‘RuPaul’s Drag Race Global All Stars’ Episode 9 recap: A global family

In a season with very few storylines to invest in, the dominating question for fans watching RuPaul’s Drag Race Global All Stars has been: Can Nehellenia actually pull out a win? While almost all the other non-RuGirls (save Vanity Vain, Tessa Testicle and arguably Pythia) have been cast aside by both the edit and the competition, the Italia Season 2 finalist has gotten quite a bit of focus. It’s not been all good; to the contrary, much of Nehellenia’s story has been about her fellow queens dismissing her and even talking quite poorly of both her drag and her character.

But nevertheless, she’s persisted, and the edit has risen up to meet her. She’s making friends like Alyssa Edwards and Vanity on the cast, even as Kitty Scott-Claus and Kween Kong continue to diminish her standing in the competition. RuPaul and Michelle Visage seem invested in her journey now more than ever. It’s not hard to squint and see Jinkx Monsoon vs. Rolaskatox when it comes to a potential finale with Nelly and the three RuGirls. And we all know how that one turned out—even though Katya couldn’t pull off the same trick in All Stars 2.

This makeover episode is a make-or-break one for Nehellenia. She’s still the only queen in the final six without a win, and worse, she just lost her best friend Pythia in last week’s (IMO, very silly) elimination. At the start of this episode, with Nelly reduced to tears over Pythia’s departure, it’s hard to imagine her summoning the strength to avoid the chopping block next. The challenge type, though, hands her a major advantage. Nelly actually won the makeover on her original season—and better yet, she gets to work with Pythia again.

That’s right, the eliminated queens are back this week, and they serve as the makeover partners for the queens still in the competition. Nehellenia and Pythia aren’t the only friends reunited: Kween gets to work once again with Soa de Muse, while Vanity is excited to work with Gala Varo. Rounding out the pairs are Alyssa with Eva Le Queen, Kitty with Miranda Lebrão and Tessa with Athena Likis.

This makeover challenge format is an excellent idea for this season. After seeing so many of these international superstars—all finalists in their original seasons!—go home too soon, it’s a delight to get one more dose of each of them. (My understanding based on episode descriptions is that it’s not the last we’ll see of them, either.) While not all the pairings have the best chemistry, most hit it off well, and the results are as polished as you’d expect for the calibre of this cast.

There is some werk room banter and talk with Ru in his walkthrough, but this episode’s narrative thrust ultimately rests on the results of the challenge. Scoring in the top this week are Kween and Soa—really an impeccable match of mugs, although with not my favourite outfits—as well as Alyssa and Eva. Alyssa really tries to turn this makeover into a moment for her, as it’s a Rudemption from being sent home on the makeover in All Stars 2. Two major problems with this: everyone generally agrees Alyssa was great in that makeover and was a victim of Rolaskatox not wanting to eliminate each other, and her makeover is actually worse this go-around. Eva looks fine, but she looks so much better in her usual paint that I question Alyssa’s high placement. I’d have just marked her safe.

The ultimate winner of the challenge, as you might’ve predicted from the setup of this recap, is Nehellenia! She finally snags her first victory with Pythia by her side, and it’s well-deserved. The judges spend most of their time raving about the outfits, which are spectacular, but are also clearly a set brought from home. I actually wish the judges would’ve spent more time talking about the fact that Nelly reproduced her mug almost exactly on Pythia, because it’s really impressive work.

Kween, however, does not agree. And it results in what is one of the wilder Mini-Untucked fights we’ve seen in a minute, simply for how out of the blue it seems.

Kween comes into Mini-Untucked saying she’s ready to shake things up and speak truth, and she indeed does not hold back! She says she thought Nelly should’ve been in the bottom, and that when it comes to family resemblance, Pythia “could’ve been a sister or a brother.” She really goes after the idea that Pythia’s beard is visible, which … maybe I’m missing something, but I don’t see it? Kitty agrees in confessional, saying Pythia looks like a man, but all I see is that Pythia looks so exactly like Nehellenia.

Nelly, for her part, is super respectful in response, saying she appreciates that it’s Kween’s opinion. It’s actually Pythia who bites back hardest: “We all have them. Like assholes, they say.” This is pretty gaggy! Kween just once again says Pythia looks manly in response, a line that even she seems to know (based on her tweet) is in poor taste. In general, I just once again can’t tell why Kween and Kitty take such issue with Nehellenia, and based on their edits, I don’t see either of them winning the crown in the end—unless production just really wants to crown a queen with a villain edit for Global All Stars.

Anyway, Kitty’s mostly upset in Mini-Untucked because she’s in the bottom this week, doing a genuinely terrible job with Miranda’s look. Their family resemblance is limited, the outfits are too simple and I just don’t think she does a good job adapting her own makeup style to Miranda’s face. If there were no Lip Sync for Your Life, Kitty would be the clear loser of the week. (Even after the lip sync, that’s still true, but we’ll get to that in a second.)

