Even though John Wilson, the titular creator and host of HBO’s “How to With John Wilson,” had several ideas that could have been part of the documentary series’ future, he knew he had to end on Season 3.
“Rather than just having it go on indefinitely, I wanted it to feel like there was a bit of an arc,” Wilson told TheWrap. “I also feel like the best thing that you can do is to just leave people wanting more.”
Thus marks the beginning of the end for one of the most charmingly bizarre series HBO has ever created. In every season of “How to With John Wilson,” the soft-spoken documentarian offers his expertise — and through a series of investigative interviews, the expertise of others — on a variety of topics. How do you make small talk? How do you be spontaneous? How do you throw out your batteries?
In every episode, a seemingly simple question warps into a wild narrative filled with memorable interviews and odd sights, all captured through Wilson’s unflinching camera. It’s not uncommon for one scene to focus on a man who eats expired war rations for fun and the next to show a plastic bag trapped in a tree.
Over the years, incidental themes have emerged. For example, NXIVM, which made a surprise appearance in Season 2, appears again in Season 3. (“They were formed in the Northeast, and that’s where we’re headquartered… So it’s not that crazy, I guess,” Wilson said. “But the fact that I saw them in f–king Nevada was annoying.”)
But as a general rule, “How to With John Wilson” has always prioritized spotlighting life’s randomness. That means keeping in footage and gaffes other filmmakers would omit.
“Leaning into the mistakes is very much within the spirit of why I make the work to begin with,” Wilson said. “If anything bad happens to me in real life, I don’t like it to be a net loss. I like to do something productive with it.”
That ethos is especially tested in Season 3’s first episode, “How to Find a Public Restroom,” a twisting saga that tests Wilson’s ability to roll with the punches. “I feel like leaning into stuff like that is just as much therapy as it is a way to narratively strengthen the work.”
Whether it knows it or not, “How to With John Wilson” is part of a tight television club that straddles the line between comedy and reality. It counts series like Adult Swim’s “The Eric Andre Show,” Amazon Freevee’s “Jury Duty” and HBO’s “The Rehearsal” among its peers. When asked why this highly specific genre of television has been resonating with people, Wilson said that audiences are “fatigued by these clichés.”
“A lot of the reality stuff we watch and a lot of the media — even narrative stuff — it’s just a lot of heroes and villains and very one-dimensional characters,” Wilson said. “It’s resonating with people because it’s letting you take inventory of yourself and making you think about your own desires and neuroses.”
Wilson also praised Nathan Fielder, who is an executive producer on his show, as an “expert” at “elevating” the in-between moments most other filmmakers would cast aside.
“Watch an entire episode of ‘The Bachelor.’ It’s just so robotic. But then the most life you see out of anybody is in the post-credits sequence when you’re just watching them do something banal,” Wilson said.
As for what’s ahead for Wilson, he said he is ready to put all of his unused ideas for “How to With John Wilson” into “the next thing.”
New episodes of “How to With John Wilson” air on HBO and stream on Max on Fridays.
