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The podcast started in 2015 as a birthday present to Hank. Hank’s first wish of John buying him a whole mountain was refused, and thus, one of the top humour podcasts about death was born. It features good old fashioned sibling rivalry, advice of both the dubious and surprisingly helpful variety on fan-submitted topics that span pretty much all of human experience, and of course, the all-important news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. It has delivered hundreds of hours worth of entertainment, has solved conundrums like the correct spelling of "as per yooj/yoosh/wogh/woosh/udgee/yoush/youzsh/yoojsh/yüje/yüshe/üje/yüsh" (the shortening of the phrase "as per ususal," in case that wasn't clear) and what to do with one’s life. The podcast has changed over the years, and especially when Hank got cancer. It went on a hiatus for a bit and since it’s come back, it’s not as regular anymore and it’s lost some of its segments. But the basic ideas are still here, and even after almost 10 years of listening, I still look forward to every new episode.
If this were a review of the whole podcast, it would of course get five stars, no question. But no, this is a review of episode 42, titled “Mayonnaise Malaise.”
This episode, much like all of Dear Hank & John, is a perfect mix of the funny and the serious, the poetic and the ridiculous. You’re bored and want something entertaining, want something to laugh about? The podcast used to be brought to us by a series of made-up sponsors that somehow related to what had been covered in the episode thus far. This episode was in fact brought to us by “non-romantic partner shower farts.” The context of the episode really is important for those sponsors to make any kind of sense... I guess the podcast is (or at least feels) small and personal enough that Hank and John more often let out their silly sides than is usually the case on the Youtube channel nowadays. And there's nothing quite as fun as taking a ridiculous question about a small thing and taking it absolutely seriously.
The podcast also goes deep. They help people with their questions about how to get over heartbreak and growing up. “I mean it hurts because it mattered. It hurts because it was important and because there's a real, profound loss there.” Hard to believe that this quote was in the same episode and said by the same person as the one who chose a question about shower farts.
Personally, I use it to fall asleep most nights. For me, it’s the perfect mix of interesting and non-consequential to keep my brain from thinking but still lets me tune out without worrying about missing anything. I mean… Not to be rude but to name just one example: In this episode, John spent some time explaining the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. I already know too much about America as it is just by virtue of growing up on the internet, I don’t need to know about the intricacies of this stimulus plan and its effects on the American economy as well.
In most aspects, this episode is just like any other, even for me. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about it is that it includes the beginning of the Ryan joke, which… I don’t know how to explain it to someone who doesn’t know it. Someone introduced themselves as Ryan in the first sentence of Ryan’s e-mail, after Hank had already mentioned that this writer was called Ryan, and it turned into a bit about saying the name (Ryan) as often as possible. I guess you had to be there...
Otherwise, it’s pretty much the same as the other episodes. With number 42, it’s still among the earlier episodes of the podcast, and so it features all the hallmarks of that: It starts with a poem read by John, it has fictional sponsors, and there’s even an “oh my god it’s burning!” to remind anyone who simultaneously cooks and listens to check on their food, a bonus feature of the podcast that disappeared with time.
The reason this particular episode is special to me is because of one specific question they covered. It's a question by a 17-year-old whose 60-year-old teacher admitted their sexual interest in this teenager. And yes, it’s a humour podcast and there’s been a lot of fun had in this episode otherwise, but for this question, Hank and John were utterly serious - of course, how could you possibly make a joke of a situation like that? - and confirmed that what happened was wrong, that it was a betrayal, that it is okay to be angry and sad. I listened to this over and over again. I downloaded the episode, cut out this part of the audio, put it on my iPod and then listened to that over and over again. I took walks where I cried and just had Hank and John tell me over and over again that what happened to me - sorry, to this 17-year-old - was wrong.
When I was 15, I was assaulted by a man I guessed to be in his fifties, someone I had come to see as a sort of friend or mentor. I didn’t know him well yet, not like the person who sent in the question, but at that point in my life, I really wanted someone to help guide me and answer my questions in a way I didn’t feel like my parents could provide, and he fit the bill perfectly. I had big hopes for what our relationship could be, and he destroyed that. Destroyed the way I imagined the world and my place in it.
When it happened, I didn’t tell my parents. I didn’t tell any adults. There was no one I trusted to help me, to 100% be on my side. I felt like I was close to breaking and one comment about how I should have dressed differently, should never have told him certain things about me, shouldn’t have been so easy to assault, would have sent me over the edge. The only person I told was my best friend and she was 14 at the time, so even though just having someone to tell that something bad happened to me was incredibly helpful, she didn’t know all the right things to say and do. Neither did I, to be honest, so we eventually stopped talking about it and it just became a part of me in the back of my mind, but not really something I actively thought about.
Until I moved away from home a few years later and soon started actually processing what happened. I started telling some other friends about what happened and have since had a lot of time to think about it and how it’s affected me, and this was an important step in that process. Hank and John were the first ones to tell me that it hadn't been my fault, that I wasn't wrong for thinking it was a big deal.
Thank you, Hank. Thank you, John. For the podcast, for the videos, for all the fun we’ve had as a community and the things I’ve learned from you. For everything you’ve shared of yourselves just in case someone needed to hear it. For the words that I most needed to hear at that point.
I give "Mayonnaise Malaise" 4 stars.