United States of Tara Season 2

Anyone else?

 

I didn't watch the first season until just very recently but I'll fully admit I liked this show a lot. It surprised me at how entertaining and funny it really is. Toni Collette is brilliant and completely convincing (especially as "T") and the rest of the cast rounds out the kind of family you want to root for. Patton Oswalt is hilarious in every scene he's in.

 

I watched the first season on demand recently, and I kept on trying to think of where I'd seen the sister before. I've only seen Rachel Getting Married, from her credits list, and I only saw that after USofT. Then it came to me. She's a brunette Elisabeth Shue.

 

They had the first 2 episodes of season 2 on back to back last night on showtime. I was a little underwhelmed, but maybe I expected too much after the brilliant first season. I'll hold off on talking about it until more people join in the conversation and/or catch up on the first two episodes.

 

I only saw the premier last night, I thought it was pretty decent. Previews look promising, and I love Joey Lauren Adams. The daughter continues to be smoking hot, and her creeping into the collections office like a spy cracked me up.

Odd seeing Buck without the trucker hat.

 

I think it's pretty great so far. I can't wait to see Max's face when he finds out what Tara has been up to.

Kate continues to be my favorite character. She's so adorable and yet so mercenary.

 

I know, right? She's being overtaken by her alters while she's taking meds and her reaction is to hide it from Max!? I just don't get that. I mean, I "get" where she's coming from--doesn't want to admit that she's not better, more meds make her loopy, etc. etc. etc. but at the end of the day....her meds aren't doing their job. She's eating bartender pussy and jogging for miles without a bra (ouch). Those have real-life consequences for Tara. Sack up and double your doseage.

I actually like Marshall best. I'm interested in seeing where this exploration of his sexuality takes him. I personally think he's bisexual but with male preference... although who knows?

But speaking of Kate--what happened to her old boss? The one she left sitting on her couch professing his creepy love for her? Where did that storyline go?

And maybe this is hateful, but the sister character can eat a shotgun barrel. THAT BITCH GETS ON MY NERVES.

 

She is the character who is most problematic for me. I'm not sure how interested I am in another Kate-at-work storyline. I'm also not sure if she makes sense in the larger picture of the narrative. Everyone else's narrative either directly relates to Tara (the husband being a foil for Tara's identity crisis, the sister being an antagonist insofar as she doesn't really believe Tara), or is a mirror for which we explore identity in other ways (the sister having a really weak grasp on her own personal identity, Marshall exploring his sexual identity). Kate is confident, self-assured, knows who she is, what she wants, and goes out to get it. Her interaction with Tara in the first season was limited to a typical you're so embarrassing, Mom! high school girl thing. This season, nadda so far. She doesn't even particularly act as a foil for Tara's identity crisis the same way her father does. She's just off doing her own thing. It would be nice to have that tightened up a bit, because she's a reasonably strong actress and I think could pull some legitimate dramatic weight.

 

I disagree. Kate is sensitive to Marshall at the most, but her whole thing is pushing people to get what she wants and getting into potentially dangerous situations. Visiting that woman alone? Trying to sue a completely unhinged guy? I'm surprised she hasn't gotten beaten up yet, or worse. Not only that, but she doesn't even seem to have any friends outside of her family, what's up with that?

Charmaine is the most superficial, stupid bitch that uses the classic, "Oh it's always about HER," in order to make it all about herself. I hope she is miserable with this new guy and Neil rejects her too.

 

I don't know, I didn't really feel the first two episodes all that much. It seems like they sort of found a way to just hit the reset button on the series and can now do season one all over again. Look at the characters. Marshall is unsure of his sexuality. Kate is starting a new job. Tara is suddenly experiencing a re-occurrence of her alters after some time without them. Sound familiar? They simply didn't pick up where the show left off. As pinkcup mentioned, Kate's story with the creepy barnabees dude suddenly went away. Max had a thing with xanax...disappeared. Tara had an incredibly serious episode of transitioning wildly while in therapy and decided she just wanted to go home. All of a sudden, she has been transition free for months. Why? They haven't touched the storyline of Tara trying to find the reason for her disorder which was the backbone of season 1 and was left hanging for season 2. I'm confused. This might as well be another season 1 so far. Granted it is only 2 episodes, but we are talking about a format where the entire season is 13 episodes...lets get a fucking moveon.

I hope the next episode is action packed.

 

Sounds like a little watched pay per view cable show was trying to acquaint new viewers to their dynamic, honestly.

I don't disagree with the whole "storyline needs to be picked up quick" thing, though.

 

Well, talk about some shit going down.

 

I figured they would be shaking things up really soon. Everything was too perfect to stay perfect for long.

I hope Kate starts turning into a delinquent, without the pretentious artsy attitude.

 

Max's reaction completely caught me off-guard. I don't we have ever seen him get angry at anyone especially Tara. I can't wait to see how this impacts their marriage. That scene where Max and his girl were diddling each other was kind of creepy. The poor kid looked so worried. That girl creeps me out for some reason. And poor Neil. Charmagne is such a cunt, it seems like she does nothing but talk about her wedding. I think it would be awesome if they had Neil catch some super hottie and then have Charmagne get jealous.

 

He doesn't want a super hottie, he wants Charmaine.

 

That's what they all say.

 

I felt so bad for Marshall. He's such a romantic, and this new girl is clearly all about the sex.

Charmaine is clearly a whore, but since she's supposed to be the antagonist, I'm not surprised. I also wouldn't be surprised if her new fiancee is a serial killer or something. Seriously, what educated man would put up with a bitch who goes on and on about how her diamond is the wrong cut?

 

HOLY WHORE FONDLING CHRIST!

Where to even begin. Did not fucking see that coming at all. I was a little worried about Max's support after the incident in the ice rink, but he once again shows his good nature by sticking by Tara's side. Where are they going to go now with Marshall? I thought this experimenting would be the storyline for him this season. I still can't figure out what the fuck is the deal with Kate's story. How is Max going to break it to Tara that her new therapist isn't real???

 

Unfortunately, I was on Showtime's website the week before, trying to find something out about the show and for some godforsaken reason, they had included the new alter in all over their season 2 promo stuff AND put her appearance in the episode cap for the next week. So it wasn't a huge shock, but still interesting.

Much more interesting to me was the red poncho Tara was wearing as a little girl. Maybe Charmaine is the source of her real trauma? Whatever the case, Tara must have been much younger than she thought when she started transitioning.

On a side note, does anyone know what the song was that played at the end? I really liked it.

 

Charmaine was the one wearing the poncho. The mom asked where Tara's poncho was. We didn't see the mom's top half, but the inflection and the skirt/apron definitely reminded me of Alice.