SHOWS FOR YOUNGSTERS AND THEIR PARENTS TOO : Sisters trade places in ABC's 'Thick and Thin'; more weighty topics in Disney's 'Heavyweights' - Los Angeles Times
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SHOWS FOR YOUNGSTERS AND THEIR PARENTS TOO : Sisters trade places in ABC’s ‘Thick and Thin’; more weighty topics in Disney’s ‘Heavyweights’

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

Adolescent Gerry Garner’s (Aaron Schwartz) parents send him to a summer camp to lose weight in the 1995 movie Heavyweights (Disney Channel, Sunday at 7 p.m.). Gerry has a lot of fun until a fitness guru and a tough-love kind of guy (Ben Stiller) takes over and wants to use the overweight kids as guinea pigs for a weight-loss video money-making scheme. The big kids rebel against the tyrant. For ages 10 and up.

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Ultimate Athlete: Pushing the Limit premieres this week (Discovery Channel, Sunday at 9 p.m.). With athletes being younger, stronger and faster than ever, Discovery travels to China, Australia, the United States and Africa in search of what it takes to make the ultimate athlete. (Among the many things learned: In China, select children start training as early as age 4. Narrated by actor Louis Gossett Jr. For the family.

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In the “ABC Afterschool Special†Through Thick and Thin (Thursday at 3 p.m.), fraternal twin sisters--one overweight, the other slim--get to magically swap bodies and learn what it’s like to walk in the other’s shoes. Trish (Annie Meisels) is the brainy one who is struggling with being overweight. Lori (Leslie Hibbard) is the slim one and the envy of Trish, but only seems to have it all. It takes an adult, Aunt Rita (Anita Gillette), to work her magic and set things right. For ages 12 and up.

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Yogi Bear and his pal Boo Boo make a daring escape from Jellystone National Park in Yogi’s Great Escape (Disney Channel, Thursday at 1 p.m.). For ages 5 and up. In Yogi & the Magical Flight of the Spruce Goose (2:35 p.m.), the bear and his pals get locked aboard Howard Hughes’ legendary plane before it makes an environmental rescue mission.

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