Snatch Game

Drag Race Sverige Season 1, Episode 4 – “Snatch Game” & Mitt Liv Som Tant runway Review & Power Ranking

March 28, 2023 by krisis 1 Comment

Welcome to my review, recap, and power rankings of the fourth episode of Drag Race Sverige (AKA Drag Race Sweden) Season 1 – “Snatch Game,” Sweden’s first try at the iconic Drag Race improv comedy challenge. It was paired with a Mitt Liv Som Tant runway, which translates literally to “My Life as an Aunt” but in the subtitles was “My Life as a Golden Girl.”

Content warning for this episode: the “Elimination Day” workroom scene after Snatch Game and before the runway includes a graphic discussion of sexual assault and sexual violence.

I get frustrated when Drag Race is an entertaining reality show first and a serious competition second. I react negatively whenever a season trends towards making things a game of random chance.

This episode combined two elements that tend to turn me off: bringing back an eliminated queen and making a surprising elimination.

Bringing back an eliminated queen doesn’t always have to be a bad thing. It’s what gave us more of Trixie in Season 7. It created amazing dramatic tension with Latrice’s return in All Stars Season 4 and Silky’s battle to conquer lip sync island on All Stars Season 6.

It’s a mechanic best used when a season has seen some queens eliminated early who felt like they they had more to offer to the show – either as drag queens or as personalities. Even less notable returns from Carmen Carrera or Joe Black still gave us iconic Drag Race moments, because they brought back great characters.

Yet, on Sverige it has felt like all three queens left with reasonable justification: Almighty Aphroditey for being too green, Antonina Nutshell for struggling with the runways, and Endigo for struggling to show confidence while in drag. All three of them brought some amount of certain “not ready for prime time” awkwardness to the show that the other queens never displayed. That’s not a statement about the quality of their drag, just about how prepared they and their packaged seemed to be for the rigors of Drag Race.

As a result, we had a Top 6 who felt like the strongest competitors in this race. Even if the show had already accounted for a returning queen mechanism, if ever there was a time to hold that in reserve an episode longer this was it! No matter who left this episode, they would be someone who had more to show.

Instead, we have a returning queen who already feels hopelessly outmatched by the competition. She proceeded to bomb Snatch Game and the Mitt Liv Som Tant old lady runway, but she was kept by Robert Fux and the judges thanks to a desperate, over-the-top lip sync win against the show’s frontrunner.

I’m not arguing in favor of protecting an early front-runner who makes a stumble – that winds up just as frustrating as an unfair early elimination! However, as a viewer I feel like I’ve lost the chance to see more of the best drag Sweden has to offer.

That outcome detracts from what was a solid, entertaining first Snatch Game from Sweden! Not only did several queens deliver comedic performances, but Robert Fux was a delightful host who upheld his end of the absurd game of improv with both the queens and the Snatch Game “contestants.”

Of course, the unusual developments of this episode shook up my power rankings from last week’s design challenge. With our front-running no longer in the race it’s not only a toss-up for who will come out on top, but there’s a sudden chance for a safe queen to sneak her way into the top three of the season.

(Want to watch Drag Race Sverige outside of Sweden? For most of the world, it’s available as part with a Wow Presents Plus subscription as soon as the episode is done airing.)

Läsare, start your engines. Och må den bästa Drag Queen vinna!

Drag Race Belgique Season 1, Episode 5 – Snatch Game & Night of 1001 Audrey Hepburns Runway

March 19, 2023 by krisis 5 Comments

Welcome to my review, recap, and power rankings of the fifth episode of Drag Race Belgique Season 1 – the first Snatch Game in Belgium, plus a Night of 1001 Audrey Hepburns runway!

I felt that this Snatch Game and accompanying iconic runway said a lot about the drag culture of Belgium.

Snatch Game was low on rude and uproarious jokes and heavy on studied character work. Even the worst queens of this panel presented better character illusions than the best queens of a typical Snatch Game in the United States!

Similarly, while queens on other franchises might take this runway theme as an opportunity to show off a “high glam” version of Audrey Hepburn, here five out of six queens presented near-exact replicas of some of her iconic looks. None of them were draggy for drag’s sake, and none amplified Hepburn’s petite frame with drag staples like exaggerated shoulder pads or giant hair.

As we have the chance to see Drag Race adapted to countries all around the globe, we must remember that the aesthetics of US Drag Race is heavily influenced by the pageant system. Critiques about proportions and “dragging things up” do not always apply equally in other drag subcultures.

