Paramount has hit a homerun with their online streaming series titled “Landman” by Taylor Sheridan. This new original drama series stars Oscar winner Billy Bob Thornton, Ali Larter (The Last Victim), Michelle Randolph (1923), Jacob Lofland (Joker 2), Kayla Wallace (When Calls the Heart), James Jordan (Yellowstone), Mark Collie (Nashville), Paulina Chávez (The Expanding Universe of Ashley Garcia), and Demi Moore (Feud: Capote Vs. The Swans). Jon Hamm (Mad Men) also stars in a recurring guest role with Andy Garcia (Expendables franchise) and Michael Peña (End of Watch) also serve as guest stars.
The series, now in Season 2, is set in West Texas highlighting the rough and tumble oil business. The series averages nearly 16 million viewers and has been renewed for a third season.
This week’s Season 2 Episode 1titled “Death and a Sunset” had a sub-plot
“Taylor Sheridan Takes Aim At Woke College Culture In Landman’s Latest Must-See Episode” – Whiskey Riff
Part of this week’s episode involves Tommy’s, played by Billy Bob Thornton, daughter Ainsley, played by Michelle Randolph, heading to A Texas Christian University (TCU) cheerleading summer camp. Ainsley is paired with a non-binary roommate named Paigyn portrayed by Bobbi Salvör Menuez. During a painful introduction we learn that Paigyn, a sports medicine student, is a all about them preferences. They/them don’t like music… they don’t like air fresheners… they probably wouldn’t like you, either. Paigyn is a vegan who seemingly enjoys correcting others.
Paramount’s Landman OBLITERATES the pronouns argument after the show introduced a non-binary character as Ainsley Norris’s TCU roommate.
— RedWave Press (@RedWave_Press) January 13, 2026
Non-binary roommate: “So what are your pronouns?”
Ainsley Norris: “My pronouns? I’d hope that was pretty clear?”
Non-binary roommate:… pic.twitter.com/faGDMrmTa9
So, after Ainsley meets Paigyn we see her struggle to understand a personality and climate totally foreign to her and through this process she goes through her own transition from happy to depressed.
She leaves her new room and roommate to go speak to Greta Stidham, an admission counselor at TCU played by Tony‑winning actor Miriam Silverman.
WATCH: Paramount’s Landman OBLITERATES the pronouns argument: Ainsley Norris: “Using a plural pronoun for one person is just kind of incorrect.”
— RedWave Press (@RedWave_Press) January 12, 2026
TCU Counselor: “Says who?”
Ainsley Norris: “Well, the English language.”
NUKED! pic.twitter.com/FzpgAuZJHi
CONCLUSION:
Landman creator Taylor Sheridan is quite brilliant in how this segment of this first episode of his second season takes on the subject of woke.
Most of us came into this scene relating to Ainsley. She is a relatable character who possesses qualities, experiences, and emotions that resonate with us. She works to have empathy for others while trying to understand people different from herself.
Paigyn, on the other hand, seems distant, cold, aloof, and overall, to many of us, engaged in some form of performance art. It is this appearance of her engaging in performance art that makes her seem both insincere and unauthentic.
Now the LGBTQA+ community will be quick to jump all over my observations by simply writing me off as “a hater”. But that is both dismissive and untrue.
Any two individuals can find common ground, given enough time together. For example, this brief exchange between Ainsley and Paigyn, gave me enough time where I would be on Paigyn’s side here:
Ainsley: “Would you be opposed to a room freshener?”
Paigyn: “A toxic airborne chemical that I breathe into my lungs?”
Two deep thoughts that followed me through this episode were:
1. Why did Taylor Sheridan have to portray Ainsley as very pretty but slow or stupid blonde and Paigyn as highly intelligent? Seriously, how many kids today would not know what a ferret is?
2. Why can’t we go back to the good old days of Saturday Night Live (SNL) with the skits involving “It’s Pat”? Nobody ever did figure out which of the TWO genders Pat was and therein lied both the challenge and the joke.
Pat O’Neal Riley was a seemingly genderless fictional character created and performed by Julia Sweeney on the Saturday Night Live show from 1990 to 1994.
“Pat at the Barbershop – Saturday Night Live”
If you think about this scenario critically, back in 1994 SNL’s Pat was a puzzle to us whereby we were simply trying to determine his or her gender. Today, in 2026, Paigyn is overtly all about change which covertly involves power and control.
There are a series of AI Sasquatch video shorts exposing the frustrations many Americans feel in 2026 in a humorous way:
“Bigfoot just got a job at Starbucks and it didn’t…” – @TheLingerers
Until I saw these, I never knew Bigfoot was a conservative, apparently. Who really knows though, because it is just AI.
© 2026 by Mark S. Schwendau
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Thinking Conservative.
