'Landman' takes on ultra-processed foods, smoking and stress. How Taylor Sheridan's latest show tackles health-related plotlines.
Set in Midland, Texas, it’s fitting that Taylor Sheridan’s hit show Landman does a lot of things Texas-big: oil rigs, explosions, egos and drama, to name a few. But there are also several sizable health topics woven throughout the show, whose characters have strong and at times controversial takes. Some health themes echo cultural shifts in how we think about the foods we eat, while others reflect potentially harmful misconceptions.
Here’s what’s going on with health and wellness in the latest hit in the Sheridan universe.
Nutrition: Pop-Tarts and Doritos vs. Angela and Ainsley
In Episode 1, Landman’s leads go after ultra-processed foods. Tommy Norris (played by Billy Bob Thornton), scolds his very much grown-up roommate Nathan (Colm Feore) for eating a Pop-Tart for breakfast, telling him the packaged pastry is “gonna kill” him.
But the real whole-food crusaders are Norris’s ex-wife Angela (Ali Larter) and daughter Ainsley (Michelle Randolph). The two are all about perfecting their bodies, and that means no ultra-processed foods and plenty of protein.
Research suggests they’re onto something. Diets high in ultra-processed foods — such as the Doritos Angela berates Tommy for having and the Vienna sausages Ainsley refuses — have been linked to higher risks of diabetes and cardiovascular disease. These types of foods are thought to contribute to obesity and inflammation and, in turn, scientists suspect they may raise risks for colorectal and other cancers, too.
Eating adequate amounts of protein is important, but recently there’s been a borderline obsession with the nutrient, at least among the very online. A super high-protein ketogenic diet — as Ainsley says she wants to eat in one episode of Landman — for example, is probably not ideal for most people, especially not long-term, according to nutritionists.
Smoking: A problem, but maybe not the problem, according to Tommy Norris
Sheridan’s show isn’t afraid to wade into some controversial territory, and theories about what causes disease are apparently no exception.
After Norris gets on Nathan’s case about the Pop-Tart, Nathan implies that the advice is rich coming from a “two-pack-a-day smoker.” That sends Norris into a speech, pointing out that people smoke as much or more in countries like Japan, China and Italy. “You know what those three countries have in common? Lung cancer ain’t even in the top 10 leading causes of death. So, it ain’t cigarettes, it’s sugar and shit like that” — the Pop-Tart — “that kills you,” he says.
Here, Norris is plain wrong. Cancers of the lungs, trachea and bronchus are the fourth-leading cause of death in Japan, the third in China and the fifth in Italy, per the World Health Organization (WHO).
However, after decades of plummeting cancer case and death rates (thanks in large part to a parallel decline in smoking rates), more young adults in the U.S. are developing and dying from cancer. And, as previously mentioned, “sugar and shit” are prime suspects.
When talking about population-level data on what diseases kill people, “there’s always going to be an exception,” Dr. Oren Gottfried, a neurosurgeon who often serves as a consultant for television shows, tells Yahoo Life. “The character is identifying people we see that live long lives and don’t get cancer, and smoke,” he says. Gottfried notes that if the character speaking was supposed to be a doctor or nurse, a medical consultant like himself would want to be sure the statements were medically accurate. But otherwise, characters can have opinions, even factually incorrect ones; it’s part of what makes them believable.
On the other hand, you shouldn’t stake your life on the words of an incorrect, fictional oilman. And research suggests that what audiences see on TV does impact their health knowledge and behaviors. “It’s OK to have a dialogue” that includes health misconceptions, like Norris’s, “as long as they come around with some accurate information about tobacco-related cancers in the U.S. or elsewhere,” Kate Folb, director of the nonprofit Hollywood, Health & Society, tells Yahoo Life.
The heart of the matter: Work is a major risk factor
(Spoiler alerts!)
A central tension between working hard enough to be successful and living well and healthily runs throughout Landman. The CEO of Norris’s company, Monty Miller (Jon Hamm), personifies that conflict. His wife, Cami, played by Demi Moore, is constantly reminding him to take his statins and to exercise to protect his heart and alleviate stress. Like other characters — most of whom are men in the oil business — he continues to prioritize work and it’s during a particularly tense phone call that Monty suffers a heart attack. It’s implied that it’s not his first.
“There’s some reality there,” says Gottfried. “It’s an extreme example, but I do feel the emotional stress of events can be the ultimate problem,” or at least the final straw before someone has a devastating cardiovascular event like a heart attack, he says. Indeed, stress is considered a major risk factor for heart attacks and chronic stress contributes to high blood pressure, another leading risk factor.
Folb notes that health-related plotlines in shows not only move the dramatic action forward but often make characters feel more real by echoing challenges faced by the kinds of people they portray. That’s very much the case for Landman. A 2021 study found that people who live near sites of fracking — an oil drilling technique used by the fictional company Miller runs — face higher risks of heart attack than others. “Probably [heart disease risks] are a very integral part of the real experience of being a landman, so it needed to be part of the story,” suggests Folb.
