The first queen to walk into the Werk Room in season 5 is Tomara Thomas from Hartlepool. She’s wearing a black and white striped jacket, panty, and thigh high boots with abstract white shapes covering most of her torso. She doesn’t seem to pad but her wavy hair is quite gorgeous.
Up next is Banksie from Manchester and she is almost naked and I love it. Her supposed dress is basically star jewelry covering her breasts, crotch, and ass with little rat toys on the toes of her high heels and she takes off the massive white fur coat to further flaunt her body. I don’t know why but I really like this as an entrance look. She says her look is non-binary realness, that must be why. Also, Cheddar Gorgeous is her drag parent? Lucky.
Next is Miss Naomi Carter from Doncaster in a monochromatic lavender mermaid gown and massive shawl jacket with a pageant necklace and earrings. Unfortunately, the mid section of the dress is quite saggy and doesn’t flatter her figure all too well and either she’s sweating or her highlighter is off because it’s exposing that lace. Her energy is fantastic though.
In a relaxed sleeve blazer with an asymmetrical lapel and massive gold hoops and chains draping throughout the look with her massively quaffed wig is Michael Marouli from Newcastle. Her nose contour is giving me Shannel from US Drag Race season one and season one of All Stars. She says her name is Michael in and out of drag and that she’s been doing drag for 15 years.
Kate Butch from Derbyshire looks like Jinx Monsoon in a knee length maroon patterned dress with lapels and draped sleeves and a ginger wig with a bow on it. But where are her lips? In her interview box, we find out she just wasn’t born with lips. She’s mainly known as a stand up comedian, clearly not a look queen.
Amazonian trans beauty Cara Melle is from London but originally comes from Atlanta, Georgia and says “Kneel for your goddess.” She’s in a warrior or gladiator look with a gold pattern on her midsection, breasts, shoulders, wrists, and shins over a black leather-like fabric. Covering her lady parts is a piece of dangling black fabric and she’s holding a golden staff. She says she’s quite well known and I believe her because she isn’t padded either and looks fantastic. She’s housemates with Tomara Thomas which is cool. And I love her Southern accent more than the other queens? Sorry about it.
Ginger Johnson from Lanchester looks like she came straight out of the Flintstones in a long sleeve asymmetrical, yabadabadoo cut dress covered in green and purple stones. Her wig looks as if Lucille Ball was an abstract performer. She kind of gives me matronly Mrs. Kasha Davis realness and she writes her own shows and has done drag for 15 years.
With an awkward walk, DeDeLicious from Kent comes in with an intricately patterned blue and gold bodysuit with massive blue puffed shoulders and a blue cape with a gold lining. She’s 20 years old and in comparison to her confessional look, her drag seems to age her. “I’m a performer” is thrown around a lot this episode, so we shall see about these queens. Her drag sister is Crystal Versace and they have been friends since she was 11 years old, but I don’t care.
Vicki Vivacious from Cornwall is in a black jacket with shoulder pads and a cartoonish, Tim Burton black and white striped exaggerated lapel that flows into the similarly striped V-neck top underneath. She has a short above the knees skirt, a black fur shawl with white pom poms on the ends, high heel booties, and a massive black curled updo. The pastry or empanada on her purse is quite funny. She says she’s a cabaret queen and at the age of 36, I can’t wait to see what a seasoned queen can do. She also performs for the armed forces.
Last but not least is Alexis Saint-Pete from London in a long sleeve BDSM black vinyl corset with a peplum skirt and sheer grayish vinyl tights connected to her garters. She has on a dog collar and a red hankie on her head along with a black basket filled with food. I just don’t know where her nose is in drag, maybe a little contour there would help. She’s a Polish queen and out of drag she’s quite adorable. I can’t tell but she seems new to drag.
RuPaul enters the Werk Room in a tweed conservative black coat and announces that the winner of Drag Race UK gets a video series from the producers of World of Wonder. She also tells the queens that the maxi challenge is a fierce impressions ball. The first look is daytime drag which is their entrance look that the judges were secretly judging; second, Club Tickety-Boo Look, which is a club where they would entertain famous queens I’m guessing; and the third Fierce Impressions look will be on the main runway.
Over at Club Tickety-Boo, Ru, Michelle Visage, and Alan Carr are in a black, white and grey club with a runway. The famous queens that walk the stage are Pangina Heals in a stoned yellow gown with a stoned white bra and burlesque feather fans; Lady Camden in a raver look including massive sneakers, mesh oversized pants, and a multicolored jacket that is mostly a sort of structured ribboning; host of Drag Race France Nicky Doll in a simple shimmer pink gown with a draped boatneck collar, a slit on her left leg and a white fur shawl; Silky Nutmeg Ganache in a multicolored leopard print pant suit meets bodysuit since the top is basically just a bra; yawn, Blu Hydrangea in a long sleeve, Tron-like, pink over black square pattern catsuit with shoulder pads and a similar patterned wavy yet structured headpiece; Sminty Drop doing her famous elimination twerk is in a ‘90s meets now look with flowing white pants, a small white corset bra, a massive fur hat, and a long, straight neon green and blond wig; and oof, Jimbo in a neon green and black bodysuit with black vinyl and green skirt peplum and long sleeves.
