Main cast: John Scott Clough (Brad Bender) and Lisa Jane Persky (Shirley Crater)
Director: Matthew Robbins

Brad Bender is the most popular jock in his high school and he knows it. He kisses his own reflection in the mirror the first thing every morning, and his athletic achievements have everyone from his mother to his teachers spoiling him silly and inflating his already overblown ego to the size of a blimp.

Well, he must be punished, and this happens when a freak encounter with a meteor turns him into a magnet, attracting all kinds of metals to his body when he’s not being pulled toward larger columns of iron.

The Main Attraction features the Hollywood version of magnetism, of course, with Brad’s newfound, er, Attraction only working when it’s convenient to embarrass him. However, this episode demonstrates that the biggest humiliation Brad has to face is having to succumb to the attractions of the nerd Shirley Crater that has a crush on him.

Yes, instead of having Shirley learn to love herself and stop pining for assholes that treat them like bird dung stuck in their hair, the show has Brad’s pinnacle shame being unable to swat away Shirley’s creepy attention.

The entire episode is all about exaggerated caricatures in a story that pretends to be a fun morality tale when it is actually a pretty cruel demonstration of the worthlessness of kids considered outcasts in school, worthy only of contempt and being punchlines for more popular kids.

The only bright spot here is John Scott Clough playing his role with gusto, making Brad seem like a more malicious Ferris Bueller on crack,  but still an entertaining one to watch nonetheless because of Mr Clough’s willingness to put in the physicality and comedy to make his more ridiculous scenes work. The fact that he’s very easy on the eyes doesn’t hurt either.

All in all, this is a shallow episode that tries but fails to be something more than what it actually is: a stupid joke.

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