Drag Race: The Sounds of My Fury
Wednesday, April 16, 2014 at 7:07PM Here, in picture form, is why I've been unable to function whenever I tried to write about RuPaul's Drag Race
somehow the blurry screenshot seemed appropriate so i didn't try again
Laganja Estranja's bottomless need for attention coupled with her lack of deserving any but mostly her limitless capacity for meaningless affectation completely broke me. As did the epic 3 hours of episode last week -- 3 hours in one single night. Turns out that's enough glitter, saturated color, and aural assault to even give Baz Luhrmann pause. But mostly it was Laganja. If I could describe in writing the clucking, mouth popping, meaningless "words" issuing from her frosted lips I would but judge Michelle Visage summed it up brilliantly in a weirdly accurate gibberish approximation of Laganja's unprocessed non-integrated robotic regurgitation of every drag vocal affectation that the show has ever produced. <-- Good lord that last sentence was a mouthful. I'm gagging on it.
Now that Laganja has sashayed away, the aural nightmare is over (the blazing fury I felt from the sounds a fictional "reality" tv character can make surprised me). And I am free to write about the show again. "Halleloo!" (er... speaking of meaningless vocal affectations!) So instead of trying to catch up we'll just proceed from the now for the sake of all of you who are watching. Cher's family members (mother Georgia Holt and son Chaz Bono) guest starred in order to be interviewed by the queens and Courtney Act basically summed of all of their reactions to the camera...
Not that that excitement helped them focus because for the most part, they were terrible at being talk show hosts. Trinity K Bonet, who sashayed away, was the worst. She kept calling Chaz Bono "Chad" which might have been funny if it were shady but it was just basic incompetence.
Courtney, who didn't suck at TV gabbing at all, won the night with a stunning wing span (the runway theme was animals) and in addition to the feathers (Trinity) and fur (Bianca) and lion-like manes (Adore), Darienne killed it with Elephant tusks, and Ben de la Creme made a fab entrance in a fly costume... even if it tilted more Costume Shop than Cronenberg. "Help meeee"
Group Regret: Everyone at my viewing party wished they could have seen what Milk would have dressed as in this particular runway challenge. Rawr. She left too soon.
Belated Confession: I really like Joslyn Fox as a person in the workroom (if not as a competitor) so I feel bad for how roundly I was dissing her in the first couple of posts. She's not as dumb as she came off... or at least she's people smart.
You can watch the episode right here if you missed it
Are your favorites still your favorites? Or are your allegiances shifting as we rapidly approach the finale?
Reader Comments (11)
Favorites are Bianca, Adore and Ben. I was a fan of Courtney before the show but I find her dull and rude now.
It HAS to be Bianca, Adore and Ben in the top 3, with Bianca taking the crown.
I'm actually bummed Trinity has gone. I LOVED her runway every week, and her lip syncing was on fire.
But yes, I am loving the show so much more since Lasanga ended her season long stroke and dropped out.
Laganja is uh-mazing.
YES MAMA. YOU JUST CANT HANDLE ALL THE GAGGING ON HER FABULOUSITY. OH MY YES GAWWWD, HUNTY. SICKENING TO DEATH, CHILE.
Ugh. lol. I wanted to like Laganja since Alyssa Edwards is her drag mother but not even that could save her for me. What a shitstorm of delusion she is. But i'm happy for her presence because it always led to epic eyerolls from all of the other queens.
Bianca pretty much has the crown at this point because she's by far the most consistent. I'm still team Courtney even if i wanted to slap her these last few episodes. Especially when she mentioned about Josyln coasting. She has no room to talk because she took a backseat since her win in that singing challenge.
I like Josyln but she is a bit of a hot mess. Sweet, but the outfits and the makeup aren't helping her. Especially since she deserved to be in the bottom two instead of Trinity. Trinity had no chance in hell of winning but she left a week too early. Love her newfound positivity though.
