[Chappelle’s] never been more self-involved or less funny, his latest material a flimsy dismissal of his past transgressions that doubles down on the laziest of them at the same time. That this should find a home on Netflix mere days after the platform adds Ricky Gervais’s similarly grievance-driven Armageddon points to the emergence of an unsavory new niche in comedy.
Though the two both rank as A-list celebrities on merit of their illustrious careers, their latest work has seen a quiet, unceremonious and frostily received release. These bits offer no insight, and in many of their longer-winded passages, scarcely contain anything that could be classified as a joke. These once-esteemed talents formerly dedicated to puncturing racial tensions or hollow pieties now argue only for the unfairness of their own persecution, and their bravery in resisting it. This is Crank Comedy.
That wasn’t the punchline.