‘Canada’s Drag Race’ Season 5 finale recap: And the winner is …

The queens reveal their new singles, and one queen reigns victorious

How much does a Drag Race finale matter? For many years, it seemed like the answer was “not at all,” particularly after the main show pivoted away from in-studio finales—lost thanks to Perez Hilton’s infamous leaking of Raja as the winner of Season 3—and to finale/reunion hybrid affairs. Nothing Sharon Needles, Jinkx Monsoon or Bianca Del Rio did in their respective finales earned them their crowns. Even when the show brought in original musical numbers for the finalists, can you really say Violet Chachki or Bob the Drag Queen won because of them?

But of course, the game changed in Season 9, when the Lip Sync for the Crown format was introduced and Sasha Velour turned an absolute barn-burner of a Whitney Houston lip sync into her greatest argument for the crown. She beat out expected winner Shea Couleé in a flood of rose petals, and the rest was herstory. I’m not sure we’ve seen a finale since that’s had quite the same impact, but Sasha’s come-from-behind victory has given the impression since that, yes, the finale can change the outcome of a season.

So here we are, at the finale of Canada’s Drag Race Season 5, with a very evenly matched final four. What one lacks in track record, she makes up for in narrative importance. What one lacks in stand-out story beats, she makes up for in never lip-syncing once. There’s a real sense that anything could happen in this episode, and with the return of Season 4’s singles challenge, there’s a lot of room for both impressing the judges and falling short.

In the end, the question of whether this finale matters is answered inconsistently. One queen puts on a dynamite showing, but is still ultimately dismissed for lacking the “fire” of her competitors. One frontrunner falters in a major way, and it costs her. And the two who stand ready to Lip Sync for the Crown at episode’s end both kill the challenge, but the one who wins it all is the one who had a better showing all season long—and, crucially, clearly wins the final lip sync.

Venus and Makayla Couture sit down for a chat before doing a nude illusion photo shoot together Credit: Courtesy Bell Media

Our final four’s final tracks are pretty different in approach. “To the Sky (Limitless),” written by Makayla Couture, is a fun sung track, and she performs it like a superstar. There’s something to the way that Makayla performs that just demands your attention; she’s got a ferocity mixed with technical prowess that makes her ready to take to the world’s stage. Contrast her performance with Minhi Wang’s, which is unfortunately awkward and stilted. At points, she even struggles to lip sync her own song “Wangderful,” which is campy to the point of seeming like a 30 Rock parody song. I appreciate Minhi’s desire to do something different, but this is a real misfire on her part.

 

Helena Poison uses her last name as the title of her track, as part of an overall finale package that really feels focused on her brand. The song is a little low-energy, but it’s catchy, and the vibe seems to mesh well with Helena’s style. She does a great job with the choreography, too. It’s not my favourite of the finalists’ performances, or even my second-favourite, but she’s a great deal better in this than Minhi.

The Virgo Queen is the big winner here, though. She’s just as commanding a dancer as Makayla, but her song is radio-ready and demonstrates more range. Her rapping is terrific, and I love the bridge to her song. It’s a performance befitting a pop star—and, perhaps more importantly, Canada’s Next Drag Superstar.

All four queens show out for the Coronation Eleganza runway category, although some looks are more successful than others. Helena’s latex mermaid gown, rendered in a poisonous purple and practically dripping off her, is a smash. I don’t love her choice of hair, but she offsets that with a striking headpiece. Minhi’s “imperial Asian goddess” look is a bit too stiff, but her mug and hair are amazing. Makayla’s wedding gown look has a spectacular initial impact, but her headpiece isn’t properly secured—and that comes back to bite her eventually. Virgo’s gorgeous silver ball gown is simply stunning, a different take from her that nonetheless feels perfectly Virgo.

Kitten Kaboodle presents Jaylene Tyme with the title of Miss Congeniality and a $10,000 prize Credit: Courtesy Bell Media

Simply put, Virgo has the kind of finale performance that most queens only dream of. In effectively every aspect of the competition, she delivers. Crucially, though, this doesn’t seem wildly out-of-step with what she’s delivered the rest of the season. Instead, it’s a culmination, a final form of her drag that makes the most effective possible sales pitch for her to win the crown. While Virgo started very strong in this competition, she faltered a bit in the middle—and this performance is strong enough to make you forget that ever happened.

