User Reviews

This should go down in the annals of absolute schlock. Not quite up to the quality of "The Crown", to put it mildly. This dreck belongs on Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Matthew Perry is horrendous in every scene he is in. What fool producer cast him in this mess (oh, never mind)?

Katie Holmes reprises her vapid Jackie-in-a-haze performance as one of only two characters in the entire production that show any redeemable qualities - and her back-and-forth from "I'm in the family" to "I am not in the family" make absolutely no sense.

If 10% of the script is true, Ted Kennedy should have spent many years in prison. His late night call to the front desk of a motel after the car crash is completely moronic. His portrayal of calling the women dumb names like "Joansy" and "Jacksy" are nothing more than annoying. Not clever or "inside Ted", just dumb.

A great scene is where Ted learns that a girl dies from cancer and her parents went broke trying to pay for care. He is an oblivious boob, but this becomes his "calling in life". Which he never fulfilled.

Another where this boob blows any chance to beat Carter for the Democratic nomination (typically through his own stupidity); he bring "Joansy" down to DC to speak for him (she was going to AA twice a day at the time), and then, when he blows it, it drives her to the airport and embraces his mistress while old "Joansy" is sitting in the car. What a great human being!

Ethel is portrayed as a psycho witch, believing she has a Kennedy birthright. Crazier than Old Lady Rose.

Joan is almost likable (if you leave out that she was dumb enough to get involved with Ted and was a lush).

Onassis is almost likable as portrayed (if you overlook his Mediterranean views toward women, his ongoing affair with Maria Callas, and best of all, his psycho shrine to Jackie).

John John is a boob. Flunks and flunks, then flunks some more, then decides he should run for office. He has good hair.

Caroline isn't in this, other than briefly as a child. Must have decent lawyers.

The show ends abruptly with John John and wife getting on a plane. Not the trip that killed them, but just another less eventful trip they planned to take. The closing credits allude to the later crash.

I am only giving this a bad review because it was 4 episodes rather than 8 as the previous series from 2011 was. This series was so short that it did not include any of the following 1-they should have explained why Teddy did not run in either 1972 or 1976. Even it was only due to the 1969 auto accident and fatality it should have been explained 2-Teddy's run for President in 1980 was accurate but extremely short. His losses during the primaries should have been explored and offering a clearer reason why he lost.

3-No Caroline Kennedy at all. She got married in 1986 and was a big part of her mother's life.

4-no mention of any of the other cousins to John Jr. including the infamous trial of William Kennedy Smith. I believe that trial changed Teddy and from 1991 to 2009 he was more on the straight and narrow 5-No mention of Victoria Reggie's Tedddy's wife until his death 6-no mention of Jackie dating Maurice Templesman shortly before she became terminally ill. She was very close to him at the time of her death in 1994 7-John, Jr's plane crash should have been a one hour episode alone.

8- Teddy's own cancer battle should have been explored in the final hour as the final moment of the mini series. His funeral in 2009 and burial at Arlington, not far from his brothers 9-At some point during the mini series the bizarre behavior of the Kennedy Cousins should have been explored. One Death from Drug Use, One Death during a Ski Accident on 12-31-97. Scandal causing Joe the 3rd to not run for higher office. Another one arrested for driving while under medication, etc.

I think Matthew Perry was okay as Teddy, not great, Katie Holmes was awesome as Jackie. Plus Kristin Booth was very interesting as the evil Ethel.

The series needed to be longer and it would have been as soon as the one from 2011

The first series last yr about the Kennedy's was a 10 star series but this one sadly fell flat. Matthew Perrys portrayal of Ted Kennedy was not good at all. He was like a fish out of water. At least the other actors resembled the people they were portraying. I think Katie Holmes did an excellent job in both last yrs series and continued on with this series. I don't understand why they short changed after Camelot with this very short series. I was so looking forward to it only to be disappointed how quickly they went thru things that happened in their lives. Not much about the marriage to Ari and much to do about pretty much nothing in regards to John John. The only reason I didn't give it one star was because they did do a little better in regards to Chappaquiddick but not much. It seems someone in the Kennedy family most likely Ethel pulled the plug on this one because after last yrs the Kennedy series I was expecting so so much more and I have to think so was Katie Holmes..what a shame.

**** Spoiler ***** What? Could they not find an actress willing to play her? It is so totally unbelievable that Jackie's death would have Ethel and Joan but not Caroline! Why did only John and Carolyn get in the plane at the end but not her sister? This made the ending so hokey for me.

Telling some truths about the elite Kennedy's?

It actually showed what a scumbag and coward was, yet the clueless still kept voting for him and celebrated his life. It showed his involvement with the death of a young girl and the power they have to coerce and cover up the truth. Even using the church to assist them. Granted, they did try to show him as redeeming himself a bit in the last installment. This would not be made in today's Hollywood. The sycophants hang on every work that their elite masters regurgitate into their mouths. Do they not realize if this went on back then, it is going on tenfold today. And yet they are in denial.

A very bad for television show concluded last night ---- the surely high rated The Kennedys: After Camelot.

[ I've watched it and this is a review of sorts ]

No one can think that JFK or the Kennedy administration was composed even of decent men let alone heroes.

Beginning at the top these people were bums of the highest ( or lowest ) order.

There is a "halo" which protects each assassinated US president.

Many years ago famed British journalist and historian Alistair Cooke made that observation.

Cooke didn't live long enough to watch the 2 part bubblegum chewing TV travesty which concluded last night.

The worst thing about shows so nonsensical is that they repeatedly peddle the nonsense that somehow Kennedys ( in the JFK age )stood for something good and noble.

JFK stood for nothing.

Idiocy knows no political affiliation and doesn't spare those populations which think they cling to a proper ideology and are "pure" in some way.

Idiocy is no more obvious than in any American who believes that John Kennedy even was a passable human being, let alone a good and decent president.

He was a bum. And, granted the power of the presidency, he was a mass murdering thug.

He ordered multiple murders of foreign heads of state...the list of his inadequacies and obvious moral shortcomings is much longer than I care to detail here.

Actually, the details long have been available to anyone who wants to do anything actually so easy as simply to read the details in long available sources .... how about starting with The Pentagon Papers and anything related to Cuba?

For that matter, anything dealing with his years in power detailed in the family jewels revelations by CIA?

Or look at the fact that he did absolutely nothing to advance Civil Rights...though of course he did find much time to actively hinder it?

This is a guy who, early in his marriage was informed his wife had miscarried and was sure to die...and who didn't leave the Mediterranean yacht on which he was ensconced with multiple whores until his father sent big, armed men to force him stateside.

Which good man won't return to the deathbed of a wife?

Even unlearned ( meaning, resolutely ignorant ) libertarians can be found who insist that somehow JFK planned to deal some kind of death blow to the Federal Reserve.

They are ignorant to the point of being offensive and should be ignored at every opportunity...actively.

The Kennedy family were a part of and represented the elite in American and world politics and the last people JFK ever would have considered disrupting were those members of that selective club of which he and his father were members.

The Kennedy's never would have disrupted the FED for they WERE the FED.

Anyway, the show does have the bright aspect that Katie Holmes plays Jackie, and Katie is always good to look at... far better to look at in my humble opinion than was Jackie.

It's not that Jackie wasn't pretty in her own right. It's just that Jackie married a murdering thug and Katie never did that.