In one of the most tragic plot points of Landman, the final two episodes of the second season, Cooper’s (Jacob Lofland) story takes a dark and emotional turn, leaving his future uncertain and his relationships rocky.

The hit Paramount+ drama series sees the attempted sexual assault of Cooper’s fiancée, Ariana (Paulina Chávez), in the penultimate episode. In the finale of Landman season 2, it is revealed that the attacker, Johnny (Mike Harkins), whom Cooper beat up, died after he had a heart attack. As a result, the police arrested and detained Cooper.

After Cooper got arrested, Ariana called Rebecca (Kayla Wallace), a successful lawyer, to help them. They manage to get him out of jail, but the police still want to investigate Johnny’s death and press charges. However, his father, Tommy (Billy Bob Thornton), managed to get the authorities to back off by threatening to expose them to the press.

In an interview with ScreenRant’s Grant Hermanns, Lofland discusses the death of Johnny and the filming process for the fight scene. He described it as one of the most intense experiences of his career. The emotional weight of the content and the violent nature of the assault made the actor very nervous as the scene needed to be handled sensitively. Everyone involved worked hard to make sure that the process went smoothly and didn’t come across as needlessly graphic.

Thankfully, they pulled it off. Lofland’s performance was convincing. While he wasn’t exactly depicted as a hero, he didn’t come off as a cold-blooded killer in the audience’s eyes either. He was presented as a flawed character who was put in an extreme situation and essentially had a “knee-jerk reaction.”

The actor explained that, despite the initial nerves that came with filming something so intense, when the day came, he just put himself in Cooper’s shoes and looked through the eyes of his character. He added that the whole experience was very astonishing and dark at the same time.

Definitely. Well, I mean, reading it, everyone was kind of nervous going into it. Just how are we going to pull this off? What’s this going to look like? How’s it going to translate? And on the day, I have to say it was probably one of the heaviest days probably in my career that I’ve had. It was just such a heavy moment. And to get in that mind space and that understanding and just give yourself over to what’s happening. It was really eye-opening and dark, but we got through it and I think the scene turned out great and it had a little bit of stuntwork going into it to prepare for the big throws and the stuff like that. But other than that, we really just let it ride and got the magic on the day.

Ariana’s character was also treated with care. Chávez did an incredible job portraying a victim of sexual assault who did not want to call the police. Unfortunately, a lot of people who go through the same thing often don’t want to report it and would rather bury it instead for many reasons. Many don’t want to re-traumatize themselves by having to discuss what happened multiple times, others are afraid of retaliation, and many believe that they won’t be taken seriously or even judged by law enforcement.

All episodes of Landman seasons 1 and 2 can be streamed on Paramount+.