Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Dustin Rowles | TV | November 17, 2025
If you’re curious about what happened on this week’s season two premiere of Landman, here’s a brief rundown: Monty (Jon Hamm) died at the end of last season, his wife Cami (Demi Moore) has taken over and successfully proves herself in a room full of bankers (for now). Billy Bob Thornton’s Tommy Norris has been elevated to President of Cami’s independent oil company and will help her navigate the future. Tommy’s son, Cooper (Jacob Lofland), bought a gas well that he discovered will produce about $10 million a year in profits, which he’ll use to start a family with Ariana (Paulina Chávez) and her baby. Tommy’s daughter Ainsley (Michelle Randolph) was accepted into TCU over the objections of the admissions officer; and Tommy’s ex-wife/current partner Angela (Ali Larter) wants to move into a bigger house in Fort Worth. Oh, and we discover that Tommy’s mother has died (she was in a memory care unit) and that Tommy’s father, T.L. played by Sam Elliott, lives in some sort of old folks’ home.
But the plot is hardly the point of Landman. Landman is about vibes; it’s about remarkably good country music; and most of all, it’s about the lines that Taylor Sheridan writes for this show, which vacillate between brilliantly misanthropic and downright stupid. Sometimes you laugh, and sometimes you cringe so hard you entire body convulses. And it’s those lines that I hope to return to each week for Landman’s Pearls of Wisdom.
On Breakfast: Tommy rants when a waitress tells him that “they” say that “breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
“Who is they? I’ll tell you who ‘they’ is. It’s Kellogg’s and General Mills and whoever it is that makes them sh***y frozen little waffles. That’s who it is. The people who tell us that breakfast is the most important meal of the day are the sons of bitches who make the stuff. You think our ancestors had breakfast? You think cavemen sat around a ****ing fire and ate waffles? No. I guarantee you, if they ate breakfast at all, it was probably bone marrow and an impala they dried out over a fire. But I guarantee you they didn’t have cornflakes.” (Score: 7 out of 10 Pearls of Wisdom)
On the, uh, insect life in East Texas: “The mosquitoes are so big they can **** a turkey flat-footed.” (Score: 5.5 out of 10 WTFs)
Angela, on football players wearing sweatpants: “God bless grey sweatpants. It’s like a present wrapped in cellophane. You know exactly what the hell you’re getting.” (Score: 6 out of 10 Pearls of Wisdom)
Ainsley, on why cheerleaders and college athletes should be allowed to date in college: “Well, it seems detrimental to really humanity in general that a university would try to keep its prettiest girls from dating the tallest, most athletic boys who could get then married and make babies that are really pretty and really athletic. It’s like if you breed a lab to a sheep dog. You have … well, I don’t know what you have. You don’t have a lab. Or a sheepdog. But if you take two really, really good-looking labs … then the puppies will be like super retrievers. And I just think that we’re wasting a real opportunity with these restrictive policies.” (Score: 6 out of 10 Eyerolling scoffs)
Angela, on … pies: “Whether I bake a pie, or have someone bake a pie for me, I’ve got pie either way. You understand? Make what you can make in life and have others make the rest. That’s the key to life, baby.” (Score: 6 out of 10 Good Lords)
Tommy, on Ainsley being accepted to TCU: “Congratulations, baby. Good job. I’m glad you passed up that public school in-state tuition … I am proud, but I was already proud when it was half the price.” (8 out of 10 on the relatability scale, as someone going through the process now)
T.L. on Dying: “I recommend you find a way to die quickly. This dying a little every day is …” (Score: 3 out of 10 but a 7 out of 10 when delivered by Sam Elliott)
Ainsley to her brother Cooper: “Did you somehow get uglier? Did you swallow a soup can? Oh, that’s your Adam’s apple.” (Score: 4.5 out of 10 Dayums)
Tommy on Angela’s Cacio e pepe: “You ever notice that the closer she gets to her period, the more complicated the dinner dishes become …” (Score: 8 out of 10 Face Palms)
After Angela loses it because Tommy blames her mood swing on her period: “This is going to sound really inappropriate, honey, but I just want to say, before you kill me, with you sweating like that, I just want to say that your t*** look great in that little tiny bra.”
“How do you manage to say the only thing that can possibly save you?” (Score: 10 out of 10 Are You Kidding Me’s)
Angela to Tommy, on her outbursts : “You think the pattern is my hormones going wonky before my period, which causes me to act irrationally. I can’t control my hormones, but you can control pointing them out to me. You ever ponder that, Mr. Oil President?
“I had not considered that fresh perspective. So, it’s my fault when you start throwing **** against the wall?” (Score: 9 out of 10 Do You Know Any Women, Taylor Sheridan?)
