Hallelujah! America has spoken. And she has said, "This US remake of Coupling is absolutely no good at all."

NBC hasn't quite canned its ill-judged version of one of the best bits of British TV to have been made in the last 10 years, but by moving it out of prime time, it's as much as ensured that this bastard child of comedy genius will not survive.

I saw a few minutes of the show on holiday - and really that was all Jen, Dunc and I could stomach. In their vain attempt to translate the show's success in Britain to a lowest common denominator Middle America, and despite relying heavily on the original British scripts, the producers seemed to have stripped the programme of all its charm, wit, and edge.

Daily Variety made a most damning judgment, and showed just how much the US team missed the mark, when it wrote: "The cast has no likeable characters, motivation for every act is sexual, and the theme of moronic men versus wily women has been played out".

Our own original had an entirely likeable cast, the women were just as capable of being moronic as the men, and the whole point of the show was both to ridiicule and celebrate the motivating power of sex. Why else, for goodness sake, would it be called Coupling?

The big networks should have learned from their experience of Men Behaving Blandly. As most of the TV I watch originates in the US, I know there are many things they can do well.

But ripping off comedy from a country more comfortable with public airing of sex, excess and bodily functions is not one of them.

The lesson is clear: sanitise and be damned.