As Landman gears up for Season 3, Billy Bob Thornton is opening up about why stepping back into Tommy Norris feels less like work—and more like muscle memory.
Speaking at Deadline’s Contenders TV panel, Thornton described the role in unusually personal terms. “It’s easy to play father-son relationships when you’re a father, and when you had a father that you had a very tricky relationship with,” he said. “I was just kind of putting on a nice pair of worn-in pants.”
That dynamic has been at the center of Landman since its debut. Thornton’s Tommy Norris—a blunt, battle-tested oil executive—has spent much of the series navigating a strained relationship with his son Cooper, played by Jacob Lofland.
Over two seasons, the show has tracked their evolution from emotional distance to a closer mutual respect, culminating in Tommy naming Cooper president of his new venture after being pushed out of M-Tex Oil.
The father-son storyline has also taken on added weight behind the scenes. Lofland recently revealed that filming a key truck scene with Thornton became deeply personal after the death of his own father in 2025. Drawing from real-life loss, both actors leaned into the moment, giving the show one of its most grounded emotional beats.
The series itself, created by Taylor Sheridan and inspired by the Boomtown podcast, has built a reputation for blending industry realism with character-driven storytelling.
At the same panel, Thornton admitted the scale of the show’s success caught the cast off guard. “We thought it was going to appeal to the middle of the country,” he said. “We didn’t think the coasts would go for it—we certainly didn’t think it would become this huge international hit.”
He added that the show’s mix of tones—“emotion and humor and drama and absurdity and danger”—has helped it connect with audiences far beyond its Texas setting.
That reach is reflected in the numbers. The Season 2 finale drew 15.8 million viewers in its first two days, marking a record for Paramount+. Season 3 is set to begin filming in May, and a November 2026 premiere is expected.
