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She'll make you scream

The Boulet Brothers' Dragula: Search for the World's Next Drag Supermonster is a reality competition show hosted by drag queen couple The Boulet Brothers, Dracmorda and Swanthula Boulet.

Dragula grew out of an amateur drag pageant hosted by the Boulets in Los Angeles, but Dragula the show, unlike a certain other drag-oriented franchise, celebrates the alternative drag scene and welcomes all drag artists so long as they adhere to the show's four pillars: Drag, Filth, Horror, and Glamour. Fake blood, slime, real insects, special effects prosthetics, sequins, and rhinestones all get equal billing on Dragula. The show also stands apart in that it gives a very fair and humane voice to its competitors, noting that they are normal people whose drag falls outside of the mainstream that has been established by its drag reality competition contemporaries, noting that drag is an art and art is subjective. Dragula also takes special care to avoid the over-production that some feel Drag Race has fallen prey to in more recent seasons; the Boulets are more than willing to insult competitors, call them out on their BS, and just generally have fun screwing around with them. Also unique about Dragula is that the show has been open to drag performers of any gender or sexual orientation: drag kings, trans queens, AFAB queens, non-binary performers, and anyone else who does drag as performance art can all get to compete and show their art to the world. Later seasons have also opened up the competition to contestants based outside of the United States, rather than relegating those competitors to their own international spinoffs.

Each week the contestants must prepare for the Floor Show, where they present an outfit to meet that week's theme which always calls back to Dragula's horror or subculture roots. Unlike its not spooky cousin, Dragula puts as much emphasis on the presentation of the outfit as the outfit's appearance as it is a floor show and not a runway presentation. Themes have ranged from something as simple as creating their own witch or zombie outfits to complex concepts like making their own heavy metal band to lip sync a song on stage, being the Kill the Cutie / Final Girl in their own slasher film, making an outfit out of trash and being unable to use anything but permanent marker for makeup, and designing a Weird West outfit combining the genre's Wild West and Science Fiction themes. One drag artist is judged as the winner of the week based on how their presentation met the challenge prompt, and at least two of the lowest performing artists are not just put up for elimination. They're put up for Extermination. They compete against each other in a challenge that wouldn't be out of place on a show like Fear Factor; contestants have been buried alive, made to eat insects and entrails, allowed leeches to drink their blood, stapled dollar bills to their body, tandem skydived out of an airplane, gotten tattooed, and made to stand in buckets of ice water the longest. The contestant who doesn't perform up to the Boulets' expectations in both the Floor Show and this challenge is then Exterminated, with the Boulets "killing" them in an over-the-top horror movie scene. The remaining contestants don't know who has made it through the challenge until the survivor or survivors show up in the Boudoir in the next episode. One by one, a drag monster is exterminated until only three are left, from which a winner is chosen... after the Grand Finale challenge, of course. For the Finale, the remaining ghouls must present three looks in the final Floor Show representing the show's core pillars of Glamour, Filth, and Horror. The winner is then crowned...and then drenched in blood.

Dragula premiered on October 31, 2016, as a pilot series for the Hey Qween! YouTube channel, before getting picked up by the Canadian OUTtv network for its second season onwards, while Prime Video and Netflix both distributed it in the US. Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic, 2020 saw the release of a feature length special called The Boulet Brothers' Dragula: Resurrection on the horror movie streaming service Shudder. The winner (and also the 1st runner-up) of Resurrection was guaranteed a spot on season 4, which premiered as a Shudder exclusive in October 2021. An All Stars season subtitled ‘’Titans’’ aired in 2022 in place of a regular season.

A character page is under construction.

Not to be confused with the Rob Zombie song of the same name.


Dragula provides examples of:

  • Abandoned Hospital: A hospital-themed challenge during Season 3 involves a photo shoot in one.
  • Actually Pretty Funny: After Orkgotik deliberately some of their drink on Jay Kay in the cauldron, Jay demands answers in the boudoir. They can't help but burst out laughing at Orkgotik's response with the rest of the cast.
    Orkgotik: You're always tell me I'm making you wet!
