This week’s cold open sees the Boulets sacrificing Shawn Morales, who was famously dug up last season after leaving "RuPaul’s Drag Race". After slitting his throat, Dracmorda enjoys a Erzsebet Bathory moment, bathing in the blood of her once-right hand man. I was genuinely shocked that Shawn left the show, but at least he had one of the better death scenes in series history.
The monsters populate the boudoir and immediately talk about who they think went home. Evah and Louisianna are convinced that Maxi went home, but Priscilla is more concerned with Dollya skating by on her family name and the legacy of her mother, Victoria Black. Maxi returns to join the cast, and they are entirely shocked to hear that Violencia refused the extermination challenge. They all feel some kind of way about it, pointing out that the exterminations are part of the game, and the fact that Violence backed down is insulting to the concept as a whole. The klaxon signals the contestants to go to the theater to get their challenge, and as daunting as that siren is, I am a fan of it.
The main challenge for the week is vampire couture. The monsters will be creating vampire stylings to feature in a special burlesque performance, as well as decorating fans provided by Dirt Squirrel which must be used in the act. The last time we saw Dirt Squirrel fans was in last season’s Gothic Wedding challenge, and I can’t wait to see what this crop of competitors does with the fans.
Back in the boudoir, the monsters talk about the capital that went into their looks from last week’s floor show. To me, this is uncalled for. Yes, Alaska Thunderfuck told us that "it takes a lot of money to look this cheap, darling," but I’ve also seen expensive gowns and wigs failing to translate to a great show. As the conversation wraps up, the fans and posters of the cast roll in, and in so many words, the lot of them are in heat. The looks aren’t discussed at length, but Yovska does talk about going for an anthropomorphic character. Yovska doesn’t leave the room unread, as Maddelynn calls her out for her shadiness and snark. Priscilla chimes in and shows her support for Yovska. In the midst of all of the drama, Dollya sets the ground rule for the boudoir: if you have something to say, say it. As if on cue, the siren goes off, and it’s time for the floor show.
The winner of this week’s challenge earns a $1,000 prize package from Dirt Squirrel. Guest judges include actress Bonnie Aarons, whose credits include Mulholland Drive, The Nun, and Drag Me to Hell, and nightlife icon and burlesque legend Amanda Lepore. My highlights for the floor show this week are, in no particular order:
Priscilla’s femme Nosferatu, complete with coffins on her fan
Landon’s show-stopping mariachi vamp, complete with trumpet fan and a bottle of blood brew reading "Fuck Your Wall"
Maddelynn’s gorgeous red vision, and the braided hair took me by surprise
Louisianna’s Vegas showgirl moment that can’t get much more burlesque
Before getting to judgment, Dracmorda addresses the elephant in the room: Violencia dropping out of the extermination. In so many words, she reminds the girls that these are a part of the competition, and if they can’t hang, they need to think twice about remaining in the game. When I look at the legacy of exterminations and the impact they have had, I look no further than season one champion Vander von Odd. She was asked, not required, to participate in the one extermination challenge she was ever in. It tested her, it pushed her, and it was all for the better, as she wound up walking away the winner of the whole damn season. "Dragula" is bigger than a pageant. It’s not all about looks and execution.
Moving forward, Maxi, Evah, Priscilla, and Dollya are deemed safe for the week. While Maxi is relieved to have redeemed herself from last week’s slip up, Dollya is upset that she is merely safe, meaning she won’t be getting critiques like the rest of the cast will. St. Lucia is first up for critiques, and while she looked gorgeous, her performance was reserved and the blood absent. Landon gets rave reviews for his look and the out-of-the-box thinking he put into the crafting and the execution. Louisianna was a softer sort of bloodsucker, but the fan being more of an afterthought in her act definitely sucked for her. Yovska is dinged hard for her being uncomfortable on stage and for her look reading devil, not vampire. The only parts of her look that made sense for the challenge were a) she was all red and b) had massive tits and tassels. Otherwise… no. Hollow Eve went full feeding frenzy in her show, and that earns major favor with the judges. Maddelynn is knocked down a few for her total lack of fan.
Hollow’s act lands her in the top three, but Landon is declared the winner of the challenge, with Louisianna rounding out the top three of the week. Maddelynn is excused from the extermination, which I genuinely don’t understand. In the Gothic Wedding challenge last season, James Majesty neglected her fan, and it landed her in extermination country. Why does Maddelynn get to skate into the next week when she committed the same mistake as James did the season before? This oversight is going to stick in my craw for a bit, but the show must go on.
Yovska and St. Lucia are your bottom two for the week, and their challenge is consume as much cow flesh and blood as the can in the time allotted. Because of all of the red viscous fluid present in this challenge, this one is easily grosser than the three course meal extermination from last season. Despite her best efforts, St. Lucia is exterminated in a bloody graveyard stabbing.
Nine performers remain. We’re beginning to see some of the cast pulling ahead, while others are hanging back, perhaps not by choice. This episode had some trouble on Amazon Prime, so it would be joined by an early release of episode three just days later, just in case one episode of "Dragula" in a week isn’t enough to scratch that itch (and it totally isn’t).