Howdy Landmanimals—that is, Landman diehards. We’ve made it to episode three, a decidedly less heavy outing after last week’s emotional pile-on. Though lighter, the screws continue to turn on Tommy and the gang this go-around as they settle into the delightful equation of high drama plus high camp, all multiplied by the power of oil. (Our regular reminder: The show is based on the Texas Monthly and Imperative Entertainment podcast Boomtown, and TM is an executive producer.)
We begin as Ali Larter’s Angela arrives at the Midland airport, legs first. She’s wearing sky-high heels and a diaphanous purple gown that looks like it could be sneezed off. Ainsley isn’t buying the “emotional support” reasons Tommy gives for her mother’s sudden arrival, but it’s still all smiles and hugs as Angela slinks toward her family. She doesn’t have any luggage, she says, because she’s not staying the night. It’s off to the country club, on boss man Monty’s dime, where margaritas await.
We cut to a scene where Monty is on a golf course, being unnecessarily mean to some old guys who ask to play through. I don’t know how well Monty knows these guys, but he’s pretty aggro about the simple ask, dissing their game and puffing his chest out. “I don’t wait on anybody,” he says. I guess the range really is the businessman’s WeWork because Monty’s golfing bud, another executive type, starts talking shop immediately. City slicker lawyer Rebecca is in the patch because Tommy has been causing problems, and Monty needs to seriously consider sacking him. Turns out that the plane that a tanker truck rammed into in episode one was property of M Tex, and Tommy failed to report it stolen. Since the cops found it in a ball of flames, mid-drug deal, this isn’t great for our Landman. Combine that with the explosion that killed Armando and his team and “numerous OSHA violations” under Tommy’s watch, and Monty officially has a problem. “Every company has a version of Tommy,” he says, arguing that sites can’t function without guys like him. Tommy has his detractors, but Monty isn’t throwing him under the oil rig just yet.
Back at the man camp (the temporary housing units where oil crews live in the patch), Cooper is back in emo mode, moping around the front steps of his room. Two crew workers with menacing auras and grim faces walk up and immediately start a fight. They get some good hits in before Cooper, in a surprising display of athleticism, manages to get one in a sleeper hold. The other crew member draws a gun, but Cooper is able to body-slam and disarm him. Manly grunts are grunted for a bit before the truth is revealed: The two crewmen are Antonio and Manuel, cousins of the crew members who died in the explosion. “They’re dead and you’re still standing here,” Antonio says, with tears welling up behind his eyes. “How’s that happen? How’s that well burn up my whole family and you ain’t got a scratch?” Tommy warned Cooper that it would be hard to come back to work after the accident, and as usual, our Landman was right. This stuff is brutal, both physically and emotionally. The cousins skulk away, but this clearly isn’t over. Another crew member, who introduces himself as Boss, tells Tommy that brutality and death are pretty common in the patch. “Devil cookin’ up new ways every day,” he says.
Now, I like Boss. He’s nice to Cooper and seems to have a good head on his shoulders, but the man is a you-know-what stirrer. He tells Cooper his crew needs a “worm” (the nickname given to newbies). His crew? Antonio and Manuel, naturally. I don’t know the logistics of how men are assigned to crews or what the HR onboarding situation is out in the patch, but is this really how it goes? Does a young man just wander around the man camp hoping a crew will adopt him? Either way, Boss clearly lives for the drama to invite Cooper onto his squad after seeing the beef they just were cooking.
If you recall, Angela is in town to allegedly provide emotional support for her heartbroken daughter Ainsley and physically traumatized son Cooper. And now watch in delight as she ponders another margarita at the country club and strips off her purple dress to reveal a strappy pink bathing suit underneath. “You’re embarrassing yourself,” Tommy says as mild-mannered Midlandians stop and stare. “That’s not disapproval, Tommy,” Angela says with cool ease. “That’s envy.” She and Ainsley head to the pool to snap some revenge selfies and have some more margs. Tommy gives clear instructions to the waiter to not give the gals more tequila, but I doubt the server can stand up to either of these thirsty women.
