Thanks to more platforms paying for stand-up than ever, technological advancements that make production significantly cheaper, and social platforms that make promotion easier, we’re in the middle of a stand-up special gold rush. Depending on how you stream, you’re likely to encounter a hastily assembled 20-minute “special” next to the masterpieces of the best comedians working. With hundreds of specials being algorithmically recommended at the same time, it’s hard to make sense of the glut. That’s what this column is for. Every month, we’ll suggest anywhere from three to five specials that are worth watching. While they might not all necessarily be the “best,” they’re worth your time for being funny, ambitious, moving, or bad in a way that must be reckoned with. There is gold in them hills, and this column will share only the most choice nuggets.
Rosebud Baker, The Mother Lode (Netflix)
Stand-ups have been talking about being a parent forever, but the tone changed in the 21st century with comedians getting “real” about how difficult it is. Much of this shift started with Louis C.K.’s breakthrough material in the aughts about how his daughters were annoying and disgusting. Then in 2016’s Baby Cobra, Ali Wong set the record straight, famously while seven months pregnant, about how female comedians don’t get opportunities to talk about parenthood onstage because, unlike male comedians, they’re too busy recovering and actually parenting after their child’s birth. Nearly a decade later, The Mother Lode feels like another step forward for the genre; it pushes the frankness in which parenthood is discussed even further and, like Wong’s special, confronts the history of how pregnancy has been discussed in comedy. Rosebud Baker discusses how physically and emotionally demanding the IVF process was for her, all while her husband “is next door just, like, shooting ropes to another woman.” It’s a joke on her comedian husband and the many male comedians who have centralized their experience of the IVF process and told jokes about how difficult it was for them to masturbate in a cup.
Baker, who also directed The Mother Lode, filmed half of it while eight months pregnant and half while a year into motherhood, and the special cuts back and forth between the two. Through this choice, Baker plays on the common new-mother “nine months in, nine months out” meme, but she subverts the typical beatific tone of those posts by telling arguably the darkest jokes on the subject ever put in a major special: “[Strangers] are like, ‘Why wouldn’t you breastfeed?!’ I’m like, ‘Well, it’s none of your business, but if you have to know, it’s because we’re raising her autistic … She’s formula-fed. She’s got all her vaccines. Yeah, she’s gonna know her way around a map. Don’t come for me when my kid lays your kid out in the fucking spelling bee, okay?’” The back-and-forth editing also makes the audience at home consider how Baker has changed between the two tapings, and in turn, how parenthood does or does not change a person. Comedically and tonally, Baker feels the same — she tells the same type of joke, with the same pessimistic tone, yet viscerally conveys an existential transformation.
Ian Karmel, Comfort Beyond God’s Foresight (YouTube)
This special has three closers. That’s not to say it has multiple endings, like The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, but it has three jokes that are closer-worthy. It is difficult for a comedian to both think of a joke with enough meat on the bone and work to make sure to get all the meat off said bone, so it is tremendously impressive that Ian Karmel can do this multiple times in one special. There is one joke that starts with the premise that middle-aged men need hobbies to avoid becoming obsessed with conspiracy theories that builds to a brilliant five-minute flight of fancy in which Karmel holds off making a stupid pun on BBQ and QAnon because the last time he did, it killed someone from being too funny. It’s is the sort of big-swing, silly, form-breaking, conceptual bit that you don’t see much these days. It’s a great piece of work, good enough to end a show, and it comes 12 minutes into the special.
Dana Gould, Perfectly Normal (YouTube)
It’s hard to explain what alternative comedy is in 2025. Performing in nontraditional spaces has become common and commercialized, and the fractured media environment makes it difficult to define what’s “mainstream.” In this context, a new special from alternative-comedy leading light Dana Gould is a useful touchstone. Perfectly Normal doesn’t feel like a time machine back to the ’90s, but it’s a nice reminder of the sensibility that defined that revolutionary era of comedy. Gould, who used to work on The Simpsons, is an incredibly sharp writer, but his presentation is still conversational and sardonic, even when throwing out perfectly crafted jokes, like, “My father-in-law is an airline pilot. Do you know the difference between an airline pilot and God? God doesn’t walk around like a fucking airline pilot.”
