Our friends at The Playlist are expressing skepticism over Jason Bateman’s latest claim that the Arrested Development movie is “in the works,” but at the very least, Bateman’s insistence on talking the thing up in spite of a total lack of hard evidence that the movie exists is a fascinating example of how not-quite major stars can use the press to their advantage.

When Bateman first mentioned the thing, on the Juno press tour, the press went nuts––probably primarily because 90% of Arrested Development’s devoted fan bas consists of bloggers and journalists. Juno had an unusually long press cycle for a studio film, beginning at Telluride and continuing straight through Oscar night, and for about a week, its fourth billed star was able to temporarily hijack the attention and steer it towards his dream project. He’s essentially doing the same thing with Hancock: he again has a supporting role, but any little crumbs he has to offer about an AD movie (and the couple of sentences dropped here are less than substantial) are far more interesting than anything he could say about the joys of working with Will Smith.