  • All of the Other Reindeer: Several of the Season 1 girls gave Loris this treatment, claiming she was not on the same level of talent as everyone else.
  • Ambiguous Situation: After the aliens episode of Season 2, there was a lot of speculation that Dahli deliberately failed her extermination. Abhora, who was part of the same extermination, speculated that Dahli had "martyred" himself to give Abhora a shot at winning. Resurrection cleared the ambiguity, with Dahli admitting that he gave up the extermination due to being overwhelmed with anxiety.
  • Ancient Conspiracy: Season 4's premiere episode had a vignette that implies that the Boulets have been running the Dragula competition, or some variation thereof, for hundreds of years, requiring blood sacrifices to appease them. This is however implied to just be a story made to sell their collectible Halloween masks within the vignette. Until people are compelled to put the masks on and hunt down new sacrifices. Such as that episode's two bottom competitors.
  • Anyone Can Die: A more literal example than what is usually seen in reality shows. At the end of each episode the exterminated queen is shown being "murdered" by the Boulets in a variety of creative ways.
  • Art Shift: The opening & extermination scenes for Season 4 Episode 8 are done in the style of a puppet show, with marionette versions of the Boulets and hand puppet versions of the contestants in their outfits from the challenge.
  • Ascended Meme: The reward for winning the Season 5 Episode 3 fright feat is the "Curse of the Teletubby Toilet Bowl" in reference to Kendra's memetic read of Yovska's entrance look in Titans.
  • Awesome, but Impractical: Niohuru X's "Drag Kaiju" look has a massive, articulated tail. The judges are impressed by the craftsmanship and the commitment, but the articulation means she can't get around on stage. She has to be carried by crew members to get onstage and over to the "Destroy the City" portion of the show, and Throb ends up "wheelbarrowing" her tail to help her onstage for the judge's critiques.
  • Awesome Moment of Crowning: The crowning at the end of each season is awesome enough on its own, but the blood drenching adds a Dragula twist to the moment.
  • Back from the Dead: In line with the aforementioned Anyone Can Die trope, the penultimate "Last Supper" episode of each season will see all eliminated contestants brought Back from the Dead to offer advice and critique to the surviving three contestants.
    • In the first two seasons, the pre-episode sketch of the Last Supper episode actually featured the Boulets performing a necromancy ritual to bring the contestants back. The Last Supper episode of the third season was more akin to a Reunion Show but the trope was still referenced.
    • Resurrection invokes this trope, with the main premise about bringing one of the contestants Back from the Dead to get a spot on the upcoming Season 4.
  • Bait-and-Switch: Used gloriously by the Boulets in Episode 6 of Season 2 to make the remaining queens (and the viewer) think Dahli is returning.
    "Dahli, please step forward..." (Dramatic Pause) "Nah just kidding, she's dead."
  • Be Yourself: Of course, the whole show is a dedication to drag artists performing without shoehorning themselves into more conventional types of drag. However, the Boulets will sometimes specifically invoke this trope if they feel a contestant is trying to appeal to the Boulets' sensibilities at the cost of their true selves. Disasterina from Season 2, Evah Destruction from Season 3, both Merrie Cherry and Jade Jolie from Season 4, and both Blackberri and Onyx Ondyx from season 5 all received such feedback.
  • Beach Episode: The main challenge of Season 4 Episode 2 invokes one of these. This being Dragula, however, it's a Nosferatu Beach Party.
  • Bloody Horror: This trope is played straight more often than not, given the show's focus on horror, filth and macabre. The Vampire challenges of Season 3 and Resurrection especially invoke this.
  • Bookends: The vignettes at the start of each episode become this in season 4, with the result being the reveal of the Extermination victim for that episode.
  • Breakfast Club: As HoSo observes in Episode 7 of Season 4, the entire top 5 of the season is comprised of people who are marginalized in the world of alternative drag, what with Saint being a Black person, Zavaleta a Mexican person, HoSo an East Asian person, Sigourney a cisgender woman, and Dahli a non-binary genderfuck drag artist.
  • Catchphrase: The Boulets (specifically Dracmorda) greet the contestants at the beginning of each episode with "Hello, uglies!"
