‘RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 10’ recap: Chappell Roan enters the Werk Room as the queens battle in a ‘Rappin’ Roast’
Previously on RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars Season 10, the second bracket of six returning queens kicked off with the "Eight Ball" design challenge. Reintroducing themselves as the competitors in this bracket are Jorgeous (Season 14, All Stars 9), Kerri Colby (Season 14), Lydia B Kollins (Season 17), Mistress Isabelle Brooks (Season 15), Nicole Paige Brooks (Season 2), and Tina Burner (Season 13). Standing proud at the end of the episode were Tina with her first ever maxi challenge win earning two points and Lydia who defeated Tina in the Lip Sync for Your Legacy to take the lead with three points.
This week, the bottom queens hand out their first MVQ points to their sisters and then meet Chappell Roan who offers advice as they prepare lyrics for a rap battle roast. Read on for our recap of RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars Season 10, Episode 5, titled "Rappin’ Roast," which began streaming Friday, May 30 at 12 a.m. PT on Paramount+.
In the "Tournament of All Stars" overall, eighteen queens compete in a "Preliminary Round" of three episodes as three brackets of six, a "Semi-Finals" round of the top-scoring three from each bracket, and then a "Finals" to determine who will join the "Drag Race Hall of Fame" and take home the ultimate cash prize of $200,000. The queens who advanced from the first bracket are Irene the Alien (Season 15), Bosco (Season 14) and Aja (Season 9, All Stars 3).
SEE ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ winners list: Every season, plus ‘All Stars’
"Everyone knows you don't trust a fat, nasty b----" — Mistress Isabelle Brooks
With budding alliances already sprouting from Mistress's garden, the decisions of where MVQ points would go got very messy very quickly. Nicole made her case clear from the jump, that she will be exchanging her point with anyone willing to give her theirs. She also pushed back against Tina's assertion that they should give points to the queens with the best critiques, stressing that she will not be giving her extra point to either of the girls that already got a point that week. Mistress jumped in to initiate a clear decision that her and Nicole would swap and Jorgeous and Kerri would swap. Mistress pressed Nicole to pass her point to Mistress, which she did, and then Kerri to pass her point to Jorgeous, which she did, but then executed with Jorgeous an unexpected swap where she passed hers to Jorgeous and Jorgeous passed hers to Mistress. The shady play produced two points each for Mistress and Jorgeous while leaving Nicole and Kerri without one. Instead of getting mad in the moment, Nicole and Kerri kept their reactions demure and acknowledged that they shouldn't trust Mistress going forward.
When the dust settled the next morning (sort of), RuPaul Charles coincidentally announced a mash-up maxi challenge where the queens would perform in a rap battle fashioned as a roast of each other. As the winner of the lip sync from the previous week, Lydia got to assign the running order of the roast. Having freshly accepted Lydia as her newest drag daughter, Mistress felt comfortable asking for a comfy spot in the middle of the order, but Lydia had a plan to angle for promises of future points in return for giving people their ideal placement. In the end, Lydia settled on Tina, Nicole, Lydia, Mistress, Jorgeous and Kerri last based on Kerri saying she'd give her a point.
"My biggest challenge this week is to not be annoyed by Mistress" — Tina Burner
The next day while the girls were putting on their own makeup, Chappell popped in mid-glam to kiki with them in preparation for the challenge. In their conversation, Chappell expressed her gratitude and love for the drag community, explained that she has local drag queens open for her shows (which is what Lydia did for her in Pittsburgh), and then tried on some of their wigs before becoming an honorary inductee into the House of Colby by Kerri. Later on the Main Stage, Chappell joined Ru, Michelle Visage and Ross Mathews as the judges of the "Rappin' Roast" and the "Little Shop of Whores" runway category.
Highlights of the digs taken in the rap verses were Tina going in on the Brooks sisters as a "body double" and "one that no one books" while also faking out a friendly moment with Mistress, Nicole asking Lydia whose butthole she licked "to get back in so quick" and whether Jorgeous has been in Ross's "colon all damn year," Lydia telling Kerri that she's "the Tamar to Sasha's Toni," Mistress going in on Jorgeous needing a GED and questioning how Nicole Paige Looks, Jorgeous calling Mistress a "Godzilla in a one-inch heel," and Kerri ending with a quick-spit verse despite not naming any of the other queens in her lyrics.
"I feel like all queens have a prickly personality as a defense mechanism" — Nicole Paige Brooks
Based on the rap battle and their runway presentations, the judges offered critiques. Michelle thought Tina was "super fun" but because she crammed so many lyrics in it made it hard to grasp what she was saying. Chappell called Jorgeous "effortless" and Michelle gave her a "10 out of 10" score for her lyrics, especially the digs at Mistress. Ross acknowledged that Nicole approached it differently and so he appreciated how clean her lyrics were delivered. Michelle thought Lydia "looked nervous" and said that she, like Tina, put in too many words, but Chappell countered that she heard Lydia the best. Michelle said Mistress "ate" and thought her physicality enhanced her jabs at her sisters. The judges were disappointed that Kerri didn't roast anyone directly and Chappell admitted she was only looking at her butt anyway.
After further deliberation, Ru declared the top two performers as Mistress and Jorgeous. To determine the overall winner, they battled to Chappell's song "HOT TO GO!" with Jorgeous turning her standard tricks and dips while Mistress struggled to find the comedic beats of the song. Inexplicably, Ru announced a tie between the two, offering them $5,000 each and a split bonus point for half a point each. With that decision, Mistress and Jorgeous took the lead on the scoreboard at 4.5 points, followed by Lydia with 3 points, Tina with 2, and Kerri and Nicole with no points heading in to their third and final challenge of the round.
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