Taylor Sheridan’s The Madison Repeats One of Landman’s Most Controversial Storylines
The Taylor Sheridan ‘factory’ is churning out new shows quicker than fans can keep up with, and… well… as is the case in manufacturing lines, the products are looking similar now. The Madison, his latest neo-Western, which was originally intended as a Yellowstone sequel before being granted independent status, is all about family, too. Interestingly, it doubles down on a major controversial storyline that played out in his other show, Landman. But we’ll get to that in a moment.
As has been the case with many Taylor Sheridan shows, The Madison hasn’t impressed critics right from the start. It currently has a 59% score on Rotten Tomatoes, suggesting that its faults are as numerous as Montana’s trees. However, the 75% Popcornmeter score suggests that fans love it. So does the 8/10 IMDb rating. Still, the neo-Western isn’t as easy to watch as the fan reviews suggest. Given that it’s all about grief, getting through it calls for some mental toughness. And one character’s arc doesn’t help either.
What’s ‘Landman’s Most Controversial Storyline?
Landman has had many wild moments, but the neo-Western’s most controversial storyline played out in Season 2’s penultimate episode and concluded in the finale. In it, Ainsley, the Norris family’s teenage child, heads to a TCU cheerleading summer camp. There she is paired with a non-binary roommate named Paigyn, who happens to be a symbol of everything that the conservative media hates about liberals.
As soon as Paigyn introduces themself to Ainsley, they reveal that they are non-binary and vegan. They also don’t like music (they prefer meditation) and are strong advocates for mental health and animal rights. On top of that, they would like everyone to spell their name correctly. It’s “Pagan” like the godless religion, not “Pay-gin” or whatever any grammar stickler thinks.
Obviously, one of these traits/identities would be okay, but including them all seems like a deliberate attempt to enrage conservatives. Ainsley is angry too, wondering whether it makes sense for anyone to use “they/them” as pronouns and immediately mocking Paigyn for their identity. She even calls her mama, demanding to be rescued from her current predicament. As expected, Mama shows up and mocks Paigyn, too, before taking her daughter away. Sections of viewers were angry with the entire storyline, arguing that Taylor Sheridan simply wanted to play politically incorrect politics and paint liberals as the most intolerable kinds of people. But he kinda fixes it all in the finale, causing the two characters to reach a middle ground. Interestingly, Sheridan walks this path again in The Madison.
Paige From ‘The Madison’ Is an Amalgam of Ainsley and Paigyn
The Madison is about the Clyburn family, originally from New York City, who move to the Madison River valley of southwest Montana to recover emotionally after the death of the partriarch. Like the Norris family, the Clyburn family has a daughter who is as privileged and self-absorbed as Ainsley. However, while Ainsley appears tied to conservative politics, Paige is linked to liberal politics.
In the opening episode, Paige gets mugged in broad daylight on Fifth Avenue in New York. Shortly after, she bumps into some NYPD officers, and when they ask her to describe the criminal – including the color of his skin – she totally refuses, arguing that it’s racist. Following this, there are contradictions. There is talk about how unsafe it is to live in New York, yet when Paige and her family move to Montana, she still feels miserable, missing her old life. As was the case with Landman, this storyline paints liberals as people who have no real reason to be upset. They manufacture things that they can be angry about. The rest of the Clyburn family doesn’t like Paige that much, suggesting that her views aren’t justified. It’s also quite interesting that two liberal characters in Sheridan’s shows have similar names. Paige and Paigyn?
As a reluctant rancher in a show about ranching, Paige is written as a character who ought to be disliked. Like Ainsley, she represents entitlement, and like Paigyn, she is painted as an example of what’s wrong with America. With this approach, Sheridan proves that he is more willing to make controversial TV than safe TV. It has worked out well for him so far, and it’ll be interesting to see where this goes. So far, a lot of things need to be fixed in The Madison. Hopefully, Season 2 will be better.