While it’s become more common for comedians to be personal, Gould still cuts a bit deeper than is standard: “[My dad] was a very serious man — unless he was drinking and then he was hilarious. So I grew up with a dad who was really, really funny all the time.” This transitions into setting up a bit where the comedy is structured more like a sketch than a traditional stand-up joke, as Gould explains that his dad would sing Christmas carols all year but changed the lyrics to complain about his life. To the tune of “Jingle Bells”: “Oh, I make all the money and your mother spends it all / So I hope you want to be homeless ’cause we’re going to lose the house / Oh, your grandma’s sick, and she isn’t going to make it / And you better not cry ’cause I don’t like people’s feelings.” There are also whimsical dissections of obscure pop-culture references, like the movie Blacula, which ties into Gould mocking “podcasts dedicated to the resurgence of the alpha male,” which are currently as close to mainstream as comedy has right now. The dream of the ’90s is alive in Perfectly Normal.
Marcus D. Wiley, Marriage Is Major Surgery (YouTube)
There are some noticeable stylistic similarities between Marcus D. Wiley and Ali Siddiq, a modern master of the storytelling stand-up special who executive produced Marriage Is Major Surgery. Like Siddiq, Wiley starts the special by setting the table for the story he’s going to tell. Addressing the non-married members of the audience, he says, “Singles, I’m letting you look over the balcony of a marriage tonight, so you could see if this is something you want to do.” Then he explains the reasons why someone shouldn’t get married that double as a dog whistle to the audience members who are married and know exactly what he’s talking about. Then he starts the actual story of his 27-year (and counting) marriage with a similar clarity: “Let’s get into it, y’all. It was December 12, 1996. I was matriculating at the University of Texas Southern …” And like Siddiq, for the majority of the special, Wiley just tells the story of his relationship as it happened, and it’s thrilling to watch. Unfortunately, after 45 minutes, the structure changes, and instead of simply telling his story, Wiley shifts to riffing and pontificating on marriage more generally. This section is fun and occasionally insightful but comparatively generic. Still, as a whole, it’s impressive that Wiley is able to breathe new life into the most well-trodden of stand-up topics.
Aaron Weber, Signature Dish (YouTube)
Between February 2003 and May 2004, Comedy Central released 56 half-hour stand-up specials. (Some names with specials those years: Gabriel Iglesias, Bill Burr, Bruce Bruce, Paul F. Tompkins, Patrice O’Neal, Ron White, Daniel Tosh, Kevin Hart, Mike Birbiglia, and Tig Notaro.) In the era we’re currently in, everyone self-releases full hours, so it’s useful to remember the potential of well-curated, tightly written half-hours, in which a comedian who regularly performs on the road showcases all killer, no filler. And there have been some really strong half-hours released on YouTube recently. In February, Don’t Tell Comedy, “comedy’s benevolent gatekeeper,” released two great ones: Emma Willmann’s HR Booby Trap and Shapel Lacey’s Three Dads, Two Moms. Even better is Aaron Weber’s Signature Dish, which was executive-produced by Nate Bargatze and released on Bargatze’s YouTube channel (Weber co-hosts a podcast with Bargatze).
It’s hard not to see similarities between Weber and Bargatze; both are southern comedians whose acts lean heavily on deadpan stories where they are being dumb out in the world. Weber, for example, tells a story of enjoying a hot dog with cream cheese and grilled onions at a random stand outside the baseball stadium in Seattle and then evangelizing the stand for years, only to eventually learn this is a “Seattle dog” and they are served all over the city. Weber isn’t as silly as Bargatze but is a slightly sharper observer, like in his bit about Tums being a top-five candy in the country right now. It’s 30 minutes that’ll make a person excited to see his hour — a lot better than watching someone’s hour and wishing it could’ve been 30 minutes.
Previously Featured Specials:
Sam Jay, Live in London (YouTube)
It’s hard to say if this is a special, especially because Sam Jay makes a point to call it a documentary. But I wouldn’t even call it a docuspecial, as the 37-minute Live in London features far less documentary footage than typically seen in that genre (it’s about 85 percent stand-up). It’s included here because, whatever it is, it feels like a more cohesive piece than most stand-up specials. Live in London captures Jay’s writing process — there are offstage conversations that turn into onstage material — but it also shows Jay process in real time what is happening to the U.S. weeks before the 2024 election (during which she correctly believed that Trump would win).