The Drag Race alum were probably asked to look standoffish to scare the queens, but it ends up being awkward. There’s a lot of annoying screaming that lasts a little too long. Finally, but also unfortunately, the runway performances start:
- Tomara Thomas is basically in the same look but with sleeves that match her boots, overalls that cover her nipples, and an unflattering piece of silver stoned rectangular fabric that acts as her skirt. She high kicks, splits, Ru calls her Demi Moore, but when she turns around the skirt barely covers her ass.
- Banksie is now wearing a shawl-coat made out of white rats but having to dance after Tomara, she mostly spins around and even her drag sister, Sminty, says she’s not using the runway.
- Miss Naomi Carter is now in a lavender skirt, iridescent bra over long sleeves, and she has on purple chaps covered by the skirt. She barely does anything on stage though, despite Silky saying her makeup is stamped.
- Michael Marouli is in an open legged harem pant lined with a gold fabric. The overall look is a silver stoned black catsuit with gold jewelry and stoning leading down her midsection to focus on her figure. She tries to vogue but she does a split and brings a lot of energy to her performance along with her yelling.
- Kate Butch is in the same colors but in a sad look. She’s in a velvet burgundy skirt with a fabric diagonally on her torso covering her breasts, her left arm is covered in ostrich feathers, and the nude illusion which isn’t white enough makes the whole look like she’s an ice skater. She tries tap dancing but her heel falls off, and ends up just laying on the floor. Blu says she likes that Kate is giving camp because Blu can’t dance herself. Okay girl.
- Ginger Johnson is in a leotard version of her entrance look that’s showing off more of her body. She has an adorable smile as she barely dances and seems nervous dancing like a dad.
- Cara Melle is in a confusing look. She’s in a nude bodysuit, which matches her skin color perfectly, but it has Britney Spears “Toxic” stoning on parts of the nude illusion covering her breasts then there’s a gold belt holding together the gold lame fabric on her right side along with even more dangling gold jewelry. But her dancing is fantastic and she’s turning out all the drag and Beyonce dance moves including splits and hair flips and hair-ography.
- DeDeLicious is in a bodysuit version of her entrance look with knee high blue boots and feathers hanging off of gold jewelry on her bodysuit. She can kind of dance, but queens who cannot and do not know how to vogue should stop entirely. Let’s not insult the art form of voguing. She does the move where she drops on her ass with her legs in a semi split. Then her wig starts sliding back and even Ru says to just pull it forward! Damn girl. She then takes off the wig and pounds into a split and makes a joke out of it. Silky calls it a tragedy
- Vicki Vivacious is in more black and white. She’s wearing a psychedelic, liquid-like black and white print mini dress with a heart shape stoning on her chest, a massive ostrich feather collar, and black and white long sleeves. Nicky jokingly says she’s the drag daughter of Bianca Del Rio and the doll from Saw. Vicki then rips off the little piece of fabric that she calls a skirt to then floss her taint with it and then attempts to do the Sminty twerk.
- Alexis Saint-Pete cracks a whip on the runway wearing basically the same outfit but with her hair down. She twirls into a drop and exposes her breast plate, and actually almost twirls off the stage.
Ru then announces the runway category for the following day, “Fierce Impressions Eleganza Extravaganza,” is supposed to be a look that is quintessentially themselves.
Back in the Werk Room, the girls are forced to fill in screen time for commercials purposes probably. Cara Melle and Banksie talk about Banksies insecurities in the challenge while Cara feels confident and is happy she is on the show now after 15 years of wanting to. She tried to get on 6 times but now that she’s comfortable with herself as a trans woman, she feels like she’s on the right road. Ginger Johnson is also insecure about her performance because unfortunately we could tell she was nervous.
Michael and Vicki talk about being in the drag game for a long time and for some reason the whole thing is sad. But to cry on the first episode, girl? You have the validation, you’re on the show, but don’t ruin your makeup. Then Cara Melle talks about how worried DeDe is but DeDe thinks Alexis will be in the bottom with her, but DeDe should keep her insecurity to herself. Alexis is trying not to cry but knows DeDe is trying to play mind games. DeDe is already making herself look like a fool, as if she didn’t already look like one with her wig coming off in front of everyone.
Ru walks the main stage in a lime yellow sheet that’s bunched and twirled in the strangest way and then she’s wearing a saggy bodysuit underneath. What the hell happened here? Guest judge and model Kristen McMenamy says to Ru, “I remember you when you were nothing,” since they’ve known each other for a long time.
Finally, time for the runway:
- Michael Marouli is up first with exaggerated hips and shoulder pads with spikes coming out of them and her arms and legs are covered in multicolored paillettes and she has a black leather corset top. She has on a similar wig to what she was wearing earlier but this has streaks of yellow, orange, and blue on the left side. She’s also holding a little disco ball while kind of doing the Lady Gaga paws up hand signal.
- Alexis Saint-Pete is in a possibly Polish inspired look but slutty of course. She’s wearing some sort of really short black corset dress that exposes part of her chest and red bra with little flowers embroidered into them, similar panty peeking out, long billowy white sleeves, red garters, a flower crown, a long braid that almost touches the floor, and a train with a red lining.
