“RuPaul’s Drag Race” Season 16 Episode 7 Recap

The episode starts in awe of Mhi’ya’s flipping abilities and her as this season’s lip-synch assassin. However, her Miami sister Morphine is quick to point out that being a lip-synch assassin does not exactly mean you are doing well in the actual competition. As the queens celebrate Q’s first win after weeks of buildup, Plane Jane wonders if they should start tallying wins. The other subject that dominates the conversation is Sapphira’s decision to use her immunity. She says she was in her head and is ready to focus on looking forward. Yet, the best moment of the opening has to be Morphine, who only just now realizes that Mhi’ya has braces.

There is no mini-challenge this week because the main challenge takes up so much time. After hints that fly over many queens’ heads, RuPaul announces that this week is the Rusical and the queens will drag up The Sound of Music with The Sound of Rusic. Plasma is quick to give a history lesson, while Dawn reveals she simply hates musicals. Remember, representation matters. There are some queer people who do not like musicals. Even so, it’s a good episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race this week.

The Sound of Rusic

The queens again need to assign roles — cue flashbacks to RDL. Plasma accurately predicts that this is a make-or-break for this challenge. Dawn, Mhi’ya, Nymphia, Plane Jane, and Xunami face no issues securing medium or small-sized roles. The first confrontation occurs over the antagonist role between Q and Megami, which they settle with a game of rock paper scissors. Megami voices her second choice, which is met with Morphine nominating Sapphira for that role. Suddenly, Megami settles for her third choice. She loses at picking roles, again foreshadowing what is to come. Morphine’s nomination of Sapphira also has a little strategy to it because Morphine and Sapphira, along with Plasma, are each vying for the lead role. Despite her lack of musical theater training, Morphine wants the role as an opportunity to showcase herself to the judges. Her lack of a win seems to be propelling her choice. Other queens add their own commentary, but Plasma puts her foot down and secures the lead.

The rehearsal process starts in the Werk Room. Plasma proves to be as much an expert on Julie Andrews as Barbra as she lectures her teammates. It’s amusing when it dawns on Plasma that, as the lead role, she basically has a number with each group and has a lot more work than anyone else to get done. Xunami and Q, led by Plane Jane, decide to be method and play the bad girls by critiquing and shading the other groups. When the rehearsal moves to the stage, the queens get to work with Adam Shankman and are distracted by Melissa McCarthy. As they work through the choreography, Mhi’ya struggles slightly with the difference between her natural dance ability and deliberate steps. Q continues to struggle with movement in general. While Megami vocally enjoys seeing those who took her parts struggling, she has a hard time getting some of the steps as well. In classic Drag Race fashion, they set up who will falter and who will overcome.

The production itself, a lengthy 15 minutes, is wonderfully done. It is polished and professional; there is nothing to critique. Yet, that is exactly what needs to be critiqued. As the rusicals become increasingly larger and more manufactured, the queens have less room to interject their own ideas and personalities into the performances. It’s become clearer each season that parts are written for certain queens, which results in often predetermined results. It gives a sense of an arbitrary competition and elimination process. Despite this, it is an entertaining production, and each queen is terrific. Hopefully, the show will continue to mine these classic musicals for material.

I Can Buy Myself Flowers Runway

The runway prompt is basically flowers. It is both vague and open. Each queen gets to interpret it in their own way. The result is showing off their unique drag aesthetic. For the most part, the queens drifted toward costumey with a few exceptions. Plasma has the benefit of matching the main challenge with an exquisite yellow costume with Broadway roots. Sapphira’s is equally costumey but in a completely different way. She decides not to simply wear flowers but to be the flower. Nymphia goes costume in a campy and minimal way that is refreshing in contrast to the others. Finally, Q gives the opposite with a maximalist pink floral creation.

Morphine, Megami, and Plane Jane give their looks character inspirations. Morphine’s period flower child stands out from the rest of the group in mixed ways. Megami’s bridal character is a strong look, but the stained wedding dress narrative is needlessly overdone and diminishes the overall presentation. Plane Jane presents a softer side of her drag persona in a princess-like floral creation. It’s interesting to see her in a less severe light.

The final runway looks are more fashion-based. Mhi’ya steps up her runway presentation this week in a lush red floral gown that shows true pageant glamor. Dawn takes on an expected darker tone that separates her from the others in a red and blue demonic ensemble. In one of Xunami’s best looks of the season so far, she goes conceptual as an upside-down bouquet. Her look is all the more exceptional in that she manages to evoke flora without a single flower.

Judging

The judging, like Plasma warns when they picked parts, seems entirely tied to the size of each person’s role. The winner has the biggest role. The top performers have the next biggest roles. The bottom three have three of the smallest rolls. Two of those are essential background singers by design. The critiques end up being vague comments about energy and facial expressions that the edit hardly shows. For example, they constantly cut away from Mhi’ya each time she delivers her lines. Either she did it well, and they want to hide it, or she did not do well, which we should see if she’s going to be at the bottom. As far as the habit in the face, that was one of the best parts of the musical, adding unscripted humor, and she handled it perfectly. With everyone looking great on the runway and performing well in the rusical, the critiques felt particularly frustrating.

Lip-Synch for Your Life

The runway category borrows a line from this week’s lip-synch song “Flowers” by Miley Cyrus. While Mhi’ya demonstrated her talents last week, Megami feels that she has a chance with the emotional impact of this song. At the same time, Mhi’ya is equally confident. It seems like RuPaul might automatically disqualify Mhi’ya when she takes her shoes off. Instead, Mhi’ya is met with approval when she adds a soulful church dance to her movements. Megami emotes well but stays at one level. Mhi’ya finds peaks and valleys in the song and radiates joy in the sadness, which speaks to the song itself. She also incorporates one stunt — a penguin slide, as Sapphira calls it — that wows the judges. Mhi’ya has now eliminated two members of Thicc and Stick. Will Nymphia be next?

State of the Race

This week wasn’t the best for the Miami queens. Both Mhi’ya and Morphine landed at the bottom. While Mhi’ya won the lip-synch and further established herself as a lip-synch assassin, being in a lip-synch for your life means being at the bottom of the challenge, and that can only happen so many times before RuPaul is ready for you to go. Plasma earns her second win, tying with Nymphia, but the advantage goes to Plasma for two individual wins versus an individual and group win. Xunami, Morphine, and Dawn are still in the competition without a win, which is never a good sign as we approach the middle of the season. Our front-runners appear to be Sapphira, Nymphia, Plane Jane, Q, and now Plasma.