RuPaul's Drag Race: Snatch Game (You Gotta Know your Icons!)

Last week, Madame LaQueer was sent home, just as we learned she was sort of annoying. This week brings us a great RuPaul's Drag Race tradition in the form of Snatch Game, and you should all check this episode out.  

The mini-challenge is called Beat the Cock, and the ladies compete in rooster and hen themed tasks. It is absurd, as usual. Phi Phi wins at pinning the rooster on Ru's face, Dida Ritz successfully blows a feather across a room, and Milan wins a ring toss game. Those three compete in a final challenge that is a variation of an egg and spoon race. I'll not go into more details. Phi Phi wins a phone call home, and Chad Michaels is sad because it is his anniversary with his partner. In a rare moment of humanity (at least on the show), Phi Phi gives up his call to Chad. 

Ru introduces the Snatch Game challenge. Snatch Game is Ru's version of the 1970s classic game show Match Game. If you ever get the chance to see an episode of the original Match Game, check that stuff out. Gene Rayburn basically corrals 6 celebrities (who may or may not be drunk) and makes them answer dumb questions while horrified house wives play along. It is great stuff. Snatch Game is the drag version of this, with celebrity impressions.  

Ru visits the girls, and he is most worried about Phi Phi trying to do Lady Gaga, and Kenya doing an accent and Beyoncé. Sharon Needles is doing Michelle Visage, and the other queens are worried for her. It is certainly a risk, but I think Sharon can pull it off. 

Guest Judges Ross Matthews and Loretta Devine get to interact with this crazed panel of celebrities. 

Diana Ross (Milan): The biggest problem with Milan's Diana Ross is that her makeup is a damn mess. Her eyes look all crazy and "cracked out" as another queen notes. Ross Matthews sums it up as Diana at four thirty in the morning after a couple of packs of cigarettes. 

Beyoncé (Kenya Michaels): Kenya's Beyoncé is pretty darn terrible. She has some of the signature moves down (like the single ladies hand flip), but she makes a bunch of weird references to pills and drinking and falls off her chair. None of this is in keeping with Beyoncé. 

Cher (Chad Michaels): Chad's Cher is pretty amazing. She commits to the character by changing wigs and headresses several times. She has all of the mannerisms down, her voice is perfect, and her attitude is totally Cher. Points to Chad for living up to the great one. 

Jessica Simpson (Willam): Willam's Jessica Simpson is not too bad either. I think the dumb blonde routine is pretty unfunny as a starting point, but it is a fairly accurate spoof of the actress. Willam just does seem as vacant as Jessica, which is good for this challenge, but not so good in the long term. 

Michelle Visage (Sharon Needles): Sharon's version of Michelle is really awesome. She has the cackling laugh down, and continually cracks Ru up with personal stories about the two of them back in their younger days. 

Snookie (Jiggly Caliente): Jiggly certainly looks like Snooki, but there isn't a whole lot to her impersonation beyond that. She makes references to things in Snooki's world, but Jiggly just isn't a natural comedian, and it comes off a little flat. 

Aretha Franklin (Latrice Royale): We don't see a ton of Aretha, but what we do see is decent. Latrice brings a plate of food and won't share it, and does a few standard diva moves as well. 

Wendy Williams (Dida Ritz): Dida is caught between the crazy front row consisting of Snooki, Lady Gaga and Beyoncé, and we only really see his Wendy Williams reacting to that madness. It doesn't leave a big impression. His introduction does show that he has a good Wendy voice, but that is about it. 

Lady Gaga (Phi Phi O'Hara): Phi Phi's Lady Gaga is not very good. Michelle Visage sums it up nicely by saying that so much of Gaga is visual, and Phi Phi couldn't live up to it. The Gaga persona is also so fluid and changing that she is just hard to impersonate. Phi Phi looks nothing like Gaga, too and certainly misses the mark here. 

