One of the most intriguing aspects of Jerrod Carmichaels Emmy-winning Rothaniel was the way it erased the already blurry line between comedy special and therapy session.

Seated in an uncomfortable-looking chair in the glare of a harsh spotlight that left the rest of the intimate venue entirely in the dark, Carmichael explored family trauma and his sexuality in a soft-spoken, introspective way that gave the impression of spontaneous self-discovery, occasionally assisted by responses from the unseen audience. What made the special so spectacular was how it used Carmichaels inherent likability to pull viewers into his life or at least into the version of his life that he felt prepared to confront at that moment. HBOs Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show, created by Carmichael, Eli Despres and director Ari Katcher, isnt precisely a sequel to Rothaniel, but its an extension of its genre-blurring tone and therapeutic approach. With eight half-hour episodes, Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show is a more expansive and confrontational thing, in which that inherent Carmichael likability is pushed into a much less comfortable place. It may not provoke quite as much self-examination from the viewer as its intended to provoke from Carmichael, but the show, its formal inventiveness, its choices and its agendas are hard to shake.

If the assumption going into a show like this the title refers to Carmichaels reality, not to reality show as a genre is that the creator-star will use the language of unscripted TV to forge a positive self-promotional platform that viewers will accept as truth, Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show borders on cautionary expos instead of enticing commercial. Time after time, Carmichael throws himself under the meticulously filmed bus, building sympathy for everybody else in his life by yanking sympathy away from himself.

I imagine that the most common question for Carmichael in the editing room was, Are you SURE you want to leave this in? But in subjecting himself to a warts-and-all treatment thats almost all warts, Carmichael is attempting something thats possibly more fascinating than Rothaniel a roller coaster of identification and rejection thats sure to alienate some viewers, leaving the rest to contemplate a frequently funny, just as frequently uneasy intersection of truth and artifice.

Carmichael describes the process here as an attempt at a self-Truman Show, forcing himself to tell the truth by surrounding himself with cameras.

It feels really dumb to lie. I keep saying I wanna live more truthfully, Carmichael claims.

But as a friend who insists on wearing a mask and being referred to as Anonymous argues, Its exhibitionist. Theres public and private and then theres masturbatorally public. Theres public which is like unnecessarily shooting a camera up your fucking asshole and broadcasting it for the world.

Theyre both right.

Over the eight episodes, Carmichael follows up on threads from Rothaniel. At the center is an examination of his dating life, which involves the long-time friend who largely ghosted him after he expressed a desire to take their relationship to the next level, plus a new long-distance boyfriend, all complicated by Carmichaels pathological refusal to remain faithful to anybody, even as the camera follows him on his infidelities.

Then theres Carmichaels examination of his status as a friend, including his efforts to push a stand-up buddy to do more confessional material, his initially generous efforts to host a friend who comes to New York with acting dreams and a mortifying incident in which he misses a wedding at which he was supposed to be the best man.

Finally, theres Carmichaels position as a son, as he tries to get his ultra-religious mother to accept his sexuality and attempts to confront his father about the infidelities that were mentioned in Rothaniel and clearly seeded his philandering present.

If theres any question that audiences will ask as frequently as the aforementioned Why would Jerrod leave some of this stuff in? its probably the far simpler and more all-purpose, REALLY?!? As in, Did he really miss a friends wedding to get a hot dog? Is he really going on Grindr immediately after an emotional confession with his boyfriend about cheating? Are his Grindr dates really signing the waiver to allow a camera crew to film both immediately before and after sex? Are his parents really just accepting having these fraught family scenes play out for a full crew and later for America?

Viewers, in choosing to watch and continuing to watch the show, are internally signing a more existential waiver of sorts either to accept that everything in the series is real or, as a very plausible alternative, to believe that nothing in the show is real, that its all just entertainment.

The unrelenting candor is the whole project, as is exposing the artificiality of reality as a genre that viewers accept as a delivery mechanism for truth. Your typical documentary achieves a look and feel that viewers accept as real by virtue of minimizing the size of the crew to the barest of bones. Part of why somebody like Matthew Heineman (American Symphony) gets the access he does is that hes often his own cinematographer and crew.

Here, with Katcher directing, Carmichael is being followed by a team with multiple cameras and multiple set-ups, all acknowledged throughout. We see the cameraman standing between Carmichael and his dad pointing his camera at one and then the other and back again after Carmichael goes through a familiar gay taxonomy twinks, bears, otters, the like exclusively to make his father squirm. Following a tense, but perfectly lit dinner, one participant steps out to the balcony and realizes the windows have been blacked out for the production.

Intercut throughout are Carmichaels on-stage musings on the evolving state of his life. If youre keeping score, its an ouroboros in which life has fueled his stand-up act and his stand-up act has inspired a reality series that is now fueling his standup. Or something like that. And yes, late in the show there are scenes in which Carmichael and Anonymous watch and critique scenes from Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show.

Does the exposing of the genres mechanics and artifice make Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show one of the genres most transparent and therefore honest entries? Or just the first one to figure out how to use a new language of truth as a way to cover for its own contrivances? Yes.

If youre watching the show at all, its probably because you like the version of Jerrod Carmichael projected in his past stand-up specials, on NBCs The Carmichael Show and in various films. Its hard, then, to watch somebody you like and somebody whom youve been trained to like in roles that mirror himself being this narcissistic and, occasionally, this cruel. But making himself look ugly at times has the oddest of effects, forcing us to empathize with family members who were, in past Carmichael recountings of these stories, presented as the villains, or at least as intolerant or judgmental. Carmichaels parents are homophobic, but theyre being ambushed and possibly humiliated to expose their homophobia, which adjusts their role into the victim space. Its a devious and calculated thought experiment where youre forced to go, Theyre in the wrong, but hes in the wrong and maybe that doesnt make them in the right, but it sure does something.

Walter Scott wrote, Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive, but Jerrod Carmichael and company are here laying out proof that when we practice to tell the truth, the web we weave can be far more tangled.

Its hard to call Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show a fun or conventionally enjoyable show to watch, but I laughed and covered my eyes in mortification in equal measure and since I finished my screeners, I havent stopped thinking about it.