Rupaul's Drag Race Season 9 Episode 11 - Power Rankings

Happy Pride Ya'll

This week, the girls gayed it up and created couture looks inspired by the iconic Village People. On top of that, they had to showcase two other looks, one inspired by the rainbow flag, and the other showcasing their sexiest take on a unicorn. Which queens left us gagged?

1) Shea Couleé

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After her slight stumble (and necessary humanizing moment) last week, Shea came back and absolutely MURDERED the runway with her village people eleganza. Now, there has clearly been lots of controversy over Shea's win, but oh boy do I ever have a lot of thoughts.

1) The final look is always the most important part of the ball challenge. It is always given extra weight as it is the one look that they need to construct and design from scratch. Shea blew every other queen to smithereens with her final eleganza look.

2) For those claiming that her rainbow look was not "rainbow" enough. Shea interpreted the rainbow how she wanted to and came out in an absolutely stunning gown. It took damn NERVE to come out with an interpretation that she knew damn well might get some backlash from the judges.

Although the statement in her construction eleganza is the Vivienne Westwood couture cape, what really took the look over the edge for me was the small details. Specifically, the way she wore her hair in a turban. This gave the look a signature Shea flair. For all of these reasons, I believe Shea's win this week was more than deserved.

Edit: 10

Challenge: 10

Storyline: 9

Over the course of the season, Shea has been the most consistent competitor, narrator and overall positive presence. Her win this week gave her a bit of a "comeback kid" mini storyline after being in the bottom two last week.

2) Sasha Velour

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Sasha absolutely killed the runway this week as well, but where she faltered and ultimately lost the win was in her final village people eleganza. Sasha easily had the most creative and high fashion unicorn look, in fact, it's in my top five favourite looks from the entire season. Her medieval tapestry take on a unicorn is inspired and totally on brand for Sasha. I suppose you could argue that it wasn't "sexy" unicorn, but like screw that. It was a great look. Her deconstructed rainbow look was definitely cute, and just like Shea, took nerve to go in a different and unexpected direction. I think Sasha had the win up until her final look. Although extremely well constructed, and pleasing to look at, it definitely lacked oomph. I mentioned previously, the final eleganza look is the most important look of the ball, and Sasha unfortunately just didn't bring that "wow factor" with the look that should have been the most exciting. I was low-key hoping for another double Shea and Sasha win, because if they argued it for Kennedy and Ginger winning snatch game, they could definitely have for this. Both Sasha and Shea excelled at different parts of the challenge.

Edit: 10

Challenge: 8

Storyline: 9

Sasha has completely come out as a front-runner for the crown, and even though she doesn't have as many WINS as Trinity or Shea, all her HIGH placements and having never lip-synced will definitely continue to make the race tight. Sasha's story on the show is fascinating. A queen who was self-aware, knew that she might be labeled as "brainy", and adapted and excelled when she needed to.

3) Trinity Taylor

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Trinity's performance in challenge's on the show is such a roller-coaster. I think she deserved to be safe this week, but she just didn't stand out. None of her looks made me go "wow", even thought I would say they were all well put together and cute. Even though she didn't wear anything completely busted, at this point in the competition, every challenge matters, and for some reason, I always feel like the ball episode is such an important challenge to slay.

Edit: 9

Challenge: 7

Storyline: 8

Let's ignore number of wins. I think a top three of Trinity, Shea and Sasha is one, if not THE fiercest top three drag race has ever had. Each queen is so unique and versatile. There isn't a "clear" third place (like Naomi or Pearl). Trinity is completely deserving of her top three placement, coming from predicted first out, to a new fan favourite. It's always heart-warming and easy to root for the queens everyone counted out when the ru-veal happened (Chi Chi, Joslyn, Kennedy etc...)

4) Peppermint

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Rounding out our extremely strong and diverse top four, our fave gal Peppermint. Pep's bottom two placement this week sort of just happened because no one really completely flopped the challenge. The judges sort of had to nitpick Pep's ill-fitted unicorn look. Her leather extravaganza was quite stunning, and I quite enjoyed her rainbow look (even though it was a much more literal interpretation when comparing it to Shea and Sasha). The true gag this week of course, was her lipsync. Pep's two lipsync performances on the show proves why she deserves to be in that top four position. I was screaming and and snapping my fingers when she did that flawlessly executed wig ruveal.

Edit: 9

Challenge: 7

Storyline: 8

Everyone, PLEASE VOTE PEP FOR MISS CONGENIALITY. I don't see any other queen more deserving of our loveable Peppermint. She has had some iconic moments on the show, but I'm pretty sure she'll be the queen who gets cut at fourth place. At that point, it's usually track record throughout the show that gets a queen cut before the top three, and Pep just has the weakest track record. You never know though, they could completely flip the script this year...

Eliminated - Alexis Michelle

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After weeks of mediocrity, it finally happened. Definitely the "Derrick Barry of the season" - a queen who went farther than she probably should have. On the bright side, Alexis definitely brought the drama and her delusional comments made for some entertaining moments. Alexis had quite a few standout moments however. Let's not forget her Liza snatch game, and her performance in the Kardashian Musical. Knowing what Alexis can do outside of the show, I was a bit disappointed with her run on drag race. I think she was too busy blaming everyone else for her shortcomings and really didn't look into herself to improve. Ah well, all I can say is, please don't send death threats to Alexis, and don't harass her online. You don't have to like what she did on the show, but don't harass her. This community SHOULD be all about love.

Well kitty girls, that's it. We have our official top four. Next week, I'm going to do things a little bit differently. We're going to analyze each queen in the top three and look at their trajectory on the show, their overall C.U.N.T and look at why each of them should win the crown. Catch you next week hunties!