed, “It looks like E.T. in drag in the closet!” I mean, the resemblance is uncanny:
I’m not even mad. I love it. I fucking love Kiki for giving us this look, and I love her more for committing to believe that she looked beautiful. You will always be famous for this, Kiki Snatch!
That said, it was clear to everyone that Kiki and Actavia were the Bottom 2 queens, and doomed to lipsync. Except: PLOT TWIST! Since Saki Yew was pulled earlier in the episode (and because they have a set number of episodes to produce), there would be no B2 lipsync, and instead the Top 3 would lipsync for the win. This was a gag, as Haus of Zen clearly were not expecting to lipsync. But to their credit, I thought they all did well in “Tension” by Kylie Minogue. They each gave a different interpretation of the song, but I thought they were each successful. When you think back to how lousy the lipsyncs were in “UK” Series 1, we’ve come a long way, baby.
In a somewhat controversial decision, the win ultimately went to Lill. I agree that Lill won the lipsync — although it was close — but Lill didn’t even make the bulk of her outfit for the challenge. And you better believe that is going to be a big sticking point not only for the other queens on the show, but also viewers of this show (and the judges!), because several eyebrows raised when Chanel, unprompted, revealed to the judges that she had sewn most of the looks for their team, including the bulk of Lill’s. Personally, I’m Team Chanel here. Was it “throwing under the bus” to make sure the judges knew that she was the one who personally created most of the looks they were raving about? Absolutely not. She wanted to make sure the judges were taking that into consideration when deciding who got the win, and I think that was smart of her.
Listen, kids. Old man speaking here: If you absolutely crush a challenge or task in life, you damn well better let people know how awesome you are and how hard you worked. We live in an age were people get rich and famous for absolutely stupid, talentless shit. See: Hawk Tuah, who has the No. 3 podcast on the planet right now for drunkenly referencing how to give a (lousy, BTW) blowjob on a viral video. Fuck. Modesty. What does modesty get you in a world of Kardashians? Absolutely nothing. Are you genuinely talented? Do you work your ass off? Get yours. Team Chanel O’Conor all the way. She may be a bitch on TV (although I suspect she’s playing it up for the cameras), but she is a talented bitch. Also, if you want real tips on how to give great head, ask a gay man. We got that shit on lock. Speaking from personal experience here.
Next: an acting challenge, in which the queens take on Love, Actually. Justice for Emma Thompson’s character!
What do you think of this season overall? Drop your thoughts in the comments.
