Tulsa King Season 3 Redeems Disappointing Villain From Season 1

Warning! This article contains SPOILERS for Tulsa King season 3, episode 2.After three years, Tulsa King season 3’s new villain is finally making up for one of Taylor Sheridan’s most disappointing antagonists. There have been some great antagonists in all of Taylor Sheridan’s shows and movies. From Wind River to 1923, Sheridan loves a strong and despicable antagonist who challenges the protagonist to be better.

For all of Sheridan’s great antagonists, however, there’s one very underwhelming villain, and he was Dwight Manfredi’s foe in Tulsa King season 1. Luckily, the show got much better villains in the form of Bill Bevilaqua and Cal Thresher, and Tulsa King season 3’s villain is the scariest yet. In fact, Jeremiah Dunmire may be able to make up for Caolan Waltrip’s lackluster villain outing.

Jeremiah Dunmire Is The Type Of Villain Caolan Waltrip Should Have Been In Tulsa King Season 1

Caolan Waltrip, the leader of the Black Macadams and the main antagonist of Tulsa King season 1, was pretty underwhelming. Waltrip and his gang caused a few problems for Dwight and his crew, but ultimately, they were taken out by Bodhi’s hacking and a single gunfight. Waltrip never really posed much of a threat to Dwight, and he also didn’t do a lot of heavy lifting for Tulsa King‘s story.

Tulsa King season 1 was a fish-out-of-water story. Dwight was this Italian mobster fresh out of New York trying to figure out how Oklahoma works. Caolan Waltrip should have been the foil to him; a born-and-bred Oklahoman who didn’t want a big city gang moving in on his turf. He even had a biker gang at his disposal, and the Black MacAdams should have been the perfect mirror to Dwight’s Italian mob.

Instead, Waltrip was an Irish immigrant who had no more business being in Tulsa than Dwight did, and he wasn’t very “country” at all. Tulsa King season 1 should have been a story of rural and urban crime lords clashing through Dwight and Caolan, but it ended up being a pretty mediocre story about Dwight steam rolling another transplant to the South.

Luckily, Tulsa King season 3 has finally found the villain Caolan Waltrip should have been in Jeremiah Dunmire. He’s as traditional and country as it gets, he’s part of the Dixie Mafia, and he has a long history with Tulsa and its residents. To Dunmire, Tulsa is his birthright, and Dwight is butting in on a place he knows nothing about.

Because of Jeremiah Dunmire, Tulsa King is finally ready to tell the story of Dwight’s big city tactics clashing with this new setting he’s completely unfamiliar with, even if it is three years too late. Dunmire is more capable of telling that story than Caolan Waltrip was, and he’s leagues better than the Italian and Chinese mob antagonists of Tulsa King season 2, Bill Bevilaqua and Jackie Ming.

Even setting aside the symbolism Jeremiah Dunmire brings to Tulsa King, he’s also just a better villain than Caolan Waltrip was. Waltrip was never very threatening — the worst thing he did was injure Stacy Beale — but Dunmire is the exact opposite. Even after just two episodes, we’ve already seen how terrifying and deadly Dunmire can be, which makes him a lot more interesting to watch than Waltrip ever was.

Tulsa King Season 3 Is Finally Leaning Into Its Western Setting

Jeremiah Dunmire also highlights a different improvement Tulsa King season 3 has made over its predecessors: it feels more Western. Dunmire is, of course, a very country villain. He’s a distiller, he’s part of the Dixie Mafia, and he symbolizes Dwight butting in on a culture he’s not part of. Dunmire isn’t the only part of Tulsa King that feels more country, though.

The first two seasons of Tulsa King never felt very Western. There were moments set on ranches and many characters look like cowboys, but the show’s Western elements were always half-baked afterthoughts. Tulsa King seasons 1 and 2 were a gangster show that just so happened to be set in Tulsa, but season 3 is a true mix of crime and neo-Western genres.

Tulsa is no longer just Tulsa King‘s namesake and a reason why Dwight could take power with so little opposition, it’s now almost a character itself. Tulsa has a history, and that history fights back against Dwight’s power plays. Dwight’s gang has ties to the town, good and bad. The Western and Southern elements of Tulsa have also bled into the show itself, and Tulsa King almost feels like a frontier story as a result.

Tulsa King becoming more of a neo-Western is one of the best changes the show has ever made. It finally feels like Dwight has to reckon with the home he’s made and whether he really belongs there, and he finally has to deal with things he’s actually out of his depth in. There’s so much more texture and nuance to Tulsa King season 3, and the show is much more interesting because of it.

Release Date

November 13, 2022

Network

Paramount+

Showrunner

Dave Erickson, Terence Winter