Back in 2017, Joe Mande made a big statement out of his first hour of stand-up on Netflix. Not only does Joe Mande’s Award-Winning Comedy Special promise a lot in its title alone; it’s contained within a frame device about Mande trying to win the American Humour Award, with material about (among other things) a traumatic diarrhea incident at summer camp, the sex aid he’d like to pitch on Shark Tank and his documentary film obsession Thought Crimes, about the NYPD’s so-called Cannibal Cop. Viewers might learn something about ethics and philosophy from watching, but it would be a longer walk for them to get there than when they watched The Good Place, on which Mande was a writer at the time.

Today, Mande’s second special, Chill, comes to Hulu. And while his opening chunk promises that, thanks to his new mood stabilizer regime, he is chill,...