Welcome to RuPaul’s Drag Race UK Power Rankings! Every Friday, we’ll debrief the week’s new episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race UK Season 3 to determine which queens are riding high, and which need she-mergency care. A Peloton-inspired dance challenge pushes the queens to their limits, and only one group quite gets the assignment. But which queen actually burned out of the competition?
11. Elektra Fence (last week: 11) — ELIMINATED
Unfortunately, unless you’re Akashia and Tammie Brown refusing to lip sync to Michelle Williams, having to lip sync twice in the first two episodes of Drag Race is almost always a death sentence. It shows a pattern of being unable to compete at the level you need to for the show, and while you can turn out a good lip sync, that only proves that you’re good at lip-syncing. Indeed, I thought Elektra’s “Sweet Melody” performance was a TKO last week, but her performance this week was more of the same; she just wasn’t performing in the way that Drag Race UK requires to be successful. But we’ll always have that first lip sync to remember her by.
10. Victoria Scone (last week: 2)
I only have Victoria this low because I am fairly certain she is not returning to the competition. Not only did Ru call her forward at the end of the episode to tell her she needs to have additional examination done on her knee, but the edit of this installment focused far too much on the injury for it not to matter. I would be very, very surprised if she returns next week, particularly after a preview for the next episode that doesn’t feature her at all.
If she does depart, I hope Victoria is granted the same chance to return next season as Eureka! and Veronica Green had before her. She is a tremendous talent, and based on what we’ve seen so far, I could see her going the distance in any season she participates in. (She even performs ably in a dance challenge this week despite her knee injury!) This season won’t be the same without her in it.
9. Vanity Milan (last week: 6)
Ru seems invested in Vanity, which is a good start. He’s shown over the years that he’ll give plenty of chances to queens he’s personally invested in: Shangela, Kandy Muse, Tia Kofi and so on. Vanity’s lip sync this week showed she’s got some real fight in her but I’ll admit she was pretty rough across the board this week. I didn’t mind the orange wig in the way the judges did, but for a self-professed dancer, she didn’t do great with choreography. I also didn’t love her red carpet runway; I got the Beyoncé inspiration, but the actual dress looked a little flimsy. It was a step down from her looks in the premiere, for sure. I’ve got confidence that Vanity can bounce back, but I completely understood her bottom placement this week.
8. Charity Kase (last week: 8)
Funny enough, after I was lower on Charity than the judges (theoretically) were last week, I’m actually higher on her this week. I loved that she served up a more glamorous look for the red carpet runway without losing her core aesthetic. The judges wanted to see a bit more shape, but the outfit moved beautifully regardless. She was off the beat in the challenge, sure, but I’m glad she didn’t land in the bottom two for it. Charity’s got more to show than I expected, and I’d like her to have plenty of time to demonstrate her range.
7. Ella Vaday (last week: 7)
I said last week I was getting Rosé vibes, and those were only amplified this week. Ella’s a smart, effective professional, but her personality isn’t really popping yet. More to the point, she blamed the other queens in her group for her low placement when she certainly wasn’t top of the class on her own. (She did fine with the choreo, but wasn’t better than anyone else in the Ball Busters group.) Blaming your teammates’ performances for your own shortcomings is a bad idea on Drag Race, and I’m hopeful it’s just a blip of frustration for Ella rather than a defining character trait. She looked lovely on the runway in the red carpet category, although her makeup tends to make her look a bit older than she is. It’ll be interesting to see if Michelle Visage clocks that, as it tends to be a pet peeve of hers.
6. Choriza May (last week: 5)
Choriza continues to be an utter delight, cracking joke after joke in the workroom and in her confessionals. She’s just an incredibly funny queen, and she’s bringing an energy that no one else in the cast is so far—perhaps that’s why she got a pass while the rest of her team had to lip sync. She wasn’t much better at the choreography, but she knew to just amp it up on the comic front in the performance. That’s the kind of thing that gets you noticed even when you’re not the strongest technically. It bodes well for her moving forward in the competition.
5. Scarlett Harlett (last week: 3)
Scarlett really surprised me on the runway. She went with a soft, movie star-esque makeup job that accentuated what was a gorgeous pairing of hair and dress, and gave us something completely different than she did in either of last week’s looks. I may have underestimated just how good she is at serving up different aesthetics; I had thought Graham Norton’s “Meryl Streep” praise last week was a bit too much, but she’s really got talent. Conversely, I thought she was just okay in the Dragoton challenge, but there were queens in much worse shape there than her. A very clear safe week for Scarlett.
4. River Medway (last week: 9)
I feel badly for River, who was the only one in her group not to get a high placement. When the praise is so obviously for the collective, why not just shout out a team win and single out a winner? It feels like River was personally excluded, despite doing a great job. She also looked great on the runway in a red carpet look that was worlds apart from either of the runways she served last week. There’s something special to River, and I hope the judges start to see it soon—beyond the statue pointing, of course.
3. Kitty Scott-Claus (last week: 4)
I was much higher on Kitty last week than most, but I think everyone should be able to agree she did a great job across the board this week. Her character work was by far my favourite in Dragoton, and she looked so different than she did on the runway in Marilyn Monroe drag. Sure, the exposed black corset wasn’t a great moment for her, and I can get why she was relegated to being the clear third of the top three. But we should be keeping our eyes on Kitty; she just feels like a Drag Race UK winner to me. Maybe that’s silly, and we should be looking at those who feel nothing like The Vivienne and Lawrence Chaney (that would certainly be Krystal Versace, after all). But I dunno! Something tells me Ru may have a specific taste in U.K. queens. We’ll see.
2. Veronica Green (last week: 10)
I mean, in any other world, Veronica would’ve won this week. Not only did she perform great in the challenge, she also looked maybe her best ever on the runway in Kylie Minogue drag. I don’t love the super lined lip quite as much as Michelle does, but even I could tell this was the best Veronica’s ever looked. And the fact that she got the credit for helping out her entire team—this is what Drag Race wins are made of! Unfortunately for Veronica, there’s someone else who’s caught Ru’s eye, and thus the win evaded her this week.
1. Krystal Versace (last week: 1)
There are certain phrases Drag Race superfans know to keep an eye out for when Ru talks about queens. “Star quality” is maybe the most notable among them, particularly after Ru gave the compliment to Symone in the second episode of Season 13. That compliment proved prescient, as Symone wound up winning the whole thing. Another such comment is that Ru can’t keep his eyes off someone, or that he can’t stop watching them. Krystal got that distinction this week, along with a herstory-making second win in a row. It’s hard to deny that Krystal is a force: her makeup looked excellent again this week, and I loved her green dress with chest to match. But this is a talented group. The fact that Krystal has nabbed both wins so far, in very different challenges, is a sign that Ru has really invested in her early.
There’s a lot of season to go, but keep one eye on Krystal and the other one on Kitty. If Ru is indeed looking to go a different direction with the winner this season, it’s hard to imagine someone better than the former.
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