RuPaul’s Drag Race: Girl Group Challenge

And we’re back for Episode 2.  Start your engines, may the best woman win.  And all that jazz.

Everyone wakes up and looks like hell in the morning.  Akashia says she deserves to be there, so she’s glad Porkchop got the boot.  Classy.

RuPaul appears on a video screen to tell everyone that this week’s challenge is a girl group challenge, and, then, out walks RuPaul/Tim Gunn, wearing a whole lot of red suit.  Spewing pearls of wisdom, RuPaul/Tim Gunn tells the gaggle of draggle that, “If they care what’s going on behind the eyes, the audience won’t care what’s going on between the thighs.”  Didn’t Shakespeare write that?

This week’s mini-challenge is that the ladies have to take photos of themselves.   RuPaul/Tim Gunn will give them a scenario, and they have to take a photo of themselves reacting.

1.      Their Louis Vuitton pursue is a fake. (Like any of these hos ever owned a real one.)

2.      Cher is retiring for real.  Everyone fakes shock; only Akashia is happy.  This is the cue for Ongina’s pitiful Cher impression.

3.      Somebody cut the cheese.  Farts are always good for a laugh.

RuPaul/Tim Gunn picks Ongina as the winner.  Oooooh, twist: there are really two winners.  Akashia is the second winner because she took a risk by being excited that Cher is retiring.  Huh?  Dumb.

The main challenge is that the girls are to be divided into two rival girl groups, with each mini-challenge winner being the team captain.  They pick teams like in the fourth grade on the playground.

Ongina’s Team Akashia’s Team

Shannel                      Jade

Nina                           Bebe

Rebecca Cheapwig    Tammie Brown – oooooh, last pick.

The two song options are by Destiny’s Child.  Akashia’s team gets “Independent Woman, Part 1,” and Ongina’s team gets “Say My Name.”  I would have requested “Lose My Breath” because that is, hands down, the best Destiny’s Child song ever.

Everyone gets a job for purposes of the challenge.

On Ongina’s team, they break it down thusly:  Shannel is in charge of make up; Ongina is choreography; Rebecca is doing outfits; and Nina is doing wigs.

Akashia reminds everyone that she is team captain and barks out her group’s assignments: Tammie is doing costumes because she can sew; Bebe is assigned hair; Akashia claims makeup; and Jade is assigned choreography.  I wish this Jade was more like Jade from America’s Next Top Model because she rocked.

Tammie’s feelings get all hurt because no one is interested in her crappy ideas about outfits.  Bebe gives them all a big, “WHATEVER,” and I instantly love her the most.

Sidenote:  Why is there a Madea commercial on?  Tyler Perry needs to keep his closet closed on this out-and-proud channel.  Unless they changed the name of the channel to D-L-ogo when I wasn’t looking.

When we return, two muscle men bring out the fabrics and wigs, and there is nearly a riot.  That is followed by an overly-long series of the two teams working on their assignments.  Here’s a list of the few parts that interested me:

• Shannel tries to boss Nina around on hairstyles, and Nina is not having it.
• Tammie is talking about doing capes, and, again, everyone vetoes that nonsense.
• Shannel is doing a diagram for makeup. “Character illusionize” is her description of this process. Shannel dumb.
• Shannel is second guessing everything Rebecca wants to do on outfits.
• Jade says the way she’ll shine is by not outdoing her team on the choreography.  That’s stupid – you are going to shine by not standing out?!?!
• Everyone thinks Tammie will stink up the joint.

There’s a commercial about bringing RuPaul’s Drag Race to a town near you.  And what town is not on that list?  Washington, D.C.  Why?  Because drag here is D-R-E-A-D-F-U-L.

Akashia is wearing me out.  She thinks she is too good for everything, and her team is near mutiny!

RuPaul/Tim Gunn is back, still in that hideous suit.  RuPaul/Tim Gunn tries to get Ongina to teach him to dance, and it’s not a pretty sight.  RuPaul/Tim Gunn makes a Showgirls reference to Shannel . . . extra credit for that.  Tammie makes a claim of getting jiggy, and I throw up in my mouth.

