“Rupaul’s Drag Race: All Stars” premiered its 10th season May 9 on Paramount +, equaling a decade of the spin off of the franchise’s show, “Rupaul’s Drag Race.”
All Stars seasons are usually set for returning queens from the original seasons of the U.S. franchise.
The first two episodes aired May 9 featuring a new layout for the competition. This season will have 18 former drag race queens who will be divided into three brackets– pink, purple and orange. The episodes are also divided by groups, meaning each bracket will have a set of three episodes before they move on to the semifinals.
In the semi finals, the winning queens from each bracket are combined and the competition will resume.
Finalists will be determined during the semi finals. However, during the third episode, judge and host Rupaul stated the eliminated queens will have a chance to come back to the competition via a plot twist in the competition.
Here’s what is known: #spoileralert
Episode 1: “Winner Winner, Chicken Dinner”
Rupaul yet again surprised the returning All Stars queens with a brand new competition layout.
Typically the layouts are reflected off of the original show’s competition layout, but this season was a completely different layout.
The first bracket showcased was the Orange bracket with legendary queens like; Aja (season 8), Bosco (season 14), Irene the Alien fka Dubois (season 15), Olivia Lux Mugler (season 13), and Phoenix (season 3).
This episode was packed with memorable queens where many of them went through their own journeys before returning back for All Stars.
Both Aja and Bosco shared their gender transitioning journeys on this episode. During the reunion of queens, both Aja and Olivia Lux Mugler had created an alliance for the rest of the competition, called “Mi-Mu.”
“Mi-Mu” is short for “Miyaki” and “Mugler” which are Aja’s and Olivia’s ballroom houses they are associated in and their drag last names.
However, Mugler had previously made an alliance with Deja Sky.
When the first bracket of queens entered, they were not greeted with a mini challenge, but instead catapulted into the first Maxi-Challenge.
In All Stars, the mini challenges are usually done for incentive points and the Maxi-Challenges are the ones graded by the panel of judges in the end– RuPaul, Ross Matthews, Michelle Visage, Carson Kressley and a surprise guest judge.
The first Maxi-Challenge asked the queens to write an original verse for the “ru-mix,” “Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner.”
During each performance, Aja was the first one to showcase her verse, and let’s just say she lived up to her expectations from earlier in the episode.
On the runway, the queens stunned their first runway back with guest judge Ice Spice watching.
The winning queens of the challenge, Aja and Irene, were asked to lipsync Ice Spice’s song, “Think U the Shit (Fart),” in which Aja proved to Spice that she is also New York royalty.
Episode 2: “Murder on the Dancefloor”
After the initiation of the first episode and determining the winners of the last segment, this episode resumed from the previous episode’s finishing run.
The eliminated queens were asked by Rupaul to give out their “Most Valuable Queen,” or “MVQ,” point to the other queens.
During this conversation, Bosco gave her point to Phoenix, and vice versa while Olivia and Deja also exchanged points.
At this moment, Aja reigned first, Irene second, and in third were the remaining queens with one point, and no queens were eliminated.
The Maxi-Challenge for this episode was an Improv challenge called “Murder on the Dance Floor.”
Each queen was asked to choose a character for the challenge and they all felt positive with the roles they chose— with no fighting, which was interesting.
Sooner or later that would change, because while the queens rehearsed, Olivia Lux and Bosco had a bit of an altercation. It began over some comment Bosco had made implying that Olivia was not going to win the improv challenge.
“Don’t be a hater, Bosco,” Olivia said.
After showcasing each queen’s performance, there was another alliance made during their preparation for the runway.
Both winners, Irene and Aja made an alliance between each other.
“If you and I are safe, it is in both of our best interest to–,” Irene said. “If you scratch my back, I scratch yours.”
The runway’s theme was “Coming and Going” and let’s just say, the queens absolutely delivered for the runway this episode.
One unforgettable queen on the runway was Bosco with her runway fusion of Lydia Deets from “Beetlejuice” and well-loved actress Elvira in a synched coffin box. Her “ru-veal” was immaculate.
The winning queens of the Improv challenge were Irene the Alien and Bosco, which was deserved after their Improv performances.
As Irene continued to prove her spot in the competition after a disappointing previous season, Bosco reigned over Irene in the lip sync.
Bosco amazed the judges with both her body and performance in the lip sync, which now put her first alongside her Seattle sister Irene with four points.
Episode 3: “Hoops Queens Makeover”
Continuing from the last episode, the queens were asked again to give out their “MVQ” points to each other.
Surprisingly enough, Olivia Lux continued to give their points to Deja and vice versa, which left Aja and Phoenix with no new points.
However, this did create some tension between “Mi-Mu,” and Aja started having second thoughts between their relationship.
“I just feel like you led me to believe it was going to go one way, and it went another way,” Aja said. “I don’t completely know how to trust you as much as I did when I walked in here.”
The last episode for the first bracket of queens featured a mini and Maxi-Challenge both involved in basketball.
This episode featured the queens returning to an unexpected mini challenge. They were introduced to six women college basketball players– Lauren Betts, Abby Prohaska, Naveah Dean, Talia Von Oelhoffen, Hunter Hernandez and Mya Hernandez.
Each queen had to compete against each other in a mini basketball game where each queen had a minute to make as many free throws as possible.
The queen who made the most baskets under a minute was Irene the Alien with eight baskets.
Immediately after, Rupaul followed with introducing the Maxi-challenge, which indeed was a Makeover and Girl Group challenge.
The winning mini challenge queen, Irene, was asked to choose pairs for the rest of the queens.
“If I am gonna win this challenge, I wanna win because I am good and not because the other girls are struggling,” she said.
It is admirable in a sense that Irene did not want to set the queens up in a bad pair when it is common to sabotage queens during these moments.
For this makeover challenge, the queens were asked to choreograph a dance, give their pairs a makeover and write an original verse for the performance.
This challenge was definitely the hardest out of all of them, but this was the last chance for each of them to prove themselves into the semi finals.
The performances were much more fun and exciting than expected. The queens transformed regular college basketball players into extravagant drag queens.
Personally, Irene killed the stage with their electrifying performance with their partner, Hunter.
They both dressed up as intergalactic alien clowns and delivered on stage with Irene’s tricks and Hunter’s determination.
Out of all the pairs, the one with the most resemblance was Olivia Lux with her partner, Naveah.
The winning queens for the challenge were yet again Bosco and Irene the Alien, with Irene winning that last lip sync against Bosco, making it her first lip sync win in the franchise.
The final placement was Irene the Alien in first place, Bosco in second, and Aja in third, and all three will move onto the finals.
However, Rupaul stated that there would be a plot twist in the competition. Each eliminated queen has the option to redeem their spot back into the competition after the judges deliberate on who to bring back.
Next week, the pink bracket is up to compete, and this bracket is anticipated to be the most chaotic bracket out of all three.
This bracket is jam-packed with these catty and cunty (definition here) queens– Lydia B Kollins, Jorgeous, Kerri Colby, Mistress, Nicole Paige Brooks and Tina Burner.
