Landman's Most Divisive Character Is Crying Out For A New Story In Season 3

Published Oct 15, 2026, 12:45 PM EDT

Cathal Gunning has been writing about movies, television, culture, and politics online and in print since 2017. He worked as a Senior Editor in Adbusters Media Foundation from 2018-2019 and wrote for WhatCulture in early 2020. He has been a Senior Features Writer for ScreenRant since 2020.

Even though one major Landman character is easily the most divisive star of the show, it is easy to see how Taylor Sheridan’s series can redeem their role in season 3. All of Taylor Sheridan’s shows have their issues. Even the most ardent defender of the Yellowstone franchise would have to admit that any show which kills off major villains with a surprise rattlesnake to the face owes more to campy classics like Dynasty and Dallas than grim, grounded crime dramas like The Sopranos.

Similarly, Sheridan’s prison drama Mayor of Kingston has the opposite problem, as the show is a miserable, dour slog, but still too heightened and absurd to be taken seriously. With too much macho posturing and too many brooding antiheroes to pass for an attempt at replicating The Wire or Oz, the show could have simply become a self-aware guilty pleasure like Sheridan’s crime comedy Tulsa King. However, Mayor of Kingston’s ploddingly self-serious tone means the series is neither fun nor genuinely dramatic.

Meanwhile, Landman season 2’s issues prove that the oil business family drama might be Sheridan’s most divisive effort yet. While Landman has proven a huge hit on streaming, the show has received criticism even among Sheridan’s defenders for its shamelessly one-sided defense of the oil industry, up to including junk science about wind farms in more than one episode. Then, there is the issue of Ali Larter’s Angela.

Landman's Most Divisive Character Desperately Needs A New Story

Image via MovieStillsDB

Flamboyant, destructive, and volatile, Angela should theoretically make a perfect pairing with Billy Bob Thornton’s Tommy Norris. Her refusal to give up her lavish lifestyle often puts her at odds with Tommy, a billionaire who is also somehow perpetually lacking in liquid cash thanks to his many business schemes and investments. As a result, much of Angela and Tommy’s shared screen time is devoted to screaming matches as Larter’s raging love interest tosses meals into walls.

Not only is the intensity of Larter’s Angela not a bad thing, but she has the potential to be the best thing about Landman. Yellowstone’s John Dutton was a vile loser who permanently lost the respect of one of his children by literally branding them, only to be murdered by his other child in one of TV’s most humiliating deaths. However, he was also a deeply compelling protagonist precisely because of how obviously flawed he was.

As proven by everything from Final Destination to Heroes, Larter is more than capable of playing a complex, ethically fraught character, so Angela has the potential to be an unforgettable player in Landman’s never-ending turf wars. The problem is that the show never lets her get one over on Tommy, meaning that, for all her supposed ferocity, Angela is usually reduced to shrill background noise as her husband does the plot’s heavy lifting.

Ali Larter's Angela Can Finally Leave Tommy In Landman Season 3

Fortunately, there is an easy fix for this. If Angela actually leaves Tommy for good in season 3, this would give her the richer, more consequential story the character has been crying out for since Larter was cast in the role. It may have taken the Yellowstone franchise years to finally utilize its true main character, Beth, in Dutton Ranch, but Landman doesn’t need to wait as long to center Angela.

Specifically, Tommy’s decision not to tell Angela about the cartel threat at the end of the season 2 finale could be used to justify her ending their marriage. It was a perfect opportunity to open up, which he squandered, so Angela choosing to leave him in Landman season 3 would allow viewers to see how she fares on her own, to find out how much or how little Tommy actually needs her around, and to discover who the show’s most underused character actually is outside of her husband’s shadow.

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  Billy Bob Thornton

  Tommy Norris

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  Ali Larter

  Angela Norris