Marc Maron’s heart made “WTF” a hit. In the Joe Rogan age, it’s all about shallow brawn

In the way of many things born at an era’s dawning, “WTF with Marc Maron” reminds us that podcasting began with good intentions. Some of us remember what that territory was like, especially when “WTF” launched and, as Maron recalls at the top of his Monday, June 2 episode, no one knew what a podcast was.

As he defined what his podcast would grow to be loved for, Maron carved out a space for his guests to bridge the distance between their celebrity and their humanity. Early “WTF” episodes are deeply confessional, a product of Maron figuring out his life’s direction after a horrendous divorce. His version of self-examination had a way of prying open everyone from comedians to President Barack Obama in 2015, making his podcast the first to interview a sitting president. Anyone willing to spend time with him in his garage and contemplate what it all means was on the lineup, with the definition of “it” changing from moment to moment.

Appropriately enough, Monday’s episode featured John Mulaney – a performer and host who, like Maron, lived out his messiness in the public eye and was judged for that. Mulaney may have been Maron’s guest, but the episode’s main takeaway was the host’s announcement that he’s ending his podcast after sixteen years.

“We have put up a new show every Monday and Thursday for almost 16 years, and we’re tired. We’re burnt out,” Maron told his faithful listeners during the episode’s opening check-in, before adding, “and we are utterly satisfied with the work we’ve done.”

Yes, and. Minutes later, he threw in one more searingly accurate confession. “I feel like I’ve partially done an amazing thing for culture,” he said. “But on the other side of that, I feel like I’ve released the Kraken.”

Accurate. Maron’s production output has been daunting since the earliest days of “WTF,” churning out two episodes a week to build an archive surpassing 1600 installments. (Monday’s episode is No. 1648.) All these years later, and with a constellation’s worth of additional competition, it’s still one of the most downloaded and streamed podcasts going.

But it’s also a small island in a medium overrun by shallow rage theater celebrating thoughtlessness. Within that swirl, “WTF” stands out as an oasis of introspection thanks to Maron presenting his show as an open cavern of feeling, constantly exposing new corners of insight and inviting listeners inside to revel in those discoveries.

“It’s always twofold when you’re at the beginning of a new medium,” Maron said Monday while reflecting on his podcast’s legacy. “There’s a lot of, like, ‘Wow, the freedom of it!’ And I think those words are said before anything turns into a horrendous, malevolent force.”

“WTF” may not be the first comedy podcast, but Maron is one of the earliest bigger-name performers to establish that the format is useful for expanding one’s fan base.

Before “WTF,” he was a featured personality on Air America, the short-lived progressive response to conservative talk radio. But Maron was less broadly popular than his colleagues Janeane Garofalo, Al Franken and “Daily Show” co-creator Lizz Winstead. Garofalo and Franken were already stars by the time Maron scored his first significant film credit in Cameron Crowe’s 2000 classic “Almost Famous.” (An audio sample of his most memorable line from that movie — “Lock the gates!” — opens every “WTF” episode.)

After parting ways with “Air America,” Maron held on to his keycard to the AAR studio and covertly used it to record the first few episodes of “WTF,” which he launched with his producer, Brendan McDonald. At that time Maron had no TV or movie deals waiting for him — just his garage in Los Angeles, where subsequent episodes of “WTF” would be recorded. 

Marc Maron performs his “All In” tour at the North Shore Center For The Performing Arts on March 28, 2025, in Skokie, Illinois (Barry Brecheisen/Getty Images)

In September 2009, Maron’s career was at its nadir. But so was the country. “WTF with Marc Maron” launched as the great financial recession was beginning to lift. Since that headline hadn’t done much to pull us out of our collective depression, maybe Maron was the right guy to meet us where we were.  

His first “WTF” guest was fellow comic Jeff Ross. Soon his Highland Park place became a destination for actors, directors, producers and rock stars. Bridget Everett, Ryan Coogler, Ariana Grande, Delroy Lindo and Carrie Coon are among his recent guests.

In 2015, Maron sat down with Chris Hayes on MSNBC’s “All In,” where he revealed his secret for getting the most guarded of personalities to lower their defenses. “If you listen to the first 100 or so ‘WTF’s, it’s really a thinly veiled effort for me to get emotional help from celebrities,” Maron said half-jokingly. “. . . I don’t feel that I interview people. I feel that I need to connect in conversation and emotionally. I’m very adept at becoming co-dependent within seconds.”

That tendency makes his listeners feel like visitors to some exclusive space, where guests say things they wouldn’t reveal to a regular interviewer. “WTF” is where Obama candidly shared his experiences with racism. Comedian Todd Glass came out during his interview. And in 2010, Robin Williams confessed his thoughts of suicide four years before he tragically saw those dark fantasies to their end.

That episode was eventually inducted into the Library of Congress’ National Recording Registry. “‘WTF with Marc Maron’s’ popularity has helped to legitimize the podcast as a media format and created an idiosyncratic document of this moment of American culture,” reads the accompanying text.

Maron fosters that sincerity by applying it to himself. The top of every “WTF” episode is his emotional check-in time, where he sometimes rails against the rancid politics of any moment but usually shares some flash of perceptivity. 

A segment in a late October 2024 episode exemplifies this. In it, Maron shares his recollection of Sharon Stone encouraging him to connect to his loving memories of his late partner, Lynn Shelton. But his praising Stone’s generous sensitivity serves another purpose, letting his listeners know he’s appearing in a film with Stone by describing a scene requiring him to cry.

Maron is similarly effusive about Owen Wilson, with whom he co-stars in Apple TV+’s “Stick,” now streaming. Maron plays Mitts, the former caddy and current grifting partner to Wilson’s old pro Pryce Cahill, a washed-up golf pro who finds a late-in-life second wind by discovering a young prodigy.

Marc Maron in “Stick” (Apple TV+)

Mitts’ personality is reminiscent of Sam Sylvia, Maron’s lovable grump of a director on Netflix’s wrestling dramedy “GLOW.” But then, Sam is only a bit removed from who we know Maron to be through “WTF” and “Maron,” his IFC comedy in which he played a fictionalized version of himself.

“WTF,” however, is both quintessentially him and an entity of singular significance. It was never designed as the left-leaning answer to anything – not AM talk radio and certainly not to “The Joe Rogan Experience,” partly because their ascension routes wildly differ.

Before “WTF,” Maron earned more respect from his more prominent peers than the industry.

Rogan’s podcast, which launched months after “WTF” debuted, benefited from Rogan’s higher profile as the host of NBC’s “Fear Factor” and as an Ultimate Fighting Championship commentator. He’s always taken an opposing approach from Maron, purveying raunch instead of raw honesty, channeling swagger, shock and dismissiveness as opposed to connection and intimacy. That direction, regrettably, is more attuned to our times.

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Although the recent race for the presidency has been dubbed the podcast election, “WTF” wasn’t mentioned in that conversation.

I doubt Maron would have wanted to be. Except for the times he used his platform to say what few of his peers would about comedy’s role in enabling fascism or the overturning of Roe v. Wade, he’s intentionally shied away from making “WTF” political.

That would go against what the show sought to be from the start, which is a refuge, however temporary, from the world’s anger and confusion. In ending “WTF” now, Maron leaves the medium with one less progressive, empathetic voice. Considering his reasons for starting it, though, we can understand why he’s ready to let go of the podcast.

“WTF” might be shutting down this fall, as Maron said Monday, but his fans won’t have seen the last of him by a mile. In addition to “Stick,” he also has a new HBO comedy special on the way. Next week, a documentary about him titled “Are We Good?” debuts at the Tribeca Film Festival.

“It’s OK for things to end,” Maron assured us. “. . . Let’s just enjoy it. The world is on fire . . . We’ll find a little joy, we’ll find a little connection, we’ll find a little solace in each other’s company. We’ll learn some things. We’ll get some laughs. We’ll cry a little bit. And we’ll move on.”