NEW YORK (Bloomberg) – Steven Spielberg's new series, "United States of Tara", features a woman with three rogue personalities, all of which are extremely annoying.

As are some of the real characters in the debut, which airs on Showtime on Sunday at 11 p.m. Bermuda time. They team up to make for a long half-hour, though there could be relief in weeks to come.

Tara Gregson (Toni Collette) is a suburban housewife with the usual accoutrements: husband Max (John Corbett), daughter Kate (Brie Larson), and son Marshall (Keir Gilchrist). She's also off her meds, which allows her gremlins to range freely.

Having multiple personalities "is like hosting a kegger in your brain", she explains during a lucid moment. If any of these showed up at my kegger I'd summon the bouncer.

"T" is a horny teenager who wants "drugs, not hugs" and early on dons a thong, reminding us that thongs are not only for the young at heart but body as well.

"Buck" is a deranged veteran who likes to guzzle beer and fight. Back in the good old days guys like Buck were sentenced to life in the copper mines and society was the better for it.

"Alice" is a prim battle ax whose heavily sprayed hair could deflect a cannonball.

Later in the series she washes out Kate's mouth after the latter expostulates on her sex life, which has much in common with the gals who work the stalls down at the Greyhound station.

Indeed, Kate may be the most irritating character of all, a jail-bait nympho whose purpose in life is to drive her parents crazy. Viewers who know such children, or perhaps have had one or two of their own, may find themselves groping for the remote when this brat appears.

Others may wonder why Max puts up with all this. He takes caring and patience to insane levels; I found myself thinking "Buck up, man. Ship Tara off to an institution."

Marshall shares his Dad's even temperament, which may suggest that males are saner than women, which we all know is also crazy.

The series, written by Diablo Cody ("Juno"), may shape up as it looks deeper into Tara's troubled mind with the hope of discovering the cause of her splintering.

If another personality appears, however, many viewers may flee this nuthouse.

Meanwhile, in Utah, another strange family – the Henricksons – also boasts multiple personalities, though only one per skull. All together, they remind us that polygamy is a very strange trip.

"Big Love" returns on Sunday for its third season on HBO at 10 p.m. Bermuda time, with Bill Henrickson (Bill Paxton) seeming to live many a middle-aged man's dream.

He has three good-looking wives – Barb (Jeanne Tripplehorn), Nicki (Chloe Sevigny) and Margene (Ginnifer Goodwin) – whose life mission is to keep him blissed. This is the service industry as the Good Lord, or at least Joseph Smith, intended.

Bill's also a Mormon with a soft spot for Mammon. This season he aims to team up with a local Indian tribe to open a "Mormon-friendly casino". He believes the plan would create "a monopoly" serving a "huge captive population".

Yet he has problems of his own, including a government crackdown on polygamy, Mormon neighbours who think his faith isn't what it should be, and unpleasant members of his exhaustively extended family, including Frank (Bruce Dern), who introduces his new "honey" in less than spiritual terms: "She sits and fetches and rolls over."

Bill also feels the need to bring more wives into the fold in order to bring more children into the world. He hasn't got but eight.

The show lurches a bit between plot lines but all told is engaging and perhaps educational.

Adding a new wife to a Mormon clan, we learn, is a family affair. Bill has his eyes on a waitress named Ana (Branka Katic). At show's start he turns down her offer of sex, saying she has to have a ring on her finger first. You'd think he'd carry a couple of spares for such occasions but he explains to Ana that she must "date" not only Bill but his three amigos before he can tie the knot and take a legitimate tumble.

We'll have to keep tuning in to see how tag-team dating works, and to follow a sad development: it appears Barb's cancer has returned, which is one reason she's all for number four.

As we also learn, the purpose of all this matrimony is to create the largest possible family so everyone can spend eternity together, apparently like a never-ending family vacation.

A calling card for some, an affirmation of heathenism for others.

Dave Shiflett is a critic for Bloomberg News.