It is strange, on television today, to see so many women so misunderstood.

Here is Molly Blane (Regina Taylor), married to the head of a secret Army force, instructing the new wife on base about her solemn duties. Country is important, family is nice, but first comes husband's bliss. Jeopardize his job, Blane says, and you'll be ''the woman who ruined his dream." That same guys-first idea infuses ''Big Love," HBO's new polygamy drama: It's natural, we're told, that desirable women would claw and fight over a man.

Women have never gotten their full TV due; on ensemble shows like ''Lost," the men are the natural leaders, and the strongest women are caught in love triangles (Kate) or set up to be hated (Ana Lucia). ''Desperate Housewives," for all the hype, has never been more than a campy soap, if never quite campy enough; sooner or later, the women descend into catfights.

Still, it's confounding, and a bit depressing, that two of TV's highest-profile new shows take a step further backward, focusing on women who stand by their men -- and against one another -- in defiance of emotional veracity. And what's strangest is how the archaic takes the guise of equality. Once relegated to B-plots, long-suffering wives are now practically the headliners.

Watching ''Big Love," in particular, is like trying to satisfy a hunger pang. With clever writing and fine acting, it begs to be loved, but the same nagging question always gets in the way: What are these women doing here?

Polygamy is tempting fodder for a network that has mined deep themes from frontier towns and funeral homes, and the subject provides a Hollywood-friendly mechanism for poking fun at domesticity. ''Big Love" is largely a running joke about logistics; Bill Henrickson (Bill Paxton), devoted husband times three, lives in a world ruled by Midol and Viagra and fraught with emotional land mines. (''People think having three wives is a walk in the park," one polygamist friend tells him with a sigh. We're supposed to feel a twinge of pity: Women are such a handful.)

But this internal world has to have its own logic, and here, ''Big Love" starts to turn on itself. There are a few realistic reasons, it seems, that women might choose to share a man. Perhaps they're profoundly religious, and see this life as God's will. Perhaps they're enmeshed with their sister-wives, emotionally or sexually.

The Henrickson wives are neither; if anything they seem to hate each other more with each episode. All they have in common is a love for Bill, who comes to polygamy by way of visions and prophetic dreams. Chloe Sevigny's Nicki, with her throwback prairie wardrobe, might have similar faith; she grew up immersed in polygamist culture and seems, despite her brains, to understand no other way. Ginnifer Goodwin's Margene, barely out of her teens, apparently sought a father figure, but she could have found one who didn't have two wives already.

Most bewildering is Jeanne Tripplehorn's Barb, the first and oldest wife; she's responsible, ambitious, and seems to have the least reason to depend on a man. We've gotten a couple of clues so far: a cancer battle that cut short her fertility; a notion that she loves Bill too much to want to lose him. But what would be worse -- losing the man to the trophy wife, or inviting the trophy wife home to sleep with the husband every third night?

That's the root of the trouble; the more ''Big Love" takes pains to prove how mainstream the Henricksons are, the more distant the family seems. Every potshot at suburban life brings another logical problem: Why would they live on a densely populated street, where the neighbors are bound to notice? But the emotional mysteries strike most at the gut. Bill is held up as a gem, kind and loving and eager to please, but he's a sensible woman's nightmare. He lives out a base male fantasy and gets away with calling it faith.

The men and women of ''The Unit" live by their own kind of faith, a belief that a few good rifle shots can save the world. This secret Army unit is a perpetual deus ex machina, a fantasy force that can solve the most explosive international crisis. And the men couldn't do their jobs if their wives weren't at home, wrapped up in normalcy.

That's what the women seem to believe, at least -- it may well be creator David Mamet's view of the military. Testosterone here is blatant; many bullets are fired, many things explode, and the men emphasize their brotherhood. Would that their wives shared the same solidarity. If they feel any, they express it largely by lecturing one another. Episodes end with tearful reunions and declarations of wifely love.

STAND BY YOUR MAN?

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The viewer surrogate is Kim Brown (Audrey Marie Anderson), a pregnant mother who declares that she and her soldier-husband have always lived off-base so that she can take classes at the local university. (So nice that she wants to educate herself, but would it have been so hard to give her a job?) Each week, she chafes at Army culture, only to be taught the right way. In an upcoming episode, she will come to an epiphany about the power of praying for her husband's well-being.

The husbands here aren't exactly home-front heroes; they sulk a lot over the stresses of the day job. One has a little problem with domestic violence, and even noble Commander Jonas Blane (Dennis Haysbert) is so skittish that he shoots his own reflection in a mirror.

The women tend to forgive and support, no matter what. That's the show's definition of good fortune, and of good love.

Joanna Weiss can be reached at weiss@globe.com.