As many great queens as there have been on RuPaul's Drag Race, none made quite the impact of season four winner Sharon Needles. From the first time she stepped into the dressing room, Needles made it perfectly clear that she was unique and could only do things her own way. With a goth style influenced by Elvira and loads of horror movies, Needles could be scary at times, but she was always original and always true to herself. While she wasn't perfect (she had some issues with dance choreography at the end), some of her performances were the strongest in show history, including a "Snatch Game" appearance as assistant Drag Race judge Michelle Visage. Needles's main competition was pageant queen Phi Phi O'Hara, and unlike with most feuds on the show, the bad blood here was real. O'Hara's offensiveness, nastiness, and phoniness made it all the more satisfying when Needles defeated her, proving that to all viewers that it's okay to be yourself.
Scott Fried is a Slammy Award-winning* writer living and working in New York City. He has been following/writing about professional wrestling for many years and is a graduate of Lance Storm's Storm Wrestling Academy. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/scottfried.
*Best Crowd of the Year, 2013
