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United States of Tara: Difference between revisions
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** It's revealed in the season 2 finale that {{spoiler|when Tara was five-years-old, her and Charmaine's parents took in her father's son from a previous marriage, who was "troubled" and was implied to have repeatedly sexually abused her. Tara and Charmaine were moved to a foster home for a while; the woman who took them in inspired one of Tara's alters, Alice}}.
* [[Ghost in the Machine]]: Probably not in the actual series proper, but the title sequence stylistically represents the three alters living in a house that turns into Tara's head. It won an Emmy.
* [[Hey, It's That Guy!]]: Hey, it's Patton Oswalt and [[Dollhouse|he's dealing with people with multiple personalities]]! Also featuring [[Desperate Housewives|Alma Hodge]] as Tara's therapist and [[Studio 60 On the Sunset Strip|Tom Jeter]] as Kate's boss.
** Not to mention Tara's husband is [[Sex and the City|Aidan]].
** In addition, [[Recess|Andy Lawrence]] of the [[Disney Channel|Lawrence brothers]] played Jason.
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* [[I Call It Vera]]: Buck has a gun called Persephone.
* [["I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight]]: [[Tear Jerker|Excruciatingly]] subverted in "Crunchy Ice".
* [[If You Ever Do Anything to Hurt Her...]]: Despite the actual words never being said, since he was ''already'' hurting Kate, Buck and Marshall just decide to skip straight to making good on the threat.
* [[Important Haircut]]: "Don't you know? Tara's {{spoiler|never coming back}}."
* [[Infant Immortality]]: {{spoiler|Averted. When Bryce starts violently killing the alters, sweet and innocent 5 year old Chicken is the first to be murdered.}}
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** Grandma Sandi has an epic, and [[Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass|unexpected]], one for {{spoiler|Bryce Craine}}.
* [[Knight of Cerebus]]: {{spoiler|Bryce Craine}}
* [[Laughably Evil]]: Say what you want about {{spoiler|Bryce}}, he's entertaining.
* [[Mama Bear]]: Alice with a whole heap of [[Tranquil Fury]] and a side of [[Kirk Summation]]. Aside from her family Alice believes she's one for Tara herself because, in her words, Tara is weak.
* [[Mood Whiplash]]: After Pammy the bartender {{spoiler|declared her love for}} Buck at the ice rink, Max {{spoiler|angrily stormed off}} which left Tara alone and depressed. Then Kate picks up the thread of a conversation she and Marshall were having earlier, explaining {{spoiler|a perverse sexual position -- "the dogs in the bathtub" -- to him}}.
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* [[Occidental Otaku]]: Kate's first shown boyfriend is a [[Goth]] and, to be blunt, Wapanese.
* [[Papa Wolf]]: Buck will kick your ass if you mess with his loved ones. [[Unstoppable Rage|Ask Kate's ex-boyfriend]]. And like Alice, he is also defensive of Tara as seen in the season 1 finale when {{spoiler|he tried to jump one of the guys who raped Tara/T in high school}}.
* [[Romantic False Lead]]: Charmaine's new boyfriend, "Fake Uncle" Nick, is a Nice RFL with regards to the relationship between her and Neil, {{spoiler|until the wedding}}.
* [[Shout-Out]]: Tara has an {{spoiler|[[Ax Crazy]]}} [[Split Personality]] that {{spoiler|mimics a family member who she had an abusive relationship with. [[Psycho|Sound familiar]]? Extra points for being named Bryce Craine, akin to the [[Decoy Protagonist]] Marion Crane}}.
* [[Slasher Smile]]: {{spoiler|This is how you know [[Ax Crazy|Bryce]] has come out to play}}.
* [[Soap Punishment]]: Alice, one of Tara's alters who is a 1950s housewife, invokes this trope after Kate gives her [[Ethical Slut]] rant. Alice follows through on the threat, driving Kate to get a job so she can move out (which becomes a major subplot for the next two seasons).
* [[Split Personality]]: Of course!
* [[Split Personality Merge]]: As with [[Truth in Television]], the ultimate goal of Tara's therapy is for her to integrate.
* [[Split Personality Takeover]]: Alice seems at times like she wants to do this, what with her "I'll be around all the time" speech to Marshall in the second episode and her deriding Tara for being weak in the season finale.
** This also seems to be {{spoiler|Bryce's plan. He "killed" Chicken and asked to be taken to Tara so he can do the same to her. Later on he killed Shoshana and then Gimme. On "Crunchy Ice" he killed Buck, T. and Alice as well}}.
* [[Stalker with a Crush]]: {{spoiler|Gene}} gets ''really'' creepy over Kate. As does Courtney over Marshall, though to a lesser degree.
* [[Stepford Smiler]]: Alice. Trapped in an eternal Eisenhower era housewife personality, said to secretly get drunk off cooking wine and initially seems hellbent on staying in control of Tara's body. Though over time her own psychosis lessens as she learns to work with Tara.
* [[
* [[Talking to Themself]]: In season 1, Alice was the only one that was able to communicate with the other alters and claimed that she had no idea where Tara would go to when she took over the body; in season 2 Tara was able to have an argument with Buck and have therapy with {{spoiler|Shoshana}}; in season 3 Tara is able to {{spoiler|fully communicate with them all and even summoned them for a conference}}.
** In season 3 some alters {{spoiler|were having conversations with each other while Tara was [[Locked Out of the Loop]]. But she was still able to see and hear them}}.
* [[The Three Faces of Eve]]: Pretty solidly averted. T is a pretty easy fit into the Seductress, but that's complicated by her being the literal Child of the three. Alice seems to be the Mother, but she's also highly sexual while still being naïve enough to believe that Tara's IUD won't work because she doesn't "believe in them." Tara's just complicated, as people tend to be.
** Tara's {{spoiler|additional alters}} further complicate things. {{spoiler|Chicken}} is obviously the child so that clears that portion up, but it's hard to deny that T can fit in the archetype as well; T, Alice, and {{spoiler|Shoshana}} have shades of the seductress but the latter two also have many traits of the mother.
* [[Title Drop]]: In "Wheels."
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* [[Wild Child]]: {{spoiler|God only knows if Gimme is a child or even HUMAN, but its 'poncho-goblin' aesthetic certainly makes Tara look feral when it comes out to play}}.
** In "Wheels," during the {{spoiler|conference in Tara's mind T refers to Gimme by saying they should "drown the dog." Gimme responds by biting her, then barking}}.
* [[Wild Teen Party]]: Marshall throws one with Kate's help when his parents are gone in the hopes that the boy he likes will come. Charmaine immediately thinks Kate is to blame.
* [[What Happened to the Mouse?]]: {{spoiler|Gene and Jason from the first season both vanished without mention by season 2. Possibly justified since a fair amount of time is implied to have passed between the two seasons so any manner of things could have happened to the two characters to prevent them showing up again}}.
** Jason is mentioned a couple of times in the second season.
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