‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Season 14, Episode 6 recap: a sudden rivalry

RuPaul’s Drag Race may be an older queen at this point—14 seasons and counting, and that’s only if we ignore All Stars and all those international spin-offs—but she’s still got some new tricks up her sleeve. That’s evident while watching the most recent episode, in which a lip sync that seemingly has no narrative stakes suddenly becomes must-watch TV just by using a brief flash-forward to Untucked.

In what is perhaps the best production choice made all episode (although as we’ll get into, that’s not a high bar), the prelude to a Jasmine Kennedie versus Maddy Morphosis Lip Sync For Your Life is a quick supercut of an upcoming fight in Untucked. There is absolutely no build-up to this fight anywhere else in the episode, and upon actually watching Untucked, it’s clear why: it’s a rivalry out of nowhere. Basically, in hyping herself up after landing in the bottom for this week’s unconventional materials design challenge, Maddy says she’s ready and able to beat Jasmine in the lip sync. This annoys Jasmine, who responds to Maddy with a blunt “Are you done?” Angeria Paris VanMicheals, truly God’s gift to Season 14, then stirs the pot ever so slightly with a question to Maddy.

And then all hell breaks loose.

In one corner, you have Jasmine, who is not worried about beating Maddy in a lip sync because she dances every week in New York City bars. In the other, you have Maddy, who has technically already sent a queen home (though I’d argue June Jambalaya sent herself home more than anything), and is insulted that Jasmine sees herself as above Maddy. There’s a bit of regional conflict here, too, as Maddy bristles at Jasmine bringing up New York. The queens get into a screaming match, coming to a climax as Jasmine yells, “This is your moment! Have it!” (It’s the safest bet in the world that makes its way into the Untucked intro next season.) It ends in a hug—one Jasmine initially tries to run away from—but it’s clear in the lip sync itself that their animosity is unresolved.

The lip sync is the best part of what is otherwise a pretty lackluster episode. There’s a lot of workroom filler in this one (as my friend noted via text, this episode desperately needed a mini-challenge), and the results of the design maxi-challenge are largely under par. But credit to Drag Race: it knows when it needs a stunt, and it executes it perfectly.

The premise of this week’s design task is that Michelle Visage has picked up a compulsive spending habit on, wait for it, “Glamazon Prime.” How it took us 14 years to get to “Glamazon Prime” is truly a mystery. (Prime is older than Drag Race is!) She’s recovered now, though, thanks to a trip to the “Acid Betty Ford Centre,” and the queens must take all the random junk she’s ordered online and make outfits out of it. That’s right, it’s the unconventional materials challenge! And like so many queens on Drag Race have done before, most go straight to the most fabric-like material they can find.

Among those is Daya Betty, who gets a lot of yellow and orange material, and uses a sock puppet she finds as the inspiration for a “baby doll” look. She is determined to win this week, even chasing Willow Pill off a similar baby doll idea to make sure she’s the only one. We’re dipping into the waters of a villain edit with Daya, as she spars with DeJa Skye in the cold open over whether she was upset to be safe last week (she was), makes Willow change her plans and later openly questions Ru’s choice of winner. Some of these actions are more justifiable than others (let’s just say I strongly disagree with who wins this challenge) but the whole package is painting a certain picture of Crystal Methyd’s drag sister.

Crystal comes up in Daya’s workroom chat with Ru and Carson Kressley, as the latter points out just how similar Daya’s makeup looks have been to Crystal’s. Daya is frustrated to hear this, because she knows she’s different from Crystal… but so far she’s been mostly unable to explain it. (In one confessional on the subject, Daya stumbles through her explanation, which feels like a pointed inclusion on the editors’ part.) “I didn’t know she owns polka dots and colour!” Daya says of her sister at one point in the workroom, and Kerri Colby clocks that those frustrations are coming from a place of “desperation.” Daya doesn’t make a case for herself, as she comes out in yet another look that evokes Crystal, and is very upset that she’s sent to safety for it. 

But that upset is nothing compared to how Daya reacts to the challenge winner. The choice comes down to three queens: Lady Camden, Angeria and Jorgeous. The edit of the episode seems to suggest Camden will finally win, and her garment would be a fine choice. She uses pink and blue material to create an angelic look, complete with giant wings and the best hair and mug Camden has ever worn. Alas, Camden is just called safe, as is Angeria—though I’d personally have given the latter her third maxi-challenge win. She takes stiff black curtains and some fan-like blinds and works wonders on them. Her resulting look is dramatic while still being paired back, and she scores her fifth top-scoring placement of the season for it.

Which leaves us with Jorgeous, who wins for a garment she made after completely discarding another. When she meets with Ru and Carson, she says she purposefully wants to go dark since she’s previously done glamour. This doesn’t go well, as she has fit issues (something Carson notes has plagued her) with her first dress. Angeria is kind enough to point her to some leftover fabric, which Jorgeous quickly whips up into a totally serviceable, if pretty standard, little garment. It’s cute, and should absolutely land her among the safe dolls.

So it’s wild when the judges all fawn over Jorgeous’ look. I get their praise of her presentation: like Brooke Lynn Hytes before her, Jorgeous manages to elevate a simple look by selling the shit out of it on the runway. But the garment itself is just nothing from a design perspective. My viewing party thought Jorgeous was in the bottom this week when the tops and bottoms were first announced. Compared to what Camden and Angeria do, there’s just no explaining Jorgeous’ win.

