Ranking the Queen's of Rupaul's Drag Race 70 - 66!

Bitches! I'm back!

Did you miss me?

You won't believe what's happened to me in the last 7 months since I last published one of these! I finished my master's degree, took two teams through a restructure, changed jobs and then picked up my old job because the replacement had a breakdown one week into the job (and the jobs were 50 miles apart!) and many other things including breaking my ankle (don't ask - gays and sports are like Charlie and lipsyncing) - SO SORRY this is late and i don't know if anyone cares anymore but here i am!

Shut the fuck up already

I wrote this all and got to 57 then my laptop was stolen so I lost all hope. I began again in November on my work laptop this time and then it was corrupted (work laptop so minds out of gutter please!), once they restored my laptop - it erased the last 3 months of data and files and took me back to August. Naturally I was devastated but much like Trixie and Shangela, I'm hoping the 3rd time will be a charm and I'm here with another five entries to tide you over until the all-star trailer is released (no doubt it will come the minute I post this!)

I've broken it into groups of five because I'm writing too much for one entry - rest assured, I'm already writing the next five and hope to have it up next week while we wait for the premiere! NO season 9 queens are in here yet - if I ever finish this, I will go back and add them where I think they deserve to be and slot them in (bumping everyone down or up accordingly!) - I also believe in letting the queens have a year to fully realise their impact and let recency bias go before I rank them so there's that as an excuse.

Enough - I'm starting to sound like Charlie Hides!

Hereeee's Charlie!

On with the countdown - meet 70!

70: Kandy Ho

The Bearded Queen

Conchita WHO? Give it up for the bearded queen, Miss Kandy Ho - kickstarting our next wave of queens with the sweet tooth because Kandy’s in the motherfucking house - or something similarly awful and awkward like...

Kandy is like a vintage wine - my memory of her has only grown better over time and I truly stand by the fact that her time on the show (it wasn’t very long of course) will only increase her standing over time. I hated Kandy with a passion when season 7 aired, mainly because she didn’t actually exist on the show and kept appearing on stage during the lipsyncs to send my two underrated favourites, Tempest du Jour and Mrs Kasha Davis home. I thought it was unfair how a queen was allowed to compete only during the lipsyncs to send senior citizens home before being locked up in her cage again. 

I joke, sort of, but over time and through rewatching the series - she’s actually not as non-existent as you think or as the legend has become and she is actually a fucking fierce lip-syncer who probably should have stayed over Jaidynn Diore Fierce - because that lip-sync to Break Free is fantastic, even despite the editor’s shady tricks. On going home, she became renowned for never really appearing on the show and her ‘what the fuck’ comment has been immortalised by Lee Dawson, leading to a new generation of fans and much like Miss Henny, Jasmine Masters and Tammie Brown, her ‘What the Fuck’ and Kandy Whooooo? Has led to her becoming a minor legend on reddit and the inner sanctum of the fandom and for that, alongside my ability to see the past through rose or wine tinted glasses, I’ve placed her at 70. (and if you disagree, go watch any of her lip-syncs again and then let’s talk, but if you still don’t agree, I’ll channel my inner Kandy and beat you up on the playground after school).

Get down to the sandpit and I will whoop your ass.

Kandy entered season 7 with one of the more cringey entrance lines there ever was and it didn’t really go uphill from there. She instantly became a senior citizen bully by asking Tempest how old she was, setting up the narrative for Season 7 Episode 1 (yes, that really was the main plot of the first episode of season 7 - it’s as bad as it sounds) which led to the first of her lip-sync assassinations. She sent Tempest home, thoroughly trouncing her to ‘Geronimo’ which All Tee All Shade is one of Ru’s worst songs ever (you’re really getting a sense of how bad season 7 started right?) and sailed through Episodes 2 and 3 by not being the worst. 

Despite it being a horrible song, she did turn it the FUCK out.

Come episode 4 however, the great question of where in the world is Kandy Ho had begun to reverberate through Reddit. She did terribly in the Spoof challenge (which to be fair, almost everyone did - except Jaidynn but that’s another discussion) and really should have been in the bottom over Trixie (Tan with You still stands as the catchiest of the three songs) but she was saved again and the world went into meltdown over the elimination of the century while Kandy slid by again. During the DESPY awards, she had the misfortune of being paired with Ginger who ate her for lunch and shat her out for dinner – meaning she wound up in the bottom two against MY president – Mrs Kasha Davis. We won’t mention what happened there, suffice to say she delivered another excellent Natalie Wood inspired lipsync and sent MY president home and turned in another weak acting performance the following episode (Mother does not play… THAT) to be sent home by miss JDF (or the power of editing – you decide!)