Did you notice that in the first 5 or so episodes Laganja never tongue-clicked once? And then during the three-hour episode she tongue-clicked roughly 8035 times? She must have watched YouTube in her room between challenges and caught Alaska's legendary (SINGLE) tongue-pop about Jinkx and decided to work that mannerism into her speech ad infinitum, like all the other ones she does.
The nearly unanimous negative reaction to Laganja's meaningless drivel actually lifts my spirits. Our rejection of wholly thoughtless showboating is a good sign.
Lovin' the Trinity love, since she worked my nerves early on, but was one of my favorites by her exit. It should have been Joslyn, Darienne and Adore at the bottom this week.
Laganja, sigh. She's a friend of mine, but the only favor she did herself being on this show was to become one of the most memorable queens of the series, albeit for the wrong reasons. The Laganja I know is quite sweet, extremely talented and doesn't really talk that way. Or didn't before she was cast on RPDR.
Final three: I say Bianca, Courtney, Ben, unless Adore and/or Joslyn find a way to get their acts together. They both give great personality, but they're too sloppy in challenges and on the runway. Darienne may survive one more week by sliding into the middle again (to paraphrase one of the judges).
joslyn's still my girl, although i doubt she's going to win (or even make the top three). the untucked segments reveal she's a lot more perceptive than appearances suggest, and even if her instincts led her astray this week her interview questions were more in depth than trinity's or adore's preparation-free attempts
although interviewing chaz and his gran was some hard work; it seems a sense of humour about yourself skips a generation (luckily for cher)
courtney - as plastic as the barbie she aspires to be. dela should've won this week
since the finale is looking anticlimactic - can't see anyone derailing the runaway train that is bianca - i'll be happy if joslyn outlasts darienne and courtney
I couldn't even enjoy TV-hating Laganja because I couldn't help but feel that she was going through some kind of mental breakdown the entire time. And maybe that happens when you're 24 years old and in a competitive environment where they take your cell phone away, but the other young queens seemed to be handling it okay.
I am still rooting for Bianca. She's a comedian, she's a Cancer, and she is giving me life.
What I find interesting about this season is that, despite the criticisms, it seems like runway hardly matters compared to the challenges. Trinity may have biffed some of the challenges, but her runway was always ON POINT. The only reason Joslyn wasn't in the bottom Two was because Trinity and Adore did even worse than she did in the talk show challenge.
This is such a weak season... I've rewatched season 3 recently and it really is in a different league. No one here, not even Bianca, can hold a candle to the starpower of Manila, Raja or Alexis... I'd even throw Delta and Carmen in there.
Plus I hate that they booted the one quotable queen wayyyyy too early this season by getting rid of Gia. At least last season we had Alyssa stick around until the top 6 or 7, who despite being a mess most of the time was by FAR the most hilarious contestant ever in this show.
Bianca's fine, she'll probably win this. Her looks are pretty fantastic and she's obviously very funny but...
Top 3 for me are Adore, Ben and Bianca, but the way reality shows work I am guessing we will get a shock exit, and the top 3 will end up being Ben, Bianca and Courtney. Bianca has this in the bag, unless she really messes up the next few weeks which I don't see happening.
As for Laganja, I was annoyed with her on the show but I weirdly missed her this week, which was odd. I saw her perform and met her briefly when she was performing in London with Alyssa last month and she was a lot calmer in person. And she gave a good show too.
Re: Laganja
...in a competitive environment where they take your cell phone away...
Where they take your weed away.
...she was a lot calmer in person...
See above.
SO GLAD Langanja is GONE! I feel like now we're down to the true creme de la creme (pun intended, since I totally <3 Ben dela Creme!) - minus MAYBE Joslyn, who is certainly savvier than I thought if not quite at the level of the other girls. I like her as a person, though. Darienne also has to get out of the little nasty funk she's gotten herself into and focus on being the best queen SHE can be. It's still probably Bianca's to lose, but her not doing well in the talk show challenge was a MAJOR chink in her armor.