Drinks are half off and there’s no cover to get in—that’s right, it’s ladies’ night on Landman. Last week Tommy got to play the big man: killing rattlesnakes, throwing his ex-wife into the country club pool. This week, the boot is on the other foot, and we get to spend more time with the women of West Texas. (Our regular disclosure: The show is based on the Texas Monthly and Imperative Entertainment podcast Boomtown, and TM is an executive producer.)
We start with Tommy’s lawyer and housemate Nate walking into the kitchen (a.k.a. his office) to find Tommy’s daughter Ainsley and ex-wife Angela clenching, thrusting, and twerking to what I’m assuming is a workout tape by the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders in the adjoining living room. “Just keeping the peach plump, Nate,” Angela purrs. Nate immediately gets Tommy on the phone to ask how long his family is staying at their shared abode. Tommy doesn’t know, which is interesting considering Angela wasn’t even going to stay the night and, as you might recall, has a husband back in the Metroplex. Who knows which way the Odessa winds will blow after that sexy scene between Angela and Tommy last week! Nate will have to wait and see like the rest of us.
But first, fancy East Coast lawyer Rebecca has taken off her scaredy pants from last week and put on her ball-busting business suit for Tommy’s deposition about the spectacular truck-plane crash that lit up the first episode. The case goes a little something like this: The company that owns the tanker truck that slammed through the plane (which drug dealers had stolen and landed, full of product, on a remote private road) is suing Tommy’s employer, M Tex, for damages, negligence, and, well, parking a plane in the middle of a road. One of the attorneys is being a real piece of work, lobbing sexist bombs toward Rebecca: “Listen hon, we were playing pissed-off litigator while you were still being bathed by your daddy.”
Rebecca channels the spirits of Erin Brockovich, Mona Lisa Vito, and Elle Woods and not only dismantles the lawyer’s argument with ease, but also practically disembowels the man who would dare talk to her with disrespect. It’s a five-minute evisceration that has the sexist attorney saying “uncle” in defeat. “You think they hired me because I’m pretty?” she says, twisting the knife. “I charge nine hundred dollars an hour, you asshole, and you’re real close to learning why.” In a head-spinning reality check that reminds me I have no idea what real money looks like, the company that just “lost” now has to accept an eight-figure settlement lest Rebecca continue to drag these bros to legal hell and back where, she says, “you will be disbarred and I will hang your law degrees over my f—ing toilet.”
She practically sashays out of the office as Tommy has a giggle fit. (Same, Tommy, same.) “You know, I didn’t give you enough credit,” he says, genuinely impressed by her performance. “Nobody does,” she replies. He suggests a celebratory drink, but Rebecca is still coming down from boss mode and takes some swipes to ensure that Tommy knows she has no romantic interest in him. Tommy insists it’s just an innocent beer, and Rebecca, back to her usual cool and collected self, relents.
Ainsley and Angela decide to head back to the country club to terrorize more waiters and members, but when they arrive, a snooty doorman says the venue is closed for a private event. Invitees are streaming in and out of the club, so Angela doesn’t seem to buy it and neither do I. She’s been blackballed! The gals pack it up and head over to the Patch Cafe, where they consider the nutritional properties of shrimp tails before spotting Tommy and Rebecca at the bar, enjoying their celebratory beer and, uh, *checks notes* stopping a sex worker from landing a customer.
Tommy chides the bartender for letting in and serving the young woman. “I’m telling you, her ID says she’s twenty-one,” the bartender says. “Just like most of your crew have valid Social Security numbers.” Zing! The two chuckle; a detente is reached. It’s the perfect setup for a talk between Rebecca and Tommy about boomtowns and what happens later during the inevitable bust. “No one is immune,” Tommy says, painting a grim picture of the past and what likely is to come.
Tommy is telling Rebecca the tale of how Monty made his fortune, when Ainsley and Angela storm the bar in a jealous fury. This is the main event, folks, and it extends throughout the rest of the episode, so grab your popcorn.
Round One: Tommy introduces “Rebecca Falcon” to Angela and Ainsley, mispronouncing Falcone. “Sounds like a f—ing Marvel character,” Angela replies. We can practically see her mean-girl gears turning. Rebecca lobs some softballs back but treads lightly. In response, Angela invites Rebecca to stay for supper. It’s a classic keep-your-enemies-closer tactic that I love, especially because Rebecca is up for the fight and accepts the invitation. Tommy, meanwhile, looks like he’d rather go chop off his other pinky finger. Winner: Angela!
Before we get to round two, we check in on Cooper and his new crew, who are still “working over” the well from the last episode. Cooper’s on-the-job training is going well, but Antonio isn’t so lucky. His hand gets caught in a drill pipe elevator and crushed. It’s so brutal; Antonio passes out before the crew can even get him off the derrick and to the ground. Dale, Tommy’s engineer bud and other housemate, is on the site. He yells to the crew that the rig needs to be up and running by morning, no excuses. With three dead and now one seriously maimed, the Medina clan really can’t catch a break.
Now, back to the main event.
