HEADER BY JACK ROWE

SPOILER ALERT: Thailand is out. On this week’s tumultuous episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race UK vs the World, another strong contender for the first ‘Queen of the Mothertucking World’ title was unceremoniously booted from the competition by one of her fellow sisters – generating enormous amounts of controversy online (even Ru and Michelle were fucked off). After securing two “coveted” RuPeter Badges – statistically making her the frontrunner for the crown – Pangina Heals slipped into the bottom two this week, for the first time we should add, after failing to impress the panel with her impersonation of Mariah Carey on Snatch Game. Following in the footsteps of Jimbo, another queen with an excellent track record cut too soon, viewers have started to question the merit of the current All Star rules and whether Drag Race is still a show about the best of the best. Here, we explain why the format of Drag Race’s All Star editions needs to be scrapped – like it states in the headline – indefinitely.

Lip-sync for your life >>> Lip-sync for your legacy/”the world”

The lip-sync for your life format has always been one of the most memorable and captivating aspects of any Drag Race episode, with the bottom two queens usually deploying a variety of sickening tricks, flips, kicks, splits and other campy dramatics on the main stage to best one another. As it’s their last chance to impress the Peanut Butter singer and secure another week in the competition, there’s a sense of urgency in their smackdowns; Kennedy Davenport’s jaw-dropping display of acrobatics against Katya and the tense lip-sync between former rivals Alyssa Edwards and Coco Montrese, for example, are two of many fierce showdowns that have helped propel the series to worldwide galore. These lip-syncs also showed how much the queens wanted it, and how far they were willing to go to showcase their charisma, uniqueness, nerve and talent to the world – creating unmissable television in the process.

When the “lip-sync for your legacy” format change was introduced in All Stars 2 – which sees the top two queens lip-sync, with the winner deciding which bottom queen should be eliminated – there was some merit to it. First off, the winner sashays away with a cash prize of $10,000 dollahz and secondly, for those who were unable to showcase their lip-sync skills the first time around, it’s a shot at lip-sync rudemption. Although there were still some issues with this new format, which we’ll touch upon in a little bit, it felt fresh for the franchise. This all changed with All Stars 5 and 6.