Brotherly advice, badly behaved tangents.
Dear Hank & John is a conversational comedy show built around two brothers, listener questions, and deliberately dubious advice. Its charm comes from the way a dad joke, a football tangent, or a Mars update can suddenly become a real thought about fear, illness, faith, or the internet.
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Dear Hank & John is built from a deceptively simple ritual: two brothers take questions, offer unstable advice, and report back from Mars and AFC Wimbledon. The format is familiar. The movement is not. A listener prompt might begin with a practical social problem and end inside a debate about love as value, social media exhaustion, baptism etiquette, football markets, or the strange intimacy of seeing someone’s social media likes. The show likes low-stakes absurdity. It also knows how to let a grave sentence stand. That contrast gives the conversation its charge. John and Hank can spend several minutes nudging a bad joke into a better one, then pivot into a sincere account of illness, mortality, faith, or the systems that make the internet feel impossible to live with and impossible to leave. The edit preserves the feeling of thought happening in public. Repetitions stay in. Corrections stay in. A half-formed premise is allowed to wobble until it either collapses into a joke or becomes unexpectedly useful. Episodes often open with banter, dad jokes, travel fatigue, product jokes, or behind-the-curtain chatter about recording schedules. From there, the show follows curiosity more than structure. That can mean treating a ridiculous premise with mock academic seriousness. It can also mean taking a question about ordinary life seriously enough to admit that no clean answer exists. The recurring news segments create a dependable landing place, especially when Mars is not a bummer and AFC Wimbledon is briefly doing well. The listener-question engine keeps the scale human. Even when the conversation wanders toward religion, cancer risk, professional sports economics, or the social internet, it tends to return to what people owe each other and what they are afraid of carrying alone. Dear Hank & John is best when it sounds slightly overfull: too many ideas, too many jokes, too much affection, and just enough discipline to bring the episode home.
Made for: For fans of conversational comedy who like advice shows that wander into science, sports, faith, internet culture, and existential worry. It especially suits listeners who enjoy smart digressions more than tidy answers.
What sets it apart: The show pairs ritual familiarity with unusually elastic range: Mars news, AFC Wimbledon updates, listener dilemmas, and sudden moral seriousness all share the same room. Its brotherly dynamic makes the tangents feel less like detours than the main event.
Hosts John and Hank Green (authors and YouTubers) offer both humorous and heartfelt advice about life’s big and small questions. They bring their personal passions to each episode by sharing the week’s news from Mars (the planet) and AFC Wimbledon (the fourth-tier English football club).
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
John and Hank turn listener questions into elastic comic riffs while preserving room for serious reflection and considered advice.
John and Hank turn listener questions into conversational comedy that rarely travels in a straight line. A dad joke leads to pilot regulations, an airport crush prompts an inspection of Instagram likes, and a complaint about online advertising becomes a riff on buying hundreds…
Tea retrieval becomes high drama before Hank and John turn your impossible question into dubiously useful advice.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A baptism story, current-events chatter, and two brothers finding a sincere center.
The episode shifts from current-events chatter into a baptism memory that feels personal, awkward, and sincere. Hank stays fixed on the world outside the room, while John keeps circling back to being 22, underprepared, and suddenly responsible for a real ritual.
Sibling banter keeps curving into a blunt internet lament.
The episode settles quickly into the familiar Dear Hank and John cadence: a sick-note update, a clock joke, a passing nod to walking pneumonia, and the brothers correcting and outdoing each other as they talk.
A funny, digressive take on ads, Twitter, and football economics.
Dear Hank & John starts with an ad-algorithm joke and keeps circling through social platforms, football contracts, player power, and the uneven leverage of different markets.
A plane joke opens into sibling banter, online vulnerability, and a practical health detour.
A pilot's dad joke sets the tone, and the brothers spin a small airport moment into easy banter about how people talk, joke, and show who they are.
A loose, inside-baseball episode that turns sibling timing into the whole joke.
Dear Hank and John settles into a behind-the-scenes setup, with the brothers saying they are banking episodes because they travel a lot and get overwhelmed by work.
A messy, funny opening gives way to a sharper look at illness, belief, and the people around it.
Dear Hank & John opens in small domestic chaos: tea logistics, microphone interference, and the SD card mistake that is funny precisely because it is so gross. The brothers keep the pace loose, and the teasing lands without flattening the embarrassment into a single joke.
A rocket is theoretically taking off.
John Green, recovering from walking pneumonia, and Hank Green discuss the social internet's harms and their complicated relationship with it — including John's admission that even though he believes it is making society worse, 'it bought my house.' The episode includes Hank's satirical housing-crisis solution involving mean ghosts assigned to NFT purchasers (both brothers then confess to owning NFTs), detailed advice for a listener considering running for local office on handling bad-faith versus good-faith criticism, and AFC Wimbledon's mixed League One results.
John and Hank Green discuss Hank's plan for a physical memorial garden to Twitter with dumb tweets inscribed on contemplative-walk stones, which John expands into a broader memorial to the entire social internet — framed as the equivalent of the 50-year period when people knew tobacco was harmful but had not yet accepted it.
John and Hank Green answer listener questions including an explanation of death for a seven-year-old, airport navigation advice for a first-time international traveler, and whether to mention a missed birthday to a possibly romantic friend.
Dear Hank & John 424 opens with the show’s usual premise: two brothers answering questions, offering dubious advice, and covering “news from both mars and afc wimbledon.” John says he has been sick all week, postponed two podcasts, and gotten out of bed only three times, which frames the rest of the conversation.
Hank and John Green record a "timeless" banked episode of Dear Hank & John, fielding listener questions while Hank is fresh from VidCon and John is recovering from a three-month multi-continent book tour for his tuberculosis book.
John and Hank welcome their new brother Travis McElroy in a humorous episode filled with jokes, trade talk, and discussions about brand deals and podcasting.
Hank and John Green record episode 421 of Dear Hank & John in person at Hank's Montana office, unusual since they normally record remotely from Indianapolis and Montana respectively.
Two brothers share dad jokes, discuss their proudest achievements like fundraising for a hospital, and reveal personal fears including geese and abandonment in a lighthearted conversation.
Two brothers discuss the creative process of writing, focusing on how immersing in a story helps manage overwhelming thoughts.
John and Hank Green answer questions and share news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon with humorous banter.
Two brothers answer listener questions with humorous advice and share news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon.
John and Hank Green joke about a textbook theft and reminisce about dumpster diving and selling baseball cards.
John and Hank Green answer listener questions with humorous advice and share news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon.
John and Hank Green answer listener questions with humorous advice and share news about Mars and AFC Wimbledon.
Two brothers answer listener questions with humorous advice and share news about Mars and AFC Wimbledon.
John Green and guest Shan discuss Shan's experience hosting Crash Course Sex Ed and share advice on talking to kids about sex.
John and Hank Green banter about clothing layers and introduce their advice podcast format.
John and Hank Green open the podcast with banter about vacations and John's new book, setting up a humorous advice show.
John and Hank Green banter about a book club, promote John's new book, and share personal anecdotes.
John and Hank Green discuss immigration policies, criticize wealth-based citizenship programs, and reflect on the sobering impacts of sudden foreign aid withdrawal on global health.
John and Hank Green answer listener questions with humorous advice and share news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon.
John Green and Deboki Chakravarti host a humorous advice podcast, answering questions and sharing news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon.
Two brothers discuss their winter experiences, including sledding and golf cart sledding, while sharing personal anecdotes and humorous advice.
Dear Hank & John 404 opens with John Green talking about a 1,000-page history of the French Revolution that he is reading “with my ears” while signing his name over and over again.
Two brothers discuss their grandmother's passing, her tough upbringing and sociology major, and briefly touch on internet feelings in a podcast that offers advice and news.
John and Hank Green answer listener questions with humorous and heartfelt advice, sharing news from Mars and AFC Wimbledon.
Two brothers answer listener questions with humorous advice and share news about Mars and a football club.
John Green says his new book, Everything is Tuberculosis, is coming out in March and is already number four on Amazon overall and number one in science.
John and Hank Green banter about a pizza joke and Excel anxiety while answering listener questions.