‘RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars’ episode 2 recap: The queens double dip in a double-headed ‘Snatch Game’
For this season of “RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars,” RuPaul Charles brought back eight crowned queens to compete again for the chance to be named “Queen of All Queens,” earn a second crown, and take home a cash prize of $200,000. On Friday, May 20, the first two episodes of the new season dropped on Paramount Plus. We were re-introduced to Shea Couleé, Jaida Essence Hall, Yvie Oddly, Trinity the Tuck, Monét X Change, Jinkx Monsoon, Raja, and The Vivienne with the reading mini challenge and two iconic maxi challenges, the Ru-mix and “Snatch Game.”
In episode 2, titled “Snatch Game,” the eight queens participated in the iconic challenge not once, but twice with two different celebrity impersonations. Which queens earned the week’s Legendary Legend Stars and which of the two got to block another queen for the next week? Check out our recap of the episode below:
Following Shea’s win, the queens assembled in the Werk Room to discuss the previous challenge. Shea was, of course, proud of her win and happy to have set the precedent that strong queens deserve to be blocked. Trinity took the block like a true queen, accepting it as a compliment of her strength in the competition and with no hard feelings. The next morning, the topic turned to who makes sense to get the block next–Jinkx and Yvie were not shy about explaining that logically the blocks should go to the queens with Stars already to their name in the hopes of slowing their growth toward the top.
For this week’s maxi challenge, Ru asked the queens to get read for the iconic “Snatch Game” once more, but this time they’d need to portray two celebrities in a doubling down of the important challenge. As winners of their seasons, most of the queens in the room had already shown their might as celebrity impersonators: Viv slayed as Donald Trump, Jinkx as Little Edie, Shea as Flavor Flav, and Trinity as Caitlyn Jenner all won.
This season, this is who each of the queens portrayed: Jaida as Prince and The Lady Chablis, Jinkx as Natasha Lyonne and Judy Garland, Monét as Mike Tyson and Martin Lawrence as Sheneneh Jenkins, Raja as Madame and Diana Vreeland, Shea as Elsa Majimbo and Miss J. Alexander, Trinity as Satan and Leslie Jordan, Vivienne as Joanna Lumley and Catherine Tate as Joanie “Nan” Taylor, and Yvie as Rico Nasty and the Boogieman. Each queen received a counseling session with Ru ahead of their performance, but Ru was excited about all of their choices and so didn’t sway any of them in another direction.
For “Snatch Game,” Michelle Visage and Ross Mathews stood in as the contestants hoping to match answers with the celebrities. Played in two rounds, the standouts in the first session were Trinity in a hilarious queer take on Satan and Monét ready to get involved with everyone else as Mike Tyson. The second session was bombarded by an incredible, top-level impersonation of Judy Garland by Jinkx and a close second, also great take on Leslie Jordan by Trinity. Raja was solid in both sessions, while Shea, Jaida, Viv and Yvie all faded into the background without being complete disasters.
On this week’s runway, Ru, Michelle and Ross were joined by Daphne Guinness and the queens walked in a “Pleather Principle” category to show off their best use of pleather fabric. In judges’ critiques, Ru let them all know that they were “hilarious” in “Snatch Game” and that she was proud of them all. The judges liked that Monét chose two male performers because she was fun to play along with, appreciated Yvie’s ability to be more sexual than they’re used to from her with her take on the Boogieman, and thought that Raja delivered comedy instead of the expected glamour which was impressive to see. They thought that Trinity’s approach to the challenge was great and that her Leslie was “phenomenal,” believed Vivienne “nailed” both of her impersonations because she’s a true impressionist, were blown away by Jinkx’s Judy and ability to make someone like Natasha her own. Ross thought that Jaida looked just like her characters, but they all agreed that neither were made personal enough. With Shea, Michelle thought that her choices were tough and that Miss J. was the stronger one.
Based on their critiques, Ru announced the top two as Jinkx and Trinity. Because Trinity was blocked by Shea last week, she did not earn a Legendary Legend Star, but she still got to perform against Jinkx for the chance to earn that power for herself. In their face off to “Rumour Has It” by Adele, Trinity and Jinkx both took the comedy route. Trinity played off her “not real” parts of her body with a touch of sex appeal while Jinkx played up her classic drunk housewife mannerisms in a way surprisingly fitting of the song.
Ultimately, Ru selected Jinkx as the winner of the lip sync. The win gave Jinkx her first chunk of change in the form of a $10,000 cash tip and the chance to put some shade on Shea’s back by blocking her from receiving a Legendary Legend Star next week. With this week’s results, all of Monét, Shea and Jinkx now hold one Legendary Legend Star each.
Do you think Jinkx deserved to win in episode 2, and was Shea the right queen to block? Sound off on that and other topics of the season in the comments below and with other fans in our reality TV forum. Also be sure to make your predictions to influence our reality TV racetrack odds.