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There are an endless amount of TV heartthrobs who had Us swooning while their shows were on air \u2014 but some small-screen crushes aren\u2019t quite as lovable in hindsight.<\/p>\n
Mark-Paul Gosselaar\u2019s<\/strong> Zack Morris was an instant teen idol when Saved by the Bell<\/em><\/a> premiered on NBC in 1989. The series, which also starred Lark Voorhies<\/strong>, Tiffani Thiessen<\/strong>, Mario Lopez<\/strong>, Elizabeth Berkley<\/strong> and Dustin Diamond<\/strong>, followed Zack as he led his pals on adventures at California\u2019s Bayside High School. While his bleach-blonde hair, acid-wash jeans and snarky attitude made him a fan favorite at the time, his once-lovable schemes were eventually reevaluated as problematic.<\/p>\n Over the course of the show\u2019s four seasons, Zack\u2019s bad behavior included faking a terminal illness to win a kiss from his crush, body-shaming dates, dumping a girl for coming to his rescue in a fight and appropriating Native American culture, just to name a few. Gosselaar, however, found one particular early season 1 episode hardest to shoot.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was one where I was basically whoring out Lisa Turtle,\u201d he explained during a 2023 episode of the \u201cPod Meets World<\/a>\u201d podcast. \u201cI charged people to kiss her without her consent. That was a tough one, which we had to preface the episode by saying, \u2018We do not condone this. We\u2019re here just to discuss it, but this is in the past.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Titled \u201cThe Lisa Card,\u201d the episode centered on Zack trying to \u201chelp\u201d Lisa<\/a> as she panicked about going over her dad\u2019s credit card limit. In an effort to assist, Zack charged boys in their grade $1 each to \u201close their Lisa cards,\u201d i.e., kiss Lisa without her consent.<\/p>\n Saved by the Bell<\/em> returned with a revival<\/a> in 2021, with Zack as the elected governor of California who found himself in trouble after he closed down a bunch of low-income high schools and sent the students to higher-performing schools, like Bayside, instead. While Gosselaar told Entertainment Tonight<\/em><\/a> in 2020 that he couldn\u2019t \u201cwait\u201d to get back into character, he also admitted that Zack isn\u2019t the easiest person to portray.<\/p>\n