Film
Tom Segura: Mostly Stories
Tom Segura's 2016 special finds him riffing on bodily mishaps, absurd encounters, and the specific humiliation of modern life. He's profane and digressive, building stories that seem to wander before snapping into focus. If you like comedians who treat the stage like a conversation with friends—messy, tangential, genuinely funny—this is exactly your thing.
Should you watch it?
Watch it if you like a stand-up who turns his own bitterness and bad decisions into tight, filthy anecdotes, and who lets a bit wander off on a tangent before snapping back to the punchline.
Skip it if you need your comedy clean or politically gentle, since this set leans hard into crude material and a sour, combative attitude that will grate if you came for warmth.
What it asks of you: About seventy-three minutes of one man talking to a room, so there is no plot to follow, just a steady run of stories that stay loud and profane from start to finish.
Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.
If you liked this
John Mulaney: Kid Gorgeous at Radio City2018
Mulaney constructs elaborate narratives from tiny observations, building to moments of perfect comedic architecture. His material about childhood and family has the same warmth-underneath-the-cynicism that makes Segura work.
But His comedy is tightly controlled and polished in ways that might feel cold if you prefer Segura's looser, more chaotic energy.
Bert Kreischer: The Machine2016
Kreischer shares Segura's gift for sprawling stories that somehow circle back to a punchline. Both are physicists of embarrassment, mining comedy from the moments when plans go catastrophically wrong.
But Kreischer can lean heavily on shock value without the underlying intelligence that redeems Segura's raunchiest material.
Dave Attell: Road Work2014
Attell's special follows him to smaller cities across America, telling stories about the people he meets. Like Segura, he finds the absurd lurking in ordinary American life and treats his audience like friends.
But His material can feel scattered, and unlike Segura, he doesn't always pull the threads together into a satisfying structure.
Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Tom Segura: Mostly Stories
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
Hannah Gadsby: Douglas2020
Both comedians build entire careers on narrative structure and personal specificity rather than joke-as-punchline. They treat stand-up as a form that can accommodate digression, vulnerability, and real thought.
Gadsby's follow-up to Nanette strips away the theatrical frame and returns to pure stand-up storytelling. Like Segura, she builds extended narratives that find profundity in the mundane—but from a completely different vantage point.
But If you come to stand-up primarily for laughs, the philosophical density might feel like work rather than entertainment.
More like this (5)
Kyle Kinane: Trampoline In A Ditch2022
Kinane is a master of the digressive narrative, spiraling into tangents that somehow make perfect sense. His comedy has the same unfiltered, semi-autobiographical quality as Segura's best work.
But His delivery is deliberately flat, which might feel under-energized if you want your comedy performed with visible commitment.
James Acaster: Repertoire2018
A four-part special where Acaster tells interconnected stories with genuine emotional stakes beneath the jokes. He builds the same kind of narrative momentum that makes Segura's longer bits work.
But It's sprawling and British, and requires patience—this isn't quick-hit comedy. Some found it self-indulgent.
Pete Holmes: Faces and Sounds2016
Holmes builds stories from observation and vulnerability, finding comedy in confusion and failure. There's a similar warmth underneath the cynicism that keeps his comedy from becoming just bitter ranting.
But His material relies heavily on impressions and voices, which can feel like a different tool than Segura's conversation-based approach.
Waiting for "Superman"2010
Both find their power in specificity: Segura gets laughs from the particular absurdity of his life; this documentary gets impact by refusing to generalize about education failure. Both say: look at what's actually happening here.
A documentary about American education that unfolds through personal stories and structural observation. It has the same DNA as Segura's best material: the comedic observation that emerges from noticing how systems fail actual people.
But It's not comedy—it's serious documentary, which means you're signing up for frustration and sadness rather than laughs.
BoJack Horseman2014
Like Segura's best stories, BoJack finds comedy in the gap between self-awareness and actual behavior. Both explore the specific humiliation of being a moderately self-aware person in situations that expose your worst instincts.
An animated series about a washed-up sitcom actor navigating depression, ego, and the gap between who he is and who he wanted to be. It's desperately funny and desperate in equal measure—comedy rooted in real observation about how people hurt themselves.
But It's dark enough to be genuinely depressing; some episodes prioritize emotional weight over comedy, and it's a serious time commitment.
People
Cast
Tom SeguraHimself
Davis ChohFactory worker
Directing
- Jay KarasDirector
- Rami HachacheDirector
Writing
- Tom SeguraScreenplay