SPOILER WARNING: The next article offers away among the greatest bits from Marc Maron’s newest stand-up particular, Panicked. When you have not but used your HBO Max subscription to test it out, as a substitute of heckling me about it, simply proceed with warning for those who proceed to learn on.
I’ve all the time admired Marc Maron as a comic, nearly greater than I get pleasure from him because the host of the influential podcast, WTF, which he’s ending in 2025 after 16 years. Nevertheless, given the intensely neurotic conduct that he bases a variety of his bits on and his aversion to comedian e-book movies (regardless of having a job in Joker), he has by no means been an individual I might simply say I establish with… till now.
After his newest comedy particular, Panicked, dropped on the 2025 TV premiere schedule, I made an effort to test it out as quickly as I obtained the prospect. Not solely would I name it among the finest stand-up specials on HBO Max, I’d additionally credit score it with serving to me understand how a lot I do establish with Maron in spite of everything, and for 2 specific causes.
His Pet Proprietor Philosophies Mirror My Personal
Maron spends a variety of time in Panicked discussing a subject that has additionally come up steadily on WTF and in a few of his earlier Netflix stand-up specials: his relationship along with his cats. I’ve no feline pets, however I do have two canines (certainly one of which is the third I’ve shared with my spouse), and his anecdotes from this particular about his three cats jogged my memory fairly a little bit of the challenges I’ve confronted whereas elevating my furry pals, from the almost combative manner he should put together to journey with them to the various frustrations that include potty coaching.
On high of that, at one level, he mentions watching a docuseries about Adolf Hitler that the comic of Jewish descent admits didn’t precisely shock or dishearten him till this system revealed that, earlier than the dictator ended his personal life, he killed his personal canine, to which Maron exclaimed, “What an asshole!” To not make gentle of any atrocities Hitler is answerable for, however I’ve little question that I seemingly would have reacted the identical manner, given what number of people I’ve seen die left and proper in traditional horror films with none qualms, solely to cower in misery on the sight of a domesticated animal in peril.
I Have Additionally Had My Truthful Share Of Life-Altering Experiences With Pop Songs
The actor/comic closes Panicked by detailing a time when he went on a hike and, in an effort to grasp the singer-songwriter’s immense recognition, determined to placed on Taylor Swift’s then-latest album, Midnights. Right now, he was nonetheless mourning the demise of his associate, filmmaker Lynn Shelton, so when he obtained to a quite disheartening single about loss known as “Larger Than the Complete Sky,” it triggered such a robust emotional response that he briefly handed out.
Now, I can not say I’ve ever skilled a response to a tragic tune, not to mention a Swift observe, fairly to the identical diploma, however I completely get it. Every now and then, some decidedly sappy ballad, typically sung by a feminine artist, comes on my Spotify that fully takes me out of myself for some time with the way in which it jogs my memory of a beloved one, or invokes a sense I’ve had earlier than and even longed to have. This bit from Panicked, of all that I’ve seen from Maron to this point, is well his most susceptible and humanizing to me, which makes me respect and admire him as greater than only a comedian.
Even when you don’t find yourself having some surprising bonding expertise with this stand-up particular like I did, I’d nonetheless suggest that you just stream Marc Maron: Panicked on HBO Max only for the nice laughs it ought to present.