    • Drac and Swan will usually say some variation of "Now, let's dim the lights, start the music, and let the Floor Show begin!" before each Floor Show.
    • Before every judging session, Drac rattles off the disclaimer "We are not here to judge your drag. Drag is art and art is subjective. What we are judging you on is your drag as it relates to the competition and the challenges we put before you."
    • Attention Competitors. The Floor Show Is About to Begin.note 
  • Continuity Cameo: The Boulets will bring back ghouls from previous seasons from time to time. The reigning winners have appeared as guest judges in the season following theirs, with Vander showing up again in season 3 to judge, along with some fun unique returns:
    • Meatball shows up in the Season 2 finale in a gag out of Scooby-Doo.
    • Disasterina is brought on as a Fashion Correspondent in Season 3 Episode 5.
    • Vander Von Odd and Biqtch Puddin appear in the "ritual" before the Season 3 Grand Finale.
    • Kendra Onixxx has a cameo, albeit masked, in the Season 4 Premiere's opening vignette.
    • Biqtch Puddin has a cameo in the Season 4 Episode 4 opening vignette dressed up in her winning Janitor Filth look.
  • Crew of One: Resurrection was filmed with a skeleton (pun intended) crew of five people due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, comprising just the Boulet Brothers and three of their production team.
  • Cruel to Be Kind: Downplayed. Drac keeps the pressure on Victoria Elizabeth Black in season 2 to improve herself and come out of her shell until the end. When she meets the Boulets in their private box, Drac admits that while both brothers liked Victoria from the start, they didn't think she would be pushed to improve herself the way she did if she didn't have some critiques of her performances. Since this was just before the finale with Victoria in the final 3, it's safe to say it worked well.
  • Curb-Stomp Battle: The extermination challenge for the Ghost Town episode of Season 2 involves a paintball duel, with Kendra Onixxx going against James Majesty. Kendra, a former soldier, immediately snaps to her training, takes a proper firing stance and pelts James with bullet after bullet before James even has a chance to take a shot. The contestants later lampshade the unfairness of the fight.
  • Dark World: Invoked in the death scene of Season 5, episode 4 where Jarvis Hammer finds themselves in a darkened, empty and black-and-white version of the stage, with the editing implying they were transported there from the "real" world. The Boulets confirm this in their podcast and explain that they intended all the deaths of the season to be taking place in the same shadow realm.
  • Drag Queen: The name of the game like RuPaul's Drag Race, with its roots being a competition the Boulets held at their parties at the club Precinct in Los Angeles. But unlike Drag Race, Dragula focuses on the alternative drag scene where the performance is just as important as the look. Instead of a runway, there's a floor show. And blood, guts, and other bodily fluids and viscera get as much air time as sequins and rhinestones. Dragula also sets itself apart from Drag Race in its inclusivity of all types of drag performers of any gender or sexuality.
    • Season 1's winner Vander Von Odd has since come out as trans femme and non-binary. Ursula Major is also the franchise's so far only bearded queen, sporting a full beard in all her looks.
    • Season 2's Disasterina identifies as "heteroflexible", as out of drag he is in a straight marriage. Winner Biqtch Puddin' has since incorporated more androgyny and genderfuck in their drag by incorporating her real moustache in her drag looks in 2021 onward.
    • Season 3 featured two AFAB performers: the non-binary drag artist Hollow Eve of Destruction and drag king Landon Cider who identifies as a lesbian cis woman and ultimately won the season. It also featured the AMAB non-binary performers Maxi Glamour and Yovska, who were open about their drag not really conforming to binary gender roles like Hollow Eve.
    • Resurrection brought back Season 2's Dahli who began incorporating more gender ambiguous looks into his/their drag with an exaggerated cartoonish black moustache as part of his/their signature look and Season 3's Priscilla Chambers had since come out as a trans woman and made this identity a prominent feature of her Ghost Floor Show by portraying a murdered trans sex worker.
    • The press for Season 4 went out of its way to make sure viewers knew how the cast described their drag styles and what their preferred pronouns were, with most of the cast preferring they/them in some combination with or exclusively from she/her and/or he/him, such as Formelda Hyde (he/they), Koco Caine (they/them only), Saint (he/she/they), and La Zavaleta (she/they). Some uniquely identifying cast members were trans woman Bitter Betty, trans-femme and nonbinary "Drag Youkai" HoSo Terra Toma, "female impersonator impersonator"note  Sigourney Beaver, and the return of Dahli.