Tim Gunn/RuPaul introduces Michelle Williams from Destiny’s Child as the guest host for this week.  Michelle is the one who replaced LaToya and LaTavia when those two ingrates tried to get Matthew Knowles – manager and father of Beyoncé- removed from the group.  I’m sure that manager and stylist Tina Knowles had a hand in it, too.  Why?  Because she will cut you.

Bebe tells Akashia that she needs to start working, and I love Bebe even more.  Bebe is further made mad that she had to fix her own costume at the last minute.  My better half, Dragatha Christie, is sitting beside me and comments that in this episode Bebe looks like Nina Simone.  HA!  So true.

In the next segment, we turn to the educational portion of our episode.  Ongina introduces me to a new turn of phrase:  “Mannal Toe” = the male version of camel toe.  Never stop learning, people, never stop learning.

Ongina’s group’s name is Serving Fish.  Akashia continues to rule her group with an iron fist, and tells her group that their name is 3D.  This is followed by a montage of Tammie repeatedly acting like a freak and generally making everyone else uncomfortable.

We’re on the Main Stage now.  Here’s our hostess, RuPaul, in a blue sequined number.  She looks like a black Anna Nicole Smith.  Merle Ginsburg (a journalist), Santino Rice (a Project Runway loser), Frank Gatson (a video director), and Michelle Williams are the judges.

First up:  Serving Fish.  Their outfits are silver and acid yellow.  Nina admits that she sucks.  No argument here.  Shannel is amazed at herself and applauds herself for doing a great job.  She says she’s already won.  I think they did pretty well, actually.  If this was Star Search, I would give them three-and-three-quarters stars.

Second Up:  3D.  They all have on some tight, brown, metallic outfits.  Akashia looks crazed.  She looks totally nuts.  Tammie Brown’s nipples keep falling out.  Everyone is doing her own sort of dance.  I give them only two-and-a-half stars.

Serving Fish gets props all around.  The judges do make fun of Nina’s dancing and Ongina’s Mannal Toe.  When asked whom she would send home, Rebecca has a complete breakdown.  She then names Shannel as the one she would send home, only because she’s her toughest competition.  Then Rebecca tells Shannel that she loves her in a totally fake way.  Shannel says that she loves Rebecca, too, then makes like she’s clawing her eyes out.  Just in time for Valentine’s Day!

The judges are not so kind to 3D.  Michelle says that Akashia couldn’t do the choreography and that it wasn’t even that difficult.  Santino says Akashia gives off a bad vibe.  Tammie gets real defensive when questioned about anything.

RuPaul sends the girls to the Interior Illusions Lounge, and the judges deliberate.  There’s nothing particularly bad to say about Serving Fish.  Not so much with 3D.  Michelle says all she saw in Akashia was “a messy man.”  HA!  That’s the highlight of the episode.  All of the judges are concerned about how Tammie did not connect with the material or the judges.  That’s called foreshadowing for those of you without literature degrees from Oxford.

Serving Fish is all safe, but Ongina is the winner.  She wins chocolates and wine – how classy!  I wonder if it’s Franzia?  Jade is safe.  Bebe is also safe.  It’s down to Akashia and Tammie.  RuPaul says that, whatever happens, they are both “fine queens.”  As in the premiere episode, these last two have to lip synch for their lives.  Tammie doesn’t know the words to Michelle Williams’ song, but, in fairness, there’s only about three people who know the words because they’re the only people who buy Michelle Williams albums.  So, obviously, Akashia is safe again, and Tammie is outta there.  Akashia says that she is the phoenix, rising from the ashes.  RuPaul tells Tammie that she gave up, and then Tammie has some sort of seizure on her way out.  Much dancing to end the show.

Are we living up to Week 1′s promise?  Eh, not so much.  Pick it up, episode 3!

Season 1, Episode 2: Girl Group Challenge (originally aired February 9, 2009)

For more on RuPaul’s Drag Race, click here.

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Photographs courtesy of Logo Online