Three Ways “Rupaul’s Drag Race: Global All Stars” Could Improve
Last year, Paramount+ released the first ever season of “RuPaul’s Drag Race: Global All Stars.” The “Drag Race” machine has been pumping out tons of shows every year, creating more and more international spinoffs from the UK to Brazil, and all of these seasons have led up to this moment: to create a global “All Stars.” Among the cornucopia of “Drag Race” content there already were some seasons that were intended to be global, such as “UK vs the World” and “Canada vs the World,” but “Global All Stars” was the true global season – twelve contestants, each one from a different country. The Drag Olympics.
“Rupaul’s Drag Race” fans had been anticipating “Global All Stars” for a while, and were so excited when it was finally announced to be premiering in August 2024. But the season itself ended up being, unfortunately, not a hit. The fans only became more disappointed and angry with the season as it went on because of what they saw as unfair judging and bias towards the queens from English speaking countries like the US and UK. American drag icon Alyssa Edwards ended up being the one to win the season, but despite her being universally adored, her crowing wasn’t even much of a celebration. Because by the end of “Global All Stars,” the fans either stopped caring about the season altogether or they were frustrated with the US favoritism.
But despite the first season being harshly criticized, there is still hope for the franchise to return. It still has a great concept, and is a wonderful way to platform international drag artists. If “Global All Stars” is able to return for a second chance, here are three ways they could fix some of the problems viewers had with it the first time around.
1. Having a more international panel of regular judges
For “Global All Stars,” the panel of main judges were RuPaul, Michelle Visage, and Jamal Sims – all of whom are American. While it makes sense for Americans to be running the show since it’s where the franchise originally began, for a global season of “Drag Race” it should be important to have a panel of permanent judges who are more international. For the next season of “Global All Stars,” it might be a good idea to keep RuPaul and Michelle Visage but then have a couple permanent judges from other parts of the world.
2. Not having comedy challenges
Comedy challenges are a staple of “Drag Race,” so it might seem crazy to suggest that they get rid of them. But the problem with comedy challenges in a global season, where people of all different native languages are speaking English, is that your first language heavily impacts your ability to pull off a comedic performance in English. So during a comedy challenge, the English speaking judges are going to connect more with the contestants whose first language is English, which creates an unfair bias towards queens from English speaking countries. For this reason, it might be beneficial for a second season of “Global All Stars” to scrap comedy challenges and focus on everything else.
3 Not casting an American who’s already done “All Stars” before
When looking at the cast of the first season of “Global All Stars,” you might notice that every single queen on the season was returning to do a season of “All Stars” for the first time, except for Alyssa Edwards representing America, who was returning for a second time after already doing “All Stars 2.” This cheapens “Global All Stars” a bit, by making it seem like the franchise is just a way for the more famous American contestants to be given yet another chance meanwhile for the international queens this is their first chance at redemption. To even out the playing field, it might be a good idea to cast an American queen who has also not been back for “All Stars” yet, because that’ll make them in the same position as everyone else.
While “RuPaul’s Drag Race: Global All Stars” didn’t live up to its expectations, there is still plenty of hope for the show to return, and if it does then hopefully things will be turned around for this potentially amazing platform of drag outside of America.
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