    • The press for Season 5 continued the trend of making sure pronouns and styles were made clear from the top. Notable cast members include trans woman Fantasia Royale Gaga and the nonbinary Throb Zombie and Jay Kay.
  • Eat That: At least one extermination challenge each season involves eating a disgusting meal. Past courses include cow brains for a zombie-themed challenge, an extraterrestrial-seeming for an alien-themed challenge, and cow's blood for a vampire-themed challenge.
    • Episode 1 of Season 3 has a mini-challenge where Landon Cider is forced to eat live spiders for losing a random draw.
    • Jade Jolie eats maggots for the first floor show of Season 4.
    • Season 4 episode 2 saw a "Fright Feat" challenge where every contestant had to eat a whole head of garlic and then wash it down with (ethically sourced) pig's blood the fastest to set up the teams in that week's Floor Show.note 
  • Embarrassing Tattoo: Victoria and Kendra had to get these as a part of one extermination challenge. The following season Hollow, Maddelynn, and Yovska had to get them as part of the same challenge. After being absent is Season 4, the next season brought it back with a twist, being that the tattoos were raunchy American tattoos.
  • Evil Slinks: While not evil, Vander's moves have a very serpentine flavor to it, serving to enhance the creepy and monstrous elements of her drag. The Boulets have expressed fascination about the way she moves on multiple occasions.
  • The Faceless: Except for the first season, Dragula has featured a masked drag queen on each season, with their unique masks being an integral part of their drag persona. Season 2's Monikkie Shame was never seen without her mask on the show,note  while subsequent masked queens Yovska and Formelda Hyde at least appeared out of drag without masks, with Yovska presenting a few looks that did not incorporate a mask. These drag artists also have to contend with the Self-Imposed Challenge of having their masks limit their ability to express themselves during performances, which has led to a so-called "curse" on masked queens getting eliminated early on.
  • Face Your Fears: Many extermination challenges involve this. The casting application even asks would-be contestants what they fear.
    • The first extermination challenge of Season 3 involves the bottom two jumping out of a plane at 18,000 feet. As it turns out, this is one of Violencia!'s greatest fears and she almost quits the competition over it, but agrees to go to the air field after receiving encouragement from all the other contestants. Ultimately Subverted: she gets out of the plane at the last second before takeoff, and is exterminated as a result.
    • Louisianna Purchase is afraid of needles despite having tattoos and piercings. She admits that she usually faints and has trouble handling the pain. When the Season 3 Episode 7 challenge for the queens stapling dollar bills to their bodies is announced, it looks like she may bail out like Violencia! did. Not only does she go through with it, she manages to staple herself to the point of fainting. It is probably the reason why she survives the elimination.
    • Shortly after Season 3 aired, Kendra Onixxx had a freak accident during a fire breathing performance, leaving her hospitalized with severe second degree burns over most of her face. Despite these experiences, she included a fire performance in her Ghost floorshow for Dragula: Resurrection, explicitly invoking this trope as her goal.
    • Season 4 begins with an extermination challenge that all the ghouls must participate in: going through an extreme haunted house. At one point, a truck speeds toward the group before crashing into a barrier just in front of them. This sends a shock through Astrud's system, as she had been in a traumatic car crash a few years before that nearly left her dead.
    • The first proper extermination challenge of Season 4 sees the bottom 2 being buried alive. La Zavaleta freaks out at having to do this, and reveals the last time she was in a cemetery was to bury her sister. She survives the extermination.
  • Fake Video Camera View: In Season 4, the transition from the main stage to the cauldron inexplicably uses this effect.
  • Final Girl: While the Season 2 queens don't play straight-up final girls for the "slasher movie victim" challenge (given that dying on camera was part of the challenge), matching the energy of the typical slasher movie final girl is part of the brief.
  • Freeze-Frame Bonus: The opening sketch of Episode 7 of Season 2 has the Boulets playing chess with four pieces representing the final four contestants. If you look closely, you'll notice the knight piece has a miniature pointy nose made out of paper, representing Abhora.
