Sandra Oh is back with sass in Netflix’s The Chair

Netflix released the first look and a sneak peek into its new show The Chair on Wednesday. Chronicling the tale of a young woman of colour, who becomes the first to chair a major university’s department, the show will be a fun and hard-hitting testimony to the racial and gender discrimination prevalent across the globe.

Playing the central character is Sandra Oh, famous for her roles in Grey’s Anatomy and Killing Eve. She dons the avatar of the Ji-Yoon Kim, who struggles to manage the unrealistic expectations and demands of a failing English department in Pembrooke University as its first colored as well as first female chairperson, all the while navigating through the daily challenges thrown at her.

The Chair also has a solid cast including Jay Duplass as professor Bill Dobson, Holland Taylor as professor Joan Hambling, Nana Mensah as professor Yaz McKay, David Morse as Dean Paul Larson, Bob Balaban as professor Elliot Rentz and Everly Carganilla as Ju-Hee Kim.

Along with a teaser, Netflix also posted a fictional newspaper clipping, showing a section of Pembroke Daily, narrating how the appointment of Ji-Yoon Kim was a last desperate attempt by the English department to increase the enrolments and to save the sinking ship, but was approximately 179 years late.

With six 30-minute episodes, the series is a satirical drama co-created by Amanda Peet, who also functions as showrunner, writer and executive producer, with other executive producers being Sandra and Game of Thrones creators DB Weiss and David Benioff. The chair is scheduled to stream on Netflix from August 20.