Yes, darlings, it’s the most wonderful time of the year once again. Miss Ru’s Charm School for Fishy Bitches is back in our lives, with another crop of hopeful young and not-so-young ladies.

Make that half a crop. On the one hand, the idea of splitting the introductions up over two episodes makes sense – and not just because they’re stretching out their material to get as much ad time as possible. It also gives the audience time to meet each one of the queens. All reality competitions suffer from the problem of the first several episodes of a season being overwhelming to the viewer and hard to follow without a score card. This gave Ru (and us) time to really assess every queen up and down.

On the other hand, it felt like the least energetic season opener the show’s ever had. It felt like what it was: half an opener. We’d have rather they aired the two hours back to back in an eleganza extavaganza, because the night ended somewhat unceremoniously.

But we’ll say this: these queens are bringing it. Maybe not so much on the serving and style front, but none of them are suffering from a personality deficit.

Also: Mega-Pit Crew. Not to get all PC or anything, but if they’re doubling the size they should’ve added a Bear or Daddy at the very least. This crew, while hot, are a little too same-y.

And speaking of Daddies, Mike Ruiz is back once again to break these queens in.

Hit it, girls:

Adore Delano



Adore’s voice is like nails on a chalkboard. There. We said it. Aside from that, we think there’s a real character there, but we thought the judges were a little too charmed by her schtick.

BenDeLaCreme



Another who one who’s a real character. But we’re not entirely sure we can stand listening to her for more than a second. We’re sure she’s great at Gay Bingo Night, but she doesn’t seem to translate well to TV. Great, polished look, though.

Gia Gunn



This bitch was serving SHADE. She’s entertaining so far, but you know we’re all going to turn on her eventually. Especially when she makes one of the nice ones cry. Among the more polished of the queens so far.

Kelly Mantle



Sorry. Too old school. Her look had nothing going on and her comedy style didn’t feel modern.

April Carrion



Adorable. But another one with a voice that cut glass. “Crap. Crap! CRAAAAAAAAAAP!”

Vivacious



Oh, honey. This one is so entertainingly delusional that we hope she’s in it right up to the finals. It’s not that we don’t think she’s serving it up, but she’s quite a bit more awkward and less fabulous than she thinks.

“BOOTS.”

Laganja Estranja



Cute n’ Bitchy. Exactly what you want in a reality TV drag queen. We think she’ll be around a while.



Serving Aphrodite. Had she worn a different wig, we’d have dubbed her “Afrodite.”

Too sweet to be a judge. A line we said last night on twitter, and which inexplicably pissed off a whole bunch of Glamberts.

The results of the catwalk portion were, to borrow a phrase from April Carrion, “CRAAAAAAAAAAAAP.” Did they gas the contestants or something? Give them only ten minutes to put their looks together? We’re with Ru. We don’t get these queens who can’t sew.

Gia Gunn





Didn’t love the skirt but she’s definitely top tier in this group.

April Carrion





She turned it around in the end, but we thought the judges way over-praised this.

Laganja Estranja





Awkward. And she wound up taking critiques oddly. Maybe she won’t be here as long as we thought.

Kelly Mantle





HORRIBLE.

To steal a line from a supermarket tabloid cover, “WHAT WAS SHE THINKING?” We can’t unsee the bacon.

“Unsee the bacon” should be a catchphrase of some sort. If only it actually meant something.

Adore Delano





It’s not well made, but credit to her for putting together a real look for a real character with a story behind it. Ru just loves that sort of shit. She’s playing the game well right out of the gate.

Vivacious





Girl, we don’t know WHAT is going on in your head.

BenDeLaCreme





But BenDeLaCreme was the clear winner here. She may be annoying in her affect, but you can’t fault the bitch’s FLAWLESS execution.

These two wig disasters wound up giving one sad motherfucker of a lip synch. We’d have sent both of them home except we’d like to meet the rest of the cast before taking such a big chunk out of it.

But if it had to be one, then Kelly was the right one. Vivacious is too much fun to get rid of yet.

“BOOTS!”

[Screencaps: tomandlorenzo.com]