  • The Friend Nobody Likes: Almost every season has at least one monster with a penchant for starting drama who the rest of the cast can barely stand.
    • Abhora's initial clash with Biqtch Puddin about past issues starts most of the drama in the season, and their distant, cold attitude didn't help matters. He did, however, have a Heel Realization toward the end of the season and ended up genuinely redeemed in the eyes of their competitors.
    • Dollya Black came out swinging, starting drama with about half the cast while calling out others for talking about her behind her back. When she tries to be nicer, nobody really seems to trust her on it.
    • La Zavaleta is openly abrasive for most of their season, being the main source of chaos in the infamous Ghost Ship Glamour Cauldron. Like Abhora, she does realize she's been being a bitch and start to walk it back after that.
    • Jay Kay's reads of everyone else come across as mean instead of funny, and their refusal to hear criticism puts everyone else on edge around them. No one seems particularly sympathetic or sorry when Orkgotik spills some of their drink on them. It's telling that part of the reason they were brought on the show was that La Zavaleta called them "the most annoying person in Brooklyn" on Instagram.
  • Funny Back Ground Event:
    • Meatball makes some amazing reaction faces during the deliberation session of Season 1's Pretty In Pink episode.
    • During the Last Supper episode of Season 2, Monikkie Shame can be seen fidgeting at her seat, repeatedly adjusting her clothes, her mask, her wig and her microphone. At some, she seems to lean away to communicate with someone off-stage while the camera makes a pointed effort to keep her out of the shot. It is clear that she is experiencing some sort of Wardrobe Malfunction but the nature of it is unclear. Once whatever issue she is having is sorted, she takes a big swig of her wine.
  • Ghost Town: Once a Season the queens will be taken to one in the desert for the week's challenge. Part of the difficulty is attempting to perform in the sand and extreme heat.
  • Haunted Technology: The ending of Resurrection shows each contestant receiving a video cassette. When played, the cassette will show images of the Bouletsnote  and cause Psychic Nosebleed-induced deaths on all but the winning contestant. Or maybe contestants.
  • Hollywood Exorcism: The "Exorsisters" acting challenge culminates in one of these, complete with foreign-language chanting and passionate cries of "I CAST YOU OOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUT".
  • How We Got Here: Dahli provides a hilarious moment of this at the beginning of Season 4, Episode 5's cauldron via Confession Cam.
    Dahli: So...today's cauldron is just a big fucking hot mess. So, so far we have Saint, completely upset about their critiques even though they're in the top, [...] we have HoSo, thinking this is complete bullshit, [...] nobody's congratulating Sigourney on her win, [...] and whatever the fuck Jade and Zavaleta are doing. [...] Let's take a look at how this all started, shall we?
  • Hypocritical Humor: An unintentional example. Landon Cider's "Haunted Hospital" look is a Mad Doctor who eats his patients' brains to gain their intelligence. The medical textbook he carried out with him is titled "Hunger for Inteligence". The judges call him on the error, but he gets away with it because it kind of makes sense in context.
  • Lighter and Softer: One of the main fan complaints about Season 3 was that the extermination challenges, death scenes, and general show content was all tame in comparison to that of the first two season. Especially noteworthy because show dropped from a TV-MA rating to a TV-14 rating for the third season.
  • Love Triangle: Titans features a significant one between HoSo, Astrud, and Abhora. Abhora is significantly attracted to HoSo, and while HoSo admits to having a deep admiration for Abhora, she is also extremely flirtatious with Astrud, which upsets Abhora. The tension between the three takes up a significant amount of screen time in every episode up until Abhora's elimination.
  • Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: There seems to be something of a running gag in Season 5 where a contestant will make a prediction or express a wish, only for it to come true with uncanny accuracy. It leaves the Boulets wondering if some of the cast actually do have magic powers.
    • Perhaps the most notable example is the first part of the Monsters of Rock challenge. At the start of the episode, Orkgotik off-handledly mentions they are trying to cast a curse on Jarvis Hammer for putting them up for extermination in the previous episode. The episode ends with Jarvis unexpectedly eliminated in a sudden death challenge. After the episode aired, the Boulets wondered if the Orkgotik's curse actually worked.
