How To with John Wilson

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7aSybHRa6s

http://johnsmovies.com/
https://www.hbo.com/how-to-with-john-wilson

hell yes

It's a pretty spectacular and accomplished show right out the gate but the many vimeos at that "JohnsMovies" links show this is a formula he's been perfecting for awhile.

I've watched the first two episodes twice and new gags jump out at me, like when he spends a fwe seconds honing in on the "One Leg, 24 Crimes" (paraphrasing) headline though we're meant to be paying attention to the one that relates to the actual episode story

absolutely thought that author was john malkovich and now its got me wondering if kyle mclachlan was ever there at all

http://pyxis.nymag.com/v1/imgs/852/ff8/3c41b03244b1409c1dd0c6ca44bb650c77-kyle-maclachlan-subway.rhorizontal.w700.gif

https://i.imgur.com/A6tjXmh.jpg

Simon OTM, this is just so dense with jokes

third episode was my favorite so far

hard to talk about this show without spoiling one of
its main appeals, which is the sort of unconscious way wilson wanders deeper into or adjacent to his subjects, i.e. the mandela effect stuff in ep 3

I'm a fan. The part that he gets removed from the MTV audience in Cancun cracked me up.

I don't think I've ever seen a show structured quite like this one, you never have any clue what's gonna happen from one minute to the next

thanks for starting this thread, first two episodes were really special. it’s gotten to the point where whenever he takes an interest in a person you know it’s gonna be very worth it. kind of a whole show made out of those nathan moments where he would let his subject ramble into transcendent ridiculousness

Wow at the ending of the third episode. I feel like he intentionally started with two straightforward episodes before diving into the true weirdness. I wonder if that will be more the vein of future episodes.

I'm fascinated by the Mandala Effect, I don't think there's anything to it but I love that there's this bonkers conspiracy theory that isn't rooted in something political or nefarious

favorite part was the line "the worse your memory was, the more these people liked you"

I liked that it was a seemingly benign/not racist conspiracy community, though I'm sure if you dig into the real circles you'll find some unsavory ties to other uh movements

i just love that their conclusion is “we’re interdimensional travelers” and not “human brains process and store information very similarly”

"this guy claimed he invented Pokemon"

I squealed with joy when I realized we were going to get a glimpse into his archiving process in this episode

that journal seemed way too elaborate to just be a prop for the show

it looked unhealthy! but i'm glad he's finding ways to make it productive.

I'm fascinated by the Mandala Effect

i could've sworn "Mandala" was spelled "Mandela," must be a timeline warp situation.

SAME

First two episodes we've seen have been great. What a weird show.

The ending of ep.3 with the stickers is really good. One of these Mandala effects on me is an interview with Joaquin Pheonix on a red carpet where he asks the interviewer if he has a large frog crawling out of his hair and, honest to god, I could not find evidence of that video for years but I googled it a few minutes before making this post and found it right away, but just a 20-second snippet rather than the full thing. I guess the full video had been suppressed by his agents or whatever, as the clip I watched has only 50,000 or so views rather than the millions the original clip would have had. I also swear on my life that there were a couple of years that you couldn't find the footage of the Fabio Goose incident as well to the point that I started seriously considering that I had imagined it.

I love how deeply public access TV this show is, but with HBO's travel budget

I have no idea how it got on HBO but I gotta thank Nathan Fielder and Adult Swim's influence

someone please seed the torrents for S01E02 and S01E03 already

uhhh theres footage of the fabio goose incident??

I managed to get S01E02 but am on my 3rd attempt at E03. drag.
E02 was quite interesting.
Hadn't really been aware of that before.
Dpers seem a lot of central London has intermittent stuff up every time I'm there too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjAYxpXUklc

not the moment of impact if that's what you're looking for.

just learned this season is only six episodes :(

it's fine if they're all this quality

It's impressive to me that he even put three of these together, considering how many months or years must have spent getting all this footage, and the cataloging sorting etc.

i'll take episode four over most television

what a journey

it’s like what if adam curtis except better

It's impressive to me that he even put three of these together, considering how many months or years must have spent getting all this footage, and the cataloging sorting etc.

― early-Woolf semantic prosody (Hadrian VIII), Saturday, November 14, 2020 10:20 AM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

yea this. ep 4 i finally had the galaxy brain dawning of how these are prob assembled

t/s TLC Tugger vs TC Tuggers

"but they still let the pigs go whoever they want"

that shot was so brilliant

how in the world did he get that

let me tell you I hooted and hollered at that shot

Holy shit at that episode. I liked the last one a little better, but this was wild.

how in the world did he get that

I'm assuming when you are filming nearly all of your waking hours in NYC you are going to get some things.

one of the most explosively funny and deeply disturbing episodes of tv, i've ever seen. more please.

t/s TLC Tugger vs TC Tuggers

right?? i have so many questions

The guy must have a few years of video files stored with pretty intense metadata. There's definitely more than one moment showing "Before and after" shots from the same location that look like they're least a year apart from each other.

