After my positive experience with NYX’s Fat Oil Lip Drip, it was inevitable that I’d try the next product in the Fat Oil series: Fat Oil Slick Click, a balmy lipstick in click-pen form. I feel ambivalent about including this review in my Cheap Thrills series—$11 for two measly grams of lipstick is a mid-priced thrill at best—but alas, the days of $4 NYX lipsticks are well and truly behind us, and we must adapt to the times. (The days of long-form reviews on beauty blogs are also mostly behind us, but I’ll keep that flame alive as long as I can, damn it.)

I bought my two Slick Click shades, DM Me and Going Viral (all the shades have cringey social-media-related names) as replacements for two recent empties: NARS Sheer Lipstick in Dolce Vita and Etude House Dear Darling Water Gel Tint in Red Bean Red. “Why not repurchase those two products if you liked them enough to use them up?” you might ask. Well, frankly, because the allure of new shit was just too great. And, as I discovered while writing this post, I couldn’t have repurchased Dolce Vita even if I’d wanted to, since NARS discontinued its sheer lipstick formula with zero warning earlier this year! Ugh.

For size comparison, here’s Going Viral next to a Fat Oil Lip Drip bottle (the shade is Missed Call, another new purchase). You’d think NYX would have chosen a chubbier tube to go with the Fat Oil concept; the combination of the name and the slim stick creates some cognitive dissonance.

Here we have two swipes each of Going Viral (L) and DM Me (R), first in direct sunlight outdoors, then in indirect natural light indoors:

The first shade I picked up, just over a month ago, was DM Me, described by NYX as “lilac pink.” The tube happens to be a perfect match for my Lululemon bucket hat:

At Target, where I couldn’t swatch the lipsticks, I hesitated for a while between DM Me and That’s Major, a “mid-tone mauve.” I did a quick Google for swatches, but these days it’s hard to find a makeup swatch that isn’t filtered to hell. When I finally got home and opened the lipstick, I discovered that I’d chosen the wrong shade. DM Me looked like a mauvish shade in the tube, but on my skin, it was clearly pastel—much closer in color to NARS Sheer Lipstick in Roman Holiday, a cool candy pink, than to Red Bean Red. L-R, in indirect natural light: Roman Holiday, DM Me (two swipes), Red Bean Red:

However, I found myself wearing DM Me often in the next few weeks, and I ended up liking the formula enough that I returned to Target for Going Viral, described simply as “rose.” Had I been entrusted with the naming of these lipsticks, I probably wouldn’t have chosen to associate the concept of “viral” with anything a customer might put on their mouth, but whatever.

Unlike DM Me, Going Viral was exactly what I’d wanted: a sheer, elegant rosewood that brightened up my face instead of washing it out. Going Viral was, alas, not my first attempt to replace Dolce Vita, so I had several other MLBBs to compare it with. Below, L-R: NARS Sheer Lipstick in Falbala, MAC Lustreglass Lipstick in Hug Me, Going Viral, Bobbi Brown Crushed Lip in Brownie, NARS Sheer Lipstick in Dolce Vita:

DM Me and Going Viral are identical in packaging and almost identical in formula, so I’ll review them together for the rest of the post.

Packaging: In the last year, several brands have come out with sheer, moisturizing lipsticks in click-up packaging. (I recommend this detailed YouTube video comparing the NYX, Tarte, elf, and ColourPop versions.) The click-up tube seems to be an evolutionary branch of the slim lipstick, and I can’t see that it has any advantages—except maybe novelty—over a normal twist-up tube. I do like that cheeky neon-green button on the end, though. Also, am I just a pervert or does the typeface make the name look like “slick dick” at first glance?

Each Slick Click has a paper seal; make sure the seal of your chosen tube hasn’t been broken by some swatch-hungry raccoon person.

The new lipstick looks like this. It will probably take you several clicks to get it going, but after that, you’ll need two or three clicks per application.

When I tried my first click-pen lip product, Glossier Vinylic Lip, back in 2019, I noticed that when the tube got jostled around in my makeup bag, the end of the pen depressed and the gloss oozed into the cap. Luckily, I haven’t had that problem with the Slick Click pens (it helps that they contain solid lipsticks, not glosses). Overall, I don’t hate this packaging, but I don’t see the point, either. With a clicky lipstick, I can’t obsessively check how much product is left in the tube, and I can’t retract the lipstick if I click the end too many times. The twist-up lipstick is like the folio book: an enduring technology that’s hard to improve upon.

Formula: These lipsticks are part of NYX’s Fat Oil line, meaning that they should bear some resemblance to lip oils in texture and finish. Do they actually? Eh. If “Fat Oil” weren’t emblazoned across the tubes in neon green, I doubt I’d make the connection. The Slick Clicks contain oil, sure, but so does every other lipstick in the world. On my lips, Going Viral and DM Me feel less like lip oils than like the much-mourned Revlon Lip Butters: on the thick side and slightly tacky. The main resemblance between the two Fat Oil products lies in the pronounced berry scent, though the fragrance of the Slick Clicks is a little more subtle, fading after half an hour or so. The shine is mostly gone after an hour; the color lasts a couple of hours after that if I don’t eat or drink. (If I do, it starts coming off immediately.) I find myself having to reapply a few times if I wear one of the Slick Clicks for the whole day, especially now that it’s hot out and I’m drinking more water.

Here’s how they look on my lips just after application of two coats:

DM Me has a patchier formula than Going Viral, which I’d expect of a pastel lip shade. My lips are in their best condition in months, thanks to liberal use of a product I plan to review soon, but DM Me clings to every unevenness, while Going Viral smooths out the appearance of my lips. They are both moisturizing, though less so than the OG Fat Oils. The moisture doesn’t last after the color wears off, but they are comfortable to wear (if you don’t mind a slightly heavy-feeling sheer lipstick), and they certainly aren’t drying.

And now for some looks! DM Me is a nice complement to the light blue and lavender clothes I like to wear in the spring. Here it is with Urban Decay 24/7 Pencil in Mushroom and ColourPop blush in Night Bloom. As you can see, I had a dry patch on my lower lip that the lipstick failed to disguise.

And here’s Going Viral with two ColourPop products, Super Shock Shadow in Fruit Punch and powder blush in Flirt Alert, and my grandmother’s Gap denim overshirt from 1999:

These lipsticks are a solid B+ product for me. They don’t provide the “12-hour hydration” or the “non-sticky, shiny finish” that NYX claims, and I could do without the berry fragrance, but I like the formula enough that if I saw another shade I really liked, I’d consider buying it. In fact, when I was last at Ulta, I swatched a few others that caught my eye. L-R: Double Tap, No Filter Needed, Going Viral, Trending Topic, In a Mood (I know I’ll be sorely tempted by the last two come fall):

Finally, as if this post isn’t long enough already, a moment of writerly self-promotion! I have a creative nonfiction piece in the latest issue of Foglifter Journal, a San Francisco-based LGBTQ+ literary magazine. My essay, “The Usual Cause,” is about growing up in San Francisco in the shadow of the city’s HIV/AIDS crisis and, decades later, discovering an AIDS-related casualty in my own family. The issue is available for purchase now, so please check it out and support a great publication (and, by extension, me)!