RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 episode 5: Recap and more details explored

RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 episode 5, released on Friday, February 2, has sent another queen packing this week. In the previous episode, viewers saw the queens competing in an RDR Live challenge, which was a Drag Race take on Saturday Night Live. The challenge tested the contestant’s ability to perform comedy skits in a single take.

Mirage became the second queen to be eliminated from RuPaul’s Drag Race season 16 in episode 4, while Plasma was announced as the winner. Episode 5 saw the return of the remaining 12 queens to compete in yet another challenge, but this time it was all about teamwork.

The Swedish synth-pop duo, Carolina Hjeth and Aino Jawo of Icona Pop graced the Emmy-winning competition series as guest judges, while Ts Madison served as an alternating judge.

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What happened on RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 episode 5?

The mini-challenge

Here, the queens were challenged to create their own book title, cover, and bio. After the judge's critiques, RuPaul selected Saphhira Cristal as the winner of the mini-task, earning the latter a cash prize of $5000.

The main-challenge

The main challenge of episode 5, titled Girl Groups, witnessed the queens take part in a singing competition. The 12 contestants were split into three groups and were tasked to write and perform their verses on RuPaul’s songs from the album Black Butta. Along with creating individual lyrics, the girl groups were also ranked for their choreography.

The selected tracks included RuPaul’s Star Baby, Courage to Love, and A.S.M.R Lover. Meanwhile, the announced captains were Plasma, Sapphira, and Geneva. The queens chose their team in a quick name-picking selection round. Megami was the last to be chosen by Geneva’s team with Nymphia and Mhi’ya.

Surprisingly, Plasma shook hands with rivals Plane Jane and Amanda for the challenge with Xunami Muse in her team. The last team was completed with Dwan, Morphine, Q, and Sapphira.

Though Geneva’s team with Megami was deemed the weakest, in a dramatic twist, they emerged as the winners of this week. The team with past winners Plane Jane and Plasma fell to the bottom.

The runway

Last week, the queens recreated Cher’s look for the runway segment, but this time they paid homage to Russ Meyer’s film Faster Pussycat! Kill Kill! and Monét X Change’s signature pussycat wigs. The queens had to design a look, keeping in mind the Monét wig style.

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Who was eliminated on RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 episode 5?

The queens who landed in the bottom two spots this week were Q and Amanda, who competed in a lip-sync battle for survival against each other. They performed on guest judges Icona Pop’s Emergency.

Unfortunately, Amanda Tori Meating became the third queen to be eliminated from RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 in episode 5, despite being on the team with previous challenge winners Plane Jane, and Plasma, alongside Xunami Muse.

The 11 queens who survived this week were Dawn, Geneva Karr, Megami, Mhi'ya Iman Le'Paige, Morphine Love Dion, Nymphia Wind, Plane Jane, Plasma, Q, Sapphira Cristal, and Xunami Muse.

In the next episode of RuPaul's Drag Race, all the remaining queens will take part in a DollHouse conquest, where they’ll be tasked with designing individual dolls based on their drag personas. The ultimate winner of the competition series earns the title of America’s Next Drag Superstar and takes home the whopping grand prize of $200,000.

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RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 episode 6 will be released on Friday, February 9 at 8 pm ET on MTV.