yeah that occurred to me with the shot of the lawyer's office and its "great view"

will never think of parasite in the same light again

https://filmmakermagazine.com/110494-i-dont-have-the-prosthetics-team-sacha-baron-cohen-does-john-wilson-on-his-hbo-show-how-to-with-john-wilson/#.X7LlBxY8aEc

no one:
absolutely no one:
the daughter of the foreskin guy in the other room trying desperately to stay out of camera range:
foreskin guy: who wants grapefruit seltzer

haha that moment was excellent, that poor girl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6Y3WFWoSP8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgkdmSm721Q

there's like two dozen videos on the TLCTugger YouTube page, including ten "song parodies," a Downfall meme, an alex jones clip and two "Andrew Yang for a Better Wang" clips

also this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzKjvxS5QfA

http://i.imgur.com/R0x0YkA.png
http://i.imgur.com/XG8masN.png

i watched and enjoyed the first episode of this but it is very much "take three dashes of nathan fielder and add one dash of joe pera, blend and serve." i like both of those things but the vibe seems uncomfortably close. the visual jokes are the one unique element.

I don't know how intentional the similarities to Joe Pera are but yeah I thought the same

Those three definitely stand apart in my mind as a new wave of a certain kind of comedic voice, really the only three TV comedy people I'm interested in at this point tbh.

yeah that plus On Cinema

Fielder and Wilson have some overlap, Pera and On Cinema are their own things entirely imho

I don't know if I'm reading too much into the past few posts but in case anyone thinks Wilson is ripping off Pera, Wilson's been doing this for almost a decade now (link to his non-HBO material in the OP)

think it's more that this is the first era where a comedian like that could land a TV show on a major network

The Mandela people reminded me of the characters in slacker and waking life

the part where he uses a "memory trick" to recall his shopping list was brilliant

I don't know that I'd necessarily comfortably slot Wilson into "comedy," feels to me more borne out of a Les Blank path if anything. Think there's a lot of genuine humanity and lack of judgement in what he's doing, certainly more so than Fielder. I think the Joe Pera maybe holds on grounds of kindness

Not that it's not funny, it's incredibly funny, but I'd doubt that's his primary intent

xp yeah the more freewheeling Linklater seems like a good touchstone too

Damn this is good

This has brought my household great joy in a time that's low on joy

i don't think anyone is ripping anyone off. and i agree "how to" is much more fielder than pera. i just see similarities in the halting speech patterns representing intense social awkwardness and the narration explaining things to the viewer.

i feel like fielder, wilson and pera all seem linked to me bc they all have a comedic persona thats based on some level of naivete, where the comedy comes not necessarily from making fun of things per se but from just sort of looking at the world with fresh eyes

nathan for you is obv darker than the other two, but as has been often pointed out a lot of the time the comedy comes from people being nicer than we expect them to be, being too nice or overly accommodating of nathans horrible actions. theyre not necessarily an antidote to cynicism or whatever, but i feel like theres definitely a relationship to irony and cynicism in these shows that feels very different from a lot of other comedy in recent years

Something about last night's ep felt like it was more influenced by Nathan Fielder than the past few eps

Anyway loved it, loved the income tax neon sign, loved him showing up to the Long Island referee meeting in the wrong sport referee uniform, loved the shot of the little kid eating his own snot as John was talking about organic food

I was dying laughing at pretty much every second of the ref meeting sequence, incredible stuff.

I had very vivid feelings bringing back a lot of childhood memories of being in rooms like that and groups of adults like that, having to tag along with my dad to some boring meeting or potluck or something, having the general idea of "adults" demystified for me, learning that for the most part they were usually not interesting or cool or even very nice, pretty much the same as the kids I already knew in my elementary school class, just much larger. Amazing stuff. They even stole his whistle.

covering your furniture hasa new meaning or is that new.
Finally getting to see last week's one or the week before's

okay the thing he does where he records someone wincing and looking distraught and then does a voiceover claiming they're upset because the check was split unfairly is really funny to me

one of my favorite parts was the "2 guys...3 guys....4 guys...two three four" bit, mostly because that's a joke you'd never see on any other show

I died at “a reffle”

one of my favorite parts was the "2 guys...3 guys....4 guys...two three four" bit, mostly because that's a joke you'd never see on any other show

i was really hoping it was going to somehow lead up to "three cousins, a deli slicer, and a buncha bagels" in coney island

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DBt5PAeWsAAMYbl.jpg

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/on-television/hbos-how-to-with-john-wilson-captures-the-weird-wondrous-new-york-city-thats-never-on-tv

a reffle

one of the reasons this couldn't work in the UK (most places in the west?) is that you have to get a waiver signed to broadcast someone's image on TV or at least you mostly do. I do find myself wondering about the logistics/legality and even the morality of some of the shots playing alongside the narration. I know I'd feel pretty humiliated and annoyed if I was, for example, the clearly exasperated guy in the baseball cap giving his friends the side-eye at the restaurant table while John's talking about resentments w/r/t splitting the bill.

I think all those people signed releases! Check that interview link upthread.

really? I find that almost impossible to believe. I'll check the interview out, thanks.

