Maybe I should stay away from this topic -- since a commenter already gave me heck for posting an item about Chocolate Rain (the bizarre YouTube performance by Tay Zonday, also known as Adam Bahner) -- but I can't help myself. I know that paying attention to former child actors whose lives have descended into a blur of drugs and alcohol is pretty low, and even worse is watching those former child stars engage in the ritual of abasement and ridicule known as a "reality TV" show. Still, Corey Haim is Canadian, and so I feel a twinge of patriotic duty.

If you're like me (and I know I am), you probably remember the movie The Lost Boys, a somewhat goofy movie from 1987 about teen vampires that was elevated by some fine performances from a group of young actors, including Keifer Sutherland and Jason Patric. The movie also starred the two Coreys, Haim and Feldman -- although it would be stretching things to say that either of their performances were star calibre (in fact, they were mostly played for laughs, and seemed to exist primarily as foils for Patric and Sutherland).

Maybe it's the fact that his career is primarily associated with a movie called The Lost Boys, but it still seemed extra pathetic when Haim's career (such as it was) went off the rails and he was reduced to doing direct-to-TV movies such as Snowboard Academy and Demolition High. He developed a reputation for abusing drugs and alcohol, filed for bankruptcy in 1997 and by 2000 he was virtually unemployable. He did a bizarre interview for an entertainment show -- which someone has helpfully preserved on YouTube -- in which he was so stoned he was unintelligible.

The following year, he had a stroke as a result of a drug overdose and was briefly in a coma. At one point, he tried to sell one of his teeth (a molar) on eBay. He weighed close to 300 pounds and was taking 85 Valium a day.

Coming from those kinds of depths (there's lots more detail here and here, if you're interested), it probably seemed like a gift from God to get a "reality" show with his buddy called -- what else -- The Two Coreys. But for anyone who has watched it, it's an almost painful experience. Okay, it's a train wreck. Although the show is described as being"partially scripted," and Feldman told the New York Times that he and Haim were "in on the joke," the show still consists primarily of Corey Haim stumbling around like a moron while Feldman tries to settle him down.

Not that Haim appears to still be using drugs, necessarily. He just seems foggy and, well... not that bright. Possibly even brain-damaged.

One of the most cringe-worthy moments was on a recent episode when Feldman told Haim -- who was talking excitedly about making a Lost Boys sequel -- that someone was making a sequel, but Haim wouldn't be in it. From the reaction (there's a clip here), you would have thought Feldman had told the former child star that his dog had just died. It's possible that Corey Haim is such an incredible actor that he was able to fake the tears and obvious anguish, but I doubt it -- in which case, the fact that this moment might have been scripted seems extra humiliating.

It seems even more likely that the incident was scripted because a press release was just released saying that Haim will in fact be appearing in the sequel, which will (fittingly enough) be going direct-to-DVD. A step up for a recovered former child star -- or just another in a long series of humiliations for someone too addled and/or desperate to know any better? Hard to say.