Sharon's Michelle Visage and Chad's Cher are easily the most entertaining in the show. Kenya, Jiggly and Phi Phi kind of devolve into ridiculous upstaging and yelling over each other at one point, and Latrice Royale is particularly annoyed at them the next day. 

Mainstage

Ru looks freaking fabulous in a blue and black gown featuring huge blue feathers. She is joined by (the real) Michelle Visage, Santino Rice and guest judges Ross Matthews and Loretta Devine.  

Jiggly Caliente: Jiggly's mainstage look is not great. It is a gross powder blue dress that is too short in the front (a few inches off the ground), and longer in the back. It looks like a terrible prom dress. She also did her hair á la Snookie, and it isn't pretty. 

Chad Michaels: Chad's look is a ridiculous (awesome) leopard-print cat suit with cutouts on the sides by his hips. It is extremely unique and he makes it even better with an electric yellow wig. 

Milan: Oh, Milan. She is going for an homage to singer Janelle Monáe, but the look Milan emulates is where Monáe wears a man's suit. He ends up just looking like a man, and it is not good. 

Willam: Willam's outfit is a full lace body suit with leather accents and an animal tail (of course). Despite all of this going on, it is still a little bit boring. 

Phi Phi O'Hara: Phi Phi looks a damn mess on the runway today. Her outfit is like a gymnastic body suit with pointy triangles glued the shoulders. Her makeup is also dating her, as usual, but this time it is also making her look cross-eyed. Not good. 

Dida Ritz: Dida isn't much better on the runway. She is wearing another of her tired wigs that do her no favours at all. Her outfit is weird—her skirt is made up of little stuffed animals. Not great. 

Kenya Michaels: Kenya does a tribute to the Puerto Rican flag and superheroes by wearing a sort of boxing outfit with a big robe. It looks pretty awesome, in fact. 

Sharon Needles: Sharon pulls out another great outfit, with this channeling crazy ladies who get too much plastic surgery. She has gauze artfully draped around her face and carries a syringe. I don't even mind the crazy coloured contacts that I usually hate because it works with her awesome character. 

Latrice Royale: Girl can pull off a royal blue gown…she actually looks a bit like Ru this week, because of their matching outfits. 

Chad Michaels wins this week's challenge, as he should have. Sharon Needles and Willam are also in the top, and Willam takes that moment to fakely try to convince us he is a vulnerable person (in direct response to the judges' critique). It is awkward, and he both references the fact that he acted with Loretta Devine on Boston Public and says he isn't acting. Those are two huge clues to the fact that he is, in fact, acting. 

Phi Phi O'Hara is told that she is in, but barely. Milan and Kenya Michaels will have to lip sync…..for their liiiiiiiiiiiiives. They get to it, and they are syncing to "Vogue" by Madonna. They are both strong performers—they have great dance abilities and stage presence. 

Milan is asked to shante, and stay, while Kenya Michaels is sent sashaying away. 

Hidden Gems

• I really thought Milan would be leaving us this week. Her crazy-eyed Diana Ross was not good, and she dressed like a man on the mainstage. Cardinal sins! 
  
  
• We were so sure that Milan would be leaving that The Peanut Gallery was already saying "You gotta dress in drag!" for her final word. 
  
  
• "See, you aren't a complete bitch!"- Latrice Royale sums up Phi Phi in one succinct sentence. 
  
  
• "Impersonating Beyoncé is not your Destiny, Child" -Ru, amazing work here. 
  
  
• "I didn't win (the Oscar), but I am wearing the shit out of this headpiece" - Chad Michaels as Cher. Well done, sir. 
  
  
• "Bitch likes to talk about Cher, a LOT" - Jiggly, in a rare funny moment about Chad being annoying. 
  
  
• Speaking of Chad, he really won me over this week. With the dead-on Cher impersonation, the hot mainstage look, and the adorable partner back home, he had the whole package. 
  
  
• Actual last words go to our beloved Peanut Gallery: "You gotta know your icons! You can't say Beyoncé is on pills!"

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