Tommy has another encounter with Rebecca, the liberal-coded attorney who is sniffing around for a fall guy for the explosion. A big meeting is coming up and she has to report on what’s been happening under Tommy’s watch, so she asks for another site visit, this time to where the plane blew up. Tommy calls Nathan, the on-site attorney and his roommate, for some advice while he speeds off to pick her up at her hotel. Rebecca is not a petroleum attorney, Nathan says, she’s a liability expert, so Tommy’s gotta do whatever it takes to get Rebecca on his side. Nathan suggests everything shy of becoming Rebecca’s personal sugar daddy. Once Rebecca is in Tommy’s pickup, the show works overtime to paint the duo as an odd couple. She’s young! He’s old! She’s too woke! He’s too offensive! She’s wearing a cap from Northwestern! He likes country music! How will these two ever find common ground?
While the two drive off, we find Cooper in the neighborhood where Armando’s family, including his two new crewmates, live. He pulls up to a house overflowing with people, a bouquet of flowers in hand. “You don’t have the right to be here,” Antonio says. Luckily for Cooper, Luis’s widow walks out of the house just then. Cooper offers words of condolences and, because she’s a good Texas woman, she invites his skinny butt in to eat. “Andale pues,” she says. It’s a heartbreaking moment: Armando taught Cooper that “andale pues” means “it’s time to eat,” something he’s excited to share with Armando’s cousins as a way to make some sort of connection. It’s for naught. “Armando was f— with you,” Manuel says. “It means ‘let’s go.’ ” Cooper tries to leave, but the cousins now insist that he stay. They hate him, but not as much as they respect Luis’s widow.
Inside, we see dozens of family members and friends and a smorgasbord of Mexican dishes. After being served a plate of food, Cooper awkwardly plops down on the couch. The food is too spicy for Cooper, but it brings a smile to the young mother next to him. This is Ariana, the widow of Elvio, the youngest of the three men who died in the explosion. You can see her brain ricocheting back and forth between her grief and her delight at Cooper’s company. I don’t know where this is going, but I’m praying for Cooper’s sake that this doesn’t lead to a love affair with the widow of a man who died in the explosion his dad may be responsible for.
Rebecca and Tommy finally make it to the site of the plane accident, and Tommy’s got some explaining to do. Monty brought this up earlier with his oil exec buddy, but it’s worth explaining to the audience again: Just how and why would anyone in charge of an oil site not report stolen machinery, especially when they know cartels are using them to move drugs? For starters, Tommy says, the planes and trucks and machinery that go missing eventually make their way back. If Tommy reports a truck missing and a state trooper finds it, then that truck is possessed until the trial and out of commission for years. “Or I can keep my mouth shut and have my truck back in two or three weeks,” he explains. Gangsters don’t mess with the big guys like Exxon or Chevron, only the small independent oil guys like M Tex, our artisanal, boutique oil outfit.
Rebecca, seemingly offhandedly, looks out to the giant wind turbines turning in the distance. “Green energy starting to push out the oil industry?” she asks, practically begging Tommy to give a monologue on just how little she actually understands his industry. Tommy seizes the moment.
“How exactly is the wind bad for the environment? So glad you asked my oil-illiterate, know-nothing friends!” Okay, Tommy doesn’t exactly say that, but that’s the vibe of this scene. Creating the individual mills alone is a carbon disaster, he says, with tons of diesel burned to mix all the concrete, make all the steel, haul the behemoth out to the middle of nowhere, and finally assemble it with an equally enormous crane. That’s before taking into account all of the oil used to lubricate the parts. “In its twenty-year lifespan, it won’t offset the carbon footprint of making it,” Tommy says. One by one, he topples the arguments for alleged clean alternatives to our oil-centered lives. He can’t even begin talking about the manufacturing of solar panels or batteries, and even if we wanted to go completely electric, we don’t have the transmission lines. “Unfortunately for your grandkids, we have a one hundred-and-twenty-year petroleum-based infrastructure,” he says. It seems like Tommy’s strategy here is to not become buds with Rebecca but to make her really understand the forces at work. It’s a fascinating take on the discourse around energy. So often green energy is labeled as good while the oil and gas industry is dated or bad, but it’s not that easy. Everything, everything, Tommy says, is dependent on petroleum. “And we’re going to run out of it before we find its replacement.”
The back-and-forth between Tommy and Rebecca is so refreshing; it’s exactly like the argument you have with your cousins who post weird stuff on Facebook, except this time, the fight doesn’t get ugly and you actually learn something. “Getting oil out of the ground is the most dangerous job in the world,” Tommy says. “We don’t do it because we like it. We do it because we’re out of options.” He’s making the case to Rebecca that this is not his fault. Heck, this isn’t even the oil industry’s fault. “There ain’t nobody to blame but the demand that we keep pumping it.”
