There’s a New Boss in Season 2, and She Doesn’t Play
An ambivalent love letter to the rat race of the great Texas oil boom, as well as the industry’s shuck-and-jive tactics, Landman was perfect in Season 1. Thorough, objective, and clear-eyed, it was made without false piety or duplicity. Fans were thus curious to see what Season 2 would look like with Cami Miller (Demi Moore) at the helm of M-Tex following Monty’s death. Well, she has been impressive so far. There was no doubt that Moore’s performance was going to be impressive. After all, she has very few flops in her career. Fans merely wondered whether her arc would be great. In Season 1, Cami had been relegated to a housewife, which many felt was a waste of Moore’s talent. Thankfully, she is now where she belongs. Landman’s second season gets right into business. Following her husband’s untimely death, Cami Miller, an ideologue of wealth, attends a luncheon of oil and banking executives where she intends to announce her active ownership of M-Tex. In what is an obvious nod to Moore’s 2024 sci-fi-horror, The Substance, Cami is age-shamed by a group of young ladies in the bathroom, who wrongfully believe she is there for the same purpose as they are: hunting wealthy men. The shock on their faces when she steps onto the podium is priceless.
Instead of being nice, she opts for a harangue, warning everyone that she will be more ruthless than her husband. Later, several shareholders try to negotiate new contracts, arguing that the previous ones with Monty are now invalidated upon his death. Unfortunately for them, they are rebuffed by Tommy, who dares them to sue. From there, things move pretty quickly. After dominating her interviewer, Ainsley secures a spot with the cheerleading team at Texas Christian University, and Angela makes plans to purchase a house in Fort Worth to be closer to her daughter. Cooper also believes he has secured his future when one site strikes oil with a predicted volume of 500 barrels a day, but he soon learns that things are more complicated than he thought. Elsewhere, T.L. Norris, Tommy’s estranged father, also finds out about the death of his wife, Dorothy, setting the stage for a funeral where father and son open their hearts and tell each other harsh truths.
‘Landman’s Ainsley/Angela Arcs Are Wildly Unpopular
Scanning through the Rotten Tomatoes popcornmeter, one thing becomes clear. The majority of fans like Tommy. He is the perfect kind of protagonist for a neo-Western show about the oil boom. If you were to ever meet a landman, you’d expect him to look like the Billy Bob Thornton character. The part places great demands on the actor, which he more than fulfills. He acts with a burnished and measured theatricality: his pupils glow brightly in his haggard visage, and even when he rants, he never goes over the top. However, fans are never too thrilled to see Tommy’s family on the screen, especially Ainsley and Angela (Cooper is kinda okay). First, none of them is likable. Angela reeks of toxicity, constantly getting on Tommy’s nerves for no reason. Whether it’s losing her mind and breaking all the plates during dinner or threatening Tommy, none of her actions ever make sense. She is the typical rich man’s spouse, who enjoys the pleasant golf-and-charity-ball elite circle routine without caring much about anything else. Ainsley, on the other hand, looks like she belongs in a teen drama. She is entitled, carefree, and lost in hedonism.
‘Landman’ Needs to Figure Out Its Identity
What next for Landman? Unless Taylor Sheridan saved the best for last, Season 2’s next few episodes are likely to be the same, leaving a large section of fans more disgruntled. But with a Season 3 renewal already confirmed. Sheridan and his team need to think about the next steps. Since the majority of complaints target the personal storylines, should the show focus only on the business side of things going forward? Hit dramas like Succession and Billions proved that it’s possible to dwell on money without being boring. These award-winning dramas treat investment and corporate machinations as pop culture of the current era: for the characters, making money is what heists were for DeNiro’s Jimmy “The Gent” Conway in Goodfellas — something far more powerful than carnality. In those two shows, deeper research was done on the particular industry that the characters are involved in, making everything feel as realistic as possible. Perhaps Sheridan needs to dig deeper into the oil business instead of constantly addressing Angela’s dissatisfaction. We need to see more of the burning circuits. We want the midnight “we have a problem” calls, the clandestine meetings meant to throw someone under the bus, the urgent patch-ups, the threatening letters and email messages.
Such a move would make Landman a unique show in Taylor Sheridan’s catalog – it might even attract an Emmy. However, there is a risk of alienating a section of the fanbase, those who became hooked when they first saw Angela acting all sexy during a video call with Tommy, or when they saw Ainsley bonding with her father in the series premiere. Would it be okay to lose fans who tune in for the ‘soap opera’ moments and keep those who value the corporate moments? It’s a tough choice. A safer bet would be to improve both areas. Tommy shouldn’t be the only pillar holding everything together. There ought to be a plethora of characters that fans can root for. Angela and Ainsley should be empowered like Cami. Alternatively, they could switch to the 2.0 versions of themselves. If Angela stays as an annoying wife, make her like Carmela from The Sopranos or Skyler from Breaking Bad. If AInsley stays as the annoying teen, put her in Riverdale/Pretty Little Liars mode. Why not throw in a troublesome drug addiction angle for Ainsley, or make Angela commit a major crime and keep it a secret… a crime that can ruin the entire family.
The business arcs need some buffing up, too, and that should be easy since the situation is currently good, only a few miles away from excellent. We love the Andrew Lockington scores and the negotiations, which often move as fast as comprehensibility will allow. This may not be an outstanding or particularly original show—the prose outweighs the poetry — but it’s easily the most vivid liquid-gold melodrama since ABC’s Blood & Oil. Landman isn’t a trainwreck… not yet. If you can stomach the ridiculous, wafer-thin characterization and Santa Barbara plot, you will consider it an enjoyable romp, if only for the gusto these characters bring. But it’s destined to be a trainwreck if nothing changes, so let’s hope the course gets corrected before it becomes one.
