Several times throughout “Voices Within: The Lives...

Several times throughout “Voices Within: The Lives of Truddi Chase,” we were told that the heroine had 92 personalities or “selves.” We probably could come up with 92 reasons not to like ABC’s mediocre version of her story.

Overwhelmingly, it was a perfect example of why American dramatic TV always will be a second-class medium. This powerful adult story should have grown in power but instead was undercut by stupid commercial interruptions every 10 to 11 minutes until what we were watching no longer made any sense but--worse still--was just plain boring.

Compounding the problem in “Chase” is that its construction was jumbled from start to finish and there was no suspense whatsoever regarding the outcome because we knew full well the “heroine” wouldn’t commit murder. In addition, the ending was flat and anti-climactic.

If not for the acting of Shelley Long and John Rubinstein, the four-hour running time would have been a complete waste.

David R. Moss, Los Angeles