It stars Stephen Mangan as recovering alcoholic Keith Merchant and Kate Ashfield as his suffering wife Anita.

Mangan and Ashfield had previously worked together early in their careers, providing voices for an animated series of Watership Down.

"[11] Mangan has said that he did not attend any AA meetings as part of research saying, "I didn't feel I could sit there and pretend to be an alcoholic, I thought that would be wrong.

Paul Hoggart wrote in The Times that, "It is amiably amusing, but may suffer from comparison with last year's Outnumbered, which covered similar ground with superb dexterity.

A. Gill disliked the show, writing in The Sunday Times that, "Never Better (Thursday, BBC2) is so poor, so comically bereft, so rigorously scoured of charm, traction, humour or insight, that seeing that whichever sad sap wrote it couldn't be bothered to include an original syllable, neither can I.

In America, the aspirational sitcom has, as is its nature, successfully progressed to become Friends and Sex and the City, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Frasier, The Larry Sanders Show.

The recipe for success is simple: more of everything – more care, more commitment, more writers working harder to higher standards, with more discipline, for more money, with a collective understanding of what the genre stands for and, crucially, a belief that it has merit.

After the second episode had been broadcast, he wrote that, "Sadly, what modest potential the show evinced last week had evaporated in the interim.

A paper-thin character to begin with, with no job, no friends and no real personality to speak of, Keith was now entirely transparent, revealed as a mere vehicle for lazy situation comedy.

In comparison, Little Miss Jocelyn, the programme that was broadcast immediately before Never Better over the same six weeks on BBC Two, attracted an average of 1.1 million viewers.

[19] The series is to be written by Dave Walpert, with Warren Littlefield, John Heyman and Don Reo acting as executive producers.