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If there was any doubt that the toolish Wil Wheaton character on The Big Bang Theory is a very fictionalized version of the real Wil Wheaton, well, read on, and that doubt won’t last much longer than anyone caught in the path of a phaser set to kill.
On The Big Bang Theory, Sheldon Cooper ranks Wil Wheaton as his sixth all-time enemy — his contempt for the Star Trek: The Next Generation actor dates back to a 1995 convention that Sheldon traveled to via 10-hour bus ride to meet his childhood hero, only to discover upon arrival that Wil Wheaton hadn’t shown up.
The real-life Wheaton wrote a post on his Facebook page Tuesday about a full weekend of meeting fans that was decidedly different from Sheldon’s no-show story. The post starts out as a rather familiar and typical story about the joy a life-long geek-turned-famous finds in paying it forward at conventions, meeting fans who stand in line for hours to get his autograph and to share their appreciation for his work, much as he did at conventions growing up. Wheaton explains that last weekend at MegaCon in Orlando, Fla., he met “dozens of people who told me that they were scientists, engineers, doctors, or programmers because they were inspired by Wesley Crusher.”
But his story turns worthy of a PopWatch post with the word “tearjerker” in the headline when Wheaton begins to recount one meeting with a fan “that stands out, that moved me so much, I’ve been struggling to find the right words to recount it.” He ends the post — about meeting a fan who recovered from illness and years later was well enough to come to his signing– by saying “I’m still overwhelmed when I think about what that means, and how I was part of it.” PopWatchers, grab a box of tissues and read an excerpt from his story below, then click over to Wheaton’s Facebook page for the full recounting: READ FULL STORY »
