After a rocky first impression, Rebecca comes to Tommy’s defense.
Here are some random thoughts prompted by “The Sting of Second Chances” — Episode 4, Season 1 of Landman. (The recap for Episode 3, Season 1 is available here.) Warning: There are scads of spoilers here, so you should wait until you watch before you read.
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- Legal jargon got tossed around like so much confetti as insurance company reps sat down with Tommy, Nathan and M-TEX litigator Rebecca Savage. Tommy was characteristically and unapologetically sarcastic and disrespectful to folks on the other side of the negotiations who, truth be told, didn’t appear to know a whole hell of a lot about the oil business. But Rebecca came across as even more of an overt badass, brushing aside condescending and/or sexist remarks like Godzilla swatting fighter jets and generally winning the meeting. “I didn’t give you enough credit,” Tommy marveled. “Nobody does,” Rebecca replied. As Will Sonnett used to say: No brag. Just fact.
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- Michelob Ultra remains Tommy’s drink of choice, even though he claims to be a recovering alcoholic, and he orders it almost as often as Beth demands Tito’s Vodka on Yellowstone. Tommy makes no apologies for falling (if not diving) off the wagon: “It’s a Michelob Ultra. There’s more alcohol in orange juice. You watch me drink six of these sons of bitches. Then I’ll come back in here tomorrow night and drink six whiskeys, and you tell me if you notice a bleeping difference.” You have to wonder whether that’s the kind of product-placement plugging the Michelob folks actually wanted.
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- Since Angela has announced plans to stick around for a while — which, not surprisingly, has not yet elicited a full-throated roar of approval from her ex-husband — Tommy and Rebecca likely won’t get romantically involved any time soon, if ever. But they’re getting friendlier all the time, to the point of sharing stories after work over drinks at The Patch Café. That’s where Tommy memorably described the procession of people drawn to oil boomtowns: “We ain’t any different than Tombstone or Dodge City or San Francisco. First come the dreamers. Then the bankers. Then the salesmen. Then the sharks. Then the desperate. And then the thieves.”
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- Glad to see they’re paying close attention to details: Tommy had to slice off the tip of his pinkie a couple of episodes back, and he’s still wearing the bandage.
- Angela continued to coax Tommy back between the sheets, despite Tommy’s protestations that they were never the perfect couple, and aren’t likely to become one now: “We had a terrible marriage interrupted by brief moments of joy.” But Angela isn’t a woman who gives up so easily. And Tommy is a man who gives up too easily — at least, where Angela is concerned. Why? “Because that’s how stupid I am,” he admitted.
- So how many episodes do you give this temporary reconciliation? Four? Three? Two? Or will it be Splitsville again as early as next week?
- After the oil rig explosion that killed three of his co-workers, Cooper has been traipsing around with a bad case of survivor’s guilt. But that hasn’t stopped him from landing work as a “worm” (i.e., newbie) with another crew, and impressing his boss enough to merit selection as a replacement for an injured roughneck. Indeed, at the rate he’s going, he probably will make his dad Tommy proud. If he doesn’t get killed first.
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- And speaking of Cooper’s possible demise: Remember last week when we predicted he might come to grief at the hands of Manuel if he didn’t heed that guy’s warning to stay away from Ariana, Antonio’s newly widowed cousin? (How newly? Her husband was killed in that explosion Cooper survived.) Looks like Cooper is ready to dice with death: Ariana called and asked to meet him. “Yeah, I can do that,” he replied. But only after making sure no one else could hear his side of the conversation.
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Michelle Randolph as Ainsley Norris and Ali Larter as Angela Norris.
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- Does anyone else find it more than a little creepy that this show devotes so much time to showing Ainsley (Tommy’s daughter) unsettling the older guys in her orbit whenever she dons a bikini or skimpy exercise attire? Didn’t this sight gag already wear out its welcome an episode or two ago?
- Come to think of it: Is Demi Moore ever going to get anything else to do in this series other than lounge decorously around her character’s swimming pool?
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Photography: Emerson Miller/Paramount+
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