Bangin'

What makes this special stand out is Nikki Glaser’s insistence on treating women’s sexual desires and insecurities with the same clinical, dirt-under-the-fingernails specificity that male comics have spent decades applying to their own. Glaser does not do polite euphemisms. Instead, she gets right to the mechanics of dating, her preference for submissive roles in bed simply because it requires less effort, and the defensive choreography of keeping her hands strictly on a date’s neck during a goodnight kiss to avoid accidentally grazing his belt. It is an hour of highly detailed, hyper-candid comedy that functions like a late-night locker room conversation where all filter has been completely abandoned.

Filmed at The Academy in Los Angeles and released in late 2019, the show caught Glaser at a significant career turning point. She had spent the previous couple of years solidifying her status as a standout roaster at the Comedy Central Roasts, most recently making a splash at the Alec Baldwin roast just weeks prior, while hosting her daily SiriusXM morning show, You Up. This special translates that same fast-paced, high-heat energy to a solo hour, moving quickly through longer bits about her sobriety and her frustration with the uneven power dynamics of male compliments. Vulture named it one of the ten best comedy specials of the year, and it became one of the most-watched stand-up releases on Netflix during its premiere month.