‘Chad Powers’ Avoids a Problem Plaguing Modern Sports Projects

Chad Powers, the newest comedy streaming on Hulu, has a fascinating origin. Real-life NFL quarterback Eli Manning thought it would be a good idea to go undercover at a college tryout and shock all the attendees with his skills. The result was a hilarious skit for his show, Eli’s Places, that went viral ons several occasions. But that was far from the end of the story, as Top Gun: Maverick star Glen Powell and Loki creator Michael Waldron believed that the skit’s concept could work as a scripted TV show.

A few creative liberties were taken when creating Chad Powers‘ narrative, with Eli’s successful professional career being replaced by that of a collegiate athlete, allowing Waldron and Powell to incorporate a redemption element into the proceedings. Typically, altering that much would be evidence of the “Hollywoodification” of a story, suggesting that the powers that be aren’t serious about the heart of the concept but rather their own idea. However, Chad Powers bucks that trend by avoiding a problem that plagues nearly all modern sports projects.

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Chad Powers‘ creators aren’t the first people to use football as a vehicle to tell an interesting story. For decades, football has opened the door for some of the better movies in the sports genre, such as Rudy, The Replacements, and Remember the Titans. One thing all those movies have in common is that they came out well over two decades ago. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, there was a concerted effort to make sports movies feel realistic, which helped immerse the audience and convey the message more effectively. Unfortunately, it’s been a while since football felt like football on either the big or small screen.

While there have been critically acclaimed football movies in recent years, such as The Blind Side, they rarely focus on the actual gameplay. They tend to beat around the bush and only show the snap of the ball when necessary. The world of television isn’t doing much better, with clips from the CW series All American frequently making the rounds on social media because of the ridiculous nature of their content. Meanwhile, Chad Powers is going out of its way to ensure it ends up in the headlines for the right reasons. Moreover, the series never lets its accuracy get in the way of the humorous premise of the show, and vice versa. Instead, the two elements that make the show as good as it is work in tandem to create real stakes and much-needed levity when the competition and nature of athletic programs begin to take its toll on the series.

‘Chad Powers’ Sets Itself Up for Success

Glen Powell in Chad Powers walking on campus wearing an athletic shirt and arm sleeve

The opening moments of Chad Powers are a breath of fresh air. Russ Holidau, Oregon’s talented yet cocky quarterback, is aiming to lead his team down the field and secure the national championship. It’s a scenario many real-life quarterbacks have found themselves in, and Holiday looks as good as any of them out there. He bobs and weaves through the defense and sets his sights on the end zone, glory within grasp for him. Unfortunately, he both figuratively and literally drops the ball, allowing the other team to flip the game on its head by scoring a touchdown.

Chad Powers proves with this one sequence that it’s not messing around, and it never lets up from the gas after that, even after the titular character heads to a down-on-its-luck school. Eli and his brother, Peyton Manning, who serve as executive producers on the show, surely deserve some of the credit for that, as it’s hard to believe two Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks would sit on the sidelines and allow the sport to be misrepresented on screen. However, the rest of the creative team deserves props as well, because, just like in football, making a TV show is a team sport where it takes everyone working in sync to come up with a win. Chad Powers is streaming now on Hulu.