From this season thus far I get the sense that Belgian drag values a much less exaggerated sense of femininity from its drag artists, which has been reflected both in the runways and the judging. It seems to be a season where smaller, more-thoughtful performances can thrive.

Snatch Game shook up my power rankings compared to last week’s acting challenge everywhere but the very top. While we maintained the same front-runner, spreading the wins around and putting a new queen in the bottom definitely shuffled the odds of who might wind up in the finale.

(Want to watch Drag Race Belgique outside of Belgium? For most of the world, it’s available as part with a Wow Presents Plus subscription as soon as the episode is done airing.)

Lecteurs, start your engines. Et, que la meilleure Drag Queen gagne!

RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15, Episode 5 – House of Fashion, Review & Power Ranking

January 28, 2023 by krisis 1 Comment

Welcome to my review, recap, and power rankings of the fifth episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15 – House of Fashion. It’s an unconventional material design challenge with a twist: the queens are split into three groups and have to present cohesive runway collections for the House of (Michelle) Visage, the House of (Carson) Kressley, and the House of (Ross) Matthews.

This episode lacked a certain spark, and it’s hard to decide if that was down to the 40-minute runtime or the peculiar version of this familiar challenge. Seasons 3, 4, & 5 each opened with and iconic unconventional materials episode with a full cast of queens.

Season 4’s “RuPocalypse Now!” is probably the best of the bunch – packed with Sharon’s zombie look, Jiggly’s baked potato couture, and LaShawn Beyond’s classic “Post-Apopaloctic” line. It’s a 63-minute edit, but 20 of those minutes are entrances and a length photo shoot challenge! That means the meat of the design challenge (including the whole “wrestling with zombies for clothes” bit) still fit into 40 minutes, and it included both a walkaround with Ru and the private judges deliberations.

Of everything that feels squeezed by these 40-minute edits, I think the element that is most-sorely missing are those private judges deliberations. Without them, we don’t have any sense of RuPaul as a character on her own show. It also complete defangs Michelle Visage if we can’t hear her cutting opinions in private. Finally, it renders the guest judges completely pointless, since we don’t get to hear their unbiased opinions as they go to bat for the queens.

It was especially cruel to miss out on those deliberations in this episode, where Michelle and Ross had queens representing their brands and the guest judge was Janelle Monae, who knows something about fashion!

House of Visage

House of Kressley

House of Matthews

Looking beyond the edit, there was also the unusual nature of this iteration of the unconventional material challenge. First, since the queens were in teams it meant there was no apparent fighting over materials – sharing was in their best interest. Aside from losing the prurient fun of the catty fighting over who gets what leopard-print pillow, what was really lacking was a feeling of scarcity.

Part of what makes unconventional material challenges truly challenging is the queens trying to figure out what they can construct out of things other than fabric. Yet, in this challenge there was enough for nearly every queen to make a cape!

If I had to award a team win, it’d go to the House of Matthews. Even if their collection trended a little bit casual, it was cohesive and there wasn’t a bad look in the bunch. The judges seemed to agree, giving half the group a high placement and calling the other two safe.

What did this unconventional version of the unconventional materials design challenge mean for my power rankings? While the very top remains the same as last week’s Snatch Game ranking, there are some major shake-ups in the middle of the pack as the queens without wins jostle for positive critiques and screen time.

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15, Episode 5 – House of Fashion, Review & Power Ranking

RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15, Episode 4 – Snatch Game, Review & Power Ranking

January 21, 2023 by krisis 1 Comment

Welcome to my review, recap, and power rankings of the fourth episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15 – a supersized version of Snatch Game, the Drag Race game show challenge of impersonation, comedy, and quick wit.

I think we had more than one potential Hall of Fame performance in this Snatch Game, which is always exciting to see! The first round of the game was more all-around entertaining, but the second round had had a trio of standouts.

Maybe this solidifies the argument for front-loading the season with Snatch Game as well as a Ball challenge within the first few episodes. We really ought to see a queen make it through these Drag Race fundamentals before she sashays away.

Surprisingly, this episode may have also made an argument in favor of the tight 40-minute edit of this season’s episodes. We never saw Ru’s walkaround where he attempts to undermine the queens’ characters choices, insisting that everyone would be funnier if they did Cher. It doesn’t add anything to the show. I much prefer to watch Snatch Game unfurl without a preview of how Ru might be biased for or against any of their choices.

Of course, Snatch Game is the one Drag Race challenge that has such a straightforward format where you can easily cut minutes out of the process of explaining it and it still turns out the same. Next week we’re due for a design challenge, and I fear that we’ll see very little of each queen as they design and construct their garments.

