True, the nerd doesn’t always get the love interest, but sometimes, they manage to do something even more important: completely steal the show away from the hero and earn the love of the audience. Run through a list of your favorite movies and TV shows - how often is the stereotypical uncool character the one you’re citing as your favorite?

Take “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.” for example. It’s undeniably Ferris’ movie - after all, his name’s right there in the title. But while Ferris is the one who instigates and propels the action, it’s really the story of uptight pal Cameron Frye (Alan Ruck) learning how to loosen up and have fun. At the end of the movie, Ferris is still the same fun loving slacker he always was, but Cameron has done a complete one-eighty. Not to mention that he gets all the fun lines, too.

Another favorite movie nerd is Anthony Michael Hall, one of the standing players from the John Hughes oeuvre. From Brian in “The Breakfast Club” to The Geek in “Sixteen Candles” Hall was everyone’s favorite brainy nerd who specialized in everything from stealing panties to purchasing a fake ID just to be able to vote. In “The Breakfast Club,” he wasn’t as abrasive as Judd Nelson’s Bender, and not a complete ass like Emilio Estevez’s Andy. Brian is the character that you respect and feel a little bit sorry for at the same time. He’s the one everyone can relate to.

Yes, the Nerd As A Sidekick theme is still alive and kickin’, but what happens when the nerd takes center stage on the silver screen? It’s a gamble. Sometimes you get Rick Moranis’s Seymour from “Little Shop of Horrors,” a caricature of a nerd complete with horn rimmed glasses, a pocket protector, and an obsession with plants that nearly leads to the destruction of the entire human race.

Other times, you get Peter Parker and the smash hit "Spider-Man."

If you don’t know the lore behind the web-crawler by now, it’s safe to say you’ve been living down a mineshaft, but just to recap it, “Spider-Man” is arguably the greatest Nerd As Hero movie of all time. By day, Peter Parker digs on science and photography, wears glasses, can’t speak to the popular girl of his dreams, and is to jocks what soccer balls are to David Beckham. By night, he’s the guy in the red and blue costume who swings through the city and brings the bad guys of New York to justice. Spider-Man is the guy everyone wants to be. In the end, though, it’s not the superhero persona that wins him Mary Jane’s heart - it’s the inner nerd who still gets just a little bit tongue tied every time she smiles at him.

Say what you will about nerds, but women these days seem to have quite the soft spot for them. In the “Saved By The Bell” days of the early '90s, Screech never quite managed to win Lisa Turtle over, but the times, they are a’changing. Fast forward to 2005 and the Fox hit “The O.C.,” where Summer Roberts is hopelessly smitten with raging geek Seth Cohen - just like every other American girl in the 12-to-dead age bracket. Ryan might be the show’s center, but Seth is the one with the best lines and the infinitely cooler girlfriend.

The brooding hero might be the guy everyone wants to be, but the nerd is the one everybody can relate to. The nerd is the character worth sticking around for, and ultimately makes the movie or TV show worth the time.

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