Sunday’s new episode of Landman changed the game entirely when Tommy Norris (Billy Bob Thornton) was shockingly dismissed as president of M-Tex by the company’s new owner, Cami (Demi Moore). Cami chose to fire him on the spot during a work trip to Louisiana after he expressed his sincere doubts about her decision to gamble on an outmoded offshore rig site instead of trusting her lawyers to deal with her contractual obligations issue in the courtroom instead of the ocean.
Under Cami’s late husband Monty’s (Jon Hamm) leadership, Tommy was the M-Tex landman, so he’s been quietly running the show for years. Now, though, Cami is choosing to risk her nest egg on a wildcat operation, with financial partner Gallino (Andy Garcia) waiting in the wings for whatever happens — if she succeeds and strikes oil there, they both win, but if she doesn’t, he still wins because he’ll simply seize the company from under her and collect all the future profits from current leases.
On social media, fans were outraged by Cami’s choice and fear it will spell disaster for her and the company at large.
“Firing Tommy doesn’t bode well for her. Cosplaying a boss is exactly what it is and no one respects her- which is why even her ‘friends’ stopped returning her calls,” one Landman watcher predicted on X (formerly Twitter).
Another suspected that this sudden separation will not last long, writing, “Cami firing Tommy shows she dont know her ass from her elbow. Shes gonna crawl back to him.”
Yet another insisted it was her “biggest mistake” yet.
We’ll have to wait until next week’s finale (and possibly beyond) to find out what the real consequences of Cami’s decision to oust Tommy will be, but we can already suspect a few potential outcomes.
For one, Tommy’s firing might put a damper on Angela’s (Ali Larter) desire to get a house in Fort Worth to be close to Aynsley (Michelle Randolph) at TCU — not to mention that beach house and everything else she told him she wants. The two were last seen lapping it up at a swanky resort as Angela made plans to find Aynsley an apartment in town to avoid the social woes of dorm life, but will Tommy’s sudden income stop crush that dream? Or perhaps if he no longer has ties to M-Tex and the frat house of employees living in his house, could he pack it in and fully move there, too?
Emerson Miller / Paramount+
Meanwhile, this move could also have a major impact on Cooper (Jacob Lofland), as his position with the company is largely dependent on Tommy telling the others, like Boss (Mustafa Speaks), to listen to him as he makes his own gambits about where to drill. Now that his wells are under the purview of M-Tex, what will that mean for his already-tenuous future in the industry? Boss sure didn’t seem thrilled with Cooper’s most recent decision, but he had to bite his tongue out of respect for his position, which was assigned by Tommy…
As for Gallino’s part in the matter, he has been pro-Tommy all season long, despite being occasionally angry with him for his ingratitude after saving Tommy from the lower-level cartel guys in the bloody finale for Season 1. However, he has also warmed up to Cami in a big way, gladly partnering up with her despite Tommy’s protestations. At this point, would he be willing to step up and help Tommy once again by talking Cami out of this decision? Or is this maneuver one of his own making behind the scenes to get Cami — and, by extension, M-Tex — right where he wants her?
A long-shot possibility, of course, is that T.L. (Sam Elliott) somehow comes into play with all of this. Though he seems to be delighted by all of those “physical therapy” sessions with exotic dancer Cheyenne (Francesca Xuereb), he’s also otherwise bored to tears even with unlimited sunset watching. Could T.L. be the Chekhov’s gun in this story and emerge as a key weapon for Tommy to move forward in the oil business anew? After all, he seems to know a thing or two about wildcatting.
One thing’s for sure: The Season 2 finale has a lot of burning questions to address!
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