Like most of us, Stewart Lee has been lying low for the last couple of years, but he’s re-emerged like a magnificent middle-aged butterfly, a little plumper and greyer yet manifestly galvanised by the cornucopia of material made available by recent worldwide events and movements. And, despite one critic’s observation that Lee’s audiences don’t laugh but merely sit and nod in agreement, he’s both immediately hilarious and refreshingly unsettling – the way in which he ridicules himself, the audience, his artform, his comedy peers, and indeed most aspects of human interaction, is incredibly freeing, and very, very funny.

The show comprises two sets: Snowflake explores the Covid-Brexit era and comments on the ‘anti-woke’ movement while Tornado focuses on Lee’s status as a comedian, being both declared “the world’s greatest living standup” by the Times yet remaining insignificant enough on Netflix to have his show sit above a listing describing it as, “reports of sharks falling from the skies are on the rise again. Nobody on the Eastern Seaboard is safe.”

An Oxford graduate himself and uncharacteristically demonstrating delight and gratitude at being at last ‘out’ (his trademark look is one of enduring disdain), Monday night’s Lee was a little warmer and affectionate than the one I’m used to seeing on TV. That’s not to say his sets were any less brutal than usual, more you got the sense of witnessing a man who was immensely happy to be back on the stage and sharing space with likeminded souls (not that I feel I can actually compare my mind to Lee’s in any way).

Snowflake/Tornado is dense show, but generously so. You can expect Lee’s trademark deconstruction of all material as he proceeds to deliver it (turning the lens on himself, his technique, and the audience’s anticipated and actual response) and sharp and deliciously contemptuous improvisation, but you’ll also be treated to an expert rendition of, for example, a supposed 1950s horror story written by Alan Bennett as well as a quick, perfect joke about the 90s boy band Bros.

Lee goes from the sublime to the ridiculous in a way that makes other comedians seem basic, and he’s gleefully aware of this yet somehow manages to ultimately come across as modest. Indeed, such juxtapositions run throughout his work. His direct observations regarding the pandemic, recent movements such as Black Lives Matter and transgender rights, and of course the state of our current government, were on the surface minimal, delivered quickly and in a seemingly ‘off-the-cuff’ manner, yet of course he was conjuring deeper, more unsettling analysis of these issues while we thought we laughing about a cess pit (for example…).

Lee always wins. His brand of self-deprecation elevates him. His ability to engage with criticism from the genuine leftfield always leaves the critic looking foolish, his willingness to linger on a joke, to push it to its absolute limit, to not pander to short attention spans and play, masterfully, with repetition, is brave, brilliant, and belly-laughingly funny. As Lee points out, real life has overtaken comedy in terms of absurdity, and so there is no better time to go see a comedian who manages to take everything apart and put it back together in a way that at first makes no sense and then somehow mysteriously all comes together beautifully. Perfect.