Joke Show
Netflix · 2019 · 59 min
Michelle Wolf targets outrage culture and gender double standards.
Michelle Wolf starts her second hour-long special without an intro, a theme song, or greeting the crowd, immediately launching into a bit about seeing otters on Instagram. It sets the tone for an hour devoted to the absurdity of public outrage and gender dynamics. Following her controversial headline-making set at the 2018 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, Wolf moves away from DC politics here, focusing instead on social commentary, childbirth, and feminism.\n\nThe special was filmed in New York City and directed by Lance Bangs. Released on Netflix in December 2019, it arrived after a turbulent year for Wolf, whose late-night talk show was canceled after a single season. She works through meticulously constructed routines on how men’s and women’s bodies function, including a thought experiment about what would happen if men menstruated. Her delivery is fast-paced, leaning into her signature high-pitched cadence to challenge defensive men and overly sensitive women alike.
The set list
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An Instagram commenter reacting to a video by asserting that otters rape baby seals.
Uses the comment to dissect outrage culture and internet pile-ons, highlighting how social media creates an obsessive need for everyone to take an aggressive stance on everything before pivoting unexpectedly into dog breeding.
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Childbirth is terrifying and visually nightmarish rather than miraculous.
Compares a postpartum woman's body to a catastrophic car accident being appraised by an insurance adjuster who declares it totaled, while her husband eagerly asks about getting a mid-size Japanese rental.
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How men would handle menstruation if they were the ones who experienced periods.
Imagines how emotional men would become, hypothesizes the names they would invent for tampons, and argues that society should speak honestly and graphically about female bodily functions to eliminate taboo.
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Demystifying abortion through comedy.
Addresses her own personal abortion with directness and humor in order to counter cultural squeamishness around the procedure.
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The closer (spoiler). Show it
Women are fundamentally grosser than men.
Summarizes the hour's focus on bodily functions while recounting a reporter at the White House Correspondents' Dinner calling her vulgar, arguing that women should be allowed the same comedic license to be filthy as men.
How it plays
- Tone
- Raunchy, irreverent, defiant, and bitingly satirical.
- On stage
- Unapologetically vulgar, irreverent, and cheeky, embracing the identity of an outspoken comic who refuses to adhere to double standards imposed on female comedians.
- Pace
- Punchline-dense with tight, streamlined rhythm; incorporates deliberate lulls in momentum where she allows the audience to sit in serious silence before flipping the premise with a misdirecting punchline.
- About
- outrage culture and internet controversies, childbirth and physical realities of women's bodies, menstruation and male periods, abortion, feminism and double standards regarding vulgarity
What the critics said
Critical response was positive, highlighting Wolf's meticulous joke construction, lean writing, and refusal to soften her provocative, vulgar edge when discussing gender and cultural discourse.
In the room: Engaged and receptive, moving between hearty recognition at physical comedy and hushed silence during faux-serious setups before laughing at the punchline turnarounds.
Backstory
Filmed in the wake of the intense media backlash and controversy surrounding her 2018 White House Correspondents' Association Dinner keynote monologue, along with modern debates over cancel culture and social media outrage.
Details
- Released
- Runtime
- 59 min
- Where
- Netflix
- Director
- Lance Bangs
- Topics
- Before
- Nice Lady (2017)
- After
- It's Great to Be Here (2023)
More from Michelle Wolf
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The Well
Netflix
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It's Great to Be Here
Netflix
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Nice Lady
HBO
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