Contrast Virgo’s performance with Helena’s: I think Helena smashes this finale, but it does seem like an elevation from what she’s been doing all season. Granted, Helena did well in basically every challenge, but we never really saw her surpass expectations. This is a breakthrough. It is the kind of performance that, from a queen the judges were truly invested in, likely could’ve secured her a place in the top two. But when the judges note that Helena lacks a “fire” that the other queens have, that’s their way of saying that Helena didn’t have a realistic chance coming into this finale unless the frontrunners universally flopped. Since they didn’t do that, even her best wasn’t enough to break into the top two.

Kudos to Makayla for ending her journey on a high note. She’s had a rollercoaster of a time, all while shouldering much of the narrative burden for the cast. I think she’s got a great deal of potential for a future All Stars or vs. The World run as she continues to mature and develop as both a drag artist and as a person. It’s nice to see her in the top two of the season, but if I had to choose myself, I would’ve put Helena there instead. While Makayla has a very good finale, I don’t think she had a better one than Helena—and this was, seemingly, a finale that mattered a lot. At the end of the day, Makayla was the main character of the season, which is why she was my predicted winner coming into the finale. Would her finale performance be enough to secure her the crown, though?

One queen who clearly just does not merit consideration, sadly, is Minhi. I think the Pit Crew member-turned-drag superstar has surprised a lot of people—the judges, the fans, me—this season, and that is to be commended. Unfortunately, as we saw a couple different times this season, Minhi falters when it comes to lip sync performance. That’s basically all this challenge was, and her performance disappointed once again. It’s a bummer to see the statistical frontrunner fall so hard at the final hurdle, but unfortunately, this was not Minhi’s time.

The Virgo Queen has become the fifth winner of the crown, scepter and title of “Canada’s Next Drag Superstar” Credit: Courtesy Bell Media

Our top two of Makayla and Virgo—the very same top two we had back in Episode 1—are charged with lip syncing to Shania Twain’s “From This Moment On.” Good finale song, I’d say! Although I’m still a little sad we moved away from Celine Dion songs only last year. This is a gorgeous lip sync, with emotional performances from both, but there is a clear winner. Makayla, owing to her too-heavy headpiece that she has to keep up, has really limited movement. I wish she’d have come with some kind of easy removal solution so she could be free to perform; alas, she can’t help but fall behind the passionate, emotional Virgo.

In the end, Virgo wins her fifth lip sync (a 5-0 record for a single season, pretty great), and wins the crown! I’m thrilled for her, even if I didn’t expect it at the end. I thought her relatively minimal involvement with the season’s story would trip her up, especially since most of the CDR winners we’ve seen have been focal characters. But Virgo got just enough focus in these past few episodes to make up for it, really showing her vulnerable side in the penultimate episode especially. She earns this crown, passed on by her similarly V-named winners’ circle sister Venus, and can proudly say she is Canada’s Next Drag Superstar.

Overall, I enjoyed Canada’s Drag Race Season 5, but I do have some notes. This was an incredibly ambitious season when it came to innovation, sometimes to the show’s benefit (the Wooden Beaver!), and too often, unfortunately, to its detriment (the team format for the Lip Sync Slay-Offs). A more dynamic cast might’ve been able to meet the various challenges this season offered, but it often felt like they were struggling to keep up with the various twists and turns. The Golden Beaver remains a franchise highlight, but beyond that twist returning, I wouldn’t mind a more back-to-basics format in Season 6.

Still, even in its lesser seasons, Canada’s Drag Race brings me great joy. While the American franchise continues to grow bigger and bigger, there’s a feistiness to CDR that reminds me of the show’s origins. Most importantly, I always get the sense that the creators, judges and queens are excited to take part in creating the series, and that enthusiasm is infectious. With Season 6 already casting, I can’t wait until we return to the Queens of the North once again later in 2025. Until then, remember: stay true, north, strong and fierce!

Untucking our final thoughts

This is where I vaguely complain every UK or Canada season about the X Factor-style intro of the final four in place of the “Previously On” recap. You all know I don’t like them; they continue to exist. Moving on!

Jimbo joins the final four girls for a chat at the start of the episode! I learned since last week’s episode aired that Jimbo coming on and giving out the episode’s prize fund was her idea, which I find super cute. The chat between her and the finalists is pretty standard, although it is fun to see her and Minhi recognize each other from Minhi’s days on the Pit Crew.