Hear that? It’s Rebecca’s mind being shaken to its core. Wait. It’s actually the shaking of a rattlesnake, just steps away from Rebecca. Poor thing is so scared and so not from Texas that she doesn’t even know what kind of snake it is. “I don’t know, the f— big kind?!” she yells to Tommy. Our Landman leaps into action and cuts the snake in half with a sharp dig from a shovel. Like any good Texan, Tommy collects the rattle as a souvenir while Rebecca complains that there was no need to kill the creature. Classic city slicker.
Now I purposely glossed over what Ainsley and Angela have been doing at the country club because none of it really serves the plot. But just so you know, Angela really loves tequila and Ainsley really loves selfies. After saving the day with Rebecca, Tommy is back at the club to collect his girls, who are both passed out poolside from the daylong deluge of margaritas. I squealed with glee as Tommy scooped Angela up and threw her into the pool, making a scene at what I’m sure is usually a quiet and relaxing country club.
They make it home and Ainsley, a little tipsier than she should be, tells Tommy she’s old enough to choose where she wants to live and that she wants to live with him. Angela, who originally said she wouldn’t be spending the night, has seemingly forgiven the pool incident and is in full seduction mode. If all the sex talk in episode one didn’t clue you in, let this scene be the final warning: This show is not for the prudish. With Tommy’s denim shirt barely—and then not at all—covering her up, Angela straddles Tommy, reminiscing about the good old days of their marriage. Our Landman, a man of great will, reminds Angela the reasons she left him are still unchanged. The two share some tender moments, pondering how they can fix their family, and even float trying to be together again for good. Alas, Angela has remembered what drove them apart in the first place: “There’s always some calamity only you can fix,” she says, “With you, I’m always second.” The camera pans over to an eavesdropping Ainsley. She’s smiling and crying, listening to her parents’ laughter upstairs. Was the scene raunchy? Yes. Was it lovely? Yes! I’ll remember the tears more than any of the skin Angela showed. All around good stuff.
We’ve got some loose ends to tie up: Back in the patch, Cooper heads out with his new crew for the first time. They stop by the same coffee hut where the lady baristas are scantily clad, and Boss orders a very girlie whipped cream macchiato thing, which is cute and fun until one of the nameless cousins pulls a knife on Cooper in the back seat. “You ever put your arm around my cousin again and I’ll f— kill you,” he says. I just hope Boss got to enjoy his drink.
Even with OSHA violations and cartel drama in the background, our Landman still has his regular grind. He’s on the phone with Monty, telling him that Dale, the engineer, thinks an oil well needs to be killed. It isn’t producing what it used to and fracking ain’t gonna help. Monty gives the go-ahead. We get our only sighting of Demi Moore’s Cami in this scene. She’s in the pool while Monty is on the phone. (Our oil wives are really catching some rays in this episode.) After he hangs up, she tells Monty to “take a pill,” “get some exercise,” and, in general, get his blood pressure down. It reminds me of an earlier passing mention of Monty’s lack of a fitness routine. I’m convinced some seeds are being planted that I’m sure will bear fruit later. I’ve got my eyes on your clogged(?) heart, Monty!
The crew also has eyes on Cooper, who is just thrown into the work with his new team. Everyone keeps saying that if Cooper doesn’t get his act together, more people are going to die. Boss gives him instructions to “work over” the well, and Cooper does not seem to follow. “I got no f— idea what you’re talking about,” he says. I’ve heard of learning on the job, but somebody call Rebecca because I have some negligence claims I’d like to file. Thankfully, the well and that rattler are the only casualties in this episode.
(Black) golden moments:
- I let out a chuckle when Cooper revealed the reason he was able to give the beat down on Antonio and Manuel at the man camp. Big ups to the Texas Tech wrestling team!
- I’m biased, but I think it’s really rad that Sheridan decides to not subtitle any of the Spanish in the series. It’s perfectly fine to not be fluent (Lord knows I’m not), but most English-speaking Texans can figure out enough to get by without making it a big deal. It’s nice to see that represented on-screen.
- I’d like to pour a margarita out for all the teens who take care of the crazy folks who come through the Midland Country Club. If Sheridan and crew need a CW-style teen spin-off, I’d start with them.
- Best line: “That was meant to be a compliment before you Gen Z’d your way out of it,” Tommy says in reference to his mention of Rebecca’s age.
