Billy Bob Thornton tops Landman’s weirdest storyline yet with an even stranger twist.
Warning: spoilers for Landman season 2, episode 8 — “Handsome Touched Me”
As Landman season 2 barrels toward its endgame, Tommy Norris (Billy Bob Thornton) proves there’s still room to surprise — not with oil-field brinkmanship or boardroom intrigue, but with a jaw-dropping family decision that instantly becomes the show’s strangest moment yet.
On paper, Tommy has enough on his plate. As president of M-Tex, he’s scrambling to keep the company afloat amid the risky decisions of new owner Cami Miller (Demi Moore), the looming offshore drilling deal financed by Gallino (Andy Garcia), and the fallout threatening his son, Cooper (Jacob Lofland). Yet the problem he seems to dread most waits for him at home.
That’s where T.L. Norris (Sam Elliott) comes in. At the insistence of Tommy’s ex-wife, Angela (Ali Larter), Tommy’s estranged father moves into his rented house in Midland, Texas, forcing years of unresolved resentment into close quarters. When T.L. takes a spill into the backyard swimming pool in episode 8, Tommy responds in a way only Landman would dare.
Instead of hiring a licensed physical therapist, Tommy stops by Rick’s Cabaret and hires Cheyenne (Francesca Xuereb), an exotic dancer with zero medical qualifications, to rehabilitate his father. His reasoning is blunt: T.L. wouldn’t cooperate with a traditional therapist, but a beautiful stripper? That, Tommy believes, would get results.
Against all logic, it works. T.L. happily floats in Cheyenne’s arms, clearly enjoying himself, while Cheyenne seems amused by the odd assignment. Still, the entire setup is bizarre — from Tommy not even giving Cheyenne his name or address until after she’s hired, to the casual way this wildly inappropriate solution is treated as a win.
The moment outdoes even Angela and Ainsley Norris’ ongoing side adventures — which have included entertaining elderly friends and dragging them to a strip club — as the most off-the-rails storyline Landman has offered. More importantly, it raises real questions about Tommy’s judgment, even as it delivers shock value and dark humor.
That tension highlights a growing issue in season 2: Landman increasingly feels like two different shows. Tommy’s professional storyline — the power plays with Gallino and Cami, and the ominous forecasts about the oil industry — remains compelling. Meanwhile, the Angela-centric detours often feel disconnected, existing more to fill screen time than to advance the central narrative.
After standout episodes like the Norris family funeral and the unexpectedly warm “Pirate Dinner,” the series seems to have lost momentum. Tommy hiring a stripper as his father’s physical therapist may be entertaining, but it underscores the widening gap between Landman’s sharp, grounded drama and its increasingly oddball distractions — a split that’s harder to ignore as the season nears its finale.
