It was a TV show that was tragically canned after just three seasons, and attempts to revive it had seemingly come to nothing. But now, Arrested Development seems to have a fresh life ahead of it, as the long-mooted big screen version appears to be one step closer to fruition.

The Hollywood Reporter is saying that one of the show's executive producers, James Vallely, and its creator Mitchell Hurwitz are joining forces to write the screenplay for the feature film version of the show. This is a step forward, as previously Hurwitz had noted that he wouldn't write a film unless the main cast from the TV show would be on board. Is it, therefore, fair to say that Jason Bateman, Jeffrey Tambor, Portia de Rossi, Michael Cera, David Cross and Alia Shawkat and Will Arnett are ready to return? The Hollywood Reporter piece does note that scheduling might be a bit of a problem, but we suspect it might resolve itself should the script be ready.

The film is set to be directed by Mitchell Hurwitz as well, although one of the show's other executive producers, Ron Howard (who, of course, memorably turned up in the last episode and narrated the others) is likely to be involved somewhere along the line.

Even though there's no timescale mentioned, that's really not a bad start to the day, is it?

The Hollywood Reporter