Drag Race Down Under power-bottom ranking: episode 2
this prison themed acting challenge gives a new meaning to "hard time" - in the sense we had a "hard time" watching it
gidday gidday gidday, welcome back to another power-bottom ranking of Drag Race Down Under, the show that really exemplifies Australian culture (derogatory).
This episode was the acting challenge, and I’m struggling to remember if there’s ever been a good acting challenge on drag race ever. Ever. Actually the All Stars 2 acting challenge was pretty great - what ha’ happened to baby jj - was just stupid as all hell, thanks to the rare chemistry of Alaska actually acting the role to filth and Alyssa just being Alyssa.
Drag race scholar and love of my life Eilish Gilligan also reminded me that the season 6 ‘Drag Race Me To Hell’ was also pretty good. But considering All Stars 2 and DR6 are top tier, maybe it’s less to do with the challenges and more to do with the queens.
Anyway, this particular acting challenge in DRDU2 was a parody of Australia’s love of carceral dramas like Prisoner and the more recent Wentworth (we are a nation of cops), and it also wasn’t good. I’ll say that the majority of people involved at least committed very strongly to it, and there’s a lot of joy you can find in that. There’s nothing worse than when people are embarrassed and know it’s bad, so don’t commit - that makes the audience feel so incredibly cringe. I think really only Kween Kong and Yuri were noticeably nervous, and they still gave it a good shot.
The challenge also had some good one off gags - electrocuting the “writer of all the drag race acting challenges” was pretty funny. Self aware, self deprecating humour is so Australian/New Zealandish, and I want to see more of it.
Although once again, what is it with DRDU and piss jokes? I hate piss/poo/fart jokes more than anything in the world. I like classy, witty jokes, like the kind of quip you’d make over a martini to a bunch of new yorker writers and famous philosophers.
Also there was once again a bunch of weird, inexplicable drama this episode, and I’m pretty sick of it. ANYWAY. Let’s power rank:
WINNERS
The ghost of RuPaul + 1
One of my favourite things (maybe my only favourite thing) about s1 was the theory that RuPaul wasn’t even in the room with the contestants. This has reared its head again and i love it.
Spankie + 3
Spankie gets some points for winning this week, somewhat inexplicably… It’s not that she shouldn’t have won, it’s just that I can’t work out what she did that was in any way notable. Anyway, enjoy your points babe.
But she also had a gorgeous moment with Yuri Guaii, who talked about growing up in a religious household, and how her family doesn’t support to this day. It’s a drag race trope now - finding out whose family is supportive, whose isn’t - but it never fails to move me, and I thought Spankie showed the best parts of her in this conversation.
Kween Kong + 4 points
Kween gets a bunch of points for schooling the children about respect for Minnie again. Molly Poppinz, who I really like, made a bunch of statements about how Minnie deserved to leave, and Kween very calmly and firmly put her in her place about respect. More on Minnie later, but I do like this conversation about age and respect - there’s probably something specific to drag and age that should be analysed, but anecdotally, it seems that the gay male community sees age as some kind of personality fault.
Anyway - Kween also gets some points for doing one of the most involved flips during a lip sync i’ve ever seen.
Hannah Conda + 5 points
Hannah Conda’s moth look is ELEVATED and BEAUTIFUL and what I would expect for an All Stars season, and it was so good to see it. She should have won for that look alone, because christ, nobody really covered themselves in glory from the challenge.
LOSERS
Aubrey Haive/ Beverly Kills - 1 points each
I think i got these twinks mixed up last week because as someone in their thirties, I have twink blindness. Rather than admit to my mistake, I shall simply dock them each one point.
Whoever did the lighting for this episode - 2 points
Nobody looks good and it’s destroying the fantasy.
Aubrey Haive - 2 points
A great name, and a great run for someone who started drag less than a year ago! Nonetheless, you are docked points for being booted. Farewell! Excited to see what you are up to next.
Lucy Lawless - 2 points
Lucy Lawless is my QUEEN and I LOVE HER but she only got like two sentences in for the whole episode, so these lack of points go to either the editors of maybe the judges for not creating a safe space for Xena to talk more.
Minnie - 5 points
I want to support Minnie because she’s an icon and a legend and I’ve enjoyed her on the show too, but girl, calm down please. First we get that kind of weird drag confrontation apology thing between her and Aubrey, which was just so incoherent it didn’t count as drama. “I felt you felt you were attacked” and it was… unnecessary.
Then, in an admittedly vulnerable moment, she went to thank her team for supporting her through dyslexia with the acting challenge, saying “not many people know this about me” and Pomara interrupts with “not many people know this? you’ve said it like 6 times today”.
Sure, it’s an ill-timed joke, but it really didn’t seem offensive in the way Minnie took it, absolutely taking dire offence, asking for an apology etc. I think that making fun of a disability IS bad, and I think Minnie would be absolutely right in taking offence, i’m just not sure if that’s what actually happened here. But still - a vulnerable moment, and you don’t want it made light of, so I can totally understand Minnie here.
Perhaps i’m being unsympathetic, and I’m happy to be told if so, but in two episodes there’s been a lot of touchiness so far.
But it quickly became clear that Minnie had brought a lot of drama from outside the show with her, and she literally told Pomara to her face that “when i mentored you i didn’t enjoy it”.
Then Pomara confronted her about how once she had said, again, outside the show:
“I don’t mind that Pomara does drag i just don’t like that she gets paid for it”.
I don’t mind shade and feud, but Minnie is very much on her high horse about all this. She also pushed through a lot of forced apology talk, and then ended with “come give me a cuddle” which… is not a vibe.
“I have very strong opinions and that can be hard for young people” she says in her POV, and… my darling that is not it. It’s just a lot of diva behaviour, for no real reason, and I didn’t find it interesting, and I don’t want the show to be about this.
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ANYWAY that’s the power ranking - i’ll do a mid-season tally and see who’s winning. Please tell me what you are thinking about this season… are we enjoying… are we living
Yes! Minnie has really turned me around from intrigued to annoyed in just two episodes! That was not good drama, it was melodrama.
And I enjoying? Am I living? I am something. It is still in those early days when no one has really stood out massively to me yet. And a big jarring coming right after watching AS7, though that was in a league of its own and Australian drag is very different.