h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

That was aimed at the 'superman' thing.
It wasn;t actually cynical, more a non-commital agreement that didn't encourage more talk about the subject.

No, seriously: an orphan, raised in the countryside by adoptive parents, discovers he has a strange and wonderful heritage, goes on adventures... sure it's a different kind of story but then 64 years of Superman comics are a different kettle of fish to a 3 or 6 or 7 book/film series.

So there!

I guess I enver think of it from that angle, most of the time superman is already super, you don't think of him discovering stuff. Also Lex Luthor isn;t evil enough.

Hmm, maybe you're right about Luthor not being that evil... I mean, other than causing the odd earthquake and committing various murders he's no worse than your average tycoon.

You should try and catch the TV show Smallville, it does a very good job on the Superman origin story.

Seen it a couple of times but seems a bit too dawson's-creeky to be able to just pick up now and again, have to watch continuously to get all the complicated realtionships.

Mmmm.

Chloe loves Clark.

Clark loves Lana.

Lana kinda knows Clark has a thing for her but loves Whitney anyway.

Whitney loves Lana (but he's leaving the show anyway so it doesn't matter).

Pete is jealous of Lex being Clark's new best mate.

Lex likes everyone but suspects Clark has a secret.

(Me & my big mouth dept: apparently Gary Oldman's in talks to play Sirius in HP&tPoA. Sigh...)

So Dawson's Creek with superpowers, great. (am so living in that land at the moment, is very amusing)

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0304141
Looks like it.
I'm reserving judgement.

I like the Gary Oldman idea (since they were really never going to get Fiennes except in my hopeful little head)
's long as I can suspend the "But he's good really" knowledge as far into the film as possible

The ugly spectre of typecasting. If you ever get the chance catch a movie called Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, it's not a great film but Gary Oldman is very good in it playing a comedy role (he and Tim Roth do a double act as a couple of stooges).

Besides, you're supposed to think Sirius is the bad guy for most of the film, and casting Oldman will certainly reinforce that idea for non-readers in the audience.

well, yes, I want to be able to forget Sirius is innocent till I get to the bit where it's revealed, it'd be a treat if the film got some tension.

Love Rosencrantz and Guildernstern are Dead (love Stoppard) Oldman and Roth are fantastic in it.

Non-readers in the audience.

It's not as if it's hard to read, or would take a long time.

Some people just aren't readers.

And not that I'm arguing with you or anything, CW, but the IMDB always used to be notorious for not checking things... their page for Men in Black 2 listed David Duchovny as 'Agent M' for months until wisdom prevailed...

I know, and for a while they had Ian McKellan down as Dumbledore, and then took him down again. So it's not actual evidence, just showing that it's a high-quality rumour.

Unless my source's source was the IMDB in which case it could just be a lone nutcase in Bermondsey who got past IMDB's b.s. detector...

Why, do they just accept it if you tell them stuff? (someone tell them it;s actually Ralph Fiennes, maybe then he'll believe them)

Do you know how hard it'd be to check every piece of info they get sent? The IMDB isn't that big an outfit and the HP producers aren't going to want to spend time yaying or naying every rumour they're asked about.

I was thinking more in terms of not dealing in rumours.