“RuPaul’s Drag Race” Season 16 Reveals Cast and Gets January 2024 Debut!

RuPaul’s Drag Race is ready to debut the 16th season of the long-running reality competition series come January 5, 2024. A total of 14 contestants will be competing for the winner’s title.

RuPaul’s Drag Race season 16 will air on MTV on January 5, 2024. The grand prize is a whopping $200,000 USD as well as the title of America’s Next Drag Superstar. The upcoming season will get a two-episode premiere where the contestants will participate in a Talent Show.

I enjoy Talent Shows in the Drag Race franchise. But here’s to hoping a bunch of them bring a variety of talents to the stage instead of delivering lip-sync after lip-sync after lip-sync. I mean, don’t get me wrong, lip-syncing is indeed a talent. But I like to see queens showcase something that’s not part of the show’s usual rules.

Furthermore, the new season will also feature a twist called ‘Rate-A-Queen’. From my understanding, once the performances are done, the contestants will be in charge of ranking their fellow competitors to determine the week’s tops and bottoms.

Adding twists to impact the elimination and winning decisions isn’t something new to the award-winning franchise. Currently, Canada’s Drag Race Season 4 has something called the Golden Beaver that gives the winning queen of the week the ability to save one contestant from the bottom 3 from lip-syncing for their life.

Along with the flagship series, RuPaul’s Drag Race: Untucked will also return, airing immediately after the main episode. You have to give people the full story!

In other good news, the show is going back to airing 90-minute episodes after the controversy caused by the 60-minute episodes for season 15 and MTV trying to make the poorly received The Real Friends of WeHo a thing. The less said about that particular “show” the better.

As for the 14 contestants, we have Amanda Tori Meating, Dawn, Geneva Karr, Hershii LiqCour-Jeté, Megami, Mhi’ya Iman Le’Paige, Mirage, Morphine Love Dion, Nymphia Wind, Plane Jane, Plasma, Q, Sapphira Cristál, and Xunami Muse.

You can get a feel for their personalities and aesthetics from the ‘Meet the Queens’ video.

Now, trying to be honest in my coverage, I have to bring up something. For those who might be unaware, there are certain allegations surrounding Plane Jane over on Twitter. I’m still looking into it. So, I can’t offer much details. Let’s just say that the allegations are kind of similar to Sherry Pie (from RuPaul’s Drag Race season 12). Though Sherry Pie was eliminated from the 12th season, time will tell if the online allegations surrounding Plane Jane pick up steam before the January 2024 premiere and if production will decide to do something about it on the editing floor.

The entire ordeal has got the fandom talking about how production needs to do more when it comes to vetting the contestants because again, this isn’t the first time disturbing allegations about certain contestants have popped up in the international Drag Race franchise.

For those interested, you can view my reaction and review videos for the Drag Race franchise over on The Geekiary’s YouTube channel. And yes, I do plan on covering the upcoming season.

Are you excited about the cast?

Let us know.

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(via Variety)

Author: Farid-ul-Haq

Farid has a Double Masters in Psychology and Biotechnology as well as an M.Phil in Molecular Genetics. He is the author of numerous books including Missing in Somerville, and The Game Master of Somerville. He gives us insight into comics, books, TV shows, anime/manga, video games, and movies.

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