  • Mood Dissonance: In the Cauldron segment following the Hairy Monsters challenge, Jade explains to the others that her cat had to be put down the night before. It's a tender moment as everyone offers comfort to Jade... and then cuts to a confessional of Zavaleta saying she feels like an asshole because she was wearing a cat costume.
  • Mood Whiplash: In Resurrection Kendra finishes her extremely-emotional interview about her fire accident with a Self-Deprecation joke about how she'll probably burn herself on camera again.
  • Monster Clown: Several make an appearance each season.
    • Meatball's Season 1 promo look.
    • James Majesty's Season 2 Finale "Horror" look.
    • Evah Destruction's Season 3 promo look, which was based on her appearance on America's Got Talent and a viral performance at Atlanta Pride.
    • The basis of Season 4’s “Killer Clown” challenge.
  • Mr. Fanservice: The show features a few.
    • Israel, the Boulets' manservant revels in this, always appearing shirtless and sometimes down to wearing nothing but a loincloth. The behind-the-scenes episode of Season 1 even had him give a small show for the audience, with the Boulets acknowledging this trope. Unsurprisingly, most of the cast has a Squee reaction to his appearances.
    • Dahli was admired by his castmates during his initial appearance on Season 2, but the fans came to admire him for his return in Resurrection and Season 4 with his new confidence and markedly no-longer feminine drag persona. Dahli however is surprised by this as he believes his new drag persona to be asexual.
    • Landon Cider, as the franchise's first drag king, serves exaggerated but still conventionally-handsome masculine looks in drag. One of his go-to sayings as a show host is, "All the gay boys want to suck my sock." His "sexy werewolf daddy" look in the Halloween episode was also an instant hit with both audiences, the judges, and some of his castmates who all felt conflicted as out of drag Landon is a cisgender lesbian woman, while Swanthula, guest judge Rachel True, and fellow castmate Priscilla Chambers all considered themselves exclusively attracted to men.
  • My Greatest Second Chance: In addition to Saint and Dahli coming back for Season 4, the season also features Jade Jolie from RuPaul's Drag Race Season 5 as the first Ru Girl to compete on Dragula. What makes her inclusion surprising though is that she started out as a mainstream drag queen who found her niche as a Taylor Swift impersonator, unlike some of the more alternative queens who have appeared on Drag Race over the years.
  • Negated Moment of Awesome: Loris' heartfelt speech about eating pig brains (as part of an extermination challenge) was punctuated by her ripping her prosthetic mask off before proceeding with the challenge. At least that was the plan. Unfortunately, the prosthetic didn't come off when she yanked it, forcing her to peel it off bit-by-bit even as the rest of the challengers were close to the end of the challenge. It turned the whole thing from awkward to Cringe Comedy.
  • Non Sequitur: The opening sketches, which focus on the Boulet Brothers and their adventures, typically have no relevance or bearing to the rest of the episode.
    • Sometimes, the theme of the sketch will relate to the challenges. For instance, the Boulets killing someone while acting the part of an amusement part fortune teller will segue into a competition about amusement park freak-shows.
    • There were signs early in Season 1 that the sketches were intended to present a continuous season-long story taking place within the context of the competition. If so, it looks like this idea was abandoned.
  • Noodle Incident: It is never explicitly mentioned that Jade was originally on Drag Race. Likely at the request of the producers, she refers to it as "that other show" the few times the subject comes up. Given Small Reference Pools, it's expected that if someone is watching Dragula, they likely already know where Jade is from.
  • No Periods, Period: One Season 3 episode involved making outfits out of trash. Hollow Eve created an outfit made of menstrual pads and tampons which was criticized by the judges for not going far enough. After the episode aired, Hollow revealed on social media that they originally wanted to use used bloody pads and tampons for their outfits, but due to TV production rules, were barred from doing so by the producers, including not being allowed to use the color red in their makeup. This was especially egregious, considering the fact that Hollow keeping used tampons in the cast's communal freezer was a plot point earlier in the season.
