Is Netflix’s ‘Ugly Delicious’ Setting Up an Aziz Ansari Comeback?

First thing’s first: Ugly Delicious Season 2 is spectacular. David Chang’s deep dive into the cultural and ethical forces driving cuisine continues to deliver searing commentary on the foodie world. The second episode of Ugly Delicious Season 2 delves into the misunderstood world of Indian cuisine. “Don’t Call it Curry” features brilliant interviews with Top Chef host Padma Lakshmi, Bombay Bread Bar chef Floyd Cardoz, and Bon Appetit favorite Priya Krishna. Also providing commentary in the episode is Chang’s long time buddy Aziz Ansari.

Ansari was once one of the most ubiquitous figures in comedy, starring on Parks and Recreation, Master of None, and in a string of stand up comedy specials on Netflix. However, Ansari was one of the many public figures whose private behavior was outed during the #MeToo Movement. In January 2018, a woman accused him of sexual misconduct on a date. Since then, Ansari has kept a mostly low profile. He put out another Netflix stand up special last year, in which he addressed the allegations, but besides that, the once prolific comic has been mostly laying low.

So it’s interesting to see him featured so prominently in the second season of Ugly Delicious. In Episode 2, we get to watch Chang have a homey family meal with Ansari, his brother, and his parents. Later, Ansari accompanies Chang on a trip to India. On the one hand, it’s not so Ansari appeared in three episodes in the first season of the series. However, those appearances were all shot before the scandal broke. During a Netflix junket Decider attended in the weeks before Ugly Delicious‘s February 2018 debut, Chang was asked about Ansari’s show Master of None and how the fake show in that series compared to his own. Instead of directly addressing the question, Chang grew somber, and said, “You know, Aziz is a very close friend of mine, and I’m just going to give him his privacy right now. I don’t even know how to talk about it.”

Now there’s a scene in Ugly Delicious Season 2 that seems to suggest that Ansari is ready for a comeback. Chang and Ansari try an ayurvedic meal, which is an ancient Indian practice that uses food to boost physical and mental health. Chang is skeptical of the practice and compares it to Pentecostal ministers, but that changes with the doctor they are interviewing, Dr. Pankaj Naram, comes up with some pretty spot on diagnoses after just reading their pulses. He’s able to predict that Chang will have rheumatoid arthritis, which Chang laughs he already has, and he’s able to pinpoint a psychological change in Ansari.

When the doctor takes Ansari’s hand, he asks how old the comic is. When Ansari says he’s thirty-five, Naram says something that makes the comic perk up: “Beginning of new life.”

“You want to become now spiritual. You want to become more inside. But sometimes your mind is thinking too much. And you want to do something which is known as social work – helping humanity. You want to become a part of solution,” the doctor says. “This is coming.”

While eating their meal, Ansari admits to Chang that the doctor had him nailed. “Some of it is a pretty deep insight into my head,” he says. “I’ve been, like, really into meditation and stuff…I haven’t talked about that in interviews, where he would be able to find it, I would think.”

It’s not merely that Ugly Delicious gives Ansari screen time again; it’s that in that scene, there’s a hint that Ansari himself is thinking about his “new life.” The subtext being that his 2018 scandal may have changed the way he sees himself and his role in society. Whether or not that’s something that Ansari will act on is another story, but the fact that he has returned to his friend’s Netflix show at all suggests that we might be seeing more of Aziz Ansari in 2020 than we did in 2019.

Ugly Delicious Season 2 is now streaming on Netflix.

Watch Ugly Delicious on Netflix