Round Two: Angela’s tactic here is to go straight for the heart. Rebecca and Ainsley lap up her story of the good ol’ days when Tommy surprised her with tickets to a George Strait concert in Lubbock. It’s a lovely (but also raunchy, of course) story about how good things can be when oil prices are high and the patch is producing. Ainsley practically has hearts in her eyes as she listens. But the market crashed soon after and the family lost everything, Angela says, tears welling in her eyes. “And I do mean everything.” Tommy looks uncomfortable, hurriedly makes an excuse, and leaves the gals at the table. Rebecca promises to give Angela and Ainsley a ride back home. Round two winner: Angela, again!
Final Round: Angela and Ainsley are in Rebecca’s car and it’s time for Rebecca to get in some licks. “Can I ask what you’re doing here?” Rebecca says. Angela responds, “You’re not his type.” Between this moment and the one earlier, when Rebecca freaked out after Tommy invited her for a beer, I’m beginning to get the sense that the show really would like for us to consider Rebecca as a potential love interest for Tommy, their thirty-year age gap and ideological differences be damned. Could a Dharma and Greg situation be fun for our Landman and city slicker? Maybe! If anything does happen, however, Rebecca is going to have to get through his ex-wife first. “Why are you jealous at all? He’s not your husband. You have a different husband.” It’s a knockout, and Angela knows it. She looks out the window and laments: “F—ing lawyers.” Final round winner: Rebecca!
I’ll tell you who the loser is: poor Ainsley. She may be airheaded, but she’s a sweet girl who seems sensitive to her parents’ drama. When Tommy finally gets home after checking on the rig where Antonio had his hand crushed, he finds Ainsley on the couch crying. “She’s a quitter,” she says of her mom. “The market crashes, and she leaves you—finds the richest man who will have her.” He explains to her that even without the bust, the marriage would have ended. “I’ll never quit you, no matter what,” Ainsley says. It’s a moving moment that makes me very nervous about her tender heart.
Upstairs, Tommy finds Angela also crying, lamenting the failure of their marriage. It feels almost condescending that Tommy has to explain to her again how miserable their marriage was and why it would never work if they rekindled. “We had great sex and I made you laugh, that was it,” Tommy says. Angela says she’s going to leave her husband for said great sex and humor. It’s hard to tell whether Angela is seriously pining for Tommy or has some selfish master plan hiding in her negligee. Could this be a ruse to keep Ainsley close? “Say yes,” Angela says over and over again as the exes fall into bed.
The next morning, Ainsley spots Angela walking around in Tommy’s shirt and no pants. She’s thrilled and leaps into her parents’ arms. Angela says they’re moving in “for good.” The cracks in the reunion begin to show almost immediately. I hope these crazy kids can keep it together for more than a couple of episodes, but it ain’t looking good!
Tommy leaves the house and pulls up to the site where Cooper, Boss, and Manuel have gotten the well up and running, even after Antonio’s accident. “We’ve got a gusher, boys!” says Dale. Tommy gives Monty a call to give him the good news. He then saunters over to Boss to get a report on Cooper. Now I’m sure it was very impressive that Cooper didn’t die or get his crew blown up, but it just feels very strange that Tommy is so concerned with his son’s performance and yet doesn’t, I don’t know . . . train him on what he’s actually doing out there. “He stepped up big time,” Boss says of Cooper. “That boy worked them derricks like he’s been doing it all winter.”
Tommy tells Cooper he wants him to swing by the house to see his mother. That’s right, folks, it’s been days since Angela’s been in town and she still hasn’t seen her son, who almost got charred to bits on his first day of work. Tommy sheepishly says they’re giving their marriage another shot. “Why would you do that?” It’s the response of an older child who knows too much and remembers too well how the last time around went.
Before the episode closes out, Ariana (Elvio’s widow) gives Cooper a call and asks for a favor. “I need to see you,” she says. Cooper was threatened at knifepoint by Ariana’s cousins—who happen to be his new crewmates—and told never to see her again, but he gives in to Ariana’s request. How can he say no? This episode is, after all, about women getting what they want.
Golden moments:
- Bravo again to Rebecca for her master class in putting smart-aleck men in their place, including Tommy! Her reply to him asking her out for a drink had me cackling: “A sixty-year-old, two-pack-a-day smoker living in a rent house in Midland, Texas, is not how I’ve drawn up my dream man. And if you’re thinking of something a little more casual, you’re up against a little toy the size of a lipstick case that doesn’t talk back and never makes me sleep in the wet spot!”
- California is out here catching shade from Tommy as he describes the state’s high taxes on oil and gas. Oil “can be forty-five dollars a barrel and it’s still four dollars [for gas] at the pump. I don’t know how those sons of bitches do it out there.” (This is a little bit of oil field hyperbole. The last time oil was $45 a barrel, back in December 2020, the retail price in California was $3.13 a gallon.)
- Angela thinks she’s not a bad mom for encouraging her underage daughter to be drinking—she’s a cool mom. “She’s on spring break and she should be drinking,” she says to Tommy at the Patch Cafe. “This is Aledo’s mother of the year, in case you were wondering,” Tommy says to Rebecca, name-dropping the posh suburb west of Fort Worth, where Angela lives with her new husband.
- Angela beautifully articulates the dreams of many Texas women (and some men!): “My dream was to see George Strait in concert. That was part of the dream. The other part was climbing him like a cat and riding that fine son of a bitch until he had calluses on his thighs.”
