Taylor Sheridan’s new hit series, Landman, featured a cutting dig at Bud Light in Sunday’s episode, as the beer giant continues to deal with fallout from their partnership with trans activist Dylan Mulvaney.
Back in March 2023, the company sparked fury after influencer Mulvaney, 27, posted an Instagram video that featured a personalized Bud Light can with her image on it.
The negative response from conservative consumers snowballed into a boycott that led to a significant decrease in sales for the brand.
The issue was noted in the seventh episode of Sheridan’s newest Paramount+ series as Billy Bob Thornton’s character, Tommy Norris, spoke to a waitress in a bar.
He’s greeted by the waitress, who announces that the bar is having a special on Bud Light.
‘I bet you are,’ Tommy replies as his friend Dale (played by James Jordan) then asks: ‘How’s that working out for you?’
Taylor Sheridan’s new hit series, Landman, featured a cutting dig at Bud Light in Sunday’s episode
The lager brand continues to deal with fallout from their partnership with trans activist Dylan Mulvaney
The waitress candidly responded: ‘Like a popcorn fart in church.’
After decades of being the undisputed top-selling lager in American stores, the brand has seen itself regularly become the butt of the joke due to the continued fallout from their failed campaign.
The Instagram video saw Mulvaney dressed as the character Holly Golightly from the 1961 film Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and she announced that she was celebrating ‘day 365 of womanhood’ following her transition.
The clip saw her partner with the company to promote their ‘Easy Carry Contest’, but it had the opposite effect of what the brand might have hoped for.
People took to social media to express their bafflement at the sponsorship, some filmed themselves shoveling cases of Bud Light into the trash or pouring cans of beer down drains.
Rock star Kidd Rock even posted a video of himself mowing down a stack of Bud Light cases with an assault rifle and then saying ‘F**k Bud Light, and f**k Anheuser-Busch.’
An indication of the lasting damage to the brand was revealed in March when Budweiser’s bosses released their earnings for last year.
They told investors that the Bud Light boycott had led to a $1.4 billion drop in sales in America.
Bud Light saw sales plummet last year after a boycott began following the beer giant’s collaboration with influencer Mulvaney in March 2023
The company’s issue was highlighted with a scathing joke in the seventh episode of Sheridan’s newest Paramount+ series
The world’s largest brewer said sales dropped 15.3 percent after Mulvaney’s post.
Since the Bud Light controversy, Mulvaney has gone on to be named on Forbes’ annual ’30 Under 30′ list, with the magazine praising her for withstanding the fall-out from the disastrous campaign.
Forbes said that the Californian native ‘found herself at the center of an unexpected political crossfire’ following the beer advert.
She went on to earn $2 million this year in promotional work, landing deals with Nike and Mac.
Elsewhere, Landman follows ‘a modern-day tale of fortune seeking in the world of West Texas oil rigs,’ per an IMDB synopsis.
The new Paramount+ show was met with positive reviews from X users after its first two episodes debuted on the streamer last month.
Many social media users couldn’t help but compare Landman and the hit Western series Yellowstone.
Both shows were co-created by Sheridan and he also directed the first two episodes of Landman as well as co-writing the series.
Billy Bob Thornton’s character is told by a waitress that the bar is having a special on Bud Light but it has been as successful as ‘a popcorn fart in church’
In March it was revealed to investors that the Bud Light boycott had led to a $1.4 billion drop in sales in America
‘I just watched the Landman pilot. Taylor Sheridan may have another banger on his hands, I fear,’ an X user wrote.
Landman centers around Tommy Norris (Thornton) – a rugged executive from M-Tex Oil company in Texas.
The series premiere starts with a tied-up Tommy wearing a bag over his head while discussing a lease with a cartel member.
He survives the intense exchange and continues to work under businessman Monty Miller (Jon Hamm) while balancing relationships with his ex-wife Angela (Ali Larter) and his children Ainsley (Michelle Randolph) and oil field worker Cooper (Jacob Lofland).
The cast also includes Kayla Wallace, James Jordan, Demi Moore and Paulina Chavez.
Since its release on Paramount+, Landman has become the number one series of all time on the streaming site.
More than one critic mentioned Landman’s connections with Yellowstone.
‘Landman has the masculine bravado and conservative milieu of Yellowstone, Sheridan’s flagship red state soap opera, but also builds an immersive, detailed world in the sun-baked Permian Basin that anchors the show in observed reality,’ a critic wrote for Variety.
Landman centers around Tommy Norris (Thornton) – a rugged executive from M-Tex Oil company in Texas
Social media users couldn’t stop comparing Landman and Sheridan’s other hit Western series Yellowstone when the series premiered
One reviewer from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review claimed it was Sheridan’s ‘best series yet’ and that it was ‘even more entertaining‘ than Yellowstone.
‘I have enjoyed most of Taylor Sheridan’s series so far, but Landman is the best work he has done since the first season of Yellowstone,’ wrote a critic from JoBlo’s Movie Network.
Still, some insist the series leaves much to be desired.
‘Landman runs at the pace of an oil derrick, lumbering slowly from one branching plot thread to the next,’ a reviewer from RogerEbert.com wrote.
‘None of the men in ‘Landman’ are saints. They’re broken, sexist, slovenly, selfish, greedy, patronizing, ignorant, and more,’ a critic wrote for Entertainment Weekly.
‘But Tommy and his male peers are three-dimensional disasters; the women, by contrast, are wholly defined by their sex.’