Did the crowd of strong Season 15 Snatch Game performances shake up my power rankings from last week? We had a major fall and a major lift, but not too much jostling between them.

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15, Episode 4 – Snatch Game, Review & Power Ranking

RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under Season 2, Episode 4 – Snatch Game: Review & Power Ranking

August 21, 2022 by krisis

Kia ora and welcome to my review and power rankings for the fourth episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under Season 2 – Snatch Game!

Snatch Game is one of the most-celebrated episodes of every season of Drag Race. That’s not only for the laughs and memes that it brings, but because it is the one challenge queens can prepare for the most. Even when RuPaul slightly changes up the format, Snatch Game is always a challenge about celebrity impersonation and being ridiculous.

I’ve come to appreciate that Snatch Game is also an interesting window into the national humor of each country and its drag scene. That was slightly muted in this panel of contestants, because only one of them chose to portray a New Zealand or Australian celebrity – and, that choice came with its own set of challenges.

Spankie Jackzon brought Barry Humphries to Snatch Game, who has been primarily known outside of Australia for decades as a drag character named Dame Edna Everage. This is down to Drag Race‘s rules around playing copyrighted characters. The idea is that as long as you claim to be playing the actor behind the copyrighted character that Snatch Game is a fair parody. The show wants to avoid legal trouble for portraying a character without legal release… sometimes saying inappropriate things.

While Humphries certainly wears drag to portray Dame Edna, who he created in 1955, to my knowledge he does not considered himself a drag queen. He happens to portray an over-the-top female character, which has links to British Panto.

In the case of Dame Edna as a drag character, I’m not aware of her having any connection to gay or queer culture or making commentary on same. She is simply a parody of a woman – at first a Melbourne suburbanite, but from the 80s onward a sort of self-made media mogul fitting for the time period. She became sort of daft but incisive response to the heartless conservative power-ladies of the Thatcher era

Adding another layer to all of that, Humphries lives publicly as a straight, cisgender male, and he has repeatedly and unapologetically made transphobic comments in recent years. It reached a point that a famous Australian comedy award named in his honor decided to retitle itself.

People of any sexual orientation or gender identity can perform in drag. However, performing in drag is not a shield for being deliberately cruel or offensive, or to protect your bigoted views.

I share this background not only to catch you up on the only actual Australian character on the panel this year, but also as a means of exploring Spankie’s portrayal of Humphries as Dame Edna. As an impersonation, it was perfect. I’ve seen a fair amount of Edna back in the day, and if you had told me this was the real deal making a guest appearance on Drag Race I would have believed you.

If you listen to Spankie’s answers, you’ll note a lot of slang about female genitalia and how Edna’s has aged. I haven’t watched Edna’s act recently enough to recall if this is a big part of it or Spankie’s own invention. However, what stuck out to me is that this is the sort of overt parody of womanhood that leads some folks to label drag performances as misogynistic.

Drag Race itself engaged in this sort of misogynistic commentary more often in earlier seasons, as well as language that we would now all label as transphobic. Comparing the sorts of things the judges would say on Season 1-4 to today reveals how different the dialog around queerness, drag, and transgender people has become.

Of course, I’m also writing about a regular challenge on a female impersonation show called “Snatch Game.” There’s always an element of transgression in drag.

What’s fascinating about that is we have no way of knowing how meta Spankie intended her performance of Edna to be. Was she intentionally leaning into the offensive aspects of an elderly, bigoted man playing an elderly panto dame, making outdated jokes? Was that also a commentary on Drag Race itself? Or, was this her literal interpretation of Edna, with no comedy attached? Or, yet again, was this Edna speaking with Spankie’s voice, saying things Spankie thinks are funny?

I have no answers for you. Nor am I trying to engender any negativity or blame towards Spankie! To me, this is one of those moments that is so fascinating about Drag Race, where it has become the very thing it is commenting upon. I think it’s important that we don’t just view the show as entertainment or as a showcase for drag art, but as a conversation about gender – and, one that sometimes can be uncomfortable or even offensive.

Last week, Spankie Jackzon conquered my Episode Three rankings. Has she held onto her top spot, or did someone else snatch the pole position from her? Read on to find out – and let me know if you agree (or disagree) in the comments below.

If you want to watch RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under Season 2 outside of Australia, New Zealand, and Canada you can sign up for WowPresentsPlus to watch the many worldwide Drag Race franchises for $4.99 a month or $50 a year. (Note that if you’re in the home country of a franchise you will need to use a VPN to “visit” another country to see that content.)

Readers, start your engines… and may the best Down Under drag queen win!