Drag Race UK Vs. World Episode 2 Recap: The Battle Of Fan-Favorites

Following the shocking elimination of Lemon in episode 1, the contestants on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK vs. The World episode 2 featured an even more impossible decision with two of the ultimate fan-favorite queens in the Drag Race franchise landing the bottom two. For this new UK Vs. The World spin-off, Mama Ru brought back the long-standing All Stars rules that started with season 2. Each week, the top two queens have to lip sync, and the winner of that lip sync decides which of the bottom two queens to send home.

Pangina Heals won the first lip sync of the season and chose to send Lemon home instead of Janey Jacké. Going into episode 2, there was a sense in the room that the queens were gagged by Lemon being the first-eliminated queen on the show. This was made even clearer when Jimbo revealed that she had pulled Janey’s lip sync instead in case she had won the first lip sync. With that said, Jimbo and Lemon were Canada’s Drag Race co-stars, so it wasn’t all that surprising that they’d look out for one another at least in the first week.

This week, the queens were challenged on Drag Race UK Vs. The World to serve three looks in the so-called “RuPaul Ball.” Categories were “Kitty Girl,” “Butch Queen,” and “You Wear It Well.” The latter category was described as something that RuPaul herself would want to wear on the runway. For longtime Drag Race viewers, it wasn’t surprising to see queens like Baga Chipz, Cheryl Hole, and Jujubee getting immediately concerned about facing another looks/design challenge. The three of them are fan-favorites with charisma to spare, but they haven’t always been that great at putting together a look when the challenge is all about walking the RuPaul’s Drag Race runway.

As the maxi challenge played out in the episode, it instantly became clear that Jujubee’s looks and Cheryl Hole’s looks just weren’t up to par for these categories. As expected, Jimbo killed it with all three of her runway looks, whereas Mo Heart (née Monique Heart) served one of the most iconic looks in Drag Race herstory in the “Butch Queen” category. Blu Hydrangea also did very well, and Janey Jacké surprised the judges with a much better runway showing that redeemed her bottom-two placement in week one. After the judges’ deliberations, Ru announced that Jimbo and Janey were the top two queens of the week while Cheryl and Jujubee were the bottom two queens of the week. Jimbo really wanted to redeem herself after that lackluster lip sync performance from episode 1, but Janey also had something to prove after going from the bottom two in the first week to the top two in the second week.

In Untucked, the decision between Jujubee and Cheryl quickly became about this being Juju’s fourth attempt at Drag Race but only Cheryl’s second chance on the show. Alas, Janey and Jimbo agreed that Cheryl had done objectively worse than Jujubee in this specific challenge. Back on the runway, Jimbo and Janey lip synced to RuPaul’s iconic hit song “Supermodel (You Better Work)”. Jimbo once again faltered in her performance, which gave Janey the win. In the end, Janey pulled out Cheryl’s lipstick and sent her home, which saved Jujubee from elimination. As a result, Cheryl has become the first UK queen to get eliminated from the UK Vs. The World spin-off.

RuPaul’s Drag Race UK vs. The World airs Tuesdays at 4 p.m. ET/PT on the WOW Presents Plus streaming service.

About The Author

Bernardo Sim
(1773 Articles Published)

See also  New '300: Rise of an Empire' Featurette: Themistocles Fights For His Country

Bernardo Sim writes about TV shows, queer culture, & Brazilian media. Born and raised in the Amazon, he now lives in South Florida. he/him

More From Bernardo Sim