‘Trevor Noah: Joy in the Trenches’ review: Noah asks the tough questions, but makes you laugh anyway

Trevor Noah has never been content with just making you laugh. In his latest Netflix special, Joy in the Trenches, the former Daily Show host poses a question that cuts right through the laughter and makes you sit up: “who will you be when history calls?” It is the kind of question that makes you sit up and pause, even in the middle of what is otherwise a thoroughly hilarious hour. 

The South African stand-up comedian is widely known as a political satirist with a flair for observational comedy, but at his core, Noah is a master storyteller. Much like his memoir Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood, this special is essentially a collection of stories and situations drawn from real life, peppered with sharp, situational comic relief.

The show, which runs about an hour and eight minutes, opens with Noah addressing a Truth Social post by U.S. President Donald Trump, who had reacted strongly to Noah’s turn as Grammy host over a joke about Trump’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, and threatened to sue the comedian. What the President wrote is beside the point. What follows is a sharp, confident opening that sets the tone for the rest of the special. Noah, who readily admits he stands no chance against one of the world’s most powerful men, takes him on anyway, one joke at a time. It is not your regular Trump takedown but a more human and nuanced one. 

Trevor Noah: Joy in the Trenches (TV Special 2026)
| Photo Credit:
Netflix

Noah’s comedy, as I have long found, is rarely the fall-off-your-chair, laugh-out-loud variety. It is something subtler and, in many ways, more lasting: laughter at situations that are uncomfortable, absurd, and often deeply human. He has a rare gift for finding the comic nerve in conflict and chaos.

At its heart, the special is about how people find joy in difficult times. Ukraine and Russia have been at war since 2022. Almost all of Gaza lies in rubble, its people surviving in makeshift tents. Conflicts rage across West Asia. What do we do at a time like this? Should you throw the graduation party and let your hair down, or hold back out of guilt, as so much of the world starves and burns and suffers? As Noah illustrates through the image of soldiers in opposing trenches singing together and playing games across the border: “They were fighting to live. They weren’t fighting to fight. If you forget what you’re fighting for, there’s no point in fighting.”

Just as the special settles into its more reflective register, Noah takes a turn. We learn he sees a therapist, a revelation easy to appreciate at a time when conversations around mental health are more necessary than ever. The shift to his dating life, however, feels abrupt given the weight of what precedes it. Noah has always been generous in sharing his life with audiences. His memoir for instance lays bare everything, from a childhood incident of defecating on his grandmother’s floor to his mother’s troubled marriage. What we have rarely heard about is his romantic life, who he has loved or hopes to love. This, then, is a first. Unexpected, yes, but also a genuinely human moment.

And it is precisely the unexpected that sets this Emmy Award-winning comedian apart. Joy in the Trenches is anything but ordinary.

Trevor Noah: Joy in the Trenches is currently streaming on Netflix