Steve Carell has now been nominated for a Lead Actor in a Comedy Series Emmy 11 times. He’s won it zero times. Ten of those nominations came from playing Michael Scott. The 11th came this year, for a show about a novelist who writes beach reads and hates teaching.
That show is on HBO Max right now, and it’s one of three you should clear a weekend for.
HBO Max has had a loaded 2026: new seasons of The Pitt, House of the Dragon and Hacks, plus originals like A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, DTF St. Louis and Half Man. The back catalog isn’t going anywhere either, and The Sopranos, Six Feet Under and The Leftovers will still be there next month. These three won’t wait as patiently.
Steve Carell finally found a role that isn’t Michael Scott
Rooster hit HBO Max in March 2026 and turned into a streaming hit almost immediately. Carell plays Greg Russo, a successful novelist who cranks out page-turners as part of his bestselling Rooster franchise. But the books are almost beside the point.
The show is really about Greg as a devoted father and a reluctant professor at Ludlow College, a prestigious liberal arts school on an idyllic New England campus. Co-created by Bill Lawrence, the guy behind Ted Lasso and Shrinking, so you know the register: warm, funny, occasionally sharp enough to draw blood.
Ten episodes. Easy to knock out in a weekend. The ensemble around Carell includes Danielle Deadwyler, Phil Dunster, Charly Clive and John C. McGinley, and the whole thing lands right as back-to-school season starts, which is either perfect timing or a cruel joke depending on your situation.
Season 2 is already in development at HBO.
The Seahawks let cameras into a title defense
The 2026 NFL season is days away, which makes this the exact right weekend for Hard Knocks: Training Camp. HBO’s flagship sports reality series is in its 21st season, and it’s still doing what it’s always done: pulling back the curtain on how an NFL team actually operates.
This year the subject is the defending Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks, working toward what could be another title run under QB Sam Darnold and head coach Mike Macdonald.
Four of the season’s five episodes are already streaming. The finale arrives Tuesday, September 1, about a week before the NFL Kickoff game, which happens to be a Super Bowl LX rematch between the Seahawks and the New England Patriots.
And this preseason has been chaotic. Injuries, contract disputes, the works. Good year to be watching.
The DC show that’s beating everything else on the platform
Make Lanterns your priority this weekend. The third of eight episodes drops Sunday, August 30, which means you can catch up on the first two and be current by the time it lands.
Two episodes in, Lanterns has already been called one of the greatest projects the modern DCU has released. It’s sitting at a 94% Rotten Tomatoes score and has held HBO Max’s No. 1 worldwide spot since its August 16 premiere.
The tone is grounded and True Detective-adjacent, which is the key detail here: you don’t need to know Green Lantern lore to press play. Nobody’s quizzing you on the Corps.
Kyle Chandler plays Hal Jordan. Aaron Pierre plays John Stewart. They’re two members of the Green Lantern interstellar police force investigating a string of deaths in the small town of Rushville, Nebraska. Hal’s showing John the ropes as the newest recruit while an extraterrestrial threat rattles the local community.
Three episodes by Sunday night isn’t much of a binge. But it’s the No. 1 show on HBO Max right now, and getting in early on this one beats catching up in November when everyone’s already spoiled the Nebraska of it all.
