Stand-up comedian and actress, Wanda Sykes stars as Wanda Hawkins, a struggling comic living in Washington DC, who manages to land a job as an on-air news reporter at a local news station. In the series premiere, Wanda, through flashbacks, relates how she was hired and subsequently fired from her job when her liberal views clash with the conservative news anchors.

When Jenny, Barris, and Holly determine to throw Wanda a surprise birthday party despite Keith's warnings, he hides Wanda's keys to detain her, but then she thinks she's been robbed.

Wanda and Keith are invited to receive honorary doctorates from the college they both attended—and from which they were expelled. Their differences of opinion on how they should conduct themselves at the ceremony result in a rift in their friendship.