ABC’s sitcom “Selfie,” a millennial-friendly riff on “My Fair Lady,” premiered Tuesday night, and the jury is still out on how successful the show will be. The pilot opens with Eliza Dooley, the show’s protagonist, confessing that she was a homely, awkward adolescent who decided to devote her post-adolescent life to being beautiful and popular.

Fast forward to Eliza today: Eliza is hot, has thousands of Facebook, Instagram and Twitter followers and is seeing a guy at her advertising firm. In a tragic turn of events, Eliza learns that he is married while on an airplane with all of her coworkers, which turns into her stress-vomiting in a cringe-worthy, “Bridesmaids”-esque fashion as her co-workers snap pictures on their phones and laugh. Later, when Eliza texts her “friends” about the incident, none are sympathetic, save for Siri (yes, the iPhone app). In short, Eliza knows she has hit rock bottom, and she realizes that she must change to make people like her.

Enter Henry Higgs, the firm’s marketing guru, who begrudgingly takes on Eliza as the latest “product” that he will “re-brand.” Eliza’s first assignment is to make friends with the firm’s receptionist. She ignores Charmonique while clacking away on her phone and yells, “In my defense, that’s not a real name!” when the interaction stalls.

Her next mission is to be Henry’s date for a wedding. Eliza enlists her judgmental “hipster” neighbor and her gang of ukulele-brandishing clones for a “make-under.” Though dressed for the part, she fails her first big assignment when she compulsively whips out her phone and starts playing a very loud game. Apparently, this is Eliza’s “stress response” to seeing people having meaning in their lives. Henry goes ballistic, calling her a lost cause. The two make up in the end, swapping apologies and secrets as rain falls outside Henry’s uber-posh house.

Overall, “Selfie” is both uneven and heavy-handed. Eliza Dooley is a caricature, all perfectly curled tresses, fishnets and perfectly asinine one-liners (“I get horny when I travel—it’s science”). It is unclear as to whether Eliza is so vapid and socially inept because that’s how she actually is, or if she is merely performing an inflated self, akin to the one she presents on social media. Either way, her character is pretty unbelievable. Who honestly doesn’t know that “It’s not a real name!” isn’t the correct response to forgetting someone’s name?

Henry Higgs is a bit of a stick in the mud, an “un-fun coxcomb” (a nod to “My Fair Lady”). At his worst, he harps on the show’s thesis, with lines like “Why do people in this generation feel the need to tweet everything that goes into their mouths?” Henry and Eliza are polar opposites, but not quite full people. Additionally, the supporting characters seem quirky and promising, but underutilized.

That being said, the rain scene deflated the caricatures of Eliza and Henry presented in the first 20 minutes, showing that these overwrought characters may actually have substance. John Cho and Karen Gillan’s acting chops shine through in those last few moments, just enough to make “Selfie” a show to tune in to next week.