To Michael Oliver

Okay, this is going to be a serious post. No Big Ben Healy tomfoolery. Michael Oliver, we know you read this shit, just like you read everything else on the Internet. I'm sure you'll read this, and feel free to reply.

Owing entirely to the antics on this board (and ultimately to the queers on IMDB, which I haven't been a part of), I bought the Tantrum Pack last week. In fact, the queers on this board have taken a renewed interest in the Problem Child films since all this started. (You can thank us when your one dollar royalty check comes in.) I watched the two movies, and they were GREAT! And despite what you've said about fulfilling a "look", your acting was fantastic! I don't think that any other kid could have pulled the job off like you did.

So what the fuck happened?

Your mom pulled a Kit Culkin, held the studio up for payola, and fucked your career into the ground, it seems. Yet if you really wanted to continue acting, there was surely some outlet which you could have taken. Instead, you dropped off the planet, cementing Junior as the only thing that anybody outside of The Samples knows you to be. It's like a condensed version of Dustin Diamond's sadder and more queer-friendly career. You get points for not badmouthing your former castmates - but then again, half of them are dead, and Gilbert Gottfried is unassailable (though you handed him his ass in Problem Child, and Amy Yasbeck never starred in Showgirls, so you're kind of Dutched there. You've never appeared on a reality show in an attempt to revive your career, so you get BIG points on that. I hope you've never picked up a chick at an Arby's. Good work on all that.

Yet you paradoxically maintain this veneer of asshole paranoia about your public persona - which hasn't existed in fifteen years. You monitor every comment on the internet concerning you, and attempt to erase the ones you find offensive. Your article on Wikipedia contains a discussion page where you (or at least somebody who went by "RoadiePC") have commented, apparently trying to steer the tone of the article towards your sanitized version of things, made obvious by the complete omission of Universal's lawsuit until very recently. Not that Wikipedia isn't subject to bullshit from all angles (including us), on all subjects. But it's rather tasteless (and I'm an expert on tasteless).

Yeah, most people you meet are going to call you "Junior". But that's on you and your agent. The level which you monitor your public perception is completely unnecessary, and it is almost solely responsible for the creation of this board.
Unlike Screech, a lot of people LIKE what you've done. You never made a "Problem Child: The College Years", or "Problem Child: The New Class" (although that might have been Problem Child 3, which you ducked out of). There are many child actors with worse careers than you've had.

What makes our mockery of Dustin Diamond - which has gone on for the better part of a decade - so fun is in the way that he has responded to our bullshit with such anger. He attempted to sue our original queerboard, dustindiamond.com, and lost. It's only gotten worse since then. The creepy thing about our "fansites" is how much we know about the actors, and their shows. The Dustin Diamond contributors have an almost Trekkie-like obsession with Saved By the Bell. Yeah, we use it to proposition Screech into violently gay sex, but that doesn't take away from our dedication. To my knowledge, we're the only fansite you have.
We're assholes. Get used to it. But you could have fun with this.


Yours,

Big Ben Healy