RECAP: RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 17, Episode 10 (Roast)
Well, I guess we know why nearly everyone called Arrietty the villain of the season in the Meet the Queens…
Episode 10 brought us the Villains Roast, and it also brought us actual villains. I’m using plural here, as I thought several of these queens were behaving in highly manipulative and in some cases toxic ways. Arrietty is the most obvious example, and her behavior in his episode will likely be discussed and dissected for weeks if not years to come. But I also thought Lexi Love once again came across terribly — that has unfortunately become the norm at this point, which I did not expect at all when this season started — and Suzie Toot’s negative edit ramped up as well. On the flip side, we had unexpectedly strong showings in the challenge from two girls expected to bomb, and two other queens continued to rise in estimation for speaking truth to these sloppy, passive-aggressive flops.
Below find my thoughts on RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 17 Episode 10, “Villains Roast” SPOILERS AHEAD!
After an absolutely pointless mini-challenge in which the queens were subjected to splashing into the Badonk-a-Donk Tank — I presume to get more use out of it, since that had to be expensive, as well as to plug Entertainment Weekly likely in exchange for promotional consideration — we got to the meat of the episode: the roast. The targets were three recent-season villains, Season 13’s Kandy Muse, Season 15’s Mistress Isabelle Brooks, and Season 16’s Plane Jane (I assume Season 14’s Daya Betty was unavailable?). Comedian Whitney Cummings was brought into assist the queens with their comedy, which has led to discourse about connection to Trump-enabling podcaster Joe Rogan, as well as some homophobic comments by Cummings herself. With all the gay comedians working out there, I’m surprised they went with this direction.
The drama of the episode surfaced quickly, as last week’s main challenge winner, Jewels Sparkle, was given the privilege of assigned the running order in the roast. We have seen line-ups cause drama before — the one in Drag Race UK Season 2 caused massive friction for Lawrence Chaney and Ellie Diamond — but I think this one may take the cake. Jewels asked everyone for their preferred positions in the roast, and seemed to genuinely take that into consideration with her assignments. Right off the bat, she did not need to do that. She could have done whatever she wanted but she was trying to be inclusive. Second, for the most part she followed people’s wishes, which included putting Lexi Love last, putting Onya Nurve toward the front, etc. But it didn’t matter, because multiple queens were upset about their placements, and did not hide their displeasure.
I’m not sure if Production explicitly told the queens to play up the drama on this, but from where I was sitting, it sure felt real. Lexi got the place she requested — last — but was furious that Jewels “set her up for failure” by putting Suzie Toot on immediately before her (the assumption being that Suzie would likely smash this challenge, and Lexi would have to work harder to distinguish herself). If that wasn’t wild enough, Arrietty lost her fucking mind because Jewels put herself after Arrietty, which was a tacit acknowledgement that she thought Arrietty would bomb, which would allow Jewels to look even better by comparison.
At no point did Jewels say out loud that she wanted Arrietty to bomb. I don’t think she even said she thought she WOULD bomb. This was all inferred by Arrietty — the same way Lexi was projecting her own insecurities on to Jewels for her placement — but the antisocial behavior exhibited by both of them was very real. Lexi once again spiraled into self defeat, and I’ve honestly lost track of the number of times that has happened at this point. Snatch Game for sure. She was on the verge of disaster in the Betsey Johnson design challenge last week until Sam Starr pulled her out of her funk. I understand that Lexi is putting a tremendous amount of pressure on herself to be successful, and I also understand that, by her own admission, she is highly emotional because of her hormone therapy. But this has honestly become very difficult to watch, and I personally find myself exhausted by the episodic battles with Lexi’s inner saboteur. If she was regularly facing them and emerging victorious, that would be a narrative I could get behind. But all I see is a talented queen floundering over, really, pretty inconsequential issues. I’m finding it hard to root for Lexi at this point, and that bums me out.
And then we had Arrietty. Pre-season, based on her Meet the Queen, I was convinced I would not be able to stand Arrietty. There was a strong brat element to her, and I just don’t fuck with that energy. Life is too short. But I found myself enjoying her more often than not this season. She is without question the strongest fashion girl in this group, and she gave us some wonderful moments both on stage and in the work room. You could see the mask slip when she was under pressure, and this episode it fell off completely, when she decided Jewels’ line-up was a direct, deliberate attack on her, and she spent the rest of the episode pouting or blatantly trying to get revenge. How did she do that? By treating Jewels like absolute shit in the work room, and most importantly by fully stealing Jewels’ jokes for the roast, cutting off Jewels’ set right at the knee.
