With a show that heavily focuses on the AIDS crisis, violence against trans individuals, and discrimination, it’s a given.
Pilot
- No sooner does Angel quit the House of Abundance as her former siblings immediately turn on her, mocking her when she tries to walk the balls as a free agent.
- Damon getting kicked out of his family’s home for being gay. Especially when it appears that his mother is going to comfort him, she instead slaps him and disowns him for not “hiding” it.
Giving and Receiving
- Angel recounts how when she was a child, she saw a beautiful pair of red pumps at a department store and tried to steal them. Not only did she get caught, but it was also the day she realized that her mother was never going to love her the same way again.
- Angel spends much of the episode trying to prepare her apartment in the expectation that Matt will come see her. He never shows.
Acting Up
- The season opens with one hell of a Happy Ending Override, as Blanca and Pray Tell attend a funeral for Keenan Howard, the charming young man Pray was dating at the end of season 1.
- Just the fact that Keenan doesn’t even have a marked grave but rather a rock with his name and life years to show for his memorial...and there are hundreds if not thousands just like it.
Worth It
- After learning that Ricky cheated on him with a backup dancer while on tour, Damon breaks up with him.
Never Felt Love Like This Before
- One day, Candy is a pain in everyone's ass, and the next, she is suddenly and brutally killed off.
- Lulu spends her imagined final conversation with Candy arguing with her, even as Candy tries desperately to get her to remember all the good times they had. In the end, Candy just disappears, and Lulu finds herself alone, with no sense of closure.
What Would Candy Do?
- Ricky gets a bittersweet ending; while he and Damon are able to part as friends after spending a day alternately competing against and working with each other, he wishes they could be something more.
Blow
- Lulu is in terrible shape after Candy's death. Already the poorest House in the NYC ballroom scene, the House of Ferocity is nearly bankrupt without the money Candy was bringing in, and by the time the others find her, Lulu looks half-dead, either from grief or exhaustion. After Blanca puts her to work planning a caper for ACT UP, Lulu bursts into tears, appalled at how far she's let herself sink.
Revelations
- Over the space of one day, the House of Evangelista as we know it falls apart, as Damon learns that Ricky slept with Pray Tell, which drives him to not only reveal this to everyone else but also causes him to reveal that Angel and Papi have been doing cocaine, violating one of the rules of the house. The worst part? Already facing the prospect of losing her beloved baby Damon to his new job, Blanca wants desperately to keep Angel and Papi, only for Angel to turn around and accept expulsion because she and Papi have saved enough money for a place of their own and because Blanca taught her that it was important to have integrity. It's one hell of a Bittersweet Ending; Blanca's children all manage to find their way, but Blanca is left with a painfully empty nest.
Life's a Beach
- In an otherwise lighthearted episode, Blanca almost drowns while on a beach vacation. While all the other girls are worried sick about her, what really makes it is Elektra’s shriek of “I can’t lose another daughter!” after having lost Candy five episodes earlier.
- In the same episode, Blanca goes on a date. While it all ends sweetly and the scene is rather funny, there is a bit of sadness in Elektra, Angel, and Lulu giving her several weapons to defend herself with. It really shows how much Candy‘s death rocks them to the core.
In My Heels
- The opening of the episode jumps forward several months from the previous episode, and Blanca's not doing well. She's running her nail salon out of her apartment, her relationship with Adrian apparently ended some time ago, and, having been unable to afford proper medication and hospital visits, her HIV has progressed to AIDS and her lungs have degraded so badly that she can barely walk without getting winded.
- When Quincy and Chilli tell Blanca they've been on the piers for a month, Blanca immediately (and justifiably) looks concerned. The Christopher Street Piers was a known prostitution spot in 1991, so one can only think of some of the god-awful things these babies have had to do for some food or temporary shelter.
On The Run
- It's 1994, and things are not going well for the family. Pray has lost his clothing business, is now hawking perfume at a department store, and has developed a drinking problem. The ballroom is being drained dry by a new generation of performers who demand cash prizes. Lulu's dreams of becoming an accountant have fallen apart because she was only able to get an associate's degree before her money ran out. Angel, Papi, Damon, and Ricky have all hit snags in their respective careers. And Cubby is dying of AIDS.
- Pray and the other emcees continue to attend every AIDS-related funeral in New York, but the attendance has gotten slimmer, and the deceased are getting younger. The latest funeral is for a 25-year-old. One of the other emcees notes that it was only a few weeks ago that the kid won a body category at one of the balls.
Intervention
- The ballroom faces another loss, as Damon relapses on his sobriety and moves to Charleston to stay with his cousin.
- This episode reveals that Castle, one of Pray's fellow emcees, has AIDS, and has reached the point where he sometimes needs help getting out of bed. He tells Pray that he feels the end is near and has been stockpiling sleeping pills so that when it gets to be too much, he can have a quick end.
- Pray hits rock bottom, and Ricky finally gets fed up and leaves him. Having alienated most of his friends by that point, he finally decides he needs help and gets Blanca to take him to rehab.
The Trunk
- The episode opens with a flashback to 1978, when a young Elektra Jackson is kicked out of her mother's home after being caught wearing women's clothing.
- In another flashback, this time to 1985, Elektra's burgeoning House needs cash, and she refuses to force her children, who at this point are mostly still actual children, to engage in prostitution, so she breaks into her mother's house to steal the titular trunk. Naturally, she runs into her mother, who regrets casting her out all those years ago but refuses to accept her as a woman, saying that she wanted a son who would grow up big and strong to protect her. Elektra bitterly tells her that she's much fiercer as a woman than she ever would have been as a man and that she would have gladly protected Tasha if only Tasha would accept her for who she is. For a moment, Tasha considers taking her back but spoils the moment by saying that Elektra would have to be discreet. Elektra refuses to compromise who she is and thus takes the trunk and leaves. Presumably, this is the last time she and her mother ever spoke.
Take Me to Church
- Pray learns that he now has AIDS-related lymphoma. Because of his low white-cell count, he's not a good candidate for chemotherapy, and thus the doctor informs him that he has maybe six months to live.
- Pray gets a brief Hope Spot when Vernon proposes to follow him back to New York City in order to be with him in his final months, but when the time comes for Pray to get on the bus home, Vernon is nowhere to be seen.
Something Borrowed, Something Blue
- Lulu is still in the throes of addiction, and does not seem to be willing to stop.
- After a lavish, hopeful bachelorette party, Angel comes home to find Papi, who informs her that he's discovered that he has a son and intends to adopt him. Angel, unprepared for motherhood, is understandably upset and storms off.
Something Old, Something New
- Pray reaches the next step in his deteriorating health, as he loses the sight in his right eye. On top of everything else, he now faces the prospect of his fashion career ending.
- Angel's hopes of restoring her relationship with her father fade as she realizes that he's never going to see her as a real woman.
Series Finale
- In the first half, Pray finally gets access to a pharmaceutical cocktail, and his health dramatically improves. His vision is restored, his mobility starts to return, and he's finally able to get back to his life... and then Ricky shows up, panicking because he's gotten a Karposi's sarcoma lesion
on his chest, indicating that he's transitioning into AIDS. Unable to countenance the idea of Ricky dying, Pray starts passing him the cocktail, claiming that he had extra pills on hand, and Ricky takes them and starts getting better. But of course, there are no extra pills, and Pray finally succumbs to AIDS. The worst part? Ricky doesn't manage to piece together what happened until after Pray is already dead, and when he realizes where all those "extra" pills were coming from, he is devastated. - Everyone is torn up by Pray’s passing, but hearing Blanca scream and collapse into Ricky’s arms is absolutely heartbreaking.
- Seeing Ricky find Pray’s body and attempt CPR as he begs for him to come back.
- In part 2, the House of Evangelista joins an Act Up protest where they spread the ashes of loved ones lost to AIDS on the Mayor’s front porch. We see Blanca pour what’s left of Pray’s ashes (the rest were spread amongst his loved ones) as the police attempt to break up defiant protestors. All this is scored by The Gay Men’s Chorus (which Ricky has joined) singing a rendition of “The Man I Loved”.
