CBS (Tues., Nov. 1, 9 p.m. ET)
C+
Here is another TV show about a child dying of AIDS. Linda Hamilton and Richard Thomas star as the parents of Joshua Harris, playing an 8-year-old hemophiliac who caught the disease through a transfusion. They do their best with this true story. Their show is as sincere as a needlepoint sampler—but also as simplistic. And it is manipulative. "Grandma," the dying child asks, "will you be mad at me if I die?...Dad, do they have tacos in heaven?...Mom, does it hurt when you die?" In a show such as this, when a life is not fully drawn, then death is not fully felt. That is a disservice to the story and to us.
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