I like to evaluate where our judging panel is after every season of Canada’s Drag Race, so let’s start with our regular judges. Brad Goreski, after a very good fourth season, seemed a bit checked out again this go-around. His highlight episode was as the Tim Gunn-esque figure in the first design challenge, but he didn’t give the girls much as the “What Just Happened?” host last episode. Still, a less-activated Brad is still enjoyable, I just get the sense that he’s not surprised by things, either pleasantly or negatively, in the ways he has been before. Traci Melchor, meanwhile, had a generally strong season judging, but continues to run up against her limits in the hosting sequences (as seen in this episode). I’m not sure what has to happen to move hosting duties away from these two moving forward, but I will repeat my calls for it once again. And while we’re at it, bring Sarain Fox in as a routine guest judge! She’s clearly part of the family at this point, and it would give Brad and Traci each a couple episodes off a season.

And now for Brooke Lynn Hytes: while I think her fashion was not as spectacular this season as it has been, that’s the only real note I have for her. She was engaged, dynamic and enjoyable to watch all season long. The episode in which she modeled the queens’ looks was probably the best single installment of the season, in large part thanks to her. As long as I’m renewing my calls, I will once again say that a CDR with Brooke more directly at the helm will be a better CDR.

When Traci tells the queens that they’ll be chatting with a queen who is “out of this world,” Minhi has a great confessional: “Who could it be? What could it be? … It’s Venus, right?”

A little disappointed in Venus’ whole appearance, I’m sorry to say. I’m a big fan of hers, and was rooting for her win all of last season, but she’s low-energy in her conversations with the final four, and her step-down look is a downgrade compared to others we’ve seen (particularly Priyanka’s and Icesis Couture’s). I saw some scuttlebutt online that maybe this wasn’t Venus’ original choice for her step-down look, so I’ll give her a pass there, and maybe that experience threw her off her game. And she did look great in the photo shoot! But still, not exactly how I was hoping she’d make her grand return to the show.

Orville Peck is the vocal coach and guest judge this week. He makes some good points as a judge—love that he advocates for Helena’s specific point-of-view as valuable in our ever-widening drag world—but he’s a little bland in the coaching segment. The best vocal coaches have specific notes (see: Simone Denny), but Orville mostly offered platitudes of support. Still, he’s a bigger name, so it’s nice to see him here for the finale.

Hollywood Jade is on deck to choreograph the queens’ routines, and we find out that both Makayla and Virgo have worked with him off the show. It makes sense that they would, but I do wonder if there might be some unfair advantage in this. He’s familiar with their style and moves, and they likely have a shared language when it comes to working together that Helena and Minhi wouldn’t. It’s not a huge deal, as it certainly isn’t the choreography that ultimately tips the scales, but it was notable to me.

Orville doesn’t get the “spitters are quitters” line in Helena’s single. “It’s like, don’t spit out the poison,” Helena explains. “Also a joke about blowjobs.”

It’s fun to see the eliminated queens back, and how about some of those runways? Tiffany Ann Co.’s, Sanjina Dabish Queen’s, Jaylene Tyme’s and Perla’s looks are all the best they’ve shown all season long. There’s some talk of drama in Mini-Untucked, but the situation that most interests me is the one that goes unresolved between Xana and Makayla. I think Makayla is right-on with what she says: they’ll be okay in a year (and as we’ve seen on social media, are!), but they just need time and space. A very mature response to it all!

Jaylene Tyme wins Miss Congeniality, and $10,000 sponsored by Gilead! It’s presented by the reigning Miss C, Kitten Kaboodle. The two of them on stage together is a great reminder that CDR is a leader of the pack when it comes to casting older queens, and other shows in the franchise should take note. (If it sounds like I’m throwing shade at the flagship series right now, I am.)

Thanks so much for following along with our coverage this season! The Drag Race train rolls along with the currently airing RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 17, which we’re recapping and power ranking every Monday. Join us for that journey as well—if tonight’s episode is any indication, it looks to be a wild one.

The next episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race will air tonight, January 17, at 8 p.m. EST on MTV in the U.S. and on Crave in Canada. Check back every Monday after new episodes for our recaps and power rankings, and subscribe to our drag newsletter Wig! for exclusive Drag Race content delivered straight to your inbox every month.

Keep Reading

‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Season 17, Episode 7 power ranking: Nailed it? Not quite!

 A disappointing Snatch Game leads to a shocker elimination

‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Season 17, Episode 7 recap: Snatched by the nails

It’s time to bring rules and structure back to Snatch Game—but these judges won’t do it

‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Season 17, Episode 6 power ranking: Wet and wild

12 queens, 36 looks—let’s get to power ranking!

‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Season 17, Episode 6 recap: Under the Sea

Down where it’s wetter, down where drag’s better, take it from me