Stand Up and Away! with Brian Regan season 1 premiere recap

The new Netflix series, Stand Up and Away! with Brian Regan, pairs his standup comedy with short sketches for good, clean fun.

It’s probably not easy being a “clean” comedian, because many will instantly assume that’s the main thing about you, or that your set totally lacks edge or is just plain silly.  In a way, though, Brian Regan takes that premise and runs with it in Stand Up and Away! with Brian Regan.  He is definitely one of the cleanest clean comedians, but he’s also pretty dang funny sometimes.

Even though this is a recap, I can’t give away all his jokes for this episode.  Still, I’ll give a few hints of topics covered, and look at how he covers them.  Basically, I’ll talk about what works in his style of comedy.

Here he discusses one of the dangerous risks of being famous, makes fun of movie and TV show clichés, suggests that astronauts can easily brag (and notes how a certain astronaut is sorely overlooked), and promotes a new way to eat on the go.  He delves a little into his personal life, talking about his “facial contortions” (a well-known aspect of his act) and how a firecracker accident damaged his hearing.  In some ways, he’s reminiscent of the “wacky neighbor” character in most sitcoms.

How this episode works

This episode was a solid introduction to Brian Regan, who isn’t a superstar comedian but is still popular and well-liked.  In fact, it seems like it would be hard to hate the guy because his approach is pretty disarming and a strong antidote to the seemingly forced negativity so common to this world (and sometimes to comedy).  While most people like dark, even twisted jokes sometimes, it’s good to know someone like this is out there who can make people laugh without making them cringe much (unless inoffensive comedy does that to you, which puts you at a loss here).

At the same time, Regan does deal with real issues in this episode.  He touches upon crime, lazily written characters and moments in pop culture, a stupid mistake which gave him hearing loss and how whispers are rarely intended for compliments.

The show also has pretty good special effects (reminding me of Key & Peele, one of the most cinematic comedy sketch shows).  While not every moment will be equally rip-roaringly hilarious, it’s definitely a solid watch.  It’s fun!  Probably my favorite sketch is the awkward dinner conversation, where two different tables end up hearing too much of each other’s conversations.

That’s it for this recap of Stand Up and Away! with Brian Regan.  What are your thoughts?  Let us know in the comments!