Taylor Sheridan’s Oil Series With Billy Bob Thornton Is Mostly Entertaining & Speaks To A MAGA Worldview

A color-washed sequence about robust, no-nonsense guys coping with high-pressure hands-on stuff in rural America, “Landman” is uncooked, uncut Taylor Sheridan straight from the supply. Set in and across the oil fields of Midland-Odessa, Texas, the sequence trolls the mesquite-mixed grasslands of the Permian Basin for the substitute drama so endemic there. Smuggling mishaps, oil nicely blowouts, appendage mangling, and plain previous heartbreak present the gas on this regard, which flows extra liberally than what’s pumped out of the bottom.

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There are a number of totally different storylines via the primary 5 episodes, however all have some connection to Tommy Norris (Billy Bob Thornton), a fixer for oil firm M-Tex. Tommy negotiates with cartels to lease mineral rights, runs interference on accident investigations, coordinates nicely openings/closings, and jumps on anything that may trigger complications for his company overlords. A kind of bosses, Monty (Jon Hamm), appears to understand Tommy’s function in conserving every part in movement, but the accidents which might be the direct results of M-Tex’s means of doing enterprise are starting so as to add up, and the buck stops with the 2 of them.

Whereas M-Tex drama is greater than sufficient to maintain Tommy busy, his two younger grownup children and ex-wife be sure he’s acquired complications that aren’t work-related as nicely. Son, Cooper (Jacob Lofland), has dropped out of school to try to work his means up as a roughneck within the “patch,” whereas his distractingly stunning daughter, Ainsley (Michelle Randolph), and ex-wife, Angela (Ali Larter), are angling for a spot again in Tommy’s life. And whereas occasions within the first few episodes appear drastic sufficient to carry Tommy’s consideration, like several good Sheridan present, the juiciest bits happen between the sheets, not within the streets.

Thornton performs Tommy with a weary reluctance that is likely to be the very best match for his “talents” that any director or producer has captured. Tommy’s complete existence is jerry-rigged along with cigarettes, soda, Michelob Ultras, and lethal obligation. One will get the sense watching him function that the early grave his way of life guarantees is his best-case situation. It’s laborious to inform if Thornton is phoning it in or channeling the exhaustion of his character at instances, however the truth that this function doesn’t require any such distinction appears to be a internet win for each actor and present.

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And whereas the “who,” “what,” and “where” of “Landman” is simple sufficient, the “why” of all of it is harder to pin down. The largest menace via the primary 5 episodes comes from M-Tex itself, which appears poised to chop Tommy free as a sacrificial lamb to the consequence gods. Moreover the connection drama effervescent up within the B- and C-plots, the first battle of the sequence comes from the protagonist’s shut proximity to the potential antagonist. Whereas this growth may nicely bear attention-grabbing dramatic fruit within the again half of the season, it creates a dilemma Sheridan by no means overcomes via this primary stretch.   

Who ought to we be rooting for right here? Tommy is the apparent reply, as he appears to be not less than following the foundations of the corrupt little nook of the world the place he has area. But, by his personal admission, he’s a rough, gruff, law-breaking, OSHA-ignoring fixer working in some of the nefarious industries on the planet. Angela is an industrial-grade bother magnet, and each Norris children appear nicely on their method to turning into some twisted model of their mother and father.

However possibly that’s the purpose? Devoid of any type of defensible worldview or coverage, the hero of the brand new MAGA U.S.A. isn’t the individual preventing in opposition to injustice; it’s the blue-collar sucker carrying the water of these doing it. To that group, the entire world and everybody in it’s screwed anyway, and the heroes amongst them are the vulgar, unapologetic straight shooters who work to get theirs whereas the getting is nice. It’s a miserable thought, however it appears to be the one one Sheridan and “Landman” have to supply. To boot, Thornton’s Tommy additionally appears to be “fuck your feelings” personified; too busy to sugarcoat, an excessive amount of cash at stake for euphemisms or political correctness, which the present appears to revel and take nice satisfaction in (not in contrast to Sheridan’s “Lioness” or “Yellowstone”). There’s not one f*ck given to something resembling liberal (learn: humanist) tears.

Nonetheless, the present is entertaining sufficient, and Thornton holds the display nicely as a beat-down everyman working a crap job for horrible individuals. Hamm will get the posh of rattling off traces like, “Our business is one of constant crisis interrupted by brief periods of intense success,” whereas the producers prepare dinner up methods to maintain Larter, Randolph, and Demi Moore (oh yeah, she’s on this sequence…type of) in bikinis. To be truthful, there may be one featured feminine character that “Landman” doesn’t sexualize, causation of legal responsibility lawyer Rebecca Falcone (Kayla Wallace), however that’s as a result of nearly each scene the place she seems forces her to clarify how severely everybody ought to take her.

When it’s all mentioned and completed, Tommy is nice at his job, and when “Landman” focuses on him and the others who’re working comfortably of their oil-lubed groove on the planet, the present may be attention-grabbing and thrilling in equal measure. Certain, if one squints laborious, they could have the ability to make out the subtext of all this, which is to champion the petroleum business and rail in opposition to all of the pesky rules that put a hard-working man like Tommy in peril. Some individuals will watch this and lionize these characters and their world identical to the smooth-brained weirdos who appeared as much as Tony Soprano. The distinction right here is that Sheridan, the architect of all of this, possibly one in all them as nicely.

That is all to say that taking part in round on this world is innocent sufficient and a superb waste of time. Sheridan and Thornton make it straightforward to take pleasure in, however as Tommy says to Ainsley at one level, “There are two types of people that work in the patch: the dreamers and losers.” Because it occurs, audiences on the lookout for depth or something in addition to some low cost, escapist enjoyable in “Landman” fall into an an identical dichotomy. [C+]

“Landman” premieres November 17 on Paramount+.