Channel 4 comedy AXED after three years of delays and brutal reviews

Channel 4 comedy AXED after three years of delays and brutal reviews
Source: Daily Mail Online

A Channel 4 comedy has been axed after one series - following three years of delays and brutal reviews.

Although commissioned by Channel 4 in 2022, No Strings Attached finally landed on E4 just last year.

Hosted by The Great British Bake Off alum Mel Giedroyc, it was initially titled The Really Rude Puppet Show.

According to TVZone, however, the show has been axed with no plans for a future series.

Daily Mail has contacted Channel 4 for comment.

Each episode saw Mel, 57, introduce a celebrity guest to a book club, wherein they read an erotic fantasy story out loud.

Channel 4 comedy No Strings Attached has been axed after one series - and a three year delay to arrive on screens

The show featured celebrities reading out steamy fan fiction - represented on screen by lookalike puppets

Comedian Mel Giedroyc served as the host for No Strings Attached, where she welcomed famous faces to a book club

These sexually charged encounters were written by the show's script editors, as well as real fans.

Furthermore, the celebs never saw what they'd be reading ahead of time - with their first reactions captured on-screen.

Speaking previously about the show, Mel said: 'This is going to be a celebration of erotic fan fiction. With puppets.
'Imagine a world where Jackie Collins meets Thunderbirds. I'm so looking forward to a trip to Love Island... via Tracy Island.'

No Strings Attached featured appearances from Sam Thompson, Coleen Nolan, Kerry Katona, Martin Kemp and Melvin Odoom.

The show also received scathing reviews, with The Guardian branding it as 'a profoundly silly piece of flim-flam that is objectively awful'.

A review by The Irish Independent described the programme as 'shockingly bad' and opined the show's 'novelty' wore off fast.

Elsewhere, a beloved Channel 4 drama could be set to return to screens - 21 years after its TV axing.

The Secret Life Of Us ran from 2001 to 2005 over four seasons and was set in the beachside neighbourhood of St Kilda, Australia.

Starring the likes of Claudia Karvan, Samuel Johnson and Deborah Mailman, the series followed the lives of a group of young adults living in the same block of flats.

It drew focus on their pursuits of love, careers, and their personal identities as they navigated the complexities of growing up.

The show launched the career of actor and filmmaker Joel Edgerton, who went on to become a huge star in Hollywood after starring in the series as William McGill.

The star was recently nominated for a Golden Globe in the Best Actor category for film Train Dreams, which hit the silver screen in 2025.

Speaking at RMIT's 100 Years of Television symposium, co-creator and producer Amanda Higgs revealed the show has been in talks for a reboot.

She revealed: 'There's a lot of talk, well, not a lot... there's a tiny bit of talk about whether we'll do Secret Life again.'

Ruling herself out of returning to the series, Amanda continued: 'No! I am too old to make that show. I think if you're creating for younger audiences, you have to have that younger sensibility.'