What to Watch in September 2025

Your guide to all the best new films & TV shows coming in September 2025...

FILM

Honey Don’t! (September 5)

Ethan Coen is best known as one half of the Coen Brothers – the directing duo behind Fargo, The Big Lebowski and No County for Old Men – but although they usually work together, both brothers have been known to fly solo in the director’s chair on occasion and this month it’s Ethan’s turn, with his new film set to debut on UK cinema screens on September 5.

Honey Don’t was co-written with screenwriter (and Ethan Coen’s wife) Trisha Cooke and is the second film in the pair’s “lesbian b-movie trilogy” following 2024’s Drive-Away Dolls (a third film titled Go, Beavers is currently in the works). This darkly comedic detective story is set in Bakersfield, California and centres around a local private investigator Honey O'Donahue (Margaret Qualley), who is hired to investigate a string of mysterious deaths – all of which appear to be linked to a church and its intense, cultish leader, Reverend Drew Devlin (Chris Evans). A terrible human being he may be – but is he a murderer?

Also starring Aubrey Plaza, Charlie Day, Billy Eichner and Gabby Beans, Honey Don’t offers up some great performances and plenty of laughs, even if the plot feels a little disjointed at times, but if you’re a Coen Brothers fan or a lover of film noir aesthetics, this is well worth a watch.

The Long Walk (September 12)

Just weeks after the arrival of The Life of Chuck, one of the most poignant stories from the mind of Stephen King since The Green Mile, we’re taking a sharp turn back towards the horrific with another King adaptation that finds us in much more familiar territory.

The idea behind The Long Walk is as simple as it is horrifying; a group of men enlist in a contest to see which of them can walk the furthest without stopping. The catch? If you stop walking, or slow down below 3 mph, you get shot dead. There’s no finish line in this race, and only one winner; the last man standing.

Directed by Francis Lawrence and featuring a cast that includes Cooper Hoffman, Charlie Plummer, David Jonsson and Garret Wareing, The Long Walk arrives in cinemas on September 12 – and you’ll never be happier to be sitting down.

Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale (September 12)

All good things must come to an end and so it is with Downton Abbey, which reaches its final chapter on the big screen in September and brings the curtain down on a show that has been one of the UK’s most successful televisual exports ever. 

All the usual suspects return for this final outing, which serves as a direct sequel to the 2022 film A New Era, and sees the Crawley family entering the 1930s. Mary is the subject of scandalous reports and social outrage as a result of her divorce – still a taboo subject at the time – and both the family and their servants are coming to the realisation that the world is changing around them, and they’ll need to adapt too as they prepare to hand over the reins to the next generation. 

Regulars such as Hugh Bonneville, Laura Carmichael, Jim Carter and Michelle Dockery are all present and correct, with new additions to the cast including Paul Giamatti and Joely Richardson joining the action for Downton Abbey’s final sendoff. 

Spinal Tap II: The End Continues (September 12)

40 years on from Rob Reiner’s genre-defining mockumentary This is Spinal Tap, Reiner and his fictional filmmaking alter-ego Martin De Bergi return to their subject, this time to document the heavy metal band’s unlikely reunion as they gear up for one final show to cement their legacy. 

Michael McKean, Christopher Guest and Harry Shearer all return to reprise their iconic roles as singer David St Hubbins, guitarist Nigel “these go up to 11” Tufnel and bassist Derek Smalls, while new additions include comedian/ventriloquist Nina Conti,  The Thick of It star Chris Addison, and After Life’s Kerry Godliman. There are also guest appearances from Elton John and Paul McCartney, as well as a line-up of potential suitors for Spinal Tap’s cursed drum stool that includes The Roots’ Questlove, Metallica’s Lars Ulrich and Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Chad Smith.

As the band’s guitarist once famously said, "there’s such a fine line between clever and stupid”, and this satirical sequel treads it brilliantly.

One Battle After Another (September 26)

Our final film pick this month is the latest offering from director Paul Thomas Anderson (Boogie Nights, There Will Be Blood), which features an impressive cast led by Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Penn, Benicio del Toro and Regina Hall.

