*The only spoiler warning The Gay Goods offers is that we won’t be doing spoiler alerts because what do you expect from a recap of an episode of TV?
Episode 2 of Slag Wars, here we go cock destroyers!
We return to the Slag House (are they staying there? They can’t possibly be staying there) and catch up with our slags, who are… very neatly arranged for scripted scenarios. I wish they would lean into how fake this is even harder, because the whole thing has serious “Day shoot” shot / reverse shot vibes. And as fun as the editing and music and everything is, it’s put together like shit at moments.
At one point, Tyreece is opening up to country boy Kevin about their experience as a nonbinary POC (with all the other contestants arranged as extras “sitting normally” and “chatting” five feet away), and the camera literally switches to Kevin’s interviewed white-person experience listening to Tyreece speak. It fades the audio away in that montagey this-person-is-talking-too-much convention—and Kevin misgenders them over and over in that same segment. Yikes!
We love seeing trans people share their experience but… maybe get the shot? I’d let it go, but then they do this exact same thing during the Passion Project Main Challenge. In it, the slags are supposed to get all hot and bothered for a fetish-themed photoshoot, and when they bring out kink experts/friends of the cock destroyers Emily Balfour and Busty Cookie, the editors once again fade out their talking points as a white person narrates over what they said, supposedly their expert advice. Poor planning? Didn’t get the shot? Bad audio? Just a bad look, really.
And yet! For everything it gets wrong, or just doesn’t get, Slag Wars still gets so much right.
Besides upstaging their own guests, the main challenge brought some really fun creative challenge energy. They got some great shots with you’ve-seen-him-on-Instagram photographer Sam Morris, and it brought that same satisfaction as an America’s Next Top Model photo review.
Where is this show going? Who knows. But we love the fun, and we love this representation, even if it’s a little (OK a lot) staged. And any time Sophie and Rebecca are on screen is honestly magnificent. It makes the show. They’re so fucking funny and shameless and silly. Their enthusiasm is contagious. Finally: A reality show where one of the hosts shouts into a mic: “Cock! Sperm! Dick! [Bleep!]”
Oh, yeah, plus they decided to have eliminations. So much for that cliffhanger! Guess this will be a show that kicks contestants off, now that Sophie has been talked down from her I Love Everybody ledge. That’s also camp. We love. And the tone turns delightfully competitive as she agrees to… evaluate contestants on an reality TV show, becoming the first to point out that country Kevin (who is an aspiring rapper, apparently?) underperformed in his sexy photoshoot. And so he was set free to go and despunk the world. Bye Kevin!