Ginger really representing the television viewers at home 

Now, hear me out – y’all! I hated Kandy for the longest time – on the show and after the show, I believe she went too far and far better queens were sent home because of her. But as time has gone on, I realised that your place in the race does NOT determine your legacy (Hello, Rebecca) (unless of course, you win) and I could love a queen who maybe undeservedly made it as far as she did and love my other favourites who she sent home too. She is a fierce, fierce queen who deserves to be remembered for more than a screentime joke so I hope you grow a sweet tooth because Kandy is in the motherfucking top 70 (okay, you don’t have to love that line –but love her instead) - let's not forget she actually managed to get Ariana Grande to say goodbye to her and thank her for the lips-sync! Only guest judge to do this so far!

This made me laugh way too much to leave it out.

Most Iconic Moment

You can go the joke route here and say pick any one of her three seconds of screentime or make a bearded queen joke but in all seriousness - any of her three lipsyncs are fantastic to watch but I believe that her Lovergirl lipsync tops them all, regardless of who she sent home (yeah, deal with my love for MKD) – watch the way she builds into it and then drops onto the floor – it is a thing of beauty and I just LOVE when a queen really understands the song and puts their all into it.

This look is also really underrated.

Quote:

‘mother does not play… THAT’ 

‘How old are you?’

‘What the fuck?’ – iconic and right – Sasha totally deserved the bottom two over her.

SUCH a good lipsync

69: Sahara

Queen of Mortal Kombat

I actually found it quite hard to write about miss Sahara Davenport because what happened to her was a fucking tragedy that is still really sad. Rest in peace beautiful queen and know that Miss Kennedy and Manila are doing you proud and you are most definitely not forgotten. What I’ve written here is purely for joke purposes and should hopefully in no way detract from the bright star that was this immortal goddess.

Sharon & Alaska have nothing on these two

Miss Sahara appeared at the beginning of time, in the dark ages of Season 2 and to be honest - her start was rough. She looked a little thirsty, not going to lie and didn’t jump out from the crowd on first impression. Perhaps being friends and knowing Shangela didn’t endear me to her as I couldn’t quite believe Shangela had made it onto the show in the first place and I was more interested in the mess of my namesake, Morgan McMichaels, the allure of Raven and Juju, the hilarity of Jessica Wild and Pandora and the audacious Miss Bitch Tyra (damn Season 2 has a good cast - really!) to notice Sahara. 

Notice me NOW?

Needless to say, that had changed by the end of the episode when she was placed in the bottom two (still for weird reasons - not looking draggy enough according to Kathy Griffin and I’m sorry, but girl, please. Check your lipstick (or your chopped head) before you come for queens) - I mean Mystique was saved because she did a split on the runway - imagine reddit now if that happened today! and delivered an outstanding lip-sync against Shangela (no mean feat) to send her home in a deadly acrobatic performance to ‘Covergirl’ (one of only two songs to be used twice as a lip-sync song!).

ONE of these things is NOT like the other and should not be here.

Sahara stands out to me for her lip-syncs, she wasn’t an iconic comic queen, busting out the one-liners (except for her reason for Tyra hating her!) and her fashion (much like the runway in season 2 in general) was nothing noteworthy. Her performance in the challenges never really stood out from the pack except for her role as Captain in the Starrbootylicious episode – but to me, she stood out for being one of the good ones in a season full of bitches (there is no real hero of season 2 and I think that’s why I love it so much, unless you count Pandora and no one really does count Pandora anymore). Her, Jessica and Pandora brought a level of levity and good-spirited competition to season 2 and I loved that about her. 

Her death was extremely tragic and I’m very fond of the episode in season 7 when Kennedy talks about her love for Sahara and the Davenport Legacy and Sahara would be so proud to see what this show has become and her legacy within it so rest in peace girl, as the original lipsync assassin and jump into a split queen, we will never forget you!

A truly heavenly queen!

Most Iconic Moment:

Her lipsync with Shangela was the absolute best way to launch Season 2 and showed everything she can do in one lean, mean package.

Gia Gunn who?

Quote:

'She hated me because I said Beyonce had cellulite' - so, so true and a definite reason that Tyra would hate someone.

‘I’m in a group with Satan’s baby’ - season 2's best quotes all involve Tyra.

‘Well, my boyfriend’s Asian so I decided to go with the Parasol’ - 'because nothing says Civil War like my Asian Boyfriend' - love this exchange!

