On Sunday nights, being the cinefile that I am, I like to watch a movie in the approximately two hour window leading up to when I’d like to go to bed. Personally, this is an ideal way to end the weekend and ready the body and mind for the week ahead in the best way possible.

This practice obviously involves an arduous selection process that is not for the faint of heart. First of is my mood and pickiness. Do I want a comedy? A drama? A thriller? Then there is the shear volume. Netflix, all the premiurm channels, new on demand movies I’d be willing to pay a few bucks for. This weekend was particularly rough as aside from Saturday’s festivities I did nothing but watch movies and TV so I had a recently viewed palate to make do with.

Always a sucker for a solid coming-of-age movie I went with one. It was a disastrous choice. There was too little going on with too many people. None of it made me care about any of it. About 30 minutes in a realized I needed something else. However at that point I was also getting tired. I didn’t have the energy for a 90+ minute endeavor. Then I remembered….

In searching for the latest British (kind of obsessed with across the pond entertainment right now) fare on Netflix, I came across a comedian named Daniel Sloss. I watched the trailer to his special (actually two) and added it to the list. On this sleepy Sunday night I went back, found the first special, “Dark” was only an hour long, and started watching.

Let me tell you this was the best stand up special I’ve seen in years, and this side of Segura and Burr. Sloss combines a lot, but not a frantic amount, of energy with supremely crafted, utterly intelligent jokes, all told with an almost shrugging wit and humility.

What makes this special however, is how without even trying to do so Sloss gives the middle finger to PC culture in general. The special is called “Dark” because of some of the topics of Sloss’ jokes. This isn’t “dark” humor in the vein of Anthony Jeselnik however, these are jokes based on the harder, more emotional. and more painful experiences one may have to walk through in life, but that are, as Sloss points out, indeed real things that happen to us and that need to be addressed. Basically, you don’t have a right to be offended by what other people are going through, or by their need to somehow find humor in it.

There are even some serious moments in “Dark” (I admittedly haven’t watched the second of the two specials, “Jigsaw”, yet). I understand that isn’t for everybody. But his ability to work his way through those intermissions and bringing you out laughing on the other end is not only relatable, but a sort of metaphor for life itself.

So I IMPLORE your to take the time to watch this kid do his thing in the coming days. Joey B stamp of approval through and through.

-Joey B