- Ginger Johnson looks like somebody’s mom at a picnic function on LSD. She’s wearing a long sleeve yellow dress with yellow, green, and pink flower patterns with smiley faces in them and a ginger wig that’s a little small for the proportions of the dress. This look kind of ages her and doesn’t accentuate her figure like her entrance look did. At least she’s holding a flower that she then eats. I love a campy queen.
- DeDeLicious looks like Irene Debois. She needs a new face. She’s wearing a red sequin dress with a massive collar covered in feathers. Her sleeves have feathers on the sides as well, but it’s nothing new.
- Cara Melle looks pretty cool in this ball gown skirt made out of nude tones and gold while she wears a golden bra that connects from behind her back and she’s covered in beautiful jewelry. Her gold and black headpiece makes her look like a sun goddess and there are tiny gold men on some of the sun rays. So cool. She says an orgy is happening on her dress. I don’t get it but I like it.
- Banksie is waddling down the runway in this white column dress.The dress is covered in red spray paint and pools on the floor and her mouth looks bloody for some reason. It looks like the spray paint stiffened the fabric as well and there’s another rat but it’s on her wig this time.
- Vicki Vivacious is in a Queen’s Guard look and her hips are exaggeratedly jutting out like some Disney mom but with huge round, modernist thighs. Underneath she’s wearing black vinyl thigh high’s. When she turns around, the hips and cut of the red jacket form the shape of a heart.
- For Kate Butch’s look, I’m surprised she brought this from home and didn’t make it for a bedding design challenge on the show. She’s wearing an ugly grape and green leaf printed 1800’s dress that looks like a grandma’s bed sheets from the ‘80s. Underneath the skirt is a dark green fabric and under that is a bright green fabric. The shape on her torso is not flattering, especially the ruffling by her neck. Oh she’s on wheels, wow. Is that supposed to save this look?
- Miss Naomi Carter is kind of giving me Diana Ross. Emphasis on kind of. She’s wearing an orange flower sequin netted dress, but like her entrance look, there’s still something off with the fit in the midsection. She has on a blue fur coat draped on her arms and her afro is gorgeous.
- Tomara Thomas looks like a cute angel. Her torso is sculptural as if it was shaped out of a fit woman’s chest, the tiny white skirt doesn’t detract from the top but isn’t too special, and her warm orange wings are great. Unfortunately her wings start falling off and end up crooked.
DeDeLicious, Banksie, Kate Butch, Miss Naomi Carter, and Tomara Thomas are deemed safe. Ru reveals to the rest of the queens, Michael, Alexis, Ginger, Cara, and Vicki, that they are the top queens of the week and that no one is going home this episode. Michael is complimented on her performance and her look on the runway, she says pop culture inspired her when she was younger; Alan loved Alexis Saint-Pete’s whip and look on the runway and Ru points out her boobs coming out a couple of times and Alexis says the dominatrix look is from a character she created as a child; Ginger Johnson was complimented on her runway look but was timid in the performance and at least she makes all her looks; Cara Melle was lauded for her entrance look, runway look which Michelle called flawless, and her performance was praised; and Vicki Vivacious was complimented for being in the game for so long and of course her looks and humor are praised during her performance and says her runway look and presentation is a love letter for all the performances she does for the armed forces.
The safe queens in Untucked are having fun with Kate Butch’s wheelies and DeDe makes the moment about herself. The top queens come in and play with the safe queens. Banksie says they all thought Alexis, Vicki, and Ginger are in the bottom and that Cara is on top. Then Vicki reveals they’re all in the top. Alexis sitting next to DeDe in this moment was great production as well. Cara adds that she thought DeDe and Tomara would’ve been in the bottom out of the safe queens. Alexis asks the queens why they thought the bottom they chose would be in that position. Banksie says “Personally, I thought because you set yourself up at the mirror,” and Alexis responds with, “Well, I didn’t start a conversation,” but Banksie should’ve just stopped talking. Alexis says she was so upset and shouldn’t have let someone get to her. Ginger points out how DeDe has managed to drag Alexis down into a nervous state. Alexis explains how she gets in her head. Then Ginger says again that DeDe would not shut up about it and was constantly talking about bringing someone down. Ginger then stands up for Alexis and Alexis says it won’t be the last time she proves DeDe wrong.
During the judges deliberations, they love Michael’s looks, love Alexis’ pride for her Polish nationality, for Ginger they were a little disappointed in the dancing but her look was praised for some reason, Cara is praised for everything she did on this episode, and the judges loved Vicki’s looks and weird performance in the challenge.
Ginger Johnston, Alexis Saint-Pete, and Michael Marouli are deemed safe while Cara Melle and Vicki Vivacious are the top two queens of the week. The queens lip sync to “Ooh Aah… Just a Little Bit” by Gina G. For this gay ass eurodance, techno song, Cara does her best in that regal look of hers but Vicki apparently adds a bit more camp to the song and therefore, Vicki is deemed the winner of this week’s challenge and receives the seasons first RuPeter Badge.