Roger L. Simon » Who Killed The Kennedys?

Roger L. Simon » Who Killed The Kennedys (mini-series)?

Simon points out that just about everything you read about this mini-series is wrong. He's completely right. It has generally been circulated that it is a hatchet job. Nothing could be further from the truth. (I also watched all eight episodes.)

Simon notes:

"The Kennedys is tremendously respectful of JFK as a president. Indeed, the JFK it portrays is arguably one of the best presidents of the post-war period, if not of all time. In the three key events dramatized in the series — his taking personal blame for the Bay of Pigs fiasco, his steadfastness in supporting racial integration at the University of Mississippi and, of course, his resolute behavior in confrontation with Khrushchev in the Cuban Missile Crisis — the Jack Kennedy of The Kennedys is a superlative and courageous decision maker. This makes the miniseries oddly modern and heroic and pro-JFK."

Simon doesn't even go far enough. As positively as the series portrays JFK and Jackie, they seem like Doctor Doom and General Zod compared to Bobby and Ethel. This series portrays Bobby Kennedy as the single greatest person in the history of the universe, barely edging out his wife Ethel.

It also portrays Lyndon Johnson as a sensitive guy.

And it never mentions a word about Chappaquidick. (Ted Kennedy is not a character in the series.)

The only Kennedy portrayal that could be considered somewhat negative is Tom Wilkinson's Joe Kennedy, but there was absolutely nothing unfair about it. Joe was a man who had great positive qualities as well as great negatives. The mini-series shows them all with reasonable accuracy and balance, and Wilkinson does his usual outstanding job at making Joe human.