Not Suitable for Work Episodes 1-3 Recap: Murray Hill’s First Dinner Party Exposes Every Awkward Crush

Not Suitable for Work opens like a group chat accidentally became a sitcom, and honestly, I mean that with some affection. Mindy Kaling’s new Hulu comedy begins with five ambitious twenty-somethings trying to win at work, love, rent, and basic dignity in Murray Hill, where everyone lives suspiciously close to trouble. 

The first three episodes, which launched together with the show’s June 2 Hulu premiere, introduce AJ, Abby, Josh, Kel and Davis as a friend group built on career panic, old hookups, workplace attraction and one dinner party that should probably have come with a warning label.

AJ Moves To Murray Hill and Finds Trouble Across The Hall in Not Suitable for Work Episode 1

Hulu’s Not Suitable for Work Episode 1, Welcome to Murray Hill introduces the show’s central setup: two young women live across the hall from three young men in Manhattan, and if that sounds like sitcom deja vu, well, the show knows the neighborhood it has moved into. AJ Pascarelli arrives from Boston and moves in with her college friend Abby Chilukuri. AJ is starting her professional life at Fisher Stassen, a demanding investment company where sleep seems optional and ambition is probably hiding in the office kitchen.

Abby, meanwhile, is working as an assistant to celebrity stylist Vanessa Hsu, played by Constance Wu, and her job already looks like a daily obstacle course in expensive shoes. Across the hall are Josh Teitelbaum, Kel Washington and Davis Beau Bradley Barrett III. Josh is the privileged son of a media executive and is trying to look like a serious journalist at The Wes Dryden Show. Kel is stuck between medical school and acting, which is less a career dilemma and more a family-dinner grenade waiting to go off. 

Davis works at the same company as AJ and enters the show as a hopeless romantic with the subtlety of a confetti cannon. The opening workplace-romance joke gives Davis a clean introduction. During sexual harassment training, he asks:

Are you telling me that if there’s a conflict between work and love, you expect me to pledge my loyalty to work?

That one line tells us almost everything about him. Davis is sweet, sincere and one bad crush away from becoming HR’s favorite emergency meeting. The episode also plants AJ’s romantic complications. Davis is drawn to her almost immediately, but AJ also has tension with her boss Bill Gibson, played by Jay Ellis. To make things worse, Josh eventually realizes AJ looks familiar because the two once slept together after a drunken party, and he ghosted her before dawn.

By the end of Episode 1, Not Suitable for Work has arranged its Murray Hill board. AJ is the new girl with old baggage. Abby is the friend trying to survive the fashion grind. Davis is catching feelings at dangerous speed. Kel is wobbling under parental expectations. Josh wants moral authority while standing on a family-funded ladder.

Josh’s Nepo-Baby Problem and Kel’s Career Panic Take Over in Not Suitable for Work Episode 2

Mindy Kaling‘s Not Suitable for Work Episode 2, Evil Nepo Son of the King, sharpens two of the show’s funniest early problems: Josh’s privilege and Kel’s career crisis. The official episode listing hints at Josh being treated badly because “he didn’t get his job the right way,” and that is exactly the kind of embarrassment the episode understands best.

Josh wants to be taken seriously at The Wes Dryden Show. The problem is that his father is tied to the company, and everyone knows he did not exactly kick the door open through grit and unpaid misery. He carries himself like someone who wants credit for caring about fairness while also using the elevator his family built. Jack Martin plays that contradiction with enough softness that Josh is annoying, but not completely unbearable.

The more human thread belongs to Kel. His medical-school problem gets harder to ignore after he faints in dissection class. That moment pushes him closer to the truth he has been avoiding: he may not want to be a doctor at all. He wants to act, but his parents have placed their hopes on medicine, and those hopes are heavy.

Kel’s move toward acting gives the show a better comic lane. His audition embarrassments are familiar sitcom material, but Nicholas Duvernay gives him enough nervous charm to make the scenes work. He is not just “the dumb one” or “the dreamer.” He is a young man trying to disappoint his family without disappointing himself too.

AJ and Abby continue fighting their own workplace battles. AJ adjusts to Fisher Stassen, where Bill’s pressure and Davis’ obvious interest make every office scene feel slightly overcaffeinated. Abby, stuck doing thankless assistant work for Vanessa, begins moving toward the Austin Blanchett problem, the movie-star client who will make her professional boundaries look very flimsy very quickly.

Episode 2 works better when it lets the characters be professionally humiliated rather than merely cute. Kel lies that he can still be the doctor his family wanted. AJ lies that she can keep work clean and tidy. Abby lies that a stylish job cannot eat you alive. That is where the show finds some bite.

Murray Hill’s Dinner Party Turns Every Crush Into a Problem in Not Suitable for Work Episode 3

Episode 3, The Philadelphia Thirst Monster, is where Not Suitable for Work starts behaving more like the hangout comedy it wants to be. After two episodes of setup across offices, classrooms, apartments and media jobs, this chapter finally puts more of the core group in the same social pressure cooker. The big dinner party becomes the first real test of whether these people are fun together or just separately attractive near good lighting.

The dinner party matters because everyone brings something weird to the table. AJ has her history with Josh, her workplace pull toward Bill, and Davis hovering nearby with romantic eyes and poor timing. Davis is already deep into crush territory, though the show wisely lets him be funny enough to avoid becoming too exhausting. Will Angus is easily one of the early standouts because he plays Davis like a man whose heart sends emails before his brain approves the draft.

Josh, meanwhile, remains stuck in his nepo-baby identity crisis. He wants to be seen as decent, thoughtful and politically aware, but the job situation keeps making him look like a guy who ordered integrity through room service. Kel’s acting dream continues to develop, and his growing warmth with Abby gives the group a softer thread. Abby’s story also keeps drifting toward Austin Blanchett, the movie star client who looks like trouble with better cheekbones. Since Austin is connected to her boss’ world, Abby’s attraction is not just a crush. I believe it is a professional hazard dressed nicely!

The dinner-party material helps the show because it finally lets the five characters bounce off each other instead of trapping them in separate workplace pods. That is what a hangout comedy needs. You have to want these people in one room, even when they are being silly, selfish or painfully unaware. Episode 3 gives the show its first proper spark.

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Not Suitable for Work Episodes 1-3 are now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney+, with the season continuing through weekly episode drops after the three-episode premiere.