DMV Premiere Recap: Did Harriet Dyer And Tim Meadows' Workplace Comedy Get A Green Light? (Grade It!)
If only a visit to your local DMV took just 22 minutes of your time.
CBS' new single-camera comedy debuted Monday, following an East Hollywood DMV office where "employees are making minimum wage dealing with customers who are annoyed before they even walk in the door." (A truer episode description has never been written.) Harriet Dyer (Colin From Accounts) plays our lead Colette, a driving examiner with a big heart, but bad boundaries. She's joined by Gregg (Tim Meadows), a misanthropic former English teacher, and Vic (Tony Cavalero), a former bouncer who loves putting difficult drivers in their places. The office is run by their boss, Barbara (Molly Kearney), who has been newly promoted, but sometimes struggles to rise to the occasion.
In the pilot episode, a looming government shutdown threatens to close the East Hollywood location for good. With consultants touching down to see where costs can be cut, Barb learns that one of Hollywood's four existing DMVs is going to be fully automated, and if their branch is selected, impact will be felt! (Dun, dun, dunnnn!)
DMV hits the gas on CBS
Colette spends a majority of the episode crushing on her newest coworker Noa (Alex Tarrant), a charming surfer type who's kinder to a-hole customers than he should be. According to Vic, Colette's been "eye-banging" him for a while now. She tries to deny it, as she hungrily scrolls, lapping up all the shirtless pics posted on the guy's Instagram page. But competition from "Hot Kristen" (as Vic calls her) and a near-death experience with an old lady behind the wheel ultimately get under Colette's skin, causing her to make her move. After accidentally showing Noa a photo of her foot (weird), she makes some cringey, too-personal comments about his family that she gleaned online. She also fails to notice the menstrual pad stuck to her skirt. Whoops!
After nearly dying again — of embarrassment, this time! — Colette decides to sneak out of the office via the bathroom window, but of course, she gets stuck in the process. She takes off her sweater to try to free herself, only to be found by "Regular Kristen." Regular Kristen goes to get help, but instead of only getting a security guard, she gets... the entire office, including the consultants!
By the pilot's end, Noa helps free Colette from the window, while the rest of the office finds out that Barb had been sugar-coating the truth: The consultants are there to potentially shut them down. If that wasn't bad enough, the consultants say they're in town for the entire year — talk about stressful! On their way out to the bar, Colette asks her co-workers not to embarrass her in front of Noa... only she doesn't realize she has yet another pad stuck to her skirt.
So, are you giving DMV a green light? Grade the premiere below, then drop some comments!