Tessa looks to be in some danger once again, but I personally would’ve placed her safe alongside Alyssa. Yes, her own look isn’t great, but she did a pretty terrific job with Athena. They have a clear resemblance, but Tessa varied up their actual garments enough that they don’t just look like twins. Granted, I don’t like Tessa’s look much, but I think in a makeover challenge that the partner looking good has to take precedence.

Vanity joins Kitty in the bottom two, and it’s a fair placement. Gala looks fine, but she basically just looks like Gala. Michelle makes a very smart point when she says Vanity should’ve done her white eyebrow on Gala—that would’ve been an easy shortcut to tie them together. As it stands, they don’t have as strong a family resemblance, and that’s enough to land Vanity in the lip sync once more.

At this point, the result is a foregone conclusion. Vanity would have to turn out a god tier-level lip sync to stay, while Nehellenia would need to pull a Valentina to go home. I don’t care much for Kitty’s lip sync (pulling out a mic? you’re no Maxi Shield!), as it feels like she’s just pulling funny faces to Cher’s “Believe,” while Vanity is clearly giving a more committed performance. But Vanity is not going to win this season, while Kitty has three maxi-challenge wins. I may question her viability for the crown based on her edit, but in the moment, there was no way Ru was doing anything but keeping Kitty—no matter how terrible her dip in the lip sync is.

So we say a sad farewell to Vanity, who really became one of the stars of the season for me. I’d love to see her back on an All Stars in the future: this season wasn’t a good fit for her in terms of the challenges, but she’s one hell of a performer. She clearly impressed Ru, and I bet she could make a real run for it in a different playing field. She leaves behind Tessa and Nehellenia as the only non-RuGirls fighting for a spot in the finale. Might we see a shock boot next week? Or will all three RuGirls find their way to the endgame?

I think we all know what the answer likely is. But I’ll be hoping until the very end that Nehellenia can make this a true race to the finish line.

Untucking our final thoughts

✨ Vanity tells the girls that in last week’s “I Drove All Night” lip sync, she performed for her mom—Celine Dion is her favourite artist, and she was wearing her mom’s jacket. It’s a lovely moment, and makes her performance all the more impactful.

✨ In a little bit of werk room taunting, Nehellenia says if she and Alyssa had to lip sync, it would be “Shut Up and Drive” levels of great. Alyssa taunts back asking her to show off her dance moves, but when they’re not up to Alyssa’s expectations, Nelly gets the last word in: “Baby, I’m not a dancer, I’m a drag queen. You can say the same?” It’s a funny little bit, and shows how playful shade with Nehellenia would be much more welcome than what we’ve seen from queens like Kitty and Kween.

✨ There’s a Majority Rules-style mini-challenge this week, the likes of which we’ve seen a lot in the last few seasons of RuPaul’s Drag Race. Some highlights: Nehellenia is voted most likely to steal your man, while Kitty makes everyone laugh the hardest (except Kitty herself, who votes for Kween), Alyssa is voted prettiest, including by Alyssa, while Tessa is voted messiest by everyone but Alyssa. Shadiest is a tie between Nehellenia and Kween, and Tessa “wins” the ultimate category: who will go home next? Tessa has the last laugh, though: she’s the only queen who votes for the eventual eliminee, Vanity, to go home. Kween wins the challenge by voting with the majority most, earning another $2,500 and the right to pair the queens with their makeover partners.

✨ Raven visits the werk room this week, and there’s a nice moment of the international queens noting just how influential Raven has been to modern drag makeup. Her tips remain solid, but I almost wish we’d get these visits earlier in the season, so Raven’s advice has a longer period to have an effect.

✨ There is supposedly a choreographed catwalk segment expected from the girls. In reality, it just means that they have to have a little gimmick to their runway presentation, like the girls always do in makeover challenges, and “Bring Back My Girls” is the runway song instead. Forgettable challenge element!

✨ Ru looks fucking amazing this episode. Between this and his Drag Race UK look in that season’s second episode, it’s a stellar fashion week for Ru.

✨ Designer Dianne Brill from Drag Race Germany’s panel is here as the guest judge! Like all of Ru’s old friends that he brings on the show, she’s fun, and actually offers real critique. She’s probably the best guest we’ve seen this season, although that’s almost by default.

✨ Nehellenia’s $10,000 prize this week is courtesy of Facetune … which is a very funny sponsor for a makeover challenge.

The next episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race Global All Stars will be available to stream next Friday at 3 a.m. EST on Paramount+ in the U.S. and on Crave in Canada. We’ll be publishing recaps all season long, exclusively here first in our drag newsletter Wig!, and then on Xtra every week.