68: Jasmine Masters

Jush

I Don’t even know where to begin with Jasmine so in order to do so – I think we begin with compartmentalising her write-up into show section & post-show because holy shit, if we are talking about legacies and placement and performance not being defined by your run on the show, Queen Jush is the ultimate queen of taking her short time on the show and turning herself into something else.

Show:

Jasmine entered season 7 as the sunshine and radiance of the season, smiling, clapping and cheering everyone along – she freaked out over Kennedy and praised everyone for making it on the show. She was cute, excitable, silly and a genuine breath of fresh air. Even though I can’t watch her entrance anymore without hearing Clop Clop Clop (thanks BlazeAmaze) or seeing FroZone from the Incredibles (thanks Bland Canyon) – at the time, I was incredibly taken with her and thought she was going to be a good (if a short) time.

What happened to this?

WOOSH. Well that was turned around fairly bloody fast. By the end of the opening of episode 3 – we were subjected to Jasmine’s lack of self-awareness – calling Violet HORSE-FACED still makes me spit my drink out to this day, her hatred for young, skinny queens and her lack of appreciation of the many facets of the art of drag (I’m not sure if Jasmine would understand that sentence but hey!) and our little ray of sunshine had become a black cloud over the competition. 

I believe this is the moment Jasmine lets the devil into her body

After a strange episode that saw bread, a sudden allergy to make-up (I imagine as a drag queen, that’s a career killer), a desire to quit and then a deicison to wear the best gown EVER just to be safe as fuck, an inability to say a name and a lipsync that was almost a demonstration of how to use a squatty potty – Jasmine was out on her non-bearded ass with some of the most memorable moments of the show (remember when we thought season 7 would be the best ever?) and that could have been it for miss Jush!

She could have had a future career demonstrating correct usage of a Squatty Potty

Post-Show:

Could have! But thanks to our one and only Henny – and the power of youtube and the bitterness of an old queen, we got a whole lot more than we ever expected, anticipated or deserved! From rants against drag race (the fact that Nina did NOT say ‘Rupaul’s drag race has fucked up drag in snatch game will always bug me) making her less popular than Rebecca on reddit for a while, to her iconic videos on youtube, her lack of self-awareness, hilarious observations and iconic way of talking and coming up with quotes, made her a fan-favourite for the ages. From how to get a job, to how not to get shot in her neighbourhood, Jush gives everything she has to youtube and we are all the more blessed for it. 

Blessed, I tell you!

The fact that she was a character on snatch game – alongside Alyssa & Sharon (Ho-no-no) puts her in a unique pantheon of drag race queens and we simply don’t deserve all that Jush gives us.

I mean, there are no words.

Jasmine is a hard queen to rank – I feel there’s a legion of fans who will kill me regardless because I haven’t placed her at number one and because I’m almost as inconsistent as Jasmine’s moods, I have to rank her considering her performance in the show and so she winds up here – a bit of a mess, but a loveable mess at that and the fact that her and Henny are touring together shows us the legend that Queen Kiana Jush has become.

How you say that again?

Iconic Moment:

Show: NOTHING will top her explanation of cocoon for me on season 7 and that is a season of ICONIC moments. (I’m still not sure if I believe her story about finding a pill on the floor and swallowing it pre critique because if that’s the case, she been finding pills ever since the show finished – but I love the story just the same!)

I mean the fact someone took the time to make this!

Post-Show: I am partial to her clip in the car that looks up at Henny (see the RUCAPS) but her videos are what she’s known for and there’s just no beating the following examples:

I can't - just watch and enjoy.

Jasmine videos are a dangerous wormhole to fall into - you'll never come out!

Quotes:

TOO MANY TO COUNT – of all the quotable queens, Jushmine would have to be up there with Bianca, Alyssa, Coco and Willam as the MOST quotable queens from the show and considering she only had three episodes in the competition (excluding makeovers and reunions) makes it THAT much more impressive. Imagine 12 episodes of Jush! All Stars 4 anyone?

Yes honey, oh honey, you know you want this.

‘Laquisha Kiana’ or twelve variations thereof.

‘No T, No Shade, no pink lemonade’

On my gravestone.

'It's like a um, like a butterfly in a cocoon? So Imma be like, some type of like a cocoon. Then Imma grow as I'm walking to the run-walking down the runway, I'm gonna grow. Cuz the butt-the butterfly is actuall in the cocoon. This is the coocon. And which is me, the butterfly. You know like a butterfly is in a cocoon. Every step that I take down the runway, the, uh, butterfly inside is growing. So once it get revealed to the end of the runway, the butterfly... is .... there! Shoo, shoo!'' - I want this on my headstone

Nothing but respect for my president.

