Nice Try, The Devil

Pete Holmes takes the stage with the aggressively positive energy of a youth pastor who just drank a few white wines. Instead of mining cynicism, he builds a set around unabashed joy and ridiculous premises. The high point of the hour is his acting out a video game character visiting a normal doctor, alongside a strangely logical argument for why humans should be traumatized by breast milk.

Filmed at The Moody Theater in Austin, Texas, the 2013 Comedy Central hour captures Holmes right as his career was catching fire. He had already built a devoted following with his You Made It Weird podcast, and this set premiered just months before he launched his TBS late-night show. He leans hard into his goofy persona, spinning tangents out of harassing telemarketers, the mechanics of dropping a dog, and his willingness to go gay for Ryan Gosling. He closes out the night with a long stretch on his evangelical upbringing and his lingering fear of the rapture, bridging the gap between utter silliness and the spiritual anxiety that became a regular fixture of his stand-up.