Glen Powell’s Football Comedy Has The Potential To Be The Next Eastbound & Down, But It’s Playing It Too Safe

October 7, 2025

2

Every great sitcom needs a great premise, and Chad Powers‘s is a doozy; it’s essentially Friday Night Lights meets Mrs. Doubtfire. Eight years after a career-ending mistake, washed-up football player Russ Holliday is scraping together a living working for his dad, an Oscar-nominated movie makeup artist. One day, he has the bright idea to use his dad’s prosthetics to disguise himself as a different person — the eponymous Chad Powers — and join a college team as a walk-on player.

It’s a perfect comic premise with unlimited storytelling potential. It gives Glen Powell a chance to play two characters in one, and sets up a goldmine of possible conflicts, complications, and misunderstandings. Russ has to keep his Chad alter ego a secret from his dad, and Chad has to hide his true identity as Russ from his teammates and coaches. Whatever lie Chad tells, Russ has to keep track of it. Chad has to be careful not to damage the prosthetics that will reveal the national disgrace hiding underneath.

All the pieces are there for a new hit sitcom. But so far, it’s let down by its writing. The humor doesn’t always land, the storytelling plays it a bit too safe, and Russ/Chad is the only character who feels fully fleshed out and distinctively drawn. In a lot of cases, a random reference is substituted for an actual joke. There’s a cameo appearance by Haliey Welch, a.k.a. the Hawk Tuah Girl, early in the first episode that feels dated, pointless, and falls flat. Still, the show’s heart is in the right place, so there’s a chance to turn it around.

Chad Powers Is More Eastbound & Down Than Ted Lasso

It’s Been Compared To Jason Sudeikis’s Sports Comedy, But It’s More Like Danny McBride’s

Since it’s a comedy series set in the wide world of sports, Chad Powers has been compared to Ted Lasso, but tonally, it’s much closer to Danny McBride’s Eastbound & Down. Ted Lasso is a wholesome, sentimental, uplifting show, but Chad Powers has a mean streak that sets it apart. Like Eastbound & Down, Chad Powers tells the story of a boorish, loudmouthed has-been athlete trying to launch an unconventional comeback. It utilizes a lot of McBride’s signature shock humor and adults-only raunch, although it’s ultimately a much lighter, gentler show than Eastbound.

At times, Chad Powers feels like it’s trying to find a middle ground between both shows, but that’s the wrong approach. It wants to have the underlying sweetness of Ted Lasso, but it’s too vulgar to capture that saccharin sentimentality. It wants to have the edge of Eastbound & Down, but it’s too afraid to really lean into it. If it doesn’t pick a lane between the two, it’ll end up settling into a banal, milquetoast middle ground that doesn’t make enough of an impression.

The biggest similarity to Ted Lasso is in the show’s origins. Jason Sudeikis initially conceived the character of Ted Lasso for a series of commercials to promote Premier League matches airing on NBC Sports. Eventually, Sudeikis teamed up with Bill Lawrence to expand the character into his own half-hour series. Chad Powers comes from similarly unorthodox beginnings. It’s based on Eli Manning’s character from Eli’s Places, which Powell and Loki creator Michael Waldron have turned into a whole show. It’s another series that no one asked for, but it remains to be seen whether, like Ted Lasso, it’s the show we need right now.

Glen Powell Carries The Show With A Performance-Within-A-Performance

The Writing Doesn’t Always Work, But Powell’s Performance Sure Does

Frankie A. Rodriguez's Danny and Glen Powell's Russ previewing transformation in mirror in Chad Powers — Frankie A. Rodriguez’s Danny and Glen Powell’s Russ previewing transformation in mirror in Chad Powers

It’s hard to recall a more memorable cold open in a series premiere in recent memory. Chad Powers opens with Russ literally dropping the ball at the one-yard line, losing the Rose Bowl for his team, and angrily punching a fan into a terminally ill child. This sequence instantly establishes who this character is and the mistake that ruined his life, and does so with a couple of darkly hilarious gags that make you feel bad for laughing. Punching a fan is bad enough, but knocking him into the wheelchair of a child with cancer is unforgivable — and that’s just the opening scene.

Chad Powers releases new episodes on Hulu every Tuesday.

But so far, the series that follows hasn’t lived up to that opening. There hasn’t been another moment as twistedly hysterical as that wheelchair punch, and despite having terrific supporting players like Toby Huss and Steve Zahn in the cast, none of the other characters have really stood out. As it stands, Powell is carrying Chad Powers on his shoulders. He’s funny, charismatic, and committed, and he mastered the art of a performance within a performance in Richard Linklater’s Hit Man. The writing just needs to catch up to the hilarity, originality, and conviction of Powell’s performance.