'Rupaul's drag race has fucked up drag' - Nina should have said this. Jasmine would have.

'I am Jasmine Masters and I have something to say'

'PANTIES, BITCH!' - my partner and I use this far too often to be healthy.

'DO THAT CHALLENGE'

67: April Carrion

The All-Star (that never was)

Oh April! I probably have April just a little too high in the ranking if it was an objective ranking of the queens of RPDR but she’s got a special place in my heart for being such a beautiful, gracious, fabulous queen and well, a beautiful man to boot (seriously, boy April brings out a side of me we don’t see often!)

I mean - is there any other queen that does handsome scruffy man and beautiful Kylie jenner so well?

April earns her spot through her fashion choices, elevating the runways of season 6 for her three episodes (yes, we were robbed by that split premiere) and being a classy drag queen who Adam Lambert wanted to ruin. She was one of the first queens to really make the most of her presence on the show by posting her planned runways for the episodes after she was eliminated – kickstarting a trend of queens sharing their looks which works out well for some (hey Charlie – should have lip-synced!) and not so well for others (love you Cucu but no, honey.).
'

Find me another queen that could have done this with 'Duck Dynasty'

Between her runways, her beauty and her ability to sell both April and Jason on Instagram like nobody’s business, she’s built herself up a sizeable amount of followers and maintains a steady post-show career filled with beauty ( can you tell I kinda like the smell?) but her run on the show remains one of the more unfortunate ones in the show’s history not due to her lack of talent but circumstance, casting and one of the more splashier casts in RPDR history that all ended up with her going home in 11^th place. 

At least her ass is first place

April entered season six with a bang – looking like someone who had literally leapt off a plane and nailed her first challenge, earning praise and more from the judging panel (her Duck Dynasty look still remains one of my underrated looks to this day but I can’t help imagining what she would have done with Downton Abbey…) and unfortunately that was as good as it got for April – due to a rather poor decision on everyone’s behalf she ended up playing the butch character in Scream Queens which sent her to the bottom two...

That's how I feel about that too.

Pause - rage alert  (SHE SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN IN THE BOTTOM TWO – ADORE GOT A BLOODY HOSPITAL PASS THAT EPISODE – rage over - but seriously, Gia should have been near the bottom and Vivacious was set up to fail as well - April was fourth worst by my count and that runway should have saved her) where she brought her best Selena to the stage to send home Grandma (again, another underrated performance) before somehow again ending up with a terrible part in the Rusical as one of the showgirls and the fat one at that – if she hadn’t got the showgirl with a gimmick and had had either Joslyn or Laganja’s role – I believe she would have been safe but she had to pick the fat girl (and April is to fat and butch as Stacy Layne is to couture) and this saw her sent to the slaughterhouse with Trinity committing the execution to I’m Every Woman. 

But she left looking like a staaaaarrrrr.

Again – she didn’t even do that bad in the lipsync but like Dida and the Princess – the song just fit Trinity and the moment Trinity took to the stairs and April got behind her like that one aunt at every wedding, we knew it was curtains for the one and only April Carrion!

Had April been cast on Season 3 or 4 – this could have been a different story rather than a rant and in my head canon version of season 6 – she just does every runway along with Trinity while not competing in the competition because honestly, the runway lets season 6 down a little and her and Trinity elevated it beyond the safe level the other queens brought (Courtney – you’re excused). Yes she was quiet, she wasn’t sassy or hilarious but she was cute, sweet and worked her ass off – she just didn’t pop like the others and when you think of what the ball and makeover could have been… ugh – enough! Don’t get me wrong – I love season 6 and I used that (and my mouth) to get my partner into drag race but the elimination order is SO wrong in that season and April is the worst victim of it.

Iconic Moment: 

April Showers – one of my favourite runways ever and her moment with Adam Lambert – I haven’t felt that much sexual tension on the show before! (well until Santino eye-raped Violet or whatever the hell happened there!) and her finale look – I know, I know, I’m all about the looks but I’m just a simple girl (guy).

There are no words (and I believe her and Trinity should have won the first two challenges, sue me!

Quote:

 ‘Did you know April Carrion wore a Kandy Ho T-Shirt?’ – EVERYONE

This is as mean as April gets

‘I was meant to win All Stars 2’ – no dear, that would be Alaska. And All Stars 3 is Trixie, and 4 is for Valentina – aim for All Stars 5 – that sounds about right!