That is, honestly, antisocial behavior. Like, how deranged do you have to be to not only do something like that, but to feel completely justified in that behavior? I don’t know how you watch this episode and do not come away having serious doubts about Arrietty’s mental health. These are not the actions of a well person.
To make it worse, both Arrietty and Lexi played the victim, seemingly feeling entitled to acting out and making accusations about Jewels’ character, especially after both of them flopped the roast. Jewels begged forgiveness multiple times, and watching that made my blood boil. To Jewels and anyone else reading this: you are not responsible for someone else’s skewed interpretations of your actions. Do not apologize to this kind of emotional hostage crisis. All it does is reenforce their antisocial behaviors.
While all of this was going on, there were a few great stories for the night. Both Lydia “Butthole” Kollins and Lana Ja’Rae — expected by the group to struggle in this challenge — ended up smashing it, turning in solid roasts with some very funny lines each. Suzie’s set had an energy issue for most of it, but that last joke about Raven and beating a dead horse was probably the joke of the night. Sam Starr had a short (based on what we saw) but punch set that was delivered with confidence and zeal. Onya could have easily been in the top again, but I honestly belive that producers are deliberately holding her back at this point because they don’t want her looking like such an obvious frontrunner.
And then you had Arrietty and Jewels, the “chismosa sisters,” simultaneously bombing, with Arrietty deliberately sabotaging Jewels’ set. It was clear that Arrietty was going to do poorly here, but she did so much worse than expected, flubbing basic deliveries and giving us almost nothing funny. She couldn’t even deliver the jokes she stole from Jewels. Jewels realized what was going on, and attempted to pivot. But Jewels isn’t a comedian. She can’t come up with new jokes on the fly. She had a set of material she had worked on in the same amount of time as everyone else, and someone deliberately fucked her over by taking those jokes for themself. It’s honestly wild, and the fact that this was not addressed at all on stage, in front of the judges, was deeply frustrating for me. Even in Untucked it was given a cursory discussion, and Arrietty basically just giggled about it and called them “even.” Um, no bitch. Your response was malicious and deliberate. Go fuck yourself.
One other thing I will name: there were a LOT of fat jokes from multiple queens, directed at Kandy and especially Mistress. I would like to think in 2025 we have moved past that kind of body-shaming humor. Apparently not. I would ask any future queens to do better, and I think the current cast needs to brace for social-media pushback from this.
On the runway the category was “Who Wears Short Shorts?” and I thought it was a very mixed bag. I loved Onya’s denim outfit that was itself a coochie cutter with a playful denim boustier underneath. Jewels looked great in yet another Marie Antoinette-inspired look. Suzie’s insufferable edit continued with a “cerebral” Olde English take on pantaloons. I did not care for Sam’s football look as much as the judges’ did; it seemed bulky and the shorts were in no way the focus. I’m glad Lexi loved her look and I liked the story behind it, but I thought it looked a mess and I’m glad the judges clocked her repeatedly dragging yards of fabric behind her on the runway. Arrietty’s was bold and conceptual, probably the most fun on the runway. Lana gave us a Naomi Campbell reference that just read pedestrian and off-the-rack. I absolutely hated what Butthole wore, but again: she has a very specific vision, it’s not for me, but clearly some people (including RuPaul) seem to love it.
The top queens were Butthole, Sam Starr, and Lana. I’m not entirely sure how Sam was up there over Onya or Suzie, who both had more memorable comedy sets and I think better runways. Ultimately the win went to Butthole, which…OK, I guess. Glad for Lydia. The roast was strong. The runway wanted me to bleach my eyes. But hey, good for her.
The bottom was Arrietty, Jewels, and Lexi — no argument there. Lexi was spared with the warning that she needs to get her inner saboteur in check. I hope she does. I’m so surprised by the Lexi we’ve been getting the past several weeks compared to the queen we got at the beginning of the season. Get up, Lexi! We are all rooting for you!
Arrietty and Jewels lipsynched to “Ya Ya” by Beyonce. The battle started out great, with both queens giving it everything they had. I felt that by the end they had both run out of gas, but it didn’t matter: Jewels moved brilliantly on that stage and was named the winner. Arrietty left as bitter as she had been all episode, stating that the runways were about to suffer (probably true, tbh), and then making a crass mirror message about Onya that I think reveals quite a bit about her character. Arrietty needs to grow up a lot, and I think she genuinely needs serious counseling. These are not the behaviors of a well-adjusted 28-year-old. (Seriously, she was 28 when she filmed this.)
NEXT: It’s an acting challenge — god help us — inspired by FX’s astonishingly bad Feud: Capote vs. The Swans. Oh dear…
What do you think of Season 17? Drop your thoughts in the comments.
