The month’s lineup pairs a sophomore season of Guy Ritchie’s The Gentlemen with a Ted Kaczynski origin film, the fourth chapter of Ryan Murphy’s Monster anthology, the first-ever NFL regular season game on Australian soil, and fresh extensions of the Stranger Things and One Piece universes. Taken together, it’s a month built to keep subscribers cycling between big-tent originals and proven IP.
The Gentlemen returns to Bobby’s empire
Season 2 of The Gentlemen lands Sept. 3, picking up one year after Eddie and Susie fused their operations inside Bobby’s overseas criminal empire. The official logline lays out the tension: “As they drive to expand their enterprise, the decisions Bobby is making seem to be increasingly unsound. Now Eddie and Susie must decide whether to take action or risk losing it all.”
Theo James, Kaya Scodelario, Daniel Ings, Joely Richardson, Vinnie Jones, Giancarlo Esposito, and Ray Winstone all return. The new season adds Hugh Bonneville, Benjamin Clementine, Benedetta Porcaroli, Amra Mallassi, Tyler Conti, and Chris Eubank Jr. The cast expansion signals Ritchie’s intent to widen the world rather than retread the first season’s dynamic, and the involvement of a sitting boxer in Eubank Jr. fits the director’s habit of casting larger-than-life UK personalities alongside his core ensemble.
Monster turns to Lizzie Borden
Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s Emmy-winning Monster anthology returns Sept. 17 with its first female-led installment, The Lizzie Borden Story. The eight-episode chapter dramatizes the infamous 1892 axe murders of Borden’s father and stepmother in Fall River, Massachusetts.
Ella Beatty stars as Lizzie, backed by a cast that includes Charlie Hunnam, Vicky Krieps, Rebecca Hall, Billie Lourd, Jessica Barden, and Murphy regular Sarah Paulson. The anthology model has given Murphy a steady cadence of true-crime prestige hits since Dahmer, and the Borden case—unsolved in the public imagination despite Borden’s acquittal—gives the series its most ambiguous protagonist yet. Expect the usual Murphy blend of period detail, star casting, and debate-baiting ambiguity.
Unabomber traces Ted Kaczynski’s radicalization
Netflix’s headline feature for September 2026 is Unabomber, directed by Janus Metz Pedersen and debuting Sept. 25. Jacob Tremblay plays the 16-year-old Harvard prodigy Ted Kaczynski, subjected to controversial psychological experiments by Professor Henry Murray, played by Russell Crowe. The film traces Kaczynski’s eventual transformation into the domestic terrorist who mailed bombs for nearly two decades.
The cast also includes Shailene Woodley, Annabelle Wallis, Alexander Ludwig, Steven Ogg, and Marc Menchaca. Unabomber arrives as Netflix increasingly leans into modestly budgeted, well-acted prestige projects—a lane that lets the streamer chase awards credibility without the nine-figure budgets of its tentpole originals. The Murray experiments, the subject of academic debate for years, give the film a hook beyond true-crime voyeurism: a story about how institutions can break the people they claim to study.
NFL takes its first regular-season game to Australia
On Sept. 18, the NFL Melbourne Game stages the league’s first regular-season contest in Australia, with the San Francisco 49ers facing the L.A. Rams at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. The league has pushed international expansion aggressively for years, but Australia—a country with its own entrenched footy codes—has been a tougher sell than London or Munich.
The marquee storyline is Aaron Donald’s return. The former three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year came out of retirement after two seasons away and is expected to suit up Down Under, giving the NFL a genuine superstar to market to skeptical Australian sports fans. For Netflix, which has steadily expanded its live sports portfolio, the NFL Melbourne Game is another step in a strategy that treats live events as churn insurance— programming that subscribers can’t get anywhere else and can’t afford to miss live.
Stranger Things and One Piece keep expanding
Two of Netflix’s most valuable franchises get new entries this month. Stranger Things: Tales From ’85 returns for a second season Sept. 17, sending the Hawkins gang after ghostly apparitions and a swarm of strange creatures ahead of Valentine’s Day. The animated spinoff hasn’t generated the fervor of the flagship live-action series, but it keeps the IP warm while the main show’s final season looms.
On Sept. 29, LEGO ONE PIECE arrives as a two-part animated special that speed-runs the crew’s escapades across the East Blue and into the Grand Line. The voice cast includes Iñaki Godoy as Luffy, Emily Rudd as Nami, Mackenyu as Zoro, Jacob Romero Gibson as Usopp, Taz Skylar as Sanji, Charithra Chandran as Wednesday/Nefertari Vivi, Mikaela Hoover as Tony Tony Chopper, Katey Sagal as Dr. Kureha, Jeff Ward as Buggy, and Callum Kerr as Smoker.
Comedy and animation round out the slate
Sept. 8 brings two notable originals. Dang!, created by Andrew Law, marks Netflix’s continued push into adult animated comedy with an Asian-American lens. The show follows a brother and sister whose “fun, messy lives in New York City are interrupted when their worst nightmare comes true: their high-achieving older sister shows up and wants to hang out with them.” Poppy Liu, Andrew Law, Noël Wells, and Stephanie Hsu voice the leads.
The same day, Stavros Halkias returns with his Netflix special Uncle Stav, a follow-up to 2023’s Fat Rascal. Halkias—whose stock has risen sharply through Tires, film roles in Bugonia and Tony, and a devoted podcast following—mines his new role as an uncle for material. His crude-but-empathic style sits apart from the harder-edged standup currently dominating the algorithm.
What Happens Next
September 2026 looks like a load-bearing month for Netflix. The Gentlemen and Monster are proven ratings engines, and Unabomber gives the streamer an awards-season chip early in the cycle. The NFL Melbourne Game is the wild card—if it draws a respectable Australian audience and a healthy U.S. daytime tune-in, expect more Asia-Pacific live sports experiments through 2027. The Stranger Things and One Piece extensions are standard IP management, but they matter: both franchises have global fanbases that will tune in for even modest spinoffs. The bigger question is whether Dang! can break through in a crowded adult-animation field, and whether Stavros Halkias’s mainstream ascent continues. Watch the NFL Melbourne numbers closely—they’ll set the template for Netflix’s international live sports ambitions going forward.
— Lucas Berg, entertainment desk, AXO News