I’ve always gotten the sense that comedy is a cathartic form of therapy for Marc Maron. In his new special, this has never been clearer. 

Maron rarely prompts me to laugh out loud; that’s just not his style. While some observational comedians like Jerry Seinfeld try to keep their material broad and applicable to the general public, Maron takes a much different approach. His comedy is unabashedly and unapologetically personal. He doesn’t really care if the audience can personally relate to what he says or not, he’s merely there to offer his own perspective. 

These qualities have always been at the heart of Maron’s comedy. At the beginning of each episode of his popular podcast, “WTF with Marc Maron,” he usually offers a 10-minute unscripted monologue talking (and often complaining) about the goings-on of his daily life as a prelude to his featured celebrity interview each week.

In “From Bleak to Dark,” though, things take a dark turn, as the title suggests. While the special contains the same confessional humor one tends to expect from Maron by now, two parts of his life loom large over his set: his father’s diagnoses with dementia and the sudden death of his girlfriend Lynn Shelton in 2020. 

Maron tells a story about taking his father out to a Chinese restaurant. After they were seated, his father inexplicably kept pouring spoonfuls of straight soy sauce and then drank it. Eventually Maron had to confiscate the sauce from him after realizing this was now his responsibility as a son. 

Whereas someone like Jerry Seinfeld almost never touches on the depths of his personal life in his act, Maron embraces the trials and tribulations of his life and faces them head-on, in front of a large audience. Upon hearing Maron speak about the recent turmoil in his personal life, it becomes clear that making jokes is his way of dealing with the pain. 

At one point towards the end of the special, Maron tells a joke with a lengthy set up about going to see his girlfriend in the hospital one last time to say goodbye, moments after her unexpected death. The punchline: “Do I take a selfie?” With jokes like this, the audience both laughs and grieves with Maron, feeling his most intimate and personal life experiences as he openly shares them.

When I first heard the news of Shelton’s passing in 2020, I found myself wondering how, if ever, Maron would deal with it in his stand-up act. Watching “From Bleak to Dark,” he delivers just about what I would have expected: a dark, edgy exploration into grief, family, and the decidedly bleak modern times in which we are living. 

While Maron’s comedy often seems to be a thinly-veiled therapy session for him, that’s not a bad thing. Now more than ever, audiences seem to want art that they can connect with on a deeper emotional level. As the distant, impersonal facade comedians have put up in the past falls out of favor, people like Maron will only continue to grow in popularity. 

Don’t watch “From Bleak to Dark” if you’re looking for a few shallow, mindless chuckles. Maron’s new special may not have the non-stop laughs of your average comedy special, but it more than makes up for it in its emotion and depth.

“Marc Maron: From Bleak to Dark” is now streaming on HBO Max.