Taylor Sheridan’s sprawling television empire keeps drilling, and its greasiest, most combustible corner is back. “Landman,” the oil-patch drama that turned the brutal economics of West Texas crude into must-watch television, returned for its second season on November 16, and it’s brought reinforcements — including a mustachioed legend who feels tailor-made for this world. Season 2 is here, and the oil is still flowing.
For anyone who hasn’t spent time in the boomtowns, “Landman” follows Tommy Norris (Billy Bob Thornton), a fixer for a West Texas oil company whose job is to stand in the crossfire between boardroom executives obsessed with profit and the roughnecks risking their lives in the fields. It’s a show about the ugly, dangerous, wildly lucrative machinery of American energy, and Thornton anchors it with the kind of world-weary, foul-mouthed charisma that makes even a monologue about pipelines crackle. It was one of the sneaky hits of Sheridan’s crowded slate. Warning: beyond this point there are spoilers for Landman Season 2 and where the oil-patch drama is heading.
It’s a show about the ugly, dangerous, wildly lucrative machinery of American energy, and Thornton anchors it with the kind of world-weary, foul-mouthed charisma that makes even a monologue about pipelines crackle.”
The big addition this year is a genuine coup: Sam Elliott joins as a season-two regular, and casting that voice and that mustache into a rugged Texas oil drama feels less like a casting decision than a law of nature. Elliott is the platonic ideal of the weathered Western presence, and dropping him into Tommy Norris’s world promises exactly the kind of gravelly, lived-in gravitas the show trades in. Whatever role he’s playing, his mere presence raises the temperature.
He’s not the only new face. Season 2 continues to build out its ensemble around Thornton, with returning players like Ali Larter and Demi Moore alongside fresh additions filling in the sprawling human machinery of the oil business — the executives, the families, the workers whose lives ride on every barrel. Sheridan’s shows live and die on their ensembles, on the friction between people at wildly different rungs of the same brutal ladder, and “Landman” has always understood that the oil is just the backdrop. The real drama is the people fighting over it.
What makes “Landman” click is how specific it is. Created by Sheridan with Christian Wallace — and inspired by a real podcast about the West Texas oil world — the show has a documentary-grade fascination with how this industry actually works: the deals, the dangers, the staggering sums, the human cost baked into every gallon that ends up in your tank. That specificity is Sheridan’s signature across all his shows, and here it turns a subject most dramas wouldn’t touch into genuinely gripping television.
The season arrives at an interesting moment for Sheridan’s empire. The man has built a television juggernaut — a whole constellation of interconnected and standalone dramas that have made Paramount+ a destination — and “Landman” is one of its most distinctive corners, grittier and more grounded than the ranch sagas that made his name. Its return is another brick in a wall that shows no sign of stopping, even as questions swirl about how long one creator can sustain this much output at this level of quality.
The season arrives at an interesting moment for Sheridan’s empire. The man has built a television juggernaut — a whole constellation of interconnected and standalone dramas that have made Paramount+ a destination — and “Landman” is one of its most distinctive corners, grittier and more grounded than the ranch sagas that made his name. Its return is another brick in a wall that shows no sign of stopping, even as questions swirl about how long one creator can sustain this much output at this level of quality.
For now, though, the pumpjacks are running and Tommy Norris is back in the crossfire, dodging corporate knives and field disasters with equal exasperation. “Landman” was never the flashiest show on Sheridan’s slate, but it might be one of the most quietly addictive — a lean, mean, blackly funny look at the dirty business of keeping America’s engines running. Season 2 doubles down on everything that worked, and adds Sam Elliott for good measure. Hard to argue with that math.
What Do You Think? Is “Landman” the most underrated show in Taylor Sheridan’s growing empire, or does it get lost in the shadow of his bigger ranch dramas? What role would you most want to see Sam Elliott play in the oil-patch world — an ally for Tommy Norris, or a new thorn in his side? Can Sheridan keep churning out this many shows without the quality slipping, and where does “Landman” rank for you among them?
See you on the next binge!
