Tommy Lee Jones Is Returning to TV In the Best Show You’re Probably Not Watching 

FX’s The Lowdown is almost certainly one of the best TV shows most of you aren’t watching. (Or possibly haven’t even heard of. It’s a wild time in these streaming streets.) Nevertheless, consider this an exhortation to fix your life immediately. 

From Reservation Dogs’ Sterlin Harjo, the series follows the story of a citizen journalist and self-proclaimed “truthstorian” named Lee Raybon. If you’re thinking Misty from Yellowjackets here, that’s not…entirely inaccurate, just with a little less overt creepiness and more humor. (Though Lee’s obsession with finding the truth tends to get him into almost as much trouble.) Season 1 followed Lee as he worked to uncover corruption in Tulsa, Oklahoma, a move which brought him into conflict with a powerful family whose patriarch (played by Kyle McLaughlin) was running for governor. 

The show’s a delightful mix of drama, mystery, and straight-up quirkiness, all grounded in a fantastic (and very funny) star turn from Ethan Hawke; it’s precisely the sort of smart yet entertaining television people always say they want more of, but seem to forget to watch. Well, now’s your moment. 

The series was renewed for a second season immediately following its premiere and is now adding even more talent to an already stacked cast that includes Keith David, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Tim Blake Nelson, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, Tracy Letts, and Peter Dinklage. Former GLOW and Mrs. Davis star Betty Gilpin has already been announced as joining the cast for Season 2, but the new addition that’s sure to get everyone’s attention is Oscar winner Tommy Lee Jones, who hasn’t taken a role on a television series in 37 years. 

Primarily known as a film actor, Jones has been in projects that run the gamut from The Fugitive and Cobb to Batman Forever and the Men in Black franchise. But he’s had a few notable TV roles over the years, including a stint on soap opera One Life to Live and an Emmy-nominated turn in the 1989 adaptation of Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove. He last appeared on TV in the HBO telefilm The Sunset Limited opposite Samuel L. Jackson, which he also directed. But, if we’re going to be technical about it, Lonesome Dove was the last time Jones was in a television series of any stripe. 

However, what sort of character he’ll be playing remains up in the air. Details about the second season’s plot remain under wraps, but since season 1 cleared up the key points from its primary mystery, it seems safe to assume Jones’s undisclosed character will be involved with whatever conspiracy or case Lee finds himself embroiled in next. Here’s hoping his presence gives this very deserving but sadly underrated show a boost.