  • Once an Episode: Every deliberation session from Season 3 onwards starts with the Boulets reminding the contestants that they are not here to judge the contestants' drag and that "drag is art and art is subjective". It is likely no coincidence that Season 3 also marked the point of the competition expanding its horizons to more alternative forms of drag.
  • Out of Focus: Felony Dodger was the first out of Season 2, and barely got any screen time in the one episode she was in due to the Monikkie vs. James and Abhora vs. Biqtch storylines happening in that episode. Her lack of focus was lampshaded by the Boulets during the opening sketch of the reunion episode: while looking over the bodies of all the exterminated contestants, Dracmorda pauses in front of Felony and goes, "Who the fuck is this?"
  • Pass the Popcorn: The Monsters who don't involve themselves in on-going drama or who somehow manage to stay out of it often have this attitude, sometimes down to actually making a popcorn eating gesture.
    • In Episode 7 of Titans, Hoso somehow manages to stay out of a massive argument in the Cauldron, pointledly zipping her mouth and watching the on-goings while offering snarky commentary.
    Hoso: The sound bites are popping today
    • In Season 5's Monsters of Rock challenge, the team led by Orkgotik has some of the biggest personalities of the season, including the resident drama magnet, Jay Kay. When the team falls into an argument right after announcing they are calling a truce, the rival team all make popcorn-passing gestures as they enjoy the show.
  • Pink Is Feminine: All seasons feature a Glamour-focused challenge, but in season 1 they specifically had a "Pretty, Pink, Fishy Drag" challenge where the queens were challenged to present a femme pink outfit.
  • Pro Wrestling Episode: The second challenge of Season 1 was to make an 80's Female Wrestler drag performance, complete with a mud wrestling extermination challenge.
  • Reality Show Genre Blindness: Throughout the history of the "ATTENTION COMPETITORS" gag, the monsters' appearances have always changed radically from when they first hear the announcement to when they actually hit the stage, so it's pretty clear to anyone who's watched the show that it's not a real warning. Despite this, in every season since the introduction of this gag, the new batch of monsters seem to have no idea what's going on and start complaining that they're not ready once the sirens begin.
    • This could also be applied to anyone who wears Club Kid boots, the Boulets' least favorite accessory, on the main stage.
  • Real Life Writes the Plot: The Boulets admitted that the main premise of Resurrection, with the crew visiting the homes of each cast member and getting to know them better, would probably not have worked during normal times. The COVID-19 Pandemic, however, offered the perfect opening to hold a contest in this format.
  • "The Reason You Suck" Speech: As drag artists, the contestants are naturally inclined towards this trope. However, the penultimate "Last Supper" episode of each season seems to be specifically tailored for this. In those episodes, all the eliminated contestants are brought Back from the Dead to give one last flurry of criticism to the surviving top three. Oftentimes, they also offer genuine, heartfelt advice.
  • RPG Episode: The fourth challenge of Season 3 had the competitors creating characters based around randomly-rolled races and classes, and go LARPing in the woods as these characters.
  • Running Gag: Starting in Season 2, at some point in the first episode of every season, someone will say "Welcome to Dragula, fuckers!" note 
  • Shout-Out: Many are made to classic horror movies.
    • The very first challenge involved recreating the death of the Wicked Witch of the West.
      • Abhora's death sequence also referenced this.
    • During each season's finale, upon receiving their crown the winner is drenched in blood, a la Carrie.
    • Biqtch Puddin' took her name from the Robot Chicken character of the same name.
    • Biqtch's gothic bride look very deliberately bore a strong resemblance to JonBenét Ramsey.
    • The opening sequence of Season 2's reunion episode involves the Boulets getting involved in a Scooby-Doo-style chase sequence with Meatball.
    • Also during the reunion episode, Swanthula references their sister show with the line "If you can't hate yourself, how in the hell are you gonna hate somebody else?" Complete with an Aside Glance.
      • Priscilla also references Drag Race during her first extermination, asking "Can't I just lip sync for my life?"
      • Titans' likewise has Abhora enter by calling out Laganja Estranga's famous "Oh, y'all wanted a twist?"
