‘Landman’ Airs a Rare and Stirring Defense of the US Oil and Gas Industry

Oil companies have always presented easy targets for demonization by the news and entertainment industries. Their operations are highly visible – the flares from a shale well can be seen from many miles distant – the prices they charge for their products can strain family budgets, and they’ve generally done a lousy job of engaging with the media and defending themselves.

Thus, they typically present the proverbial low-hanging fruit to be exploited by lazy script writers in Hollywood. Those who were in the industry in the early years of the Obama presidency will well remember that pretty much every TV drama series aired at least one episode centered on some highly improbable, often impossible, scenario in which people were killed by a hydraulic fracturing – or “fracking” – accident. Such stuff never happened in real life, but it sure made for compelling entertainment for audiences who didn’t know that to be the case.