A scene from the latest episode of Taylor Sheridan’s hit Landman has sent the MAGA crowd into a frenzy, with conservatives hailing it as a rare Hollywood jab at woke culture.
The moment has gone viral in part because the actress at the center of it is Glen Powell’s glamorous girlfriend, Michelle Randolph.
In the episode, Randolph’s character Ainsley Norris clashes with a college roommate over pronouns, before laying out her blunt views during a conversation with a campus counselor.
‘I don’t care what someone’s pronouns are,’ Ainsley says in the clip. ‘I mean, using a plural pronoun for one person is just kind of incorrect.’
She later doubles down, adding, ‘I just never really understood the hoops around pronouns,’ framing her argument as a matter of ‘basic English’ rather than ideology.
Online, right-wing viewers quickly seized on the exchange, praising the show for what they called a polite but devastating takedown of gender-neutral language.
A scene from the latest episode of Taylor Sheridan’s Landman involving Michelle Randolph (pictured) has gone viral, sparking MAGA praise for a rare Hollywood jab at woke culture
In the episode, Randolph’s character Ainsley Norris clashes with a college roommate over pronouns, before laying out her blunt views during a conversation with a campus counselor
One supporter wrote, ‘Paramount’s Landman is going viral for having a pretty blonde actress politely school a liberal character on “they/them” pronouns. Is wokeism beginning to lose control of Hollywood?’
Online reaction only intensified as more viewers piled in to praise the moment – and Taylor Sheridan himself.
One fan gushed, ‘It’s because the show is made by Taylor Sheridan and features Billy Bob Thornton and Sam Elliot. The show has cowboy conservative in its blood! A couple episodes ago they trolled The View.
‘Now they’re trolling pronouns. LOVE IT!!’
Another declared, ‘It was perfect. It was one of the best episodes of the year,’ while a third added, ‘Landman is such a great show in general. This makes it 10x better.’
Others applauded Sheridan directly, with one writing, ‘Taylor Sheridan just out here trolling the trolls. Love it.’
Another dragged studio politics into the mix, referencing the recent drama surrounding Netflix’s attempted acquisition of Warner Bros, and claimed, ‘Since they couldn’t buy Warner Brothers and Netflix won I guess they are going against the Netflix woke agenda now.’
But not everyone was cheering.
‘I don’t care what someone’s pronouns are,’ Ainsley says in the clip, adding, ‘I mean, using a plural pronoun for one person is just kind of incorrect’
She later doubles down, adding, ‘I just never really understood the hoops around pronouns,’ framing her argument as a matter of ‘basic English’ rather than ideology; (Randolph and Powell in December)
One disappointed viewer asked bluntly, ‘Damnit. Do I have to stop watching this show?’
On Reddit, some accused the show of leaning too hard into caricature.
‘Paygin [Ainsley’s roommate’ was just some sort of lib-bashing caricature that they dreamed up for no real reason. I went to art school and maybe some people exist who have some of those traits but no one who has all of them on steroids,’ one user wrote.
Another agreed, calling the scene ‘Pure rage bait’ and adding, ‘Good lord. The way Ainsley’s roommate is portrayed is just ridiculous.’
The online uproar comes just weeks after Sheridan pushed back at critics who accused Landman of showing too much skin, particularly when it came to stars Ali Larter and Michelle Randolph.
Rather than issuing a statement, the showrunner answered the backlash through dialogue in a December episode of the Paramount+ drama.
In one scene, Billy Bob Thornton’s Tommy Norris bristled at the revealing outfit worn by his ex-wife Angela, played by Larter, as she wandered through their shared home in a cropped shirt with her yellow bra visible.
‘Could you please put on all your clothes?’ Tommy asked, prompting Angela to shoot back, ‘Oh it bothers you to see my body?’ – a claim he denied, saying it was about ‘other people around here.’
Online reaction only intensified as more viewers piled in to praise and criticize the moment
When Angela pressed whether T.L., portrayed by Sam Elliott, was offended, Tommy admitted he wasn’t – only for Randolph’s Ainsley to stroll in wearing a similarly skimpy look.
That was enough to break him, with Tommy throwing in the towel: ‘I give up — I love you both and there’s nothing I can do about that. I f***ing surrender.’
Randolph, 28, told The Hollywood Reporter last year that she had to carefully prep to convincingly play a teenager on the West Texas–set series.
‘I worked with a dialect coach, a movement coach and an acting coach and I just studied like crazy,’ Randolph told the outlet. ‘I had about a year almost to prep for her.
She added, ‘It was incredibly helpful to kind of sit with that character. I worked really hard to find ways to justify her behavior and make a full human out of something that doesn’t always seem like what a 17-year-old would say, but people like that exist.’
Randolph, who was past seen on the Sheridan show 1923, said she ‘wanted to be very careful about the way that Ainsley comes across.’
She added, ‘There’s only so much that I can control, but you also can control a lot as an actor. And just being around Ali and Billy and Jacob [Lofland] and being in Texas really helped create this full person that Ainsley is.
‘She has this free essence about her and she’s wild, and I loved every second of it.’
The online uproar comes just weeks after Sheridan pushed back at critics who accused Landman of showing too much skin, particularly when it came to stars Ali Larter and Michelle Randolph
Meanwhile, Randolph and Powell quietly stepped out as a couple for the first time at a Golden Globes afterparty on Sunday night.
The actor and his new girlfriend were even joined by his mother, Cyndy Powell, as they exited the swanky bash together.
Powell has been dating Randolph for roughly three months, after the pair began seeing each other in October.
Us Weekly reported in December 2025 that the romance was still in its early days, with a source saying the two were ‘having fun’ while keeping things largely low-key.
The Top Gun: Maverick star and Randolph were later spotted dancing together at Austin’s Honky Tonk hotspot The Broken Spoke shortly after becoming an item.
Powell previously dated model Gigi Paris and was also linked to his Anyone But You co-star Sydney Sweeney – though both stars firmly denied any romance.
