The special, just 30 minutes long, is bracing in its skepticism and hard-shelled, morbidly funny about the mess we're all in now.

The half-hour passes quickly because Ansari is still affable as a comedian, but the humor is bland and empty.

Aziz Ansari is a talented writer and performer, managing to pull off what he claims was an afternoon of writing jokes.

Come for the celebrity jokes and encounters, stay for the kinder, gentler message, and use the Notes app to write a note to self to look into a flip phone.