Welcome to RuPaul’s Drag Race Power Rankings! Every week, we’re debriefing the week’s new episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 18 to determine which queens are riding high, and which need she-mergency care. One more elimination leaves us with a final three heading into the finale. We’ve got a LaLaPaRuZa to get through before then, but for now, let’s evaluate the remaining queens’ chances at the crown.
4. Juicy Love Dion (last week: 3)—ELIMINATED
You know, after I wrote last week’s power rankings and declared Myki Meeks the almost certain winner, I had second thoughts. While she spent the bulk of the mid-season in the bottom, Juicy still had two wins on her track record and was building some major momentum in the last couple weeks. If she could pull out one last win, she would be tied with Myki for most wins among the finalists, and I would put good money on her being able to beat Myki in a Lip Sync for the Crown. She’d be a controversial winner, no doubt, but I would personally find her arc satisfying.
So much for that thought. Even when thinking she might still be the most likely final boot, I didn’t expect the edit to fucking bury Juicy in this episode. It felt like everything she did was wrong in the judges’ eyes. Dirty jokes? In a Drag Race challenge? Juicy, how could you! Your gorgeous dripping-in-gold runway? The worst of the week, according to Ross Mathews! And as I wrote about in my recap, I have significant issues with how the show presented her sobriety story versus Darlene Mitchell’s. By the time the lip sync came around, it felt like nothing Juicy did could save her. I admire her for still putting up as much of a fight in “Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl” as she did.
Look, I’m not going to argue that Juicy was the incorrect choice to send home this week. The show was clearly not invested in her, the fandom seemed largely against the idea of her making the finale and I do think her extended stint in the bottom likely negated her chance at a crown. I just wish they didn’t have to do her so dirty on her way out the door.
3. Nini Coco (last week: 4)
In retrospect, I feel like Nini’s fortunes turned this season at the Rate-a-Queen Talent Show. By choosing to go in the first week instead of the second, she deprived herself of what almost certainly would’ve been a second win. (I do think the queens would’ve voted her into the top over Jane Don’t to halt Jane’s momentum, and I think she would’ve easily cleared Athena Dion in the Lip Sync for the Win.) Sure, she eventually got the second win in Snatch Game, but it felt like the show wasn’t entirely sure of its endgame plans at that point. After all, it had just seen Vita VonTesse Starr eliminated, and Mia Starr was about to follow her, despite both of them having maxi-challenge wins. To me, it’s more notable that Nini never scored in the top again after Snatch Game, outside of the suitcase design challenge when everyone got praised.
Moreover, the Rate-a-Queen Talent Show was also the start of Myki’s’ underdog arc. If Nini was the “alternative” option to a Jane crowning in the first half of the season, Myki quickly usurped that spot in the second half. Now, Nini is limping into the finale on the back of three Lip Syncs for Your Life in a row—all of which I would say were deserved. She wasn’t the worst this week, but she landed in the bottom with Juicy because they worked together. In the prior days of a Lip Sync for the Crown tournament, I would actually rate Nini’s chances high to pull out a surprise win. With the current finale format, though, I’d say she’s far and away the most likely candidate to be cut before the final two lip sync.
2. Darlene Mitchell (last week: 2)
The good news for Darlene stans: she finally got a second win! Not only that, she got some really hefty praise from the judges, and especially from Ru himself. This episode worked overtime to sum up Darlene’s arc as an out-of-the-box thinker who doesn’t need to play by the rules to do well. Ross emphasizing that what she did in the challenge was “incorrect,” but still successful, is a huge part of that. This new framing of Darlene is one you can see hints of in her roast challenge win, but I’m not sure the show did enough to sell that idea consistently across the competition. It feels like they’re trying to write Darlene’s story in retrospect, to make her a viable rival to Myki in the finale.
That’s because of the bad news for Darlene stans: her second win came along with Myki’s’ fourth. So it’s nice for Darlene to have, but it doesn’t do much to move the needle. You could argue it puts Darlene squarely ahead of Nini for a runner-up spot, but I’d say that was already happening with Nini’s multiple bottom two placements. If anything, this week feels like fuel for a potential Darlene All Stars winner’s arc. And I would love to see it! But I don’t think she’s going to win this crown.
1. Myki Meeks (last week: 1)
It’s all over but the crowning. In just the flagship series, Myki is the ninth queen to earn four maxi-challenge wins in a single season. Four of the others to complete that feat won (Sharon Needles, Symone, Sasha Colby and Onya Nurve), while three others lost to strong competitors with just one fewer win (Gigi Goode, Plane Jane and Sapphira Cristál) and one lost thanks to a shocking finale format change and a cascade of rose petals (Shea Couleé). Barring another genuinely game-changing lip sync stunt, I don’t think there’s any way Myki loses this season. Both Darlene and Nini have half her number of wins, and neither has the narrative momentum she does—though they certainly tried to throw some fuel on Darlene’s fire this week.
Do I think Myki, as a competitor, is on the level of those other eight queens? Frankly, no. All of them can claim to be the frontrunner for part or most of their season—save maybe Plane, who was in the same season as another four-win queen, Sapphira—while Myki only became the de facto frontrunner after Jane was unceremoniously eliminated. More to the point, I think one of Myki’s wins (the makeover) is the most baffling and unjustified of the season, and I would’ve personally given Darlene a solo win this week. So yeah, her track record feels slightly inflated to me. Circumstances are what they are post-Jane’s elimination, and even without one of those two wins, Myki would still have the best track record of those left. I just don’t buy that she dominated in a way her report card reflects.
Still, Myki has done a good job this season, and I do still appreciate her arc bouncing back from the Rate-a-Queen Talent Show mess the other queens put her through. With Jane gone, I do think she is the correct winner of the season. We’ll see if she does indeed claim that title in two weeks’ time.
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