In any case, it’s fascinating and compelling to watch Jay muse on a topic for several minutes as she searches for a joke. There is a moment where she wrestles with the idea of people supporting Trump. She explains it doesn’t bother her because she never had faith in America: “I’m Black. I never have.” The audience is uneasy and silent until Jay finds the twist: “The real reason is I just don’t want to go back to taking dick.” Nothing against polished material, but there is an undeniable urgency to jokes told when the subject is still fresh.
Liza Treyger, Night Owl (Netflix)
There is a thrilling tension underneath all of Liza Treyger’s stand-up: How can a person be both this messy and this self-aware? “I will do whatever to not actually feel my feelings,” one joke starts in her special Night Owl. “Like, I tried to fix a printer, and I couldn’t do it, and I went to get a butterfly tattoo.” She then points to said tattoo on her forearm and says, “This is so big for someone who is pretty casual about butterflies.” It’s befuddling and endearing to experience someone who can be so oblivious in the moment yet so clear-eyed toward her past actions.
The best example of this in the special is a section about Treyger’s compulsive relationship to scrolling on her phone. She viscerally captures how it feels to know social media is draining your attention while being incapable of quitting. At one point, she captures how dire the situation is by saying, “As a child, if someone told you your one source of joy will be watching a horse you don’t know get its hoof cleaned …” As is the case with this joke, a lot of Treyger’s punch lines trail off. The special’s delivery style and structure are loose, but it’s fitting considering her onstage persona. This might frustrate a viewer who prefers jokes to end sharply, on hard consonants, and in a way that signals to the audience when to laugh, but for the most part, Treyger’s conversational style is refreshing, and the laughs she earns roll along with a unique rhythm.
Roy Wood Jr., Lonely Flowers (Hulu, Disney+)
After releasing three excellent specials over four years with Comedy Central, it’s lovely to see Roy Wood Jr. free from the constraints of working for the network. Lonely Flowers shows one of the greatest stand-ups working today free to express himself to his full capacity. Especially in the genre of political comedy, which tends to be reactionary across all party identifications, Wood works with purpose and clear intention. Rather than delivering a special that feels like a grab bag of hot-button issues, he focuses on the idea of connection, exploring what is lost when we continue to eliminate human interaction even in places as seemingly mundane as a grocery-store checkout.
There is a form-following-function aspect to Wood’s performance as he strives to bring humanity to all of these everyday moments to get the audience to focus on the humanity lost in their everyday lives. Initially, while watching the special, I thought it featured a gratuitous use of callbacks, but then it became clear Wood was utilizing them not to show off, but to emphasize Lonely Flowers’s theme of creating moments of connection. No other living stand-up brings Wood’s level of thoughtfulness and sensitivity to political comedy. His mastery of both emotional honesty and sociopolitical truth-telling puts him in Richard Pryor territory.
Doug Stanhope, Discount Meat (YouTube)
While most stand-up comedians aspiring to be edgy these days focus their specials on the same ten supposedly untouchable topics, Doug Stanhope is genuinely transgressive. In Discount Meat, released on December 31, this manifests in material that is really out there in terms of appropriateness, like a 13-minute section comparing 9/11 to COVID or a shockingly thorough exploration of whether pedophiles go into having kids with the intention of molesting them one day. But beyond touching on edgy subjects, Stanhope’s work pushes back on orthodoxies. And Discount Meat focuses on the orthodoxies he’s seen among so-called political independents. In doing so, he offers a trenchant critique of a version of libertarianism that he used to be associated with that many in comedy have since embraced: “I’ve noticed a lot of anti-government people have become very pro-government in their efforts to get the government to get government out of our lives.”
The downside to the special’s unrelenting nature is that it can, at times, feel exhausting. Its watchability is also affected by its unusual presentation: Instead of showing Stanhope performing onstage, the camera focuses on a room filled with Stanhope-related paraphernalia and multiple old TVs playing his performance. It feels like you are in Stanhope’s bunker, watching specials on a pirated feed. It’s bizarre and might not be for everyone sitting down for some casual stand-up comedy after a long day at work, but for those ready to engage, Discount Meat’s unsettling style adds another layer of intrigue to the experience.