Spoilers for the first four episodes of Landman Season 1 are ahead!
So far, as Landman has aired on the 2024 TV schedule, I’ve been enamored by Billy Bob Thornton’s fascinating fixer Tommy Norris, AKA, the middleman for a massive oil company. With his tale, however, come a whole bunch of other storylines revolving around characters close to him. Now, considering we’re four episodes into Season 1 and sort of have a sense of who everyone is, I’m ready to make a claim: I think we need to see more of Cooper and less of Angela and Ainsley.
I Want To See More Of Cooper Working Out In The Field
From the jump, I’ve been fascinated by Cooper. Physically, he’s not the kind of guy you’d expect to see working the fields, and then watching him struggle with a painful amount of persistence is simultaneously difficult and super interesting. However, knowing that Jacob Lofland’s character is doing this to own his own oil company one day is what really piqued my curiosity.
To be clear, I’m not interested in seeing more of the odd subplot where Cooper is kind of helping and/or attracted to one of the women who lost her partner in the explosion at the start of the season. I just want to see more of him on the job.
So far, we’ve really only watched him get hurt or someone on his team suffer an injury. I want to see more of his comradery with his co-workers, more conversations with his dad about the business in general, and more obvious steps he’s taking to move up.
Clearly, that can be played out over a very long period. However, I think they could show more of it now, especially since there’s another storyline we could see less of.
I Want To See Less Of Angela And Ainsley Lying Around
If you look at some of the critical reviews of Landman, many of them focus on how women are represented in the show, specifically noting Tommy’s daughter Ainsley and ex-wife Angela. While I think these characters have potential, I’d have to agree with the critics. So far, these women have really only lounged around in swimsuits while the men who live with Tommy try not to ogle at them.
Quite frankly that got old about two seconds after it started happening, and now we’ve been dealing with it for four episodes.
Don’t get me wrong, I want to see Ali Larter’s explosive ex-wife and Michelle Randolph’s daughter who is trying to figure life out. I think they have the potential to be such strong characters on the show. However, at the moment, the scripts aren't giving them that. And I’d like them to do something other than lounge around while the men act kind of creepy around them.
It’s weird, unnecessary and a waste of screen time and two potentially phenomenal characters.
My hope is that there is a bigger plan for these two women, though. I’m intrigued by the idea of Angela and Ainsley moving in with Tommy, and I really want to see the whole family dynamic with Cooper being around as well. Now, that’s a story that has potential!
However, sadly, that hasn’t been explored on Landman yet.
We did get a small taste of the family nuances in Episode 4 when Angela and Tommy opened up about experiencing a bust in the oil industry, tough, and that was an interesting story worthy of more screen time. So, here’s hoping it will get some, and give us a story worthy of Angela and Ainsley.
To see if we get more or less of both these storylines, you can watch Landman with a Paramount+ subscription every Sunday.