The How to Split the Bill episode makes me think about ILX a lot (and not just the tipping/splitting threads)

If I’m shooting people on the street doing something funny, either I or a field producer will go up to that person and tell them they were in a shot for a documentary show about New York, then we get a release. Pretty much everyone says OK, which was surprising to me—people respond surprisingly well to the news they’ve been filmed as long as you level with them and tell them exactly what the show is, like “Oh, I’m making an episode about small talk and you guys were having small talk on the street.” It’s innocuous when you tell them what it is, because people’s imaginations can run wild when you tell them they’ve been filmed. You have to put them at ease and let them know exactly what context you’re planning on putting it in. I’m confident that it’s to serve a larger, weird joke, usually on myself.

Feeling a lot of feelings after that finale but mostly just thinking about that slide whistle and how I really hope he gets another season

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCNsx_NyNOU

finale was one of the best episodes of television I've ever seen, what a masterful season

otm - i love how just as it was getting crushingly heavy at the end, he pulled it all back with the perfectly stupid "SHRIMP NIBBLERS ARE BACK" shot

omfg the finale

this is easily my favorite show of the year along with aew dynamite

protect john wilson's landlord at all costs

that Anatomy Of A Scene video is brilliant

Just finished the final ep. Love this show so much.

Really curious as to how long he was filming and then how long it took to comb through it all and stitch everything together. Know we got a glimpse of his daily cataloguing, but I assume there was some more sophisticated indexing going on there? Seems like a lot of patience, creativity, and work behind it any which way.

this is pretty good but nowhere near Joe Pera imo

Haven’t seen anything from Joe Pera to my knowledge but will rectify shortly

Wilson hits me intellectually and Pera hits me emotionally.
Though to be fair, that last ep DID hit me emotionally. Really nailed what the early days of COVID in the city were like.

Enjoyed the Mama thread in the last one.

“She’s the only person in my life that I never... vape around.”

this show is funny, but - and this is gonna sound pretentious and hyperbolic but I mean it - it's in a way that transcends comedy. or I guess more accurately, it's something peripheral to comedy. this dude is a street photographer first and foremost. contemporary street photographers, particularly the ones in Brooklyn but also all the ones through NYC or anywhere where this sort of documentation is successful on the instagrams and such, are always on the lookout for little visual jokes, things that are just naturally intrinsically funny in this universal zen way where captions can only weigh them down. so captions are foregone here in lieu of the narration which is the more traditional application of "comedy" in this show, and it's exactly what you'd expect of these Brooklyn-style instagram-perfect comedy-moment hunters. the narration adds this conscious layer of

eh forget it, I don't know where I'm going this with this. I just really like this show and it's exactly what I was hoping it'd be (post-comedy)

my brother-in-law and I were texting about it and he mentioned that my seven-year-old nephew had seen it and had commented "I don't understand it, but I like it too."

It’s a lot of things, yeah, and comedy is only one of the pillars.

This sounds dumb, but personally a lot of it reminded me of a time I took mushrooms and just walked around my city one Saturday afternoon. Hyper attuned to everything and things you’d typically filter out walking down the street became significant, absurd, and alien.

if you've ever spent several years roaming your city trying to be a street photographer doing pretty much exactly this same thing, wasting hour upon hour trying to find the best of the best so as to not waste anyone's time with your product, including all the requisite laborsome editing and all the mindfuckery that meta-processing entails, you too would feel like you were having yet another one of these mushroom-style trips, another rake of the filter

Hahah. Well... happy to be a tourist in that department and appreciative of those who put in the work and do it well so I can feel those things on my couch.

word! that's how I'm feeling this show too. it's v v good

Yeah my wife digs this show a lot but I think she’s only laughed once per episode

your wife sounds pretty hot

that Nathan Fielder anatomy video seems exactly like the kind of thing this show is a welcome antidote to. Levels of Irony accepted (sadly, not gladly) but, really, why would you make that film? I realise it's to make more people watch HTwJW but it seems to work against it in a very bad way.

just kidding dude, that's a joke like how Nathan did that whole nubile young men staying at his house bouncing on his trampoline creating content for his business joke thing in that cajunsunday posted. Nathan doesn't want to violate our tweens and I'm not interested in your wife

^ xpost btw

why not

Thought the Nathan anatomy video was pretty good and kinda the only way I could see that dude making a “promotional video”.

sir, if you'd like to take this conversation about your wife offline, just send me a webmail, we'll get it going I promise you

fuck! that was an xpost btw goddangit

can we keep these other people out of the john wilson thread who is actually good please

https://www.vulture.com/article/how-to-with-john-wilson-finale-interview.html

How is your landlord doing?
She’s good! I don’t know if I can tell you exactly what she’s doing because it might be a spoiler for season two. I haven’t been greenlit or anything yet, but just in case.

otm - i love how just as it was getting crushingly heavy at the end, he pulled it all back with the perfectly stupid "SHRIMP NIBBLERS ARE BACK" shot

yeah that was amazing

finale was great. got me super emotional too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCNsx_NyNOU

nathan is gonna look 55 in his early thirties

He's 37

my point exactly
you absolutely have to watch that video btw

yeah he doesn't look prematurely old he just doesn't die his hair the way everyone else in the biz does

wow this vid takes a pretty weird turn doesn't it

you gotta diversify

criterion release of john wilson when

"I feel like the other guys don't like me as much as you do" was a little too on the nose

Mama update https://www.instagram.com/p/CIgU4hSjCX2/

I finally watched the first episode Saturday night, it was great. I don't know what I was expecting, it definitely wasn't what I got but I loved it. I really liked the serious turn at the MTV spring break.

