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

Welcome to RuPaul’s Drag Race Power Rankings! Every week, we’re debriefing the week’s new episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 17 to determine which queens are riding high, and which need she-mergency care. We get a true comeback story this week, as a queen comes back from near-elimination and scores an undeniable win.

12. Hormona Lisa (last week: 3)—ELIMINATED

Alas, poor Hormona. Despite a fairly impressive effort in the first design challenge, you could tell by Ru’s warning in the werk room that the judges were tired of seeing the same silhouette over and over again. She wisely switched it up in her made-from-scratch look this week, though the actual execution of the garment was underwhelming, and the impact of the switch was diminished when her Sea Creature Couture look, a take on a leafy sea dragon, was just a standard Hormona dress in new colours. She put up a decent fight in the lip sync, but Lana Ja’Rae wasn’t going to let herself be sent home this early. We’ll miss our Tennessee queen.

11. Lana Ja’Rae (last week: 6)

If you listened closely, you could almost hear the monkey’s paw curling when Lana told Ru she didn’t want to be safe anymore. This placement felt like a bit of karma for Lana after she came for Suzie Toot’s look in Untucked last week. A good rule of thumb: if a queen is getting praise for her runway look and you’re not, you should probably examine what the judges are responding to about the other queen’s look and adjust accordingly. “But she shouldn’t have to change her aesthetic or drag for the judges!” Yes, she should if she wants to win RuPaul’s Drag Race. Simple as that. Anyway, I didn’t care for any of Lana’s looks this week (the purple urchin one was decent, but only after she ditched the too-heavy cape), and the judges were underwhelmed. Credit to her for turning it out in the lip sync, but I’d like to see more from Lana.

10. Acacia Forgot (last week: 8)

I both agree that Acacia should’ve been called safe of the bottom three and am also gagged that she actually was called safe. The show is demonstrating so little investment in her journey that I would’ve bet on Ru to either use her as a sacrificial pawn to keep her hand-picked Hormona safe, or had a rematch of the very first Lip Sync for Your Life of the season against Hormona. But no, instead Acacia merely adds another low placement to her report card amid a sea of safety. She really does seem like a lovely queen, but I can’t be bothered to pretend like she could pull out a late-season run when the edit is practically screaming “early out” at us. I would be shocked if she’s not out next week.

9. Lydia B Kollins (last week: 11)

The fandom lost their minds over Lydia’s “Boogie Wonderland” lip sync last week, and rightfully so: Butthole tore it up! The same can’t be said for the queens, though, who failed to praise her from what we saw beyond Arrietty saying she was beaten by “Troye Sivan.” (Which, to be fair, did make me laugh.) Lydia didn’t seem to mind that much, mostly just glad everyone wasn’t pissed at her for sending home their friend. But I do think it’s significant that the show didn’t take time to gag over her victory: what felt like a huge moment in the fandom was basically a footnote in the edit. That led to an episode that overall felt a bit too quiet for Lydia, and a ball package that underwhelmed, particularly her eleganza look. I will give her credit for her Bathing Beauties look, though: she said the point of it was to make Ru laugh, and laugh he did. Between this and her intimate eye contact with Ru during the lip sync last week, Lydia seems to realize that competing on RuPaul’s Drag Race means connecting with an audience of one: the titular host. Other queens should take note! Look how that strategy worked for Jorgeous across two seasons of the show.

8. Onya Nurve (last week: 2)

Cue the Ava Max, because I’m starting to think that maybe Onya’s the problem. TrimGate was one thing, but now Onya has been responsible for two detrimental incidents regarding other queens’ garments in design challenges. More to the point, she’s had trouble with immediate accountability in both cases. (Arrietty also participated in SprayPaintGate, but she apologized and explained the second Lexi Love brought it up.) There’s a lone wolf quality about Onya that I appreciate most of the time, like in last week’s Untucked when she openly laughed at the other queens’ misery over Suzie doing well. But here, we see the downside of it: she seemingly doesn’t have the kind of awareness of other queens’ needs that makes for good sisterly vibes. I know this was an accident, but her dodging Lexi when she came into the werk room upset was 100 percent about Onya wanting to avoid being yelled at, and nothing else. Suffice it to say that plan didn’t work out.

I’m still an Onya fan, despite an underwhelming ball package relative to her near-win in the Monopulence design challenge, and I appreciate that she did eventually and sincerely apologize. But when it comes to these other incidents, as the saying goes, if once is by coincidence and twice is by chance, then thrice is a pattern. I certainly hope Onya avoids another situation like this in the future to keep that from becoming the perception of her.

7. Kori King (last week: 7)

You know, if you squint, Kori kinda nibbled this week! The left shark-into-Katy Perry reveal look may have been a little costume-y (and I’m sure somewhere Joella is screaming that she didn’t get a chance to do it), but her body looked fantastic in the Katy bikini. Her mandarin fish look in the Sea Creature Couture category was my favourite look of hers in the competition so far. Really great overall impression, and I loved the cape. And while her rope look for the final category wasn’t great, there was a certain style to it, and some cool construction details. “I look reasonably priced,” she said of herself, and I think that’s a very fair, Tia Kofi-esque estimation. She wasn’t realistically near the top, but for Kori, she did well.

6. Suzie Toot (last week: 1)

Credit to Suzie for her coconut-shell octopus look, because it was one of my favourites of the night. Absolutely loved the beehive hair in particular. Unfortunately, Suzie’s other looks brought down her average considerably. I hated the “Lucille Ball in male drag” look for the Bathing Beauties category; too hat-on-a-hat for my taste. There’s been a lot of discussion of Suzie’s love of references in the wake of last week’s runway. My opinion is that I love a reference when the outfit actually looks good, which it did last week and does not in this category. Her eleganza look was also a mess. “Amelia Earhart post-crash” is one of those descriptions that sounds cute, but the garment itself didn’t measure up. I get the sense that Suzie’s aesthetic is going to be very hit-or-miss for me this season, which lands her in a very safe middle position this week.

5. Lexi Love (last week: 5)

Lexi continues to be the main character despite consistently placing safe since her premiere challenge win. (A win, I’ll remind you, that came with no critiques thanks to the Rate-a-Queen format—meaning Lexi is one of just two remaining queens yet to talk to the judges.) SprayPaintGate didn’t exactly cover her in glory, as she seemed more invested in placing blame than in fixing the situation with her garment, but she recovered nicely once she finally did fix her look and apologized to Arrietty and Onya for her reaction. More to the point, though, it was incredibly entertaining, and it once again made Lexi the focus of the story. Think about it: in the last month, Lexi has called out Hormona for using her own stones, revealed her drag backstory, given us a genuinely intense fight with Onya over SprayPaintGate and shown us her LinkedIn page. All while scoring safe every single week. Mother’s keeping us fed no matter what!

In terms of her runway package: the nude look for Bathing Beauties was a cute idea (skinny dipping!), but there was a bit too much going on with it. Her purple stinger jellyfish look was fantastic; I loved the hair in particular. And she presented her Sea Sickening Eleganza, a water lilies look, beautifully, even if the look was just okay. This wasn’t a particularly strong ball, so Lexi was probably near the top on the judges’ scorecards. Not bad for an episode’s work!

4. Jewels Sparkles (last week: 4)

We had a long road to walk after Jewels called the 33-year-old Lexi “auntie-grandma,” but I have come to adore her. I love how delighted Jewels is by drama. I feel seen. She is the drag queen embodiment of that one clip of Shereé Whitfield on Real Housewives of Atlanta. Moreover, she’s backing up her love of mess with some genuinely great drag. 

I didn’t full-out love any of her looks this week, but I liked something a lot about each: her body looked great in her Bathing Beauties look, though the Cuban chains were a bit too weighty on her. Her Spanish dancer sea slug look had a terrific overall impression, even if the garment was a bit simple. And while the bottom of her oil spill look in the eleganza category felt unresolved, the top was terrific, particularly the fascinator and her amazing mug. Like Lexi, she has yet to hear from the judges, but has stayed narratively important since her top placement in her premiere. Unlike Lexi, I would say Jewels’ overall performance has been more consistently strong. More and more, I’m feeling like Jewels could be an under-the-radar threat to win it all. She could use an actual challenge win soon, though.

3. Crystal Envy (last week: 9)

Once again, Crystal lands in the top, and once again, it feels like it does absolutely nothing for her momentum in the competition. Maybe I’m just too invested in this theory of her as the under-rewarded “professional” of the season, but let’s look at her edit in this episode as an example. She stated that she wanted a design challenge win badly—very Q of her—and got closer than last time. (She placed in the top three versus just being safe,) but her critiques were a bit soft to seem like a real contender for the win. Why did Michelle Visage effectively blame her for Barbie saturation? Moreover, a moment in which Arrietty said Crystal deserved to be in the bottom last week over her was included in the edit for no immediately discernible reason. I guess it could’ve been in there to show the lengths Arrietty is willing to go to win … but then Arrietty won the challenge, so that would be odd.

I think it was more likely that it was included to further blunt Crystal’s edit in the face of her repeated top placements. My prediction at this point would be that Crystal does eventually snatch a win, but goes home directly after. That would explain why she’s not being edited as a potential winner despite doing well in the competition. Again, maybe I’m reading too much into things, but I just can’t make heads-or-tails of this edit if Crystal’s actually a threat to win it all.

2. Sam Star (last week: 10)

A nice recovery for Sam after her low placement last week, which helped stymie the disappointment that she couldn’t pull out another design challenge win. I did like Sam’s concept for her eleganza look—though Law Roach’s interpretation of it as “Colombian cocaine couture” was certainly interesting—but I didn’t like how visible the green tarp was underneath the bags. It cheapened the overall impression. Her Sea Creature Couture take on a viperfish did a lot of the heavy lifting for her, though, it was honestly fantastic. Sam is overall doing quite nicely in this competition, although with Arrietty’s dominant return this week, I’m starting to wonder if there might not be enough space for the both of them in the endgame. Maybe Ru wanting her godfather, Charles Barkley (?!), at the finale will help her, though! Still not over that, what a gag.

1. Arrietty (last week: 12)

What an impressive comeback for Arrietty! Not only did she snag a win immediately after almost going home, but no one was particularly close to beating her. She was the only queen who managed three terrific looks across the categories. I’m surprised Michelle didn’t take the time to say this—maybe she did and it didn’t make the edit—but I was particularly impressed with Arrietty’s various mugs. Not only did she vary up her face makeup, she did it in different ways every time. Honestly, she smashed this. Instant jump up to the top of the contenders list. It goes to show that taking setbacks as opportunities to change tack and grow are what make for winners in this competition. The rest of the queens should take note, because if Arrietty can bring this fire to the other challenges, there may be no stopping her.