66: Robbie Turner

The Queen of Wheels

Robbie probably falls down here due to the weight of expectation rather than anything else unfortunately and I often forget that A) Season 8 existed outside of Bob and Hemmy, B) That Robbie Turner made it to 7^th place or C) Robbie Turner actually won a challenge. None of these are Robbie’s fault of course – merely the season’s fault and my shady memory (or early Alzheimers – don’t joke about that!)

Robbie came to season 8 with a lot of expectations being the sister of Season 5 winner Jinkx Monsoon and Season 6 r.obbed goddess Ben dela Crème – both theatrical, campy, stellar performers and winners of snatch game and other acting challenges. I also unfortunately was quite interested in her beforehand and enjoyed her lipsyncs (Liza!) and was talking her up to everyone on the show (and my partner was obsessed with Bob and knew she was going to win the season so I kept throwing alternate solutions in his face when the truth was there all along) so I was left a little bitter by her performance on the show.

Someone watch this and explain why she didn't do Liza for Snatch Game please.

And it started so well – she came in with a hiss and a snap entering season 8 throwing shade left, right and centre – despite her questionable entrance look and wig lines (yes, I know it’s her thing but when she entered the photoshoot to find Jinkx wearing the same wig done right, well there’s your before and after shots right there!) – I was enjoying her level of sass and inability to handle Acid, Bob and Thorgy who were behaving like a kindergarten for ADD children. 

However, her performance in the first episode was enough for me to realise that my vision of her as a winner was Delusion and I maintain she should have been bottom two that episode over Laila. Episode two came and went and she did a passable job in the lipsync challenge (her Vera Wang runway was everything though) and by Episode 3 we were starting to see the limitations of Robbie Turner when it came to acting and she was thrown into the bottom after an abysmal performance in Ruco’s Empire (although she should have been safe here and Kim Chi should have been in the bottom instead but hey – she got a hospital pass the first episode so it works out). 

Her finest moment by a country mile

She did turn it out the following week and won the challenge (one of the most random challenge wins ever – but I think that's because of the endless gift that is Dragometry) but then did the most unforgivable sin in the show – especially with her family legacy – she bombed snatch game and DIDN’T CHOOSE LIZA. You could tell the RuBot 5000 was pissed that she didn’t choose Liza and her Diana Vreeland was only saved by the fact that Acid and Naomi were even worse – yes, season 8 snatch game was a fucking rough spot (ALTHOUGH, I would have put her in the bottom for this over Acid – Acid was bad but her runway was unique enough to save her in my opinion and I would have loved to have seen Acid’s makeover but that’s another story in my headcanon of how RPDR should have gone).

You can't look away

Somehow we made it to the makeover and Robbie was still here (hey Dida, we see you!) and that was it as we hit one too many rough performances and she was sent home for her horrible makeover as the Lion in the Wizard of Oz and by the time she was pulling off her wig in her lipsync against Derrick, we were all done and dusted with Miss Turner. Since the show, she has continued to have a career of sorts and these days is only brought up when she posts yet another ‘story’ or ‘encounter’ which, excuse the quotemarks, but happen far too frequently for me to take them seriously. 

Her mug is underrated however and I will never get people that critique her for this – drag is not about looking fishy and Robbie is the kind of old-school glam that I grew up with so I’ll always defend that part of her – if she just owned that rather than got into her own head about everything – we could have had a different ending – she just struck me as a queen who wasn’t able to laugh at herself on the show which is a shame because she looks like someone who loves to laugh (off the show) and knows that drag is nothing if it isn’t funny. (here’s looking at you Derrick).

Honey, I shrunk Darienne Lake!

Robbie is a queen in her own right and won a challenge and was on season 8 – she brought a playful shade to each episode and made me laugh – sometimes for the wrong reasons. Unfortunately, she got into her own head, tripped herself up and fell down due to the heightened expectations both of herself and other’s expectations of her and if you asked me who was the least memorable queen of all the queens who made it as far as she did in the competition, unfortunately Robbie would have to take the cake.

Iconic Moment:

Her decimation of Cynthia from the moment she uttered the word ‘Wheels’ in the lipsync to Mesmerise to the moment she smashed a lightbulb at the end.

She also got to meet Debbie Harry - which I am most jealous of.

Quotes:

‘Chichi came in in a trash bag, Chichi will take herself out in a trash bag’ – such potential!

‘Let me tell you a story about flats – NO!’

‘Good morning, I didn’t realise this was happening today!’

We can tell!

A coincidence that all her quotes come from the first ten minutes of Season 8? I don’t think so.

NEXT UP – and already begun writing. A baked porn star potato with a mug for years - is that vague enough for you? Any guesses?