Every show deserves some time to find itself and its audience. The first season of Paramount+’s Landman was a polished primetime drama that didn’t need that extra time. The latest from Texas TV maven Taylor Sheridan, who launched a mini-Hollywood in Fort Worth’s backyard with shows like Yellowstone, was gripping, real, and very entertaining as a gritty drama about the seedy world of corporate oil conglomerates and the questionable deals made to obtain land for drilling.
Season 2 feels like I’m watching a completely different show. The stories may be connected, but almost nothing works, except a few standout storylines of some new characters. The other highpoints for locals include the sweeping shots of our majestic, natural landscape and the familiar sights of the landmarks in our little slice of Texas, including Dickies Arena, TCU, the Stockyards (complete with the cattle drive), and even a cameo for the Star-Telegram.
The Weekly probably won’t get one after this recap.
Landman stars Billy Bob Thornton as Tommy Norris, a gruff land acquisition agent for the fictitious M-Tex Oil. Tommy does the industry’s dirty work of navigating the backroads (sometimes literally) of obtaining oil-rich fields to expand his parent company’s corporate empire. This season, Tommy starts out as M-Tex’s president as stipulated in the will of the late CEO Monty Miller — played by the always dependable dramatic and comic actor Jon Hamm — who died in the ninth episode of the first season. The job title may be different, but Tommy still has to deal with the same crop of shady characters and crooks, except now they inhabit the highest echelons of the oil and gas industry.
This exposition could have been the perfect setup to a new season of Tommy’s story about the price of success in a cutthroat industry that’s become the blood supply of America’s economy and the toll it takes on his family and sanity.
This second season starts promising with storylines about Tommy’s son Cooper (Jacob Lofland) trying to strike the kinds of deals that made his father an executive and the slow rekindling of Tommy’s romance with his ex-wife, Angela (Ali Larter). The former leads to an interesting reveal that ties back to the first season but ultimately feels unsatisfying so far as it gets bogged down in its own business. The latter creates tension using cartoonish means that are downright bewildering.
Part of the charm of Tommy and Angela’s relationship is the sexual antagonism that oozes between them. (Try not to picture that metaphor for too long.) It’s almost an old vaudeville routine. Tommy is a gruff and stone-faced Texan confused at the world surrounding him outside of the oil fields, and Angela is a walking cartoon of energy and anger. Just as their daughter is headed off to college at TCU, the family holds a dinner in the homestead where Tommy openly tests Angela’s will to act like a human being with graphic talk about her menstrual cycle. Some might describe it as a “crack,” but it goes on for an uncomfortable amount of time, leading to Angela’s inevitable plate-flinging meltdown. Angela can be over the top in just about every scene. It’s what makes her so compelling and even believable at times. No sane human being would consider this flirting.
Some moments seem to be setups just to create conflict for the sake of creating conflict. Last season, Cooper and Ariana (Paulina Chávez) had the most promising relationship story when the two kindle their love under the most tragic of circumstances. Cooper comes into huge success that scares off Ariana because she sees the folly of money and power and how it destroys relationships and families. The two break up but waltz back into each other’s lives when Ariana tells Cooper that when she broke up with him, she was really saying that she expected him to come back and fight for their relationship. It’s a lame and lazy excuse to thrust the two back together.
The castmembers do the best they can with the material, but even extreme talents like Thornton can carry things only so far. The addition of Demi Moore as Monty’s tough, grieving widow Cami felt like a gift, but even that’s been squandered. She’s set up as a conniving, scheming heel, but it goes nowhere. It’s a disappointing use of a Best Actress Oscar winner.
The only bright spot comes from Tommy’s estranged dad, T.L. (Sam Elliott, who delivers the kind of intensity and emotion that’s defined his career). He’s a perfect fit for a show like Landman, struggling with the loss of his wife that leads to a greater understanding of Tommy’s nature and attitude. Their tale feels real and genuine and fills in a lot of the emotional gaps of some of the show’s central characters. Elliott’s story and performance gave me a reason to look forward to the next episode.
We’re only halfway through the season, so maybe there’s a chance things will turn around by the finale. Unfortunately, there’s more that needs cleaning up, and it’s in danger of spreading like some out-of-control oil fire. It’s gonna need more than a few hoses and some extinguishers to put out these flames before they engulf the whole structure.