Daya all but rolls her eyes at the win, offering in a confessional that Jorgeous’ look is not top-worthy. Judging by the preview for next week, we’re not done with this storyline, either. It’s worth wondering if Jorgeous merely got this win as a way of triggering a villainous breakdown in Daya. But I actually think the explanation is simpler: like many a young queen before her, Jorgeous has become RuPaul’s favourite. She’s “the diamond of the season,” to quote Netflix’s Bridgerton; the one mother Ru has decided is destined for greatness. Unfortunately, Jorgeous’ work on the show so far isn’t holding up to that standard, and giving her a dubious win isn’t going to change that fact.

After an episode of frustrating judging choices—including the absolutely bizarre decision to make Kerri safe with the worst garment on the main stage—we’re at least left with a satisfying conclusion. Amped up from their Untucked fight, Maddy and Jasmine go at each other with both barrels. Unfortunately, Maddy is holding water guns, while Jasmine comes armed with a full artillery. Maddy really does try her best to Beyoncé’s “Suga Mama,” and she doesn’t embarrass herself. She’s just completely outclassed by Jasmine.

I found a lot of the hype around Jorgeous’ performance last week (both on and off the show) to be a bit hyperbolic. She was good in the “My Head and My Heart” lip sync, no doubt, but there were a lot of confessionals and cuts around her. It made it difficult to get a complete read on what Jorgeous was doing. Jasmine’s performance gets no such edits: she pulls out stunt after stunt, throwing her body across the stage. It’s a massacre, and proves that Jasmine, like Jorgeous, is dangerous to face off against in the bottom two.

So we say farewell to Maddy, a queen whose mere casting drew more conversation and controversy than she herself ever did. I know for many, the presence of a cisgender straight man on the show would never be palatable. I’m not personally in that camp: the fact that the queens embraced her with open arms was enough for me to consider her drag valid. But I also was not in favour of Maddy getting a free pass because of the novelty of her casting—she was more low-key than your average Drag Race contestant, and her runway walk would’ve gotten many a queen harsher critiques than she got. Still, she proved to be a genteel, sweet presence, and she even gave us a spike of drama as she went out the door. I’ll miss her, while acknowledging this is the right time for her to go.

Next week, it’s the first proper acting challenge of the season. Will Camden finally get a win? Will Angeria keep her hot streak alive? Will Daya go full villain over Jorgeous’ win? Tune in next week and find out!

Untucking our final thoughts

✨Let’s start out with a celebration: Bosco shared on Instagram this past week that she is a trans woman, using she/they pronouns out of drag! This means Season 14 is the first to feature three out transgender queens, marking further progress for a show that was once very far behind in this regard. It’s an exciting step forward, and it was wonderful to see all the support for Bosco flowing in among the fandom and Ru Girls alike.

✨Once again, the show has absolutely no time for Orion Story, with the queens not even reading her lipstick message. And echoing the heavy hand the last episode took in eliminating her, Angeria says of the result, “It’s no surprise to me, because Jorgeous slayed that lip sync.”

✨Taraji P. Henson is a ton of fun this week in critiques, although she does fall into a lot of the same bad judging patterns as the others. (Does she truly want to wear Jorgeous’ look?) Where she’s best, though, is backstage with the queens in Untucked, offering up some uplifting-but-real advice. I missed having Untucked guests for moments like these.

✨This is Carson Kressley’s best episode in a couple of seasons: his critiques are the most coherent amid some very bad judging, and his session in the workroom draws a strong contrast between his specific, actionable notes and Ru’s pseudo-psychological analysis of the dolls. Fun fact: Carson aired against himself on Friday night, as he’s also appearing as a houseguest on Celebrity Big Brother Season 3. (And he won the Head of Household competition later that night!)

✨Jasmine says Daya should change her name to “Bitter Betty.” But Bitter Betty is already taken: she was a Dragula Season 4 contestant!

✨Bosco says she’s excited to have gotten “a win on the board.” I need to know where Bosco is keeping this board. She’s obsessed! Board queen!

✨There’s an extended sequence of queens opening up about coming out as drag queens to their parents in this episode, which is as Mirror Moment as a Mirror Moment can get. But it ends on a very funny note, as Camden says she came out as she was being dropped off at boarding school. “You told them you were gay as they were dropping you off for ballet boarding school?” Bosco deadpans. “Wow.” Cue Camden pretending to jeté out of her dad’s car as she comes out. It’s such a funny bit.

✨Ru gets a good line in as Jasmine Kennedie walks over: “Now, Carson, whatever you do, don’t mention Chappaquiddick.”

✨I just have to present Kerri’s confessional about “Christmas gone wrong” fully transcribed, because it may be among my favourite talking heads ever on this show: “Have you ever like, gone to a Christmas party at your step-grandparents? And you thought you were getting something great; you were like, ‘Oh my god, they’re gonna spoil me so much because I’m new to the family.’ And then you open the box, and it’s socks? And then it’s also like, deodorant. And the most expensive gift up there is a sonic toothbrush, bitch, and you can’t even resell it because they scratched off the resale label, because they want you to use it? That’s how it feels. It feels like Christmas gone wrong.” Poetry.

The next episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race will air Friday, Feb. 18, at 8 p.m. EST on VH1 in the U.S. and on Crave in Canada. Check back every Monday and Tuesday 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 Tuesday afternoon.