    • The Boulet's Final 2 outfits of Season 2 are both based on looks from The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
    • Maddelynn Hatter's extermination was a shot-for-shot recreation of that episode's guest judge Milly Shapiro's death scene in Hereditary.
    • Season 4's first Floor Show was all about this, with the challenge being to pay tribute to a horror icon.
    • When Vanessa Hudgens guest judges on the second episode of Season 4, she says "I'm so into blood right now", referencing her line "I'm so into voguing right now" that went viral after her appearance on Drag Race.
    • After surviving an Extermination Challenge on Season 4, Jade Jolie proclaims, "She's back! Rolls."
    • Season 4 had an acting challenge called The Exorsisters.
    • The "Killer Clowns" episode from Season 4 contains a few references to the challenge's inspiration, Killer Klowns from Outer Space.
    • Season 5 had a "Trash Can Children" challenge that was a clear reference to the Garbage Pail Kids
    • At one point in Season 5, Throb Zombie compares Niohuru X and Orkgotik to Morticia and Gomez Addams, right down to likening the Addams' dynamic to the driven, focused Niohuru and the smitten Orkgotik.
  • Slasher Movie: A Season 2 challenge had the queens creating and starring as the victims in these.
  • Sliding Scale of Silliness vs. Seriousness: The Final Five of Season 4 ran into this issue during the Exorsisters acting challenge. Given the script was a parody of The Exorcist, the cast played it as tongue-in-cheek and over the top during rehearsal. Peaches Christ, their acting coach, attempted to dissuade them from not playing it serious at all, pointing out that even campy horror movies have a certain level of earnestness to them. The end product is much more toned down than the rehearsal, but is still closer to a comedy horror short than proper horror. The Boulets admitted during deliberations that they were disappointed with the direction the scene went in. They also stated on their podcast that they had intended for the scene to be 100% serious, and that Season 5 will likely contain a serious acting challenge to make up for this.
  • So Bad, It's Good: Invoked by Dahli regarding Niohuru X's guitar skills during Season 5's Monsters of Rock Part 2. Dahli notes that the guitaring was already bad from the get go but somehow got progressively worse as the performance went on, reaching a point where they just couldn't take their eyes off it.
  • Stern Teacher: The Boulets are harsh, but fair in their critiques. While they give the queens hell in the challenges and exterminations, they want the contestants to face their fears, endure, and grow as performers and people.
  • The Stinger: Unusually for a reality TV show, following the credits of Resurrection Dahli is shown waking up after seemingly getting killed by the Boulets' killer video tape sent to all of the other competitors. Fans were left guessing at the meaning until he was introduced as the 11th competitor for Season 4.
  • Surf Rock: "Gothic Surf-a-rama" by the Vampire Beach Babes, the song used for the Nosferatu Beach Party challenge.
  • Take That!: Frequently to RuPaul's Drag Race - while Dragula admits to being influenced by Drag Race, and they have Friendly Fandoms by virtue of their similar premises, Dragula does like to take shots at their friendly rival every now and then.
    • Drag Race is infamously teeming with Product Placement, best represented by its title sequence that emphasizes that all of the winner's prizes are "courtesy of [sponsor]". Dragula, however, does not rely on sponsors as heavily as Drag Race, and in Dragula's title sequence, the Boulets instead say the prizes are "courtesy of us."
    • In Season 4, Episode 6, Dracmorda makes a point of saying that, despite being a drag legend, she is entirely self-sufficient in her drag and does all of her own hair, makeup, and styling - a likely shot at RuPaul, who enlists Drag Race alumnae to style her on her show.
  • Team Mom: Even though drag queens can be vicious, some of the contestants will try to take this role for their fellows.
    • Louisianna Purchase is often seen providing emotional support for a fellow contestant who is up for extermination.
    • Erika Klash qualifies as a sort of Team Sister. She refrained from taking sides, tried to understand all sides of a drama unfolding and took pains to mediate conflicts while avoiding pettiness. Biqtch declaring that Erika should be eliminated was viewed by everyone else as a Kick the Dog moment, as Erika gave Biqtch support when nobody else would.
  • Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Played gloriously straight in the Season 1 finale with Vander's Filth Floor Show. And that wasn't special effects either.

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