What to Watch
What to Watch This Labor Day Weekend
By Jordan A. · · 4 min read
Labor Day weekend is the last long stretch of couch time before fall schedules take over, and this year it shows up loaded. Two of the biggest returning series drop within a day of each other, a splashy new movie lands right behind them, and the whole thing falls on a weekend when most people have an extra day to spend. If you want a plan for the holiday instead of twenty minutes of scrolling, you have one.
Here is what to line up, when each title hits, and who it is really for.
Chad Powers goes long on Hulu
Glen Powell's undercover football comedy comes back for its second season on Thursday, September 3, and this time Hulu drops all six episodes at once instead of spacing them out weekly the way season one did. Powell co-created the show with Michael Waldron and plays Russ Holliday, a disgraced quarterback who buries his real name under a wig, a prosthetic chin, and the alias Chad Powers so he can sneak onto a struggling college team.
Season two picks up with his cover starting to crack. A handful of people around the South Georgia Catfish now know who he really is, which turns every practice into a tightrope walk while the team chases a College Football Playoff berth. Steve Zahn, Perry Mattfeld, and Toby Huss fill out a cast that plays the ridiculous premise completely straight, which is exactly why it lands. Powell picked up a Golden Globe nomination for the role, and the timing could not be better, because the season arrives just as real college football kicks off for the year. Put it on Thursday, because six episodes waiting all at once is basically an invitation to lose an evening.
The Gentlemen expands the empire on Netflix
Guy Ritchie's crime saga returns the very same day, September 3, on Netflix. Season two moves Eddie and Susie's operation well past the quiet cannabis farm in Halstead where it all started. They are pushing into bigger territory now, from the English countryside out to Italian lakeside villas, and the further the map stretches, the more dangerous the partners around them get.
Theo James and Kaya Scodelario are back as the aristocrat and the fixer who keep underestimating each other, with Ray Winstone, Daniel Ings, Vinnie Jones, and Giancarlo Esposito returning around them. Ritchie also stacks the new season with fresh faces, including Hugh Bonneville and Maya Jama. The pleasure here is the same as it was in season one: sharp dialogue, sudden violence, and a cast that looks incredible doing terrible things. If you like your crime stories fast, funny, and dressed in very good tailoring, this is the weekend's easiest call.
Mayday brings the movie-star wattage on Apple TV
Once you have burned through both series, Apple TV has a film ready for Friday, September 4. Mayday is an action comedy headlined by Ryan Reynolds and Kenneth Branagh, which is a pairing nobody had on their card and precisely the kind of odd-couple casting that makes a holiday night fly by. Reynolds brings the motormouth energy, Branagh brings the gravitas, and the friction between those two registers is the whole pitch. It is the splashiest new movie of the weekend and a clean palate cleanser after eight hours of crime and college football.
How to build the weekend
Three titles, three nights, no overthinking required. Start Thursday with Chad Powers, since all six episodes are sitting there and the season is built to be swallowed in one go. Save The Gentlemen for Friday and Saturday, when you can spread out and let the twists breathe across a couple of sittings. Then close Sunday or Monday with Mayday, when you want something lighter that does not ask you to keep eight character names straight.
If you are watching with a group that never agrees on anything, lead with comedy. Chad Powers and Mayday both play wide, and neither one demands that everyone in the room already loves the genre. The Gentlemen is the one to save for the crowd that wants to actually lock in and follow a plot.
Prefer to stay in a single lane all weekend? We keep a running list of the best Netflix shows of 2026 if The Gentlemen leaves you wanting more crime in a similar key, and a companion guide to the best Hulu shows of 2026 if Chad Powers turns out to be your speed. Both are good places to land the moment the credits roll and you are not ready to stop.
Beyond the big three
A long holiday weekend is also the smart time to clear the library titles you keep meaning to get to. Streaming services load up at the start of every month, and Netflix in particular is stacked this September with catalog films arriving on the first, so an extra day off is the moment to finally sit down with the classics you have been scrolling past for a year. New releases get the headlines, but the back catalog is where a lazy Sunday afternoon actually lives. If you would rather have the picks mapped out for you, our regular what to watch this weekend guide runs down the standouts worth your Saturday night.
The short version is simple. This is one of those rare weekends where the new stuff genuinely delivers. You get a comedy built to binge, a crime drama built to savor, and a movie built to end the night on a high note. That covers just about every mood a three-day weekend can throw at you, and it does it without making you dig.
Still torn on which one fits the room tonight? BingeNext reads your mood and your plans and points you straight at the right pick, whether that is a bingeable comedy for a full house or a slow-burn crime story for a quiet night in. Find your weekend watch and get the scrolling over with.
Topics covered: labor day weekend, chad powers, the gentlemen, mayday, what to watch
About the author
Jordan A., Founder, BingeNext
Jordan A. is the founder of BingeNext and writes every guide on this site. He built the recommendation engine after one too many nights lost to the streaming menu, and he still tests every pick the hard way: by watching it.