Expectations for Season 4 of 'Rupaul's Drag Race All Stars'

Even though most hardcore Drag Race fans have known the cast of All-Stars 4 for quite a while now, the official announcement, including the promo looks and interviews, has just been released. With these promo looks and interviews, we get to hear from the queens directly about their plans for the upcoming season. I am so excited for this upcoming season and couldn't be happier about seeing all these queens back, back, back again, but I do have some concerns and there is quite a bit to break down coming into the season.

First off, I've noticed quite a bit of people online saying that Latrice and Manila shouldn't be on this season due to them already appearing on the very first All Stars. Personally, I don't have a problem with it because I think they barely got a chance the first time and they are total legends. In fact, the one problem I do have with Latrice and Manila returning is that they, to me, are the few queens in this bunch that seem "Hall-of-Fame-worthy." Don't get me wrong, I think every queen in the cast is incredible, but when you compare them to Latrice or Manila, there is a clear difference. Of course, All Stars is all about showing a growth in brand and improvement, so I'm sure a lot of these queens will come out and surprise me, but as of now, none of them have quite the legend status that Latrice and Manila do. For instance, for All Stars 3, I would have never compared Kennedy to the legendary Shangela or Trixie Mattel, but she did amazing in the competition and made it all the way to the final two. So, of course, there are going to be some surprises, but I think it will be hard to justify crowning anyone other than Manila or Latrica unless the other competitors are just clearly head and shoulders above them.

Speaking of queens surprising us, there are plenty of opportunities for this. For instance, Monique Heart struggled with her runways last season as she had very little money. Now, though, she has some coin and her look for the promo reflects that money. Her look is different from nearly every other look which is a great start for her. Also, Farrah Moan always struggled in sewing challenges, but All Stars is way more about the challenges because you get to bring your outfits. Farrah is a true model and as long as she chose some great outfits to bring with her (and brings it in the challenges), she could actually make it pretty far, even though most fans are counting her as an easy out.

I'd also like to talk about their promo videos as well because I noticed some very interesting things there. It appears to me that both Naomi and Valentina may be getting villain edits this season, as both of them were asked about being villains while none of the other queens were. I know that the "Villaintina" scandal at the season 9 reunion and Naomi's fight with Derrick Barry on season 8 may be the reason they were asked those questions, but there are plenty of other queens that had fights in their respective season and were not asked that question. Sure, Gia was asked if the other queens were ready for her, and other queens were asked similar questions, but the specific use of the word villain for both of them seems to be there on purpose. I'm looking forward to seeing how that plays out, as Naomi is one of my favorite queens of all time and I'd love to see her succeed.

One thing I think that is important to look out for as well, I think that some queens here may have no trouble sending queens home just because they are fierce competition or they don't like them. For instance, Trinity Taylor, Gia Gunn, Jasmine Masters, and Manila Luzon all seem like the kind of queens who put honesty above fairness. They'll keep it 100 percent real with you, even if it's not the polite thing to say. So I think that this could potentially lead to some fierce competition going home early. Let's say Trinity wins the first challenge, and Manila happens to be in the bottom but clearly wasn't the worst. I think that Trinity would have no problem sending Manila home simply because she knows how big of a threat she is to her in the competition. We've had some scandals in sending people home in the past, but I feel like they've all been justified in one way or another, besides maybe Kennedy sending Milk home in All Stars 3. I think we can expect to see a lot of eliminations similar to Milk's in this upcoming season.

Overall, I'm very excited to watch this season of All Stars and I think it's going to be a great one, but I do have some concerns that Latrice, Manila, and maybe Valentina will be the only winners that would make sense, because they have both killed it in the competition as well as being legend status in real life. But, of course, in Rupaul's Drag Race, anything can happen.