Very loosely based on Thomas Pynchon’s novel Vineland, this action-thriller is set in present-day California (as opposed to Pynchon’s original 1984 setting) and revolves around a former revolutionary who seeks help from his erstwhile collaborators to find his missing daughter, whom they suspect has disappeared at the hands of an old enemy.

Also starring Alana Haim, Teyana Taylor  and Chase Infiniti, One Battle After Another arrives at the end of September, but will no doubt be worth the wait. 

TV

The Guest (BBC One / iPlayer, September 1)

This new thriller series from the makers of Fool Me Once is set to arrive on the BBC on the first of the month and stars Gabrielle Creevy and Eve Myles in a story about the intense and toxic relationship that develops between a young woman and her employer. Creevy plays Ria, a struggling young woman who finds herself employed as a cleaner by a successful yet enigmatic entrepreneur named Fran (Myles). 

This nail-biting four-episode series details the pair’s increasingly beguiling relationship as Ria finds herself captivated by her employer as they share secrets and become intwined and obsessed with each other. 

Created by writer Matthew Barry, the series also stars Clive Russell, Kimberley Nixon, Julian Lewis Jones and Sion Daniel Young. If you’re looking for a series to keep you glued to your screen in grim fascination, look no further.

Task (Sky / NOW, September 8)

This new crime drama miniseries starring Mark Ruffalo is the brainchild of Mare of Easttown creator Brad Inglesby, who created the show for HBO (although it’s available on Sky and streaming service NOW here in the UK). Ruffalo stars as a Philadelphia-based FBI agent, who is placed in charge of a new task force with the aim of investigating a series of violent robberies, seemingly undertaken by an unassuming family man (played by Tom Pelphery).

Also starring Emilia Jones, Thuso Mbedu, Jamie McShane and Sam Keeley, the first episode of Task is set to arrive in the UK on September 8.

Coldwater (ITV, September 14)

This new six-part mystery/thriller is due to arrive on ITV in September and stars Walking Dead’s Andrew Lincoln as a frustrated stay-at-home dad who relocates his family to a Scottish village with the aim of making a fresh start, where he strikes up a friendship with his new neighbour – despite the protestations from his wife, who suspects there is something weird and creepy about their new neighbourhood. As he becomes drawn further into a web of dangerous deceit, he begins to realise he should have listened.

Created by award-winning playwright-turned-screenwriter David Ireland, Coldwater lands on September 14 and also stars Trainspotting’s Ewen Bremner, Indira Varma, Lorn Macdonald and Eve Myles (again). If you’ve already burned through The Guest by mid-month and are looking for another gripping drama, this is your ideal shot/chaser combo.

Black Rabbit (Netflix, September 18)

Of all the new TV shows coming in the next month, this is possibly the most exciting. Jude Law stars as the proprietor of one of New York’s hottest nightspots, but his fortunes soon take a turn for the worse after the surprise return of his estranged brother, Vince (Patrick Bateman), who brings with him a pile of debt and a world of chaos and violence. 

Created by Zach Baylin and Kate Susman, Black Rabbit also features Cleopatra Coleman, Troy Jotsur, Abbey Lee and Odessa Young, with an 8-episode run scheduled to begin on Netflix on September 18. Don’t miss it.

The Savant (Apple TV+, September 26)

Our final TV pick this month is a new thriller series written by Canadian playwright Melissa James Gibson and starring Jessica Chastain. Partly inspired by a real-life story featured in a Cosmopolitan long-read entitled "Is It Possible to Stop a Mass Shooting Before It Happens?" , the series tells the tale of Jodi Gibson, an unassuming mom with an unusual work-from-home job; infiltrating far-right and terrorist groups online and alerting the authorities whenever it seems like they are planning an attack.

Her latest case, however, is something bigger than she has ever seen before and she find herself being drawn deeper undercover in order to prevent an attack of seismic proportions.

Also starring Pablo Shreiber, James Badge Dale, Jordana Spiro and Hannah Gross, The Savant makes its debut near the end of the month on Apple TV+.