Officially renewed!!!

:D

fuck yeah!!

how 2

2 how 2 to

how-whit, 2-whoo

super excited for this to become the global phenomenon we all know it to be.

Based on his description of his process I wonder if it's more challenging for him to make episodes now. Remember he said he will pull footage from archives spanning years. The non-masked pre-pandemic footage is going to stand out more going forward. From clip to clip everyone may be or may not be wearing masks so it could be disruptive ...or maybe not I don't know!

i feel like he can pull this off with the right resources and it's HBO so i imagine they'll support him. he could probably do this for ten years for a tenth of the cost of one episode of game of thrones.

lol much less than a tenth but yes your point stands

excellent interview on office hours today

could probably make entire episodes out of 2-3 year old footage really

Watched Joe Pera’s show for the first time today and it’s great. That said, dismissing How To as some weak mix of Fielder and Pera (as mentioned above) is some reaching, superficial bullshit. Faux naive narrator is really the extent of it?

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/12/21/how-to-with-john-wilson-offers-a-martians-eye-view-of-homo-sapiens-habits

i can break down how the similarity runs deeper than faux naive narrator but depending on how far you are into joe pera it might have spoilers

e1 of jw (the ‘how to make friends’ one) is superficially a documentary made by a nerdy guy about social conventions, but once it gets going becomes transparently about his recent breakup and social anxiety

similarly, s1 of jp starts out superficially presenting itself as a public access style show depicting life in a small town in minessota, but as it’s gets going it’s clear that he each episode is a transparent reflection of joes psychological state and what’s going on in his love life, his strained friendships and relationships, career

i don’t like the jw show as much as many of you do, but it’s not a bad thing that they share this quality of ‘stretching a documentary medium away from its “subject“ and toward the psychology of the social awkward narrator’. it doesn’t make jons show derivative. and there’s obviously tonnes more going on in it than just this

obviously there are hints of this in Nathan for you too

i can't stand the pera show and i really like this one. not sure why. fwiw i think jw could actually make his narration good instead of obviously deliberately awkward and the show would be just as good (and by my lights, better)

all adult swim shows are pish is how I break it down to an extent

the second season of Joe Pera was my favourite TV thing this year :'-(

Joe Pera rules obv

interesting points flopson, I hadnt really considered the similarities in form like that.

the granddaddy of that mode afaik is sherman's march

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091943/

you're forgetting shoah

not too much accidentally personal whimsy in that one iirc

you gotta wait for the fifth hour

that's when the jokes start

not gonna lie, the "i don't want much, just want my foreskin back again" song is a jam

Forgive the thread spam, but I wanted to note that this show's 2020 season is nominated in the 2020 ILX TV poll:

ILX's Best Television of 2020 Poll / VOTING AND CAMPAIGNING THREAD / Voting Ends After January 29, 2021

If you like this show and you'd like to see it have a good showing in the poll (running in February) all you need to do is submit a ballot including it and your other favorites (3 minimum, 25 maximum, ranked by your favorite to least favorite) to forksclovetofu at gmail. It'll take five minutes; get to it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rX6zlvA_m3Y

https://evgrieve.com/2021/02/about-that-rolled-up-carpet-in-crosswalk.html

also

https://believermag.com/logger/how-to-interview-john-wilson/

Disappointed we weren't nominated for an emmy today. Next year!

are you affiliated with the show in some way?

Yes! Sound mixer.

nice! it's the best!

Oh man, definitely deserved a nom. Great show.

S2 starts Nov. 26

some positivity in life

perfect timing, i just started rewatching S1, its been the perfect length of time where i mostly forgot the jokes and details by now. these are so, so rewatchable.

Wilson should write the show but not be the host

fuck yes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05F2UpwZhWY

OMG that lady with the pigeons was just in Hoboken on Saturday doing that.

hell yeah

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sG1i-gALy18

beautiful

right man in the right time

Another way to watch this show is just to live in New York

Hard pass

tonight's episode was a fucking TRIP

Holy shit, yes it was. I did not see that wild ride coming.

Saying you are HBO goes a long way with some folks

I thought the ep was pretty weak. Once they drop the “HBO” bomb, the bang guy quickly turns it into a commericial and rightly so while John acts confused as to why the guy would show him around or spend time with him.

everything john makes is grand cru

Susan Orlean is on the writing staff??

https://gothamist.com/arts-entertainment/interview-john-wilson-season-2-hbo-2021

I kept asking HBO if we can get someone like Susan Orlean, and they were like, "We could just ask Susan." And then I was like, "Oh, okay." Because I thought that she would've been past that point in her career. I hadn't really been keeping tabs on her or anything. Then we just met up, and we all just went into the writer's room together.

xpost - I was referring more to the NXIVM stuff being the wild part of the ride. I remember reading that insane acapella forum thread once when it was linked in relation to one of the docs, but it was so unexpected to see it pop up in that context.

the Bang dude was insane, but I genuinely think John had no expectation at all that he would be able to just walk into the guy's house and, as a result, had no plan other than just rolling with whatever the dude said.

I loved this ep. like Jon I had read that insane thread - when it was linked here - and it was funny to find out that John Wilson was one of the accused soilers of hotel rooms.

bang guy bit was decent too

Just "interviewed" John Wilson. Metaphysician, moral philosopher, and poet of cat vomit. When things are so good, there's always a mystery about why they're so good. My hunch? They're investigations into oneself. How we see the world vs. do we see the world?

— errolmorris (@errolmorris) December 7, 2021

this show is good but his schtick is grating after a while "im just a clueless guy and life is weird hehe shrug!" oh stop

otm i’m afraid

My two cents are that he's curious and genuine, vs. "clueless"

And, life IS weird!!

Yeah, he's got far too genuine of a sense of curiosity to come off as "clueless" imo.

I might buy that argument more if the show was 100% his street footage with his commentary, but the way he's able to not only find these odd people but also charming them into opening up on camera.

it's a nathan 4 u joint, it's that genre of blue eyed comedy whose scope is slightly wider and more sophisticated than sidetalk nyc or all gas no brakes where the goal is to laugh at homeless and disabled people or whatever

the tweak season tiktok account is an interesting one to think of in terms of how grating wilson's schtick can be because at least in that one the guy who's controlling it is more plainly actually mentally ill and low key assaulting people in nyc while also making funny observations

also the show about the show would be another parallel with a host who's more honest about the power and destructive nature of observing/filming

it's a nathan 4 u joint, it's that genre of blue eyed comedy whose scope is slightly wider and more sophisticated than sidetalk nyc or all gas no brakes where the goal is to laugh at homeless and disabled people or whatever

― Bongo Jongus, Thursday, 9 December 2021 18:32 (nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is a laughable unfair take on all of the above (caveat: have not seen sidetalk nyc)

AGNB/C5 is all about presenting America as it is, not as we wish it is, nor as we fear it may be, and letting people speak for themselves without intrusion (save the odd exhortation to rap)

HTWJW is...well, similar, except more essayistic

both have a sly wit, a genuine curiosity and a generosity of spirit that is rare to find

and yeah they do both seek out the zany and the outlandish, but really, why not. it's not like there isn't enough mundane to go around (much of which they also include)

they're all funny and enjoyable to watch at times but that seems naive imago, but I guess eye opening in how people outside the US see this stuff

i get that it may at times seem like mental illness tourism, but on the flipside they are letting people tell their truths, without judgement (save the odd look-to-camera in AC's case); JW also makes it extremely clear he is Not OK either and that his show is as much him working through his issues as anything (the riff on why he couldn't cook risotto was darkly hilarious in this regard)

yeah but what I was getting at is that the JW not okayness is the same nathan for you shtick to do mental illness tourism (then again mental illness tourism is the basis of most comedy)

I'm trying to figure out why I'm ok with Bruce Gilden's Coney Island photography but this stuff ultimately seems kinda lame, and I think it's the disingenuous feeling (to me) JW nathan smol bean syndrome. I do like the pointillist JW thing, that's a neat trick

caveh from show about a show trying to strong arm JW to get Nathan to pitch his show to HBO is pretty funny tho

i meant 'laughably unfair' btw before dgmw

i think not having ever seen nathan for you means i don't quite have the same perspective on this

but on the flipside they are letting people tell their truths, without judgement (save the odd look-to-camera in AC's case);

Without judgement, save for the ominous Lynchian drone that plays when someone is MAGA-ing out.

But I agree that it's an unfair characterization of AGNB/Channel 5.

I can only work through my thoughts about comedy by being unfair to comedians

(then again mental illness tourism is the basis of most comedy)

this is why I have never laughed

AGNB/C5 is all about presenting America as it is, not as we wish it is, nor as we fear it may be, and letting people speak for themselves without intrusion (save the odd exhortation to rap)

definitely otm and very much what makes the show fascinating to me. the events he goes to get SO MUCH COVERAGE on news networks and social media but very little of that portrays what the atmosphere is really like. like those late night BLM rallies - he finds a lot of smart, articulate people who are protesting with a purpose, along with some more unhinged folk who look like they're ready to throw down if need be. he also finds the Rittenhouse types who feel their calling in life is to protect the local Walgreens from black people. all those narratives are there. but at the end of the day most of the folks there don't really fit any of them. they're trying to capture footage to go viral, they're doing it for social media clout, or just doing it for something to do, because finally something interesting is happening in their town. and I think that side goes pretty much uncovered. there's not really much logic to it and I think it makes some of the media narratives look ridiculous.

hence why he is often referred to as america's only journalist

the tweak season tiktok account is an interesting one to think of in terms of how grating wilson's schtick can be because at least in that one the guy who's controlling it is more plainly actually mentally ill and low key assaulting people in nyc while also making funny observations

bongo im losing your thread a little bit re:what forms of mental illness tourism are & arent good

when it's a white guy it's bad

also the Covid spring breakers, so many articles & tweets written with an almost scientific precision about how irresponsible and selfish they were, as though they decided to take some kind of calculated risk, and then you see these people and they're all so fucking hammered and can't even speak coherently about how much they wanna get laid

nah I'm kidding, I don't really know what I'm getting at overall, I'm posting through it. It's more like when it's a disingenuous narrative to make a comedy show, also I guess it doesn't really push anything far enough art wise, like if I felt that what they were doing led to art I would prob not think about things like mental illness tourism, but it just feels like they're scratching some american comedy itch

btw as great as nathan4u is, it would be willfully naive to say it doesn't punch down on immigrant small biz owners with accents

like ok uh put jackass, korine, a moment of pathos or epiphany in a blender and lets see what we get

nathan4u is amazing btw imago you should watch that if you like the things that you're currently posting about here

noted! onto the pile

btw as great as nathan4u is, it would be willfully naive to say it doesn't punch down on immigrant small biz owners with accents

― kurt schwitterz, Thursday, December 9, 2021 1:28 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah its kinda hard to defend some of those parts but I guess there are a number of ways to read it. I mean everyone on that show is a mark to some degree but at a certain point you wonder if he was targeting immigrants because it was easier for him to get them to go along with whatever he was doing. otoh it's LA, like half the small businesses there are immigrant owned so who knows

it's because white people think immigrants with accents are funny to laugh at.

Nathan is an immigrant with a funny accent, too, so that makes it OK.

lol true

Re: "clueless" - I wouldn't call John clueless, but I did cringe a lot when he bought that car off Craigslist (like, come on dude, sourcing everything from Craigslist was one of the best running jokes on "Nathan for You"!)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0PZ6xtnj5o

He’s flush with that landlord (and HBO) dough now, he figured he could afford a lemon for a good story.

I would say that I think JW and nathan4u both get by with the low blows because they actually try to relate it to a universal struggle. Like the dude in the last episode trying to drag his belongings down the sidewalk in a big Tupperware container was not funny because of his circumstances but his reaction to the situation was so relatable

want to go on record as saying that i don't find John Wilson's stuff exploitative or faux naive in any way and that it is often an excellent distillation of a year's worth of "did i just see that" while out and about in the city down to a half hour.

also nabisco just did an excellent piece:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/07/magazine/how-to-john-wilson.html

S2E3 felt like a ratcheting back down to the subtler season 1 style, and I loved it.

Yeah, I actually liked that one being more scaled back.

How to throw out your batteries is the best thing I’ve seen in a while

Good documentary on how systems fail people

*post of dead rat*

How to remember your dreams is the perfect question for this series. I like “weird” John more than “documentarian” John.

Also omg the court-room shows! His random autobiographical drops always kill me

cant stop thinking about them putting all the frowny faces on nuclear waste because they don't know what language people will speak in the future

it won't do any good though. if we encounter something like that from 3000 BC we are opening it on the spot

Feels like the avatar ppl was punching down

Seemed like that at the start but it really came around when the guy was talking about his depression and needing someone. Typical of John Wilson’s style to seem potentially like punching down to start (I think that was my first impression of his documentation of his landlord), only to turn out as a sincerely sweet display of humanity.

Also I went to John Wilson’s subreddit and some of the avatar guys were commenting with enthusiasm, doing informal AMA’s on posts and seemed to be wrapped with their presentation. Actually really sweet, would recommend searching

That episode was the best this season so far I thought. He packed so much in and it held together somehow.

The avatar ppl were the joke the whole time cmon

yeah i had to mute that section, 2sad4me

Nah mate

https://bushwickdaily.com/arts-culture/hbo-comes-to-ridgewood-via-how-to-with-john-wilson/

lol that is some prime hipster complaining right there - bitch about how someone doesn't show the REAL neighborhood while not actually mentioning any (I checked!) businesses or local spots that should get recognition instead.

so fucking dumb

it's not a documentary about ridgewood retail stores!

i live in ridgewood and am perfectly happy for jw to elide the creeping yupster stuff and the glowering eastern european antisemites, the wilsonian ridgewood is delightful and as accurate a representation as anything else

The key quote here is ““Seinfeld” feels like Wilson’s central comic influence “

i watch a lot of reading rainbow these days and that show's "discursive mini essays nominally related to a central theme but really not really" approach feels of a piece w how to

his way
of talking
is
driving me insane

i suddenly stopped being able to enjoy this show because all i can
hear
is
the way he
breaks up sentences
(video of dog sniffing own butt)

The only way to keep the pacing of the corresponding visuals digestible.

yeah the show is very tightly edited and most of the humor is between what he's saying and what you're seeing. if you just transcribed his entire monologue from any given episode it would probably make no sense at all, or maybe like something an AI wrote

He sounds like an idiot

perhaps he means to sound like an idiot and the show is meant to signify nothing

Haha

I do admit that his voice is kind of a put-off, my very first impression of the show is "I don't know if I want to hear this guy talk for 30 minutes". I have a similar reaction to Nathan Fielder's voice but it fits his persona/character so well that I don't mind it

It's part of the charm, but I can understand finding it grating.

otm. I would also strongly advise against bingeing this show (not suggesting you're doing that LL, your post just reminded me why I think it's a bad idea)

I have to say I've only seen a few eps of Nathan For You, and I am aware of the direct connection, but I honestly see zero similarities and find it bizarre to compare them, especially because this is about 100 times better?

both have completely different purposes, n4u is about pretending to be autistic to show the horrors of capitalism/marketing/fame/whatever, h2wjw is about pretending to be autistic for a diff reason idk I haven't really seen much of it

you pissin' a shit with that post?

There a Nathan esque touch to the way the narrative builds around the randomness, I think.

the referee convention episode had a very NFY feel to it

I think both shows have the same technique of building the "plot" of an episode mostly after the fact. it's more obvious on this show but Nathan does it too - apparently a lot of those episodes were built around hundreds of hours of footage, and the bizarre, nonsensical narratives are often just a way to get all the best parts in

Forgive the thread spam, but I wanted to note that this show's 2021 season is nominated in the ILX TV poll, with voting ending this weekend:

ILX's Best Television of 2021 Poll / VOTING AND CAMPAIGNING THREAD / Voting Ends After January 31, 2022

If you like this show and you'd like to see it have a good showing in the poll (running in February) all you need to do is submit a ballot including it and your other favorites (3 minimum, 25 maximum, ranked by your favorite to least favorite) to forksclovetofu at gmail. It'll take five minutes; get to it!

renewed for a 3rd season

What blue collar neighborhood will he profit off of next

decided i am not into this show. i thought it was amusing in the first season when it was more random but i am not interested in deep thoughts from this person tbh

begging to differ, excited to hear we got s3

very informative and funny podcast ep feat. John: http://www.screenslate.com/articles/episode-2-pest-control-john-wilson

Lol i went to the club this friday where he was doin post podcast karaoke and it was past capacity with a line up the block
The kids love wilson!

crazy re the life of crime anecdote

for uk peeps it's hitting bbc2 this sunday

Finally!! I have had this thread bookmarked for years so I didn't forget to look out for it. Watched s01e01 yesterday and it was fantastic.

Finally indeed! It exceeded expectations tbh - loved it.

Yesss!

his way
of talking
is
driving me insane

Watched the first one with my wife, I lolled three times, loved it. She chuckled twice but gave it the thumbs down :(

i was NOT adequately prepared for the TLC tugger guy omg

yeah, that episode should have come with a massive trigger warning.
glad the bbc/iplayer have posted all the episodes broadcast so far.
loved them once i got used to his vocal style.
the ongoing thread re his landlady is very sweet.

C. Spencer Yeh cameo in the wine tasting episode(!?)

that one was filmed in my friend's backyard (and w his family)--c s y lives across the street

lots of ridgewood content in this show

“before I know it, there’s a bloke lying on a bed, naked from the waist down, with his penis attached to some kind of truss” pic.twitter.com/EGZiq3xLbp

— Mumsnet Madness (@mumsnet_madness) October 2, 2022

It should’ve obvious to that guy that he was watching a show about how to protect your furniture from wear and tear, idgi

Bumped into Wilson eating dinner in Brooklyn. Friendly!

missing this show, bring on s3!

premieres may 30th!

oh shit! i missed that news, vc just made my day

I was enjoying it until the s1 episode with his ridiculous attempts to make risotto, where he scraped all his failures into the toilet, wtf. I stopped watching after that but I might be ready to forgive him and pick it up again.

That episode was the one that turned me into a huge fan, not so much the risotto but the reason why he wanted to make it <3

that was nice but I also felt the ep was too much about him - I mean the show is about him obviously but there was too much forced situational comedy and not enough passive nyc documentary footage. or whatever you call it.

I totally get what you mean, but I thought he handled it really well and the sincerity helped overcome my hesitation about it. I will say I was decidedly less enthused about the follow-up he did in season 2, but it did lead to some great only in Vegas footage.

oh shit! i missed that news, vc just made my day

― Maxmillion D. Boosted (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Friday, March 31, 2023 9:32 AM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

my bad got my thread wires crossed and thought this was the tim robinson thread. not sure if there’s been an official announcement about wilson but it’ll come later this year

sorry to unmake your day :(

https://variety.com/2022/tv/news/how-to-with-john-wilson-renewed-season-3-hbo-1235174889/

no airdate yet though

July 28th! :)

but final season :(

https://variety.com/2023/tv/news/how-to-with-john-wilson-ends-season-3-release-date-trailer-1235625228/

I skimmed over the list and literally have no idea if we ever saw S2, or, if so, if we watched every episode. I think we saw at least one? This is one of those shows I like but my wife only sometimes likes. She'll see an episode she likes, then watches another one and hates it, then doesn't want to watch the show anymore. Then some time goes by and I suggest we watch another episode, and she frowns and says no way, I don't like that show. And I tell her, but you do! You liked that one episode a lot, there might be more you like! And she just shrugs.

hey new york

those nxivm dudes are going to haunt JW for the rest of his life lmao

also holy shit @ the closing shot of the miniature piss-bottle vessel

Vry excited this is back

silo man made up for the lost footage... yeeeesh

was laughing incredibly hard at the jump cut from "can i come with you?" to being in the truck approaching burning man, a perfect example of what makes this show special

is the only way for me to watch this to sign up for HBO for a month?

i think it's also on some new service called "Max"?

Like this episode much more than the first. Partly due to myself giving it a bit more attention than the first. Thank God I don’t live near any of these disagreeable people

I guess that means I am the disagreeable person

Something lacking so far this season is the personal element the first two had. The themes have stayed similar, but it seems maybe the success of the show has removed him from a melancholy lived experience which he explored tangentially through the themes in the past. Oh well, even without it, it’s good television. God bless John

Doesn't get much more personal than having to look for public toilets because the one in your house is fucked up imo.

I spoke too soon, damn that was a good episode. He hasn’t lost it!

Sad this is the last one! This could definitely ride at a least a 4th season

The change of “topic” in episode 4 is incredible. No one else watching this?

if you like the silo man from episode 1, recommend to check out this jenny perlin film

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR80yoayxVc

I'm watching! Haven't seen last night's episode yet, but really enjoyed the vacuum cleaner collectors.

Was curious about how the collectors themselves felt and found some message board posts: https://www.vacuumland.org/cgi-bin/TD/TD-VIEWTHREADM.cgi?44808_6

"We didn’t look silly at all! They put us in a good light."

Looks like there was drama in the vac community at the time based on those messages (and that one introductory clip about banned members). The vacuum Mets story about his dead dad was really moving.

just watched the first one and realized how much I'd missed this show. idk how to explain it exactly but the tone and realness of the show is something very different from anything else on TV. like just talking to people who haven't really ever been in front of a camera, watching people try to explain things they've never really laid out before, it's really interesting. in a way it's the most real just on television. also this ep was pretty fucking gross at times, when he was talking to that bladder doctor I was wondering if I should just fast forward, luckily the episode did not go in that direction (as it kinda did once in the past)

I'm watching, just not caught up yet. It's very true that this show is often not good to watch while eating dinner, it's a calculated risk.

How To Clean Your Ears honestly could've been much worse on that front.

Attempts to watch the very gross first two episodes of the new season during during dinner have been unsuccessful.

The third episode (with the giant pumpkins) was a welcome relief, it's always a respite from grossness when he gets out of the city, lol.

I've just caught up with s2 after getting over my toilet risotto hissy fit described upthread. too many highlights to detail but the avatar fan club/support group was incredible (and not punching down as suggested above). s3 not on bbc yet.

I've only seen the first two s3 eps so far, but I'm really enjoying it.

It gets better every episode this season

one thing i cant shake is how john wilson kinda looks like terry richardson :(

pleased to have confirmed my suspicions, based on his accent, that Bruce Beveridge is originally from the Chicago area (he used to live in the suburb where my mom now lives)

Last episode was a bit Baby's First F For Fake but still good. Very strong season in general.

Attempts to watch the very gross first two episodes of the new season during during dinner have been unsuccessful.

― Chris L, Monday, August 28, 2023 9:33 AM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

second episode isn't very gross after the first 2 minutes

crazy how utterly unappealing this show makes NYC look sometimes. that episode was neat because it then shows a place which is basically the polar opposite of NYC and hey, that looks pretty unappealing too. but it all speaks to the wide variety of bullshit people can learn to live with and there's something beautiful in that. also a good example of how funny this show can be, particularly when he's interviewing those basement ravers with the kid and the kid is just constantly banging on shit the entire time

The silo bit reminded me of the crazier Grand Designs episodes, where you get the sense that the family dream home the husband is building is being inflicted on said family, rather than a shared desire.

NYC is faithfully represented here, but the difference is that usually those ugly details are not lingered on especially in a show.

🫡

what an end

3rd episode was a trip, love the ones that explore what doors having an HBO show will and won't open. scene with the party girls was pretty funny - "come on, you're not from HBO, this isn't gonna be on TV..."

was a bit bummed that they never caught the camera thief at the cat show, I guess the fact that the show doesn't always have perfect endings makes it real

UK ppl this is on bbc2/iPlayer right now
at least I think it is, I've not started watching it yet, saving it for a treat

S3 on bbc now. Ep 2 (how to clean your ears) is simply phenomenal. How do people offer themselves up like that? The loud music couple in the basement, jfc.

Sad I've finished watching it. The whole thing now feels like an elegy for the 21st century. As soon as I saw Mike in the last episode I was drawn to him. Not sure (genuinely) how I feel about his self-surgery being addressed in such a brief way. Googled and found him on Reddit

https://www.reddit.com/r/HowToWithJohnWilson/comments/16hsben/my_thoughts/

I do love that the last episode of the show examines the idea of living eternally vs finding comfort in the fact that nothing lasts forever

kinda wonder how that guy came to be on the show in the first place, the episode makes it seem like John bumped into him in a food court, guessing that wasn't actually the case

This title makes it sound like he's got more stuff brewing...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwGWoqyQqTE