After what felt like three years' worth of episodes it is finally time for the reunion of RuPaul's Drag Race season 13. This episode has some charming moments but it is drama-free, which is obviously not ideal for a reality TV show reunion. This is another slow episode that will launch the hopefully exciting finale showdown between true stars Gottmik and Symone.
The episode starts with a smash clip review of the entire season. It reminds us that Symone and Gottmik brought unbelievable lewks, Rosé can really sing the house down, Tamisha and Kandy fought, and... not much else happened? None of us are mad at having too much Drag Race but this season really tested us. This episode is two hours long when it should have been one hour.
The evening begins with Kahmora Hall who has very little to say that we did not already know. The main thing we are learning is that Zoom reunions need to be a thing of the past. If the Real Housewives have the ability to quarantine their stars to give us live reunions this show should be able to as well. It is almost impossible to have drama or stakes on Zoom.
It is nice that the producers of the show wanted to give the dolls more air time by premiering their music videos but to paraphrase Bianca Del Rio... drag queens are notoriously bad singers. Alaska and Trixie Mattel make great music, but many of these season 13 videos felt very self-serious which is sort of the opposite of what we like about drag. The exception to this is Denali, who gives a thrilling music video performance while ice skating and of course the break-out star of the season: Tamisha Iman. Her music video is drag excellence. It is so campy, so referential to the season's most-watched moment: her fight with Kandy Muse, and the lyrics are actually good. Tina Burner's rhymes feel like something out of a Barney episode.
One of the most successful additions to this reunion is a very cute segment where the top four queens respond to 69 questions. When they ask Gottmik what she is grateful for she says "Obviously it's my top four sisters. I'm just kidding it's my fucking phone". This queen is a straight-up star. When they ask, where do you see yourself in five years? Gottmik says "definitely looking back at how I won Drag Race five years ago". Honestly... give her the crown. Or... give it to Symone! We are still completely torn and so is the internet. They are neck and neck on social media votes. Symone's 69 questions are great, of course. When asked "Ross or Carson," she says "I pick Michelle".
When Rosé is asked if RuPaul's Drag Race was a movie what would it be called she replies "The Neverending Story". This queen really found her fun throughout this season. Right now on social media Gottmik leads the fan vote with 180,000 likes. Close behind her is Symone with 177,000 and Rosé is very close behind her. Kandy is almost 100,000 votes behind all three of her competitors.
Tamisha Iman proves that she is the greatest TV personality this show has found in years. She tells it like it is and has gravitas and authenticity most people cannot tap into. Fans on Twitter are having a field day reposting what she said about Kandy "if the cameras weren't there I would have hit her".
LaLa Ri says if she could describe her Drag Race journey in one word it would be "short". This queen is such a joy to watch and we would love to see her on an All-Stars season.
The best part of the episode, other than Tamisha Iman is the lip sync assassin showdown between Denali and LaLa Ri. They both get to lip sync for a charity and Denali wins which is a wonderful redemption since she lost to LaLa in the very first episode. The finale is next week and we still have no clue who will win!
Source: VH1
