Harrison John

Harrison John is a principal character on Popular. He is portrayed by Christopher Gorham.

Character
Harrison is a sweet, smart, funny and insecure guy who's on the outskirts of the social hierarchy of high school. He has close friendships with Lily, Carmen and Sam, all of whom he grew up with. Harrison laments being the 'friend' instead of the boyfriend, wanting to social climb just to have a place in the school where he mostly feels invisible. Despite this, he does have solid relationships with his friends and they support each other through the ordeals of the popularity food chain.

Relationships
Sam and Harrison have known each other since they were kids. Though they are friends, there's a definite romantic subtext to a lot of their one-on-one conversations, like two friends becoming teens and possibly developing romantic feelings, though they never talk about it in the first few years of high school. Harrison harbours a life-long crush on his next-door-neighbour, Brooke, the most popular girl in school with whom Sam finds herself in a rivalry as Sam and Brooke's parents get together. This pushes any subtext closer to the surface over their sophomore year as Sam compares herself with Brooke and even asks Harrison if he thinks she's prettier than Brooke. Sam also teases Harrison about Brooke, and Carmen at one point mentions how Harrison always used to try and sneak into Carmen's house whenever Sam would sleep over when they were younger. Sam reacts to this embarrassed, as though she's aware of the unspoken feelings between herself and Harrison, and doesn't want Carmen or anyone to poke at it. All in all, they are best friends and call each other and are honest with each other. As Sam gets a serious boyfriend and Harrison gets together with Brooke, all of their unspoken feelings surface and they have to deal with them, which results in them kissing and Sam cheating on her boyfriend.
 * Sam McPherson