Our Host Is Riley Reid review

The setup

For his girlfriend's birthday, the couple books a beach rental, and the host waiting for them turns out to be Riley Reid. Before the keys change hands, she makes sure they are soaked, which is less a metaphor than a welcome policy. Then come the rules: no photos, no shoes indoors, and the only shower is outside. The girlfriend goes upstairs to dress for dinner. He takes the shower. Riley joins him, cheerfully aware that his girlfriend is directly overhead and that the day is her birthday. The fourth rule arrives last.

Episode 2

Episode 2 is mostly silence and running water. It opens with a towel offered to the birthday guest, then returns to the shower outside, where Riley answers his protest by pointing at the rulebook. Upstairs, the girlfriend calls out that dinner is ten minutes away. Riley's counteroffer is to claim five, and her last request is that he scrub her down before anyone sits at the table.

Who's who

• Riley Reid: the host, relaxed, rule-obsessed, and inventing new clauses whenever needed
• The boyfriend: a guest trying to behave on his girlfriend's birthday and failing politely
• The girlfriend: the guest of honor, upstairs at precisely the wrong moment

Verdict: 4.9 out of 10

Riley's rulebook is a neat comic device, each rule a step closer to the obvious, and she sells it with a deadpan host voice. The material around it is thin, and episode 2 confirms the problem: a handful of lines, a dinner deadline and a lot of running water. The couple hardly registers, and the ten-minute warning from upstairs is the only real tension. Fans will be curious about the paid rest; everyone else